The Chef and the Farmer Trip

If you are a PBS devotee, a locavore, a reality TV Junkie, someone born east of I-95 in North Carolina, a chef or a farmer you may have heard of the best show on PBS that was made in America.  It’s a first season hit called “A Chef’s Life” that chronicles how Eastern NC girl Vivian Howard escaped the rural life to become a chef in NYC and once married to her front of the house and artist husband Ben Knight, was lured back to her birth place by her parents with the promise of a restaurant of their own.

Russ and I heard about the TV show and since we both love food and all things documentary we did our favorite thing and binged watched it in three nights before Christmas.  The show about Vivian and Ben told in each episode through the lens of one local ingredient laid out the tale of the creating a successful restaurant in the unlikely place of Kinston, NC, the demise from a fire, the rebuilding and the flourishing with a few hiccups due to order entry systems and the like, all while having twins and building a new house for themselves.

Russ would salivate over the “Pimp my grits” or the perfectly runny tomato sandwich so it was no surprise to me when I opened a Christmas gift that read, “A night in Kinston at the Chef and the Farmer.”  Since Kinston was two hours away and the restaurant is a dinner only kind of place Russ had found the best place to stay in the quaint small town with more empty store fronts than full, a grand Bed and Breakfast called the Bentley.

With hard to obtain reservations in hand and all the logistics to have Carter stay with friends the Hannans who were will to get up and drive her to riding at 7:30 this morning and be picked up by a college friend, Russ and I drove off to Kinston yesterday afternoon.  The traffic was not bad and we arrived early enough to meet Linda the fabulous owner of the B&B and settle into a comfy room in the house on the only hill in town.

We arrived early to the restaurant knowing we were in the right spot since it was clearly the place with the most cars in the parking lot.  The inside was so familiar since we had practically sat in the dinning room while watching the show on a giant flat screen TV for thirteen hours.  Locals greeted us at the bar as if we were kin this was Kinston after all.  Russ enjoyed a drink and I had club soda in anticipation of thoroughly breaking my regular diet for this meal.

I won’t make you wait another minute — dinner was worth the drive.  We started out sharing a sausage, mustard green and house made mozzarella pizza.  Russ, who has red sauce cursing through his veins and can rate every pizza crust from here to Napoli, declared it spectacular.  I agreed and not just because it was the first pizza I had eaten in the New Year.  Russ followed with one of the three “Pimp my grits” choices, the one with shrimp.  To die for.  I had the Oyster, & clam pan roast with shrimp and Carolina Gold rice.  Delectable, especially for two ingredients that aren’t even listed, the fennel and vermouth that made the whole dish sing.  I skipped eating the butter soaked toast in the broth and just sucked up the liquid on a spoon.  For dessert Russ got the apple crisp with rosemary ice cream and salted caramel.  My bite was cruel since I could only afford the one.

While having coffee Ben refilled our cups and we had a great conversation about his fantastic art on the walls, the TV show and how important we thought the front of the house is to the success of a good restaurant.  TV does not convey how generous and what a perfect host he is.  Vivian was not on the line last night so we did not get to meet her — An excuse for another visit.

After dinner we retired to the Bentley where we slept soundly and woke to a gorgeous breakfast.  Ward, Linda’s husband, who works the corporate life, was conscripted into serving us, this being a Saturday.  The B&B is clearly Linda’s passion that they don’t have to do to put gas in their cars, but both Ward and Linda were so delightful that it was the icing on the cake to talk with them for hours after breakfast.

Suddenly we realized it was noon and we wanted to explore the town and have lunch at the Boiler Room, the Oyster Bar that Vivian and Ben started for lunches.  As we pulled into town the phone rang in the car and up on the screen it said, “Rolling Hills Stables.”  As a mother of a horse back rider when the trainer calls you while your child is there your stomach goes to your throat.

“Is she OK?” I answered the phone.

“She had a fall,” Piper, the trainer tells me.  Then my crying child takes the phone.  She is alive!  Piper gets back on the line and says they are taking her to the ER because she hit her head when she fell off.

Russ backed the car out of the parking lot and we were out of Kinston in a shot.  Two hours later we arrived at the hospital where Carter’s two trainers, Piper and Solveig and our great friend Susan were keeping an eye on her as they waited for a CT.  While there our friend Ellie who happens to be a radiologist came in to check and our friend Darren an ER nurse was on duty and kept an eye out.  Thank god for great friends who are good mothers and fathers to other peoples children.

Carter has a concussion, but no broken bones and is alive.  When the doctor told her she was not allowed to do anything including thinking suddenly homework became important.

Russ’ beautiful present ended with six hours at the ER.  Carter is asleep in bed, just until we have to wake her and check on her cognition.  I had not eaten anything since breakfast and I guess this was a higher powers way of getting me to balance out the fabulous dinner I had last night.

Kinston, I hardly knew you, but what I did meet I really liked.  We will be back and we will bring friends and maybe even bring Carter so I can keep an eye on her.