British-born and Michelin-starred chef Kieron Hales has cooked for presidents and royalty across 27 countries.

He's Executive Chef at Zingerman's Cornman Farms in Dexter, Michigan, a farmhouse and event space with a restored red barn on the property. He works with couples to create custom menus—crafting farm-to-table meals or recreating family favorites—and provides them with the recipes to keep.

Today he talks with me about his favorite food memory, his mother's crepe cannelloni. It’s a labor-intensive lasagna-like creation of crepes stuffed with bolognese and baked in bechamel sauce. Plus what he takes away from cooking at the highest levels of the culinary world, and what it means to create meals that become memories.

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Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions.

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In Boyne City, a little lakeside town in Northern Michigan, there’s a bakery offering crepes of a quality that you'd expect to find in France. It’s owned by a classically trained French baker, Gildas Berrou. The shop offers a variety of savory and sweet fresh-baked goods, including traditional crepes made to order. Just don’t ask Gildas to add American cheese.

HELPFUL LINKS:

• Find the Gildas' Lake Street Bakery website here
• Find bonus footage on our website here

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Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions.

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Milkweed Inn is a unique culinary getaway hidden deep in the Upper Penninsula's Hiawatha National Forest. Chef Lane Regan works to craft menus that are foraged and locally sourced. We learned about what it takes to craft and execute such a remote experience, and the ways the environment shape Chef Regan's food philosophy.

HELPFUL LINKS:

• Read about Lane's work at Elizabeth
• The website for Milkweed Inn
• Bonus photos from our visit to Milkweed Inn

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Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions.

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Brothers Patrick and Ryan Evans fell in love with Sichuanese cuisine while working in San Francisco's fine dining industry. When they returned to Michigan, they teamed up with Ryan Corbin, a fellow chef, to bring those flavors to Traverse City.

We talked to the trio about Crocodile Palace, their takeout-only Sichuan restaurant, the appeal of the Sichuan region's mala flavor profile, and the ingredients that go into their bestselling dan dan noodles.

HELPFUL LINKS:

• Crocodile Palace's main brick-and-mortar is located at 124 Cochlin St. in Traverse City.

• Their kitchen at The Little Fleet near downtown Traverse City is open year-round, and offers a less spicy menu of options.

• Find bonus footage from our trip, plus a map of all our past trips, here!

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Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions.

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Tanya and Wasinade Raphael are the mother-daughter team behind Raphael Foods. You’ll find their food truck drawing long lines at powwows and other tribal events across northern Michigan. Most of their dishes are built on hot, pillowy fry bread – a Native American flat bread with a complex history.

• Find operating hours for Raphael Foods here.
• Find bonus footage from our trip here.

Want more food stories? Listen here.

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Brittany March, the owner of a culinary pop-up called It’s Food Detroit, has a deep love for pizza that goes all the way back to childhood. Now, she's cooking her own pies, offering a vegan-first take on Detroit-style. She has plans to open up her own brick-and-mortar called Roots and Dough next spring.

• Find details about Brittany's fundraiser for her brick-and-mortar here.
• Learn more about Village Pizza and Alkebu-lan Village here.
• Find bonus footage from our trip here.

Looking for more conversations from Stateside? Right this way.

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Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions.

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The Maple Grille in Hemlock, Michigan, offers a rotating farm-to-table menu. Everything is cooked on a wood-fired grill or pizza oven. The business sits on 6 acres of land, including the restaurant, a brewery housed in a repurposed shipping container, a chicken coop, a hoop house, and a small produce farm.

Two things stand out in the gravel parking lot: the smoke wafting out of a long pavilion, and an enormous pile of firewood.

“The Maple Grille started out here,” said Josh Schaeding, chef and owner of the restaurant.

Before the property just off M-46 became a restaurant, it was home to a construction company owned by Schaeding’s father and grandfather. The family built two long maple syrup evaporators in front of the business, near the roadside.

“So many people stopped by and thought we were cooking ribs,” Schaeding said. “We were just cooking maple syrup. I decided as soon as syrup season was over to… start a restaurant here.”

The restaurant is surrounded by farmland and draws in a mix of locals, loyal seasonal customers, and vacationers passing through on their way up north. Nearly everything on the menu is locally sourced, from the meat to the produce to the firewood that fuels all three of their grills.

You can see more photos from our visit HERE.

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It's Season 2 of The Dish!

Today’s story takes us back to 2014, Ann Arbor. That’s when Eric Holloway started making cheesecake with his mom. Before that, Eric was in a bad place. But he’s come a long way from growing pot for a living to baking cheesecakes.

• EK’s Cheesecakes offers custom orders that are available for delivery or pickup at Stadium Market in Ann Arbor.
• They also offer a rotating menu at their storefront in Dexter on Fridays and Saturdays. EK’s Cheesecakes shares its storefront and kitchen with Rich Grains Bakery

We’d love for you to fill out this listener survey. It will only take a few minutes, and it will help us know what you want to hear!

Is there a culinary creative we should get to know in your area? If so, tell us about them. You can send your tips to TheDish@MichiganPublic.org

GUEST:

• Eric Holloway is the owner of EK’s Cheesecakes and co-owner of Rich Grains Bakery.

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