Chef Mathew Bolton, a SUNY Adirondack alum, helps students experience what it takes to plan, prepare and serve in the fast-paced environment of a real restaurant. From cooking, prepping, baking, expediting, ordering, costing, and managing, wine/ beer pairings, bartending, serving, hosting; to taking the reservations, the SUNY Adirondack Culinary Program offers a broad inside look of the restaurant field and we are thrilled to see them exhibit their culinary knowledge at Feast of the Fields this fall!
Shelley Smith started Smith’s Orchard Bake Shop in 1999 to sell her delicious home-baked pies and to provide a store for the goods produced by the Smith Brothers Farm. Today Shelley works alongside her daughter Katie and several shop employees to convert over 2,000 bushels of the farm’s apples into approximately 70,000 pies each year. Smith’s Orchard Bake Shop offers other types of fruit pies as well, in addition to offering a variety of farm raised meats, apple cider, award-winning cider doughnuts, and other locally-made products. Smith’s apples and pies are in the “Pride of NY” Program which recognizes quality products made in New York. We are so excited to have Chef Smith as a dessert chef at this year’s Feast of the Fields!
Tracey credits her love of cuisine to her grandmother and father. Growing up all the most memorable meals were cooked at home, not a restaurant, so the thought of being a chef never crossed her mind. Her pathway to the kitchen was a straight line as she found out working at a small pizzeria as a teenager. In 2011 she took a job at Prime at Saratoga National as a line cook and joined the world of Mazzone Hospitality. Aside from a few sabbaticals to the Hawaiian Islands to study and learn hands on how to farm organically and study aquaculture; she has remained working for Angelo over the years at multiple restaurants including executive chef of Prime Bar and Grill and Fish at 30 Lake. While pursuing a degree in business management and economics from SUNY Empire State College, Tracey’s culinary journey only continues to grow. Starting up again at Prime at Saratoga National in the spring of 2019 as Chef de Cuisine, Tracey proudly upholds the signature dishes that she was once taught while incorporating new hand-crafted fare. She feels humbled to be able to source fresh local and sustainable produce, fish, and meat when available and features these components seasonally. PLAN welcomes chef Kwiecin for her first year at the Feast of the Fields!