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Spokane boy wins Red Robin contest

By Lorie Hutson lorieh@spokesman.com(509) 459-5446

Start with crispy garlic toast. Pile it high with thinly sliced Italian sausage, a beef hamburger patty, green peppers, onions and tomatoes and what do you get – a contest-winning recipe for a new Red Robin burger.

Spokane’s Anthony Graham, 10, entered his creation into Red Robin’s “The Next Gourmet Burger Kids Contest” earlier this year when the restaurant asked kids age 10 and under to send in a recipe and a statement about a new burger. Graham’s Italian Sausage and Pepper Burger was one of 50 recipes selected from more than 16,000 entries.

“My mom and grandma are Italian so I thought about what Italian dinners could be served on a bun,” Anthony said in a telephone interview. He is a student at St. Michael’s Academy.

Anthony loves to cook and has been helping make the pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving dinner since he was 5 years old.

The recipe will be published in a cookbook next summer, which will be sold to benefit the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. The nonprofit group works to prevent child abduction and exploitation, find missing children and assist victims.

The cookbook will retail for about $5 and it will be sold at Red Robin restaurants, according to a company spokeswoman.

Rachael Ray loves Chukar Cherries

Seems Rachael Ray is everywhere these days. (Try the Ritz cracker box if you’ve somehow missed her.)

Count Washington state products within her reach. The TV cook, magazine maven and cookbook author has now twice featured Chukar Cherries on “The Rachael Ray Show.”

In the most recent appearance last week, Chukar’s popular Truffle Chocolate Cherries were given as a treat to her studio audience. The treats are dried bing cherries coated in milk chocolate and dusted with sweet cocoa.

Chukar’s Cabernet Chocolate Cherries also were featured as Ray’s “Snack of the Day” in Oct. 2006, according to a company news release.

The company was founded by Pam Montgomery on her family’s cherry orchard some 18 years ago. Its products are manufactured in a plant near Prosser, Wash. For more information, go to www.chukar.com or call (800) 624-9544.