A celebration of food and the folks who grow it, cook it, serve it
A Festival of Food
Wendy Brodie and Dan Reighn actually worked together a week after the World Food Championships, when they returned, for a second year, to design and create the tablescape, the menu and the meal for a table of 10 guests at the 26th annual Meals on Wheels of the Monterey Peninsula “Culinary Classique d’Elegance” formal fundraising dinner.
The Culinary Classique was created by award-winning local chef Bert Cutino, who selects the main ingredients for the multi-course meal, from which each chef must prepare their own menu. This is complemented by the table setting, created by local florists and designers. Every element and effort is donated.
“Dan’s theme involved winter greens,” said Brodie, “so we named each course after a shade of green, which I integrated in the garnishes and oils and everywhere else I could. Dan introduced a Mardi Gras theme to the table décor, so we complemented the greens with pops of purple and yellow.”
Reighn, who was going for a “winter forest theme,” says he created a kind of Midsummer Night’s dream-meets Avatar-meets hiking through a forested dreamscape.
“I went to the Flower Mart,” he said, “where I chose foliage that would give me a really tight palette of green. Then I worked with Linda Meltzer of Magnolia Fine Gifts in Aptos, who sponsored everything. I am always grateful to work with such strong, talented women.”
Reighn said at the World Food Championships, Wendy Brodie was his sous chef; whereas at Culinary Classique, she was head chef and he was the decorator.
“We love Dan and Wendy so much, and we are so blessed and honored, lucky and proud to have them as part of the Culinary Classique family,” said Christine Winge, executive director of Meals on Wheels. “We hope to enjoy that relationship for many years. They are fabulously talented people who bring such joy to the tables they design and the food they serve there.”
Reighn always has more than one project in the works at a time. In 2020, he established Reighn World Entertainment, a diversified media, event-planning and merchandise company which, he says, specializes in farm-to-table entertaining. This will be featured in his upcoming “Bringing it to the Table” TV show, which focuses on farmers and the fruits of their labor.
“My fraternity brother, Steve Bass, a production designer who did the opening ceremony for the Atlanta Olympics and who has been awarded three Emmys, encouraged me to create this company,” said Reighn, of his New Orleans-based company. “Breaking into any part of the entertainment industry is a whole new challenge, but we’ve done it. Doors are opening so fast, and I’m so grateful to the tribe around me, who continue to help me move my dreams forward. It does take teamwork. It’s always so much more than I.”
Reighn is anchored to the Peninsula by his Pacific Grove “dream house by the bay,” but he divides his life between the Peninsula and Willow Glen.
