A chance to be creative

May 04, 1999|By MEG H. PARTINGTON

Making a multicourse breakfast for guests every day gives Kay Standish a chance to be creative.

In April, her ingenuity was rewarded when she was named a runner-up in the Southeast Region of the 1999 Jones Dairy Farm Bed & Breakfast Breakfast Recipe Competition.

[cont. from lifestyle]

Standish shares innkeeper responsibilities with her husband, Al, at The Carriage Inn in Charles Town, W.Va.

A total of 2,400 member inns from Professional Association of Innkeepers International were invited to compete in five regional categories - West/Southwest, Northwest, Midwest, Southeast and Northeast, according to a press release from Jones Dairy Farm. About 100 inns competed in the Southeast Region, which includes the Mid-Atlantic states, the East Coast down to Florida and across to Louisiana and Arkansas, according to Scott Sheff, a senior account executive for Laughlin-Constable, a public relations agency in Milwaukee.

The original breakfast or brunch recipes included products from Jones Dairy Farm, a family-owned processed meat company in Fort Atkinson, Wis., that was founded in 1889. They were judged on color, taste/flavor, texture and use of Jones Dairy Farm product by Cooking and Baking Association of Bed-and-Breakfast and Country Inns and its founder, Gail Greco.

Standish's recipe for Breakfast Flowers uses Jones' All-Natural Roll Sausage. Combined with wonton wrappers, cheese and green onions, among other ingredients, she created something she thought would be attractive and flavorful.

"I like to cook, and it was a fun thing to do. I wanted something that looked pretty on the plate," Standish says.

Contest winners were honored during Innkeepers International's national conference April 25 to 29 in Baltimore. First-place winners in each region received $750 and a set of professional cookware from Regal; second place, $500 and a gourmet pan from Regal; third place, $250. All winners received a supply of Jones Dairy Farm products.

Standish says she serves a full breakfast that includes fruit, juice, breads and biscuits, an entree and a meat product, unless vegetarian options are requested.

A variety of beverages are available, including coffee, tea, hot cider and cocoa.

Some guest favorites are lemon-yogurt pancakes and orange croissants.

The Standishes record what meals have been served to make sure a guest isn't fed identical fare on a return visit. The inn has its share of frequenters, Standish says.

Since 1996, the Standishes have owned The Carriage Inn, which was built in 1836. She and her husband visited more than 40 bed-and-breakfast inns before opening their own.

The six-bedroom house, once owned by a descendant of George Washington's, is rich in history.

Gen. Ulysses Grant and Gen. Philip Sheridan met in what is now the inn's dining room to strategize the Shenandoah Valley campaign, according to the inn's Web site. Thomas Rutherford, a former owner of the house, commissioned a flag carried by Stonewall Jackson's Corps at Second Manassas that later was returned to the house, where it was hidden in what is now the Rose Room at the inn, according to the site.

-- RECIPES --

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