While some may assume the glitzy, high-end food and wine festivals most often take places in large, coastal cities like New York and Los Angeles, this isn’t always the case, as shown by one of the newest food and wine festivals, set to debut later this month. The Whitefish Food and Wine Festival is being led by Chef Todd English and aims to spotlight Whitefish, the Flathead Valley and the state of Montana on the whole — a state that isn’t often acknowledged enough for its myriad contributions to food, farming, waterways, fishery and more

English — a four-time James Beard award winner and one of the first “big-name” celebrity chefs — has helmed multiple restaurants, penned countless cookbooks and appeared on an endless amount of food television shows and specials.

Now, he’s a founding member of the Whitefish Food and Wine Festival team. 

The inaugural Festival, as per the website, “supports the local culinary scene in the Flathead Valley, from top local chefs to regional farms & ranches, to local culinary programs and beyond.” Salon Food had the opportunity to speak with English about the festival, Montana on the whole, his career, and what’s next for the decorated chef.

The following interview has been lightly edited for clarity and length. 

The event is meant to highlight the Flathead Valley and the greater Montana — what are some of the aspects of the food, the terroir and the other aspects of Montana fare that make it such a  unique place to spotlight? 

Yes, the event is meant to feature Flathead Valley in the greater Montana and celebrate all the great things that are going on there, which are all 100% unique.

Like many places in America, they are creating amazing food. From sushi, to BBQ to Italian, there is so much talent in the restaurant and chef scene. Between the location’s combination of natural beauty, outdoor recreation and its cozy, small-town feel, Whitefish is the ideal spot for a Wine and Food Festival.

As a hub for outdoor enthusiasts, Whitefish has a quaint, friendly vibe with a charming downtown area featuring boutique shops, local restaurants and art galleries. It’s the perfect place for an intimate gathering to celebrate the local wine and food scene.

For the uninitiated, what is Whitefish known for from a culinary perspective? 

Known as one of the top ski towns in the US, Whitefish’s culinary scene has a very diverse style with a variety of restaurants, so you can try a wide range of cuisines when you visit or stay in the area. However, high-quality restaurants and fine dining options are becoming more and more prevalent, so we want to put Whitefish on the map as a culinary hotspot with this festival by showcasing the local talent.

What is it about the Montana food scene that you think is most misunderstood and/or that most people wouldn’t be aware of? 

What I’ve seen is that there’s a crowd that really enjoys food and that people are enthusiastic about it. There’s great product in the area all the things that lead to a great culinary vibe. So really just trying to spread the word about that!

Your background is Italian-American, but your restaurants often veer outside of that theme. Is there a certain element, dish or ingredient within Italian or Italian-American fare that you’d say is your favorite?

That is really true, but an American chef showcases the melting pot that we live in. I lived in New York for some years and it is a culinary melting pot of every ethnic food that comes into the country.

I love working with the availability of ingredients and the fact that you can actually pull from many different styles. It’s a fusion in the sense that you understand the ingredients and how they work together in unique ways to create unique combinations and amazing flavor profiles.

Chef Todd English in Montana (Whitefish Food & Wine)

I’d love to hear a bit about the English hotel? What are the food offerings like there? 

I spend 200 to 220 days a year on the road and I spend a lot of time in hotels, so obviously I have my opinions about food in hotels. It should be a very comfortable place that has all the basic needs in hotel and some great food offerings are a big part of big driving force of our hotel. Pepper Club is a beautiful mix of Japanese Mediterranean fusion.

Do you have a number-one dish you think best encapsulates your career?  

As an Italian-American: Spaghetti Pomodoro!

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What are your top three favorite ingredients to work with?

High quality of the following: Olive oil, sea salt, grated black pepper 

How do you practice sustainability? 

Sustainability is very important to us – one of the ways we practice that is that we work with local farmers. We really try to be very inquisitive about how things are brought to market, how the farmer handles the food and how it gets to us. We try not to involve pesticides and  we also try to keep things in season — those are all things that lead to sustainability. 

