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Washington state restaurants, chefs among semifinalists for James Beard Awards

A general view of The 2008 James Beard Foundation Awards Gala on June 8, 2008 at Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center in New York City. (Photo by Joe Corrigan/Getty Images)

Several Washington state restaurants are among the semifinalists for the 2018 James Beard Awards.

Semifinalists are in the following Washington cities: Spokane, Orcas Island, Burlington, Lummi Island, Kirkland and many in Seattle.

See the full list here.

Seattle nominations are up for best new restaurant (JuneBaby), outstanding baker (Evan Andres, Columbia City Bakery), outstanding bar program (Canon), outstanding chef, outstanding restaurant (Canlis), outstanding restaurateur (Ethan Stowell and Angela Stowell), outstanding wine program (Vino, Honolulu Wild Ginger), rising star chef of the year and best chef in the Northwest.

There are three Washington state outstanding chef semifinalists:

  • Renee Erickson, Bateau
  • Holly Smith, Cafe Juanita in Kirkland
  • Blaine Wetzel, The Willows on Lummi Island

And three Washington chefs are up for rising star chef of the year:

  • Jay Blackinton, Hogstone's Wood Oven/Aelder, Orcas Island, WA
  • Shota Nakajima, Adana, Seattle
  • Maximillian Petty, Eden Hill, Seattle

There are six Seattle chefs and one Spokane chef up for best chef in the Northwest:

  • Eric Donnelly, RockCreek
  • Edouardo Jordan, Salare
  • Taichi Kitamura, Sushi Kappo Tamura
  • Mark Schroder, Opus Co.
  • Mutsuko Soma, Kamonegi
  • Rachel Yang and Seif Chirchi, Joule
  • Anna Vogel, Italia Trattoria in Spokane

A Seattle chef won a James Beard Award in 2016: Seattle's Renee Erickson of The Whale Wins. She was the only woman to win one of the 10 regional chef awards that year.

In 2017, Canlis in Seattle won for outstanding wine program.

James Beard was born in Portland in May of 1903. His family foraged for berries, fished and gathered shellfish for cooking. He wrote cookbooks and appeared in national television's first cooking show, "I Love to Eat," on NBC in 1946.

In an interview, Beard offered advice, saying, ''The secret of good cooking is, first, having a love of it.''

He appreciated cooking outdoors and wrote what many consider the first serious book on outdoor cooking. The James Beard Foundation was established in 1986 after his death at 81 years old the year earlier. The first awards were given in 1991.

The 2018 James Beard Awards Gala will be on Monday, May 7 in Chicago.

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