Jonathan Bender
Reporter
Jonathan Bender is a former KCPT Food Content Editor and the founder of the Recommended Daily. He is the author of "LEGO: A Love Story," "Cookies & Beer" and "Stock, Broth & Bowl." He lives in Kansas City, Missouri, where has judged the American Royal World Series of BBQ, eaten sandwiches for a month, and pitched grain as a brewer’s assistant — all in pursuit of learning more about what Kansas Citians eat and drink.
Stories by Jonathan Bender
A Familiar Space Becomes A Beer Place
Heavy trucks, laden with construction materials, thud down Genessee Street in the West Bottoms. The trucks roll past storefronts covered in butcher paper and the old site of the Golden Ox, which is now set to be reborn in two stages with two businesses. First up is the Stockyards Brewing Company (1600 Genessee Street, Suite…
Sunny Side up at Sundown
Breakfast for dinner – long a refuge for working parents and college students – is heating up on restaurant menus. Leeway Franks (935 Iowa Street) in Lawrence and Cleaver & Cork (1333 Walnut Street) in Kansas City’s Power & Light District are preparing to roll out egg sandwiches and sweet potato hash to show how…
KC is About to Get Bagel Crazy
The man opens the glass door to a suite in a Pleasant Valley industrial park. Before the couple seated at a wooden table by the front door can even respond, he’s apologizing and explaining that he just had to visit the space for himself. “I saw your ad on Craigslist,” said the man. “I don’t…
New Executive Chef Tapped at Rye
The torch was quietly passed at Rye in January. Co-owner Colby Garrelts – the only name that has ever been at the top of the kitchen ladder at the Leawood restaurant – promoted John Brogan from chef du cuisine to executive chef. It was a quiet move – the fried chicken dinners and hanger steaks still…
Baconate: (verb) To Make Vegans Happy
With our proximity to pigs and tremendous appetite for pork, Kansas City has long been an innovator in the world of bacon. Local barbecue competitor Jason Day invented the Bacon Explosion –a bacon-lattice wrapped sausage. Bacon Fest Kansas City will celebrate its eighth anniversary this summer. And now, thanks to Mean Vegan, you can eat…
Culinary Fight Club Comes to KC
The knives are about to come out in Kansas City. The pots and pans and spatulas will get a turn, too, when Culinary Fight Club Kansas City – a live competitive cooking event with roots in Chicago – launches in April. Think of it as “Iron Chef,” for home cooks with a live audience, secret…
5 Questions with Lidia Bastianich
Editor’s Note: Jonathan Bender is founder of the Recommended Daily, a sponsor of Kansas City Restaurant Week. This is not a sponsored post. Lidia Bastianich has been coming into people’s homes for nearly 20 years. But she doesn’t come empty-handed, she always arrives with an easy smile, a few encouraging words, and a bowl of…
Chocolate Ale with Raspberry? That’s Our Jam.
Christopher Elbow sells drinking chocolate year round, but nothing quite like what the Boulevard Brewing Company is slated to release next Tuesday, January 12. Chocolate Ale with Raspberry is a new iteration of the Chocolate Ale that Boulevard and the chocolatier have produced in collaboration four of the past five years. “Raspberry and chocolate is…
Ranking Kansas City’s Food Scene: 2015
The burgeoning food and drink scene in Kansas City earned a lot of national press this past year. We thought we take a quick look back at some of the notable mentions for libations and gustatory delights (and, yes, there’s a mention of KC BBQ below too) in print and online publications. Folks can’t seem…
Where ‘comfort’ gets a twist and ‘local’ is a given
Aaron Salinas pauses as he walks through the building at 429 Walnut Street, his shadow stretching across the dust-covered checkerboard floor toward a door stenciled with word ‘library,’ leaning against the opposite wall. He’s in the midst of an informal tour of the space alongside James Paul – the two chefs who will be cooking…