What stands out for you as a formative moment that got you into cooking or food at large?

I was about eight years old and I said I was going to make peach ice cream. It was August in Georgia and my mother went out and bought a white ice cream maker and peaches from the local market. It was just spectacular.

In your career, is there a singular moment that stands out as something you’re most proudest of? 

Along with my beautiful children, I think being recognized by my colleagues. That’s how the James Beard award is judged and I think it’s a great, meaningful way to have colleagues judge each other.

I’ve been very very fortunate I got into the industry and was able to do a lot of things. I’m very ambitious and those are all things that kind of played into my amazing career.

What do you hope to see the Whitefish Food and Wine Festival accomplish for Montana? For the restaurant industry? For tourism?

I’ve visited Whitefish over many years and for me, I’m just so excited to be able to utilize the Whitefish Wine and Food festival as a way to really support and celebrate the local restaurant scene, as well as the local Chefs. They are doing an amazing job! I believe that a large part of tourism is where you eat and what kind of food there is. Whitefish, Montana is amazing place to visit, they’ve done a great job with tourism with all of the amazing nature, outdoor and activities to do and we’re using the festival as a way to shine a light on what else they have to offer in terms of their culinary and hospitality scene.

We also are using the festival as a way to bring it back to a little bit more grassroots and create an intimate setting within the food and wine scene. I want people to get to know the Chef so they can understand who is behind the scenes and what’s going on. I think that’s the really special thing that the festival is focused on — for Chefs, as well as the guests!

Whitefish, Montana in fall (Explore Whitefish)

You now have a host of restaurants throughout the world, which started all the way back in 1989 with Olives in Charlestown, MA. How have you seen the industry change since then? How does your most recently opened restaurant differ from Olives? 

I mean, there were no cell phones back then and there was no social media, so that alone changed everything.

With Charlestown, it was very much a grassroots and revolutionary way we brought food to the table. Today, I love the social media aspect of the industry, but I also realize that that’s not what it’s all about. We still have to deliver the incredible food, experience and atmosphere and it’s not just about Instagram moments.

Throughout your career, is there an opening — or a restaurant itself — that you have the most affinity for? 

I’d say that my first restaurant was the one that I loved most in the opening because it was my first foray into the industry.  I was really excited and really young. I didn’t really know what I was getting myself into, but there was that innocence that I loved.  I was just working so hard and was so excited to be able to do my own restaurant.

BROADUS — Gov. Greg Gianforte held a roundtable on Thursday with local officials to discuss fire-relief steps.

In attendance at the Broadus Community Center were several federal and county officials, Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation (DNRC), the Montana Stockgrowers Association, and tribal representatives to present fire information and resources to the governor.

Raylee Honeycutt is the executive vice president of the stockgrowers association and was one of the speakers at the table.

“(Gianforte) is great at showing up and really being a listening ear and trying to find solutions for those local needs,” said Honeycutt. “I’m excited to be a part of the conversation and be able to offer solutions and work with the governor hand in hand on supporting locals.”

She and the other attendees hoped to provide as many places for affected ranchers to find help. Money has been raised to assist them, but they now need a place to go.

“The key takeaway from this meeting was to kind of have a one-stop shop for people affected to go to and find resources,” said Honeycutt. “Over the next couple days, we’ll be building out our website and providing those resources available for everybody to kind of connect to federal agencies, local partners, local agencies as well to help them recover as quickly as possible.”

Honeycutt encourages all who were affected to report their losses in livestock, hay, and land. The numbers reported will also assist in determining if a disaster declaration would be filled, something the officials asked for assistance with from Gianforte.
 
Also in attendance were ranchers that were affected by the devastating Remington Fire. While the fire is at 88% containment, the damages have been severe.

Justin McKinsey/MTN News

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“The fire pretty much got it all. Right now we’re at 105 miles of fence that’s burned up,” said rancher Jae Notti, who attended the roundtable. “We lost our shop, 40 by 60 shop. Everything. Had 39 years of my tools and pieces and parts.”

