SUMMER • SUPPER • SOMM: Top Chefs' Dinner Series Featuring Heirloom Tomatoes, Virginia Wines & Duke's Mayo

News provided by

Jun 23, 2022, 10:00 ET

RICHMOND, Va., June 23, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Mikado, Fiano, and Mayo…our summer colors run red, white, and Duke's. Announcing the return of Summer, Supper, Somm, a dinner series with top chefs featuring heirloom tomatoes and Virginia wines – with support from Duke's Mayo. The series runs from Atlantic coastline to Blue Ridge Mountains and DC during seven jackpot summer weeks: 6/28 - 8/18.

Summer, Supper, Somm is a dinner series with top chefs featuring heirloom tomatoes and Virginia wines – with support from Duke's Mayo.

Village Garden RVA grows over 300 varieties of heirloom tomatoes on a vaunted acre in Hanover County, long famous for Virginia 'maters. In lieu of high production, farm and life partners David Hunsaker and Barbara Hollingsworth cultivate quality and diversity. They founded Village Garden in 2011 and specialize in forgotten gems (Mikado, named after the opera), wild color variants (El von Phuket, a pink Easter egg tomato), and Oxhearts— "my favorite of all," said Hunsaker. "The filet mignon of tomatoes."

"They're just so stunning and delicious," said Chef Brittanny Anderson, a two-time James Beard Award semi-finalist, Top Chef contestant, and owner of Metzger Bar & Butchery and Brenner Pass. "We've been using Village Garden for years. At first, it was all word-of-mouth to get them." Last season, Anderson and others created eleven tomato dinners around Richmond and Charlottesville. For 2022, the series returns with an expanded line-up: twenty-one local and day-trip-worthy events spanning the state with additional stops in Northern Virginia and Washington, DC.

Events are curated by award-winning sommelier and photojournalist Jason Tesauro, with tomato and plant lore delivered by the farmers themselves.

Each chef sets their own menu, pricing, and format. Some are casual, some are fancy, all are differently delicious. It's an eating + drinking + edutainment + harvest celebration. To accommodate tomato lovers, #SSS22 happenings range the social calendar and chef spectrum: modern Latin at Cocodrilo (6/28), African-Jewish fusion at JewFro (7/27), fine Southern at Lemaire (7/22), French country at L'Auberge Chez François (8/11), and even a hip Tomato Bowl at River City Roll (7/6)!

Paired with the best tomatoes are wines from Barboursville Vineyards, Virginia's most-honored winery, owned and run by Italians since its founding in 1976. Estate Director Luca Paschina, named amongst "20 Most Admired Winemakers in North America" by Vineyards & Winery Management Magazine is a James Beard Foundation Award–nominee himself. Diners will enjoy portfolio highlights from Barboursville including a crisp Vermentino, finessed Fiano, and 95-points-plus rated blends like the Nascent (white) and Octagon (red). Barboursville's own Palladio Restaurant hosts an Italian Festa del Pomodoro on 8/5 with varieties like Piennolo del Vesuvio and Costoluto Fiorentino that promise to crush.

Collaborating on the series is one of Southern cuisine's most iconic brands: Duke's Mayo. Each event features tomato trivia, merchandise, prizes, and surprises.

FULL CALENDAR & EVENT INFO HERE

SOURCE Duke's Mayonnaise