Photo Gallery - First Italian Cooking Demonstration - 2007

@ SubZero/Wolf Showroom in Duluth, GA

The first (of many, we hope) cooking demonstration took place January 31, 2007 at the SubZero/Wolf Showroom in Duluth, GA.   The Master Chefs were:  Joe & Roseanne DiBenedetto, Jay & Diana Hickson, Chuck & Kathy Santa Maria and Bernie & Marilyn Santa Maria.

What a great event!  The food was out of this world.  It was a fun night with lots of wine to go with the meal.

The idea came from Chuck Santa Maria and he recruited the team to assist with the demonstration.  WOW!  WHAT A TEAM!  Not only did they demonstrate and cook a fantastic meal; they also served it.

They had a practice run at the DiBenedettos the week before and from all the comments from these Master Chefs, they must have had a blast.  They kept referring to funny incidents that happened that day. 

The practice run paid-off because they all did a super job of demonstrating, preparing and serving an outstanding meal.  They worked hard but had fun.

Roseanne DiBenedetto kicked off the program with a demonstration of the art of making Sicilian dinner rolls.  The rising time for the dough and rising time for the rolls had to be omitted so she could complete the process.  Rolls had been baked earlier and were served throughout the dinner.  Great Rolls!  She even baked the demo batch and they were good.

First course of the meal was Minestrone. Jay Hickson and Bernie Santa Maria both admitted that they never cook but the team thought they could handle the Minestrone demo.  Jay’s wine was limited so that he could read the recipe while Bernie dumped the ingredients into the soup pot.  Bernie had no problem because everything was all pre-measured for him.  The Minestrone was outstanding.

Creating a Caesar Salad was demonstrated by Joe DiBenedetto.  He blended all the ingredients to make the dressing but the most important item is the egg.  Joe says “the egg has to be coddled”.  Joe’s version of coddling was:  hold the egg gently and speak to it.  Super salad!

Pasta followed the salad course.  Roseanne gave a demonstration on making fresh pasta.  During the demo she held up a ball of dough and said “This is play dough for Mommies.”  She also showed how to make it quicker by skipping some of the rolling cycles through the machine.  The fettuccini was served with an Italian sausage sauce, which made for great tasting pasta.  The sauce must be a secret recipe because it was made ahead of time and it was not demonstrated and not included in the recipe hand-outs.

Chuck Santa Maria created veal scalloppini ala Marsala, with his able assistant Kathy Santa Maria.  She was on the go throughout the whole process, gathering the ingredients and necessary utensils, and also stirred the pans on the stove when Chuck was involved in some other process.  It all came together in grand style and the end product was superb.

What’s for dessert?  Sicilian Cassata!  Marilyn Santa Maria and Diana Hickson handled the demo in great style.  Marilyn described the process while Diana demonstrated the procedure.  At the practice run, Diana said the Frangelica was a little heavy in that cake because they failed to pace their wine.  The recipe used for the Cassata was handed down by Bernie Santa Maria’s mother.  As a side note, Mrs. Santa Maria told them “Save the aluminum pans from the pound cake because they can be used to make meat loaf”.  We are certainly glad that the recipe was give to our generation.  The cake was excellent!

The entire meal was phenomenal!!!      

At the end of the evening, the Master Chefs received a well deserved standing ovation.

Article written and submitted by Sam Catanzano.

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