Notti said he was glad he attended Thursday’s meeting as the help will be much needed in the long recovery.
 
“That’s going to be a long-term fix and a major expense. We usually take care of ourselves, but this is a big one. I wanted to learn more about the fences and actually thank some of these guys that have been in on this and coordinated it,” said Notti.
 
Gianforte made sure to highlight the community effort from all parties that helped stop the fire.

“We have a whole lot of people step up, a lot of hay, fencing stuff. It’s amazing,” said Notti.

The links below have several relief, recovery, and support resources:
Farm Service Agency Disaster Assistance Programs
USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service
Montana Department of Natural Resources
MSA Wildfire Relief Fund

HELENA, Mont. (AP) — The American Civil Liberties Union plans to spend $1.3 million on campaign advertising to educate Montana voters about where state Supreme Court candidates stand on abortion and other civil rights issues with a measure constitutionally protecting protect abortion access also on the ballot.

The expenditure comes after Republicans tried unsuccessfully in 2022 to unseat a justice by making an unprecedented partisan endorsement of her challenger. GOP lawmakers also argue that the Supreme Court has been legislating from the bench in blocking laws to restrict abortion access or make it more difficult to vote.

“With politicians passing increasingly extreme laws, including abortion restrictions and bans, voters have the opportunity to elect justices who will protect fundamental rights in the state from these attacks,” the national ACLU and the ACLU of Montana said in a statement Thursday.

State Supreme Court candidates cannot seek, accept or use partisan endorsements. The ACLU of Montana said it was not endorsing any candidates.

“From abortion to marriage equality and Indigenous voting rights, the people we entrust with seats on the Supreme Court of Montana will play a critical role in determining whether we keep the rights Montanans value or whether politicians will be allowed to take away our freedom,” Akilah Deernose, the group’s executive director, said in a statement.

The ACLU wants to make sure voters know where Supreme Court candidates stand on those issues “so that they can cast an informed ballot this November,” Deernose said.

The $1.3 million is the most the ACLU has spent on a Montana election, spokesperson Andrew Everett said. The ACLU is also spending money on Supreme Court races in Arizona, Michigan, Ohio and North Carolina.

Money has increasingly poured into state Supreme Court races in recent years, especially after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022 and sent the abortion issue back to states, said Mike Milov-Cordoba of the Brennan Center for Justice.

Voters generally don’t have “strong preconceptions” of candidates in Supreme Court races, so the ad buy is “potentially significant,” he said.

Total spending on two Montana Supreme Court races in 2022 was a record $4.6 million, including $500,000 by the state Republican Party, according to the Brennan Center.

Milov-Cordoba said he wouldn’t be surprised to see similar spending this year, “especially given the conservatives’ frustration with the Montana Supreme Court pushing back on unconstitutional laws.”

The ACLU ads and mailers note that chief justice candidate Jerry Lynch and associate justice candidate Katherine Bidegaray agree with the analysis in a 1999 Montana Supreme Court ruling that found the state’s constitutional right to privacy protects the right to a pre-viability abortion from the provider of the patient’s choice.

Chief justice candidate Cory Swanson said it was not appropriate for him to comment on a case that may come before the court in the future, and associate justice candidate Dan Wilson did not respond to a survey sent out by the ACLU of Montana, the organization said.

A campaign committee, Montanans for Fair and Impartial Courts, has reported spending just over $425,000 for television ads endorsing Lynch, state campaign finance reports indicate.

Montana voters are being asked this fall whether the 1999 Supreme Court ruling should be enshrined in the constitution.

Historically, conservatives have accounted for a far greater share of spending in state Supreme Court races, Milov-Cordoba said. But since Roe v. Wade was overturned, groups on the left have nearly equaled that nationwide.

While abortion is a major issue driving the increased spending, state Supreme Courts are also being asked to rule in cases involving partisan gerrymandering, voting rights and climate change, he said.

“So who sits on those courts is a high-stakes matter,” he said.