Sunday, September 12, 2010

TheStarPress.com

Pungent favorites

"This will take two hours at low heat," Porter says as he checks a chicken stuffed with roasted garlic and basil on a charcoal grill set up outside Blue Bottle on Walnut Street downtown.

"We try to grill every Friday," he said. "Just the smell of it going out on the street is a good advertisement."

Also on the grill this particular day are ham roasts. Inside, a plastic bin of fresh green beans from Christopher Farms awaits prepping for its role as the evening's vegetable side dish.

Porter is torn when he's asked his favorite dishes to cook.

"I like to cook Asian food and curry, just because it's super pungent," he said. "On the regular menu (at Blue Bottle and Restaurant 2(oh!)4), my favorite thing is white wine-braised pork spare rib that is really, really good."

The chef and manager at Blue Bottle has been on the job locally for a little more than two years. The Muncie native had previously studied at the Scottsdale Culinary Institute in Arizona and worked in kitchens there.


Contact business editor Keith Roysdon at 213-5828. Follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/keithroysdon.