Eateries at the top of R.I. draws

It is about time that the “All In Our Backyard” bandwagon stopped in front of our favorite restaurant. The campaign that is making great strides in attempting to lift Rhode Islanders out of our self-imposed doldrums came to the forefront about the same time as the doldrums this summer.
Neil Steinberg, executive director of The Rhode Island Foundation, developed the campaign and came to my Newport radio studio in late August to talk about the effort. As someone who has long been a staunch cheerleader for the chefs and restaurants of Rhode Island, I wanted to find out how they factored in to the feel-good campaign. I found that some recognition had been extended to our state’s restaurateurs and chefs but their story had not been fully told.
First some background. In 2012, the foundation came up with the idea of gathering a large group of business leaders from Rhode Island to attempt to find a solution to the state’s economic woes. They found that a major obstacle was the state suffered from a lack of self-esteem. So the foundation concluded that the turnaround had to start somewhere and began to develop a campaign that, as they put it, “celebrates our community.”
It would appear to be a natural to first celebrate Rhode Island’s culinary community. Our restaurants are perennials on lists of the best-innovative eateries, new restaurants and creative-cooking techniques. How much of the “Backyard” initiative was spent where national recognition is already at the forefront? Not so much. As Steinberg pointed out, the reason is that All In Our Backyard is an internal campaign.
As he puts it, “for the short term, we are focused on the perception within the state. We are not focused on the visitor from New York who comes to Newport to go to a great restaurant. We need a million salespeople [who live] in the state of Rhode Island right now.” He went on, “When we meet that visitor from New York, we want to change the conversation. We want to tell him about the great restaurant in Newport but we also want to find out what business he or she is in and how there is someone in the state who can do that type of business.” A treasure trove of such stories would appear to be right in the sweet spot between farm and table. The “Backyard” campaign has a mention of this on its website, stating that farm-to-table sales have more than doubled in the state from 2002 to the present. But there is much more to the story. As I wrote back in the summer of 2008, the relationship between the chef and the farmer is key among chefs such as Brian Kingsford of Bacaro, who was practicing this “farm-to-table” philosophy each day by visiting farmer Vin Confreda at Confreda’s Farm in Cranston. Kingsford said at the time that Confreda had as much to do with his menu as the chef himself.
Kingsford was not the first chef in the state to develop a close relationship with growers of local produce. In fact, he credited George Germon and Johanne Killeen of Al Forno with pioneering the “farm-to-table” movement in the area. Other early practitioners were Maureen Pothier of the long-shuttered Blue Point restaurant, Casey Riley, now director of food service of the Newport Restaurant Group, and Bruce Tillinghast, who opened New Rivers in Providence in 1990. Tillinghast would invite local farmers he bought from to dinner at his restaurant so his customers could meet them. Now that idea has grown, quite literally. Foodies pay a big-city restaurant tab to dine at a table in a farmer’s field while an accomplished chef such as Perry Raso of Matunuck Oyster Bar or Ben Sukle of birch prepare a multicourse feast direct from the field.
We are invited to share stories of the state’s success at the campaign’s website, ourbackyardri.com. Share a success story about your favorite chef, restaurateur or food producer. The organizers of this campaign are urging us to “celebrate Rhode Island as the vibrant, stimulating place where we work and live.” •


Bruce Newbury’s “Dining Out” food and wine talk radio show is heard Saturdays and Sundays on WPRV-AM 790, weekdays on WADK-AM 1540 and on line and mobile app on iHeartRadio. He can be reached by email at bruce@brucenewbury.com.

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