Tieghan Gerard, the prolific blogger behind the favored and controversial recipe web site Half Baked Harvest, is leaving his well-appreciated kitchen in Colorado for a month-long collaboration at Fig Restaurant on the Santa Monica Fairmont Miramar and Bungalows from Wednesday 10 April to Friday. , Could 10. Gerard will work with Fig government chef Damon Gordon, utilizing native components from the Santa Monica Farmers Market to cook dinner renditions of favourite recipes from his weblog, together with ricotta pancakes, marinated cherry tomatoes with burrata, spicy pesto alla vodka rigatoni , and Pizza Calabrese with grilled purple peppers.
Half Baked Harvest began as a weblog in 2012. First, Gerard posted recipes like a non-traditional tackle latkes with cheddar and chipotle, full with a shrill remark that he's not Jewish and may't say the title of the dish Gerard has constructed a model on the Colorado nation kitchen life-style. Her debut cookbook, Half Baked Harvest Cookbook: Recipes from My Barn within the Mountains, was launched in 2017. It featured recipes akin to quinoa bibimbap, a standard dish made with rice (“bap” interprets to rice in Korean, though it additionally consists of quite a lot of grains together with barley, sorghum and millet) and “more healthy” gradual. -cooker butter hen, a meal that isn’t inherently unhealthy. The e-book continues to be a bestseller on Amazon.
In 2021, Gerard printed a recipe for “Weeknight Rooster Pho Ga” on his weblog, which he described as “Vietnamese-inspired”. Rapidly, the recipe drew widespread criticism from readers who didn't imagine it was an correct illustration of pho, particularly from somebody who’s white. Some pointed to issues with non-traditional components akin to caramelized hen and a sesame chile sauce, and others identified that pho shouldn’t be a fast dish, however as a substitute time to develop flavors. Whereas variations of pho will be made in kitchen home equipment like strain cookers that scale back the time it takes to realize a wealthy broth, conventional pho takes hours of simmering and energy to develop its taste. At first, Gerard ignored feedback on his Instagram submit that expressed issues, however finally, he started responding with a heat apology, and thanking the commenters for bringing it to his consideration. The title of the recipe has since been modified to Half Baked Harvest, however the URL continues to be “hen pho”.
In March 2023, Gerard acquired criticism once more for appropriating one other Vietnamese dish after posting a video recipe for “25 Minute Banh Mi Rice Bowls” to his roughly 5 million Instagram followers on the time. . Within the Instagram submit, Gerard didn’t check with the dish as banh mi impressed, though within the full recipe, he calls it “Vietnamese impressed.” As an alternative of being ready as a sandwich, the dish was reformatted right into a coconut rice bowl with ginger-sesame floor hen, cucumber salad and marinated greens. Backlash got here rapidly as commenters identified his mispronunciation of banh mi and the recipe's use of Asian-influenced components in a rice bowl that bears little relation to the unique dish past the inclusion of pickled carrots. Some requested the place the banh mi was for the reason that time period straight interprets to “bread” in Vietnamese. One commenter referred to the dish as a “halfbakedeffort,” whereas others mentioned they might have most well-liked the recipe to be merely referred to as “Asian rice cookery.” Gerard apologized once more, however the recipe continues to be on Half Baked Harvest as “25 Minute Banh Mi Rice Bowls” and the video of him mispronouncing banh mi continues to be on Instagram.
Even with the controversy, Gerard has additionally loved widespread success with the discharge of three cookbooks, and appearances on The Cooking Channel, Meals Community, HGTV, and extra. Since 2012, Half Baked Harvest has expanded from only a cooking website to an e-commerce hub for many who wish to purchase into the thought of a high-quality home farm life marked by idyllic snowfalls and infrequently controversial recipes.
Bookings for Gerard's future collaboration can be found by means of Fig. Neither banh mi nor pho will likely be on the brunch or dinner menu.
