While hanging out in London Yossie Horwitz mentioned he was throwing a pre-KFWE dinner as well. Now I generally try to spend time with family when in the NY area and this trip had me at 2 KFWE’s, but when Yossie mentioned who was cooking, what was on the menu and some of the wines, I had a hard time saying no….

Chef Isaac (Yitz) Bernstein – until last month the Executive Chef at Pomegranate gourmet supermarket in Brooklyn and before that at Epic Bites, the catering company he founded in Cali – is well known in the upscale kosher food world for his modern spin on traditional kosher foods as well as catering these mega multi-course dinners, often with wine-pairings. As I live in Israel, I never got a chance to attend any of these events and only rarely was able to make my way to Pomegranate to pick up some of his food. My friend David Raccah has written up a couple of events that he attended or hosted where this crazy culinarian has cooked – suffice it so say I have been wanting to come to a Bernstein prepared meal for a while. I was NOT disappointed. 16 courses – 4 being things that were unplanned and put together spur of the moment . Everything was cooked perfectly. All flavors were balanced. All garnishes added to the flavor and texture of the dish! In a word PERFECTION. Really I don’ think there is another private kosher chef who cooks at this level. The inventiveness, the plating. The excellent service and attention to detail. Really. BRAVO!

Then there were the wines….. I mean if you are having a dinner party hosted by Yossie Horwitz – the wine is going to be killer. And it was. And there were over 30 different wines. I’ll be honest. With this much food and this many wines it was IMPOSSIBLE to take perfect notes. So I will post pictures and descriptions of each of the dishes and notes on many of the wines as I can highlighting the stuff that stuck out.