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Forager Chef

Foraging and Cooking Mushrooms, Wild and Obscure Food

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Charity and Private Dinners

Chef Alan Bergo

Charity and Private Dinners

Are you looking for a chef, food item or food-based event for a live auction or gala? Charity dinners are some of my favorite events to put together, and I’ve been specializing in them for years. Depending on your needs, charity dinners can take a few different forms. Typically I stick to the metro area of Minneapolis St. Paul, but a radius of a few hundred miles can work with enough planning.

Private, In-Home Dinners

For a very special occasion. Contact me directly using the form at the bottom of the page and we can discuss your needs. 100 mile radius of the Twin Cities Metro area only. 

Timeline and Consultation

Generally, I plan each dinner about 3-12 months in advance, but I can do them with as little as 2 months notice. First we set up a call to discuss big ideas for the event, and how I can help in ways other than food, like themes and logistics. After our call, I’ll put together a sample menu for us to discuss, which we can adjust for preferences, allergies and seasonality and determine if a site/home visit is needed. If you’d like to have a charity dinner off-site, I have a few selections we can pick from for a supplement, as long as we have advanced notice. After we’ve agreed on a dinner date, a deposit secures it. Events for 20 people or more may require larger deposits.

Base Fee, and Live Auction

The base fee (my cost) for charity dinners will cover my labor, consultation and the cost of food for up to 12 people. Typically these dinners are auctioned off at a gala or other fundraiser, then prepared in someone’s home. Chef dinners are valuable commodities at live auctions, and you can be assured a good return, typically around four to five times my fee, as long as the auction is live–silent auctions never give you the same sort of return. It’s all about the show. Before the auction, we’ll put together any images or video you might want/need for the night of the auction, or whatever would be helpful. If you need me to attend or speak at your gala, I’ll need advanced notice. Unfortunately, I can’t work with silent auctions.

Pairings

For wine or beer pairings (one or the other only), I have a number of sommeliers and cicerones I contract with at a supplemental fee +the cost of libations. Or, if you’d like to do the pairings yourself, or have me handle them, we can do that too.

Dinner and Execution

As far as the dinner itself, I’ll show up on site, generally with 1 helper (2 if we’ve hired a sommelier) a few hours before service. Expect 2.5-3 hours for dinner. Cleanup is brief, and my team and I handle all of that.

Payment and Gratuity

After the dinner, I accept payment in the form of a check, paypal, or cash, or we can square things up before the dinner–no visible exchange needed. Gratuity is appreciated, but not required.

Sample Menus

Chef Charity Dinner Sample Menu 1

Chef Charity Dinner Sample Menu 2

Contact

[contact-form][contact-field label=”Name” type=”name” required=”true” /][contact-field label=”Email” type=”email” required=”true” /][contact-field label=”Website” type=”url” /][contact-field label=”Message” type=”textarea” /][/contact-form]

Smoked pigeon brochette with sunflower rolls, wild cherry sauce and foraged greens

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foragerchef

Sam Thayer dropped 25 lbs of his highbush cranberr Sam Thayer dropped 25 lbs of his highbush cranberry cultivars (3 types!) on me before the last snowfall and I honestly don’t even know where to start after processing them. I’d already made jams and hot sauce already and I have enough for a year. 😅

Great time to practice the cold-juice which ensures the juice isn’t bitter. 

Anyone else have any ideas? 

You can still find some on the shrubs if the birds didn’t get them up by the north shore. 

#highbushcranberry #winterforaging #birdberries #sweetnectar #foragerproblems #juiceme #embarassmentofriches #wildfoodlove
100% wild candy bars. I don’t usually make raw v 100% wild candy bars. I don’t usually make raw vegan snacks, but when I read about Euell Gibbon’s wild hackberry candy bars I had to try them. The  originals were just crushed hackberries and hickory nuts, but, I’ve read that Euell grew to dislike the crunch of hackberry seeds later in life. 

Here’s the thing though, if you sift the hackberry flour, you get a fun texture, with no worries about cracking a tooth. 

These are equal parts ground hackberries, dried wild blueberries, and hickory nuts, with a splash of maple syrup to bind.

The end product is a shelf stable, nutrient-packed bite filled with protein, carbohydrates, fats and natural sugars infinitely adaptable to your local landscape.

The texture is chewy and nougat-like, and now I’m curious to see how they’d perform baked in recipes that use frangipane or almond paste. 

#euellgibbons #energybars #hackberry #crushin #paleobreakfast #tradionalfood #wildfoodlove #rawfoods
Hackberry milk spoonbread with black walnuts and c Hackberry milk spoonbread with black walnuts and chokecherry gastrique is one of the dishes @credononfiction and I filmed for @headspace. 

I cook hackberry milk with cornmeal and maple syrup, whip some egg whites and fold them in, then bake. Eats a bit like crust-less pumpkin pie, if pumpkin pie came from a tree. 

#hackberry #souffle #wildfoodlove #chokecherry #blackwalnuts #brunching
Hackberry milk is a sort of rustic nut milk made f Hackberry milk is a sort of rustic nut milk made from ground hackberries and water. I grind the berries to a meal, then simmer with 3x their volume of water, strain through a chinois (without pressing) season with maple and a pinch of cinnamon. Tastes like pumpkin pie in a glass, also a decent cooking medium. 

#hackberries #nutmilk #foraging #wildfoodlove #celtisoccidentalis
Are hackberries a fruit? A nut? They're a bit of b Are hackberries a fruit? A nut? They're a bit of both. They also contain protein, fat, and carbs, and the oldest evidence of humans enjoying them goes back 500,000 years. Right now is the best time to harvest them in the Midwest as the leaves have fallen. The full break down and introduction to them is in my bio. 
#hackberry #celtisoccidentalis #winterforaging #wildfoodlove #traditionalfoods #manbird
If you’re in the Twin Cities the nocino I collab If you’re in the Twin Cities the nocino I collaborated on with @ida_graves_distillery for 2020 is on the shelves @surdyksliquor along with our spruce tip liquor. I’d give it a couple weeks before they sell out. 

Brock did a good job on this one: mellow flavor that almost reminds me of a tootsie roll, with spices and mellow tannins. 

#nocino #liquor #distillery #craftspirits #blackwalnuts #mnwinter
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