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A Taste of The Stew

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By JEFF HOUCK, The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 13, 2008

VROOM TO CHEW: You could do a lot worse for eats than the infield at Daytona International Speedway. I went over on Saturday to see what the crowd attending the Budweiser Shootout was cooking the afternoon before the nighttime race and found some amazing spreads. All I had to do was follow the columns of smoke from the various campsites.

In the east parking lot adjacent to Turn 4, Chris Masebeau, 34, and Mike Dee, 33, both of Ormond Beach, cooked racks of baby back ribs, baked potatoes and pork loins over a fire pit, as well as crab legs, fried lobster tails and London broil nuggets. Oh, and cheese dogs and bratwurst.

A few parking spots away, Bobby Solomon, 34, of Oviedo, was chopping racks of ribs he had cooked for more than six hours in a homemade barrel smoker for his bunch of friends. Solomon, who used red oak and hickory, also smoked chicken, kielbasa and some rice sausage that a friend of his had brought from Louisiana.

You can see photos and video I shot of the infield scene by going to my blog, The Stew, at TBO.com, keyword: Stew. It's also available on YouTube if you search for "infield," "Daytona" and "cooking."

If you go to my blog, you can also listen to a Table Conversations podcast I did last week with Joe Cahn, the self-anointed commissioner of tailgating. He'll be camping out in the infield at the Daytona 500 this weekend.

BISCUIT TIME: Beginning Friday and continuing each Friday through March 7, all Chick-fil-A restaurants in the Bay area will give every customer a free Chick-fil-A chicken biscuit. No purchase is necessary. Stand-alone restaurants will serve from 7 to 9 a.m.; mall restaurants will offer free biscuits from 9 to 10:30 a.m.

MARK YOUR CALENDAR: Keel and Curley winery will host a wine and art festival from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. March 8-9 at the winery, 5202 Thonotosassa Road, Plant City. To participate in the event, e-mail olgakeelandcurleywinery@yahoo.com or call (813) 748-0441. For details, go to keelandcurleywinery.com.

HAPPY NAPA: The California winemakers who visited Tampa and St. Petersburg late last week for the Napa Valley Vintners Association tour through town had lots of nice things to say about the reception the area showed them. During a trade tasting at Fleming's Prime Steakhouse in Tampa on Friday afternoon, several said that the warm welcome stood in contrast to blase reaction they got earlier in the week in Miami.

"No one really cared that we were there," one winemaker told me.

It didn't hurt that the weather was perfect Friday night for the outdoor tasting at Fazal Fazlin's waterfront estate on Park Street in St. Petersburg. Several dined Thursday night at Cafe Ponte in Clearwater and raved about chef Chris Ponte's food.

"That meal stands up to anything I've had anywhere else," Rocca Family Vineyards winemaker Mary Rocca told me.

Many at the Fleming's tasting raved about Rocca's 2004 Cabernet, which earned a 93 rating from Wine Spectator magazine.

HELLO, NEWMAN: Speaking of Fleming's, the restaurant will host a wine dinner Feb. 26 featuring Newman's Own California Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon wines produced by actor Paul Newman's label. The wines, which will be introduced in March, also will share the cinematic-themed menu by executive chef Russell Skall with a Francis Ford Coppola wine, a 2005 Diamond Collection Claret California Black Label.

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