FN Dish – Food Network Blog: Go behind-the-scenes at Food Network featuring your favorite chefs, shows, recipes, events and more.

Plain ol’ supreme nachos get a feisty kick from Rachael with the help of jalapenos, chili powder, cayenne pepper and hot sauce — a fresh Pico de Gallo salsa will help cool down the heat. Make these a part of your Cinco de Mayo fiesta tonight!

Get the recipe: Super Nachos

Browse Food Network’s Cinco de Mayo feast for more Mexican-inspired recipes.

How More Restaurants May Begin to Compost: A small food-hauling industry equipped to deal with restaurants’ compostable fare is cropping up. Cities like San Francisco and Seattle have passed laws that mandate commercial composting and since restaurants don’t often have the space or time to do it onsite, food-waste managers, like Jeremy Brosowksy, are doing it for them. It’s all part of the food-sustainability movement, Brosowsky explains to MSNBC.com. “Farm-to-table is good. Farm to table back to farm is even better.” [today.msnbc.com]

How Does Your Garden Grow? In a Truck! Compass Green, the brainchild of two Brooklyn-based green thumbs, just achieved its Kickstarter funding goal to create “the first-ever mobile greenhouse run completely on renewable energy – waste vegetable oil, solar and wind energy.” Follow the duo as they grow veggies in their greenhouse while driving around to educate both kids and adults on food and transportation sustainability. [gothamist.com]

Dinner Parties Thrown to Recruit New Nudists: The Wall Street Journal reports that nudist camps, to combat flat or declining numbers of participants amongst the 18-34 year-old set, are throwing fun, no-clothes events. In addition to 5K road races, there are naked dinner parties in NYC lofts and a “Naked Booze n Schmooze.” The jokes for punny menu items just write themselves. [wsj.com via refinery29.com]

Royal Wedding Menu Looked Pretty Fancy: In more elegant menu item news, in case you missed it, Eatocracy has what was ingested at the Royal Wedding luncheon. Try saying “Scottish Langoustines with Lemon Mayonnaise Pressed Confit of Pork Belly with Crayfish and Crackling” in a British accent. [eatocracy.com]

Here’s our round-up of food news, trends and happenings across the web. Check back for more, and tell us what else you’re loving in the comments.

On Monday, May 9, Tom Colicchio, Emeril Lagasse, Gail Simmons, Andrew Zimmern, Anne Burrell and many others in the food industry — will don their best as they join the James Beard Foundation at its annual Restaurant and Chef Awards Dinner.

In honor of the Rising Star Chef of the Year Award, we’re chatting with the 2011 nominees for this category. Yesterday we caught up with Thomas McNaughton, chef at flour + water in San Francisco. Today we’re talking with Gabriel Rucker, chef of Le Pigeon in Portland, Oregon. Being nominated is “the highest honor you can receive as a chef,” Rucker says. “And just being nominated makes me feel like a winner already.”

FN Dish: The theme of this year’s awards is “The Ultimate Melting Pot,” so what is your favorite type of ethnic cuisine?
GR: Mexican

Read what Gabriel would like to change about the food industry »

We’re teaming up with food and garden bloggers to host Spring Fling 2011, a season-long garden party. In coming weeks, we’ll feature favorite garden-to-table recipes and tips to help you enjoy the bounty, whether you’re harvesting your own goodies or buying them fresh from the market. Recently, we dove into the world of asparagus — today, we’re exploring rhubarb.

Rhubarb is a large reddish, celery-like stalk with large green leaves. Even though rhubarb is commonly paired with strawberries to create tarts, cobblers and pies, this lengthy root is a vegetable. It tends to be tart, needing the addition of ample sweeteners like sugar and additional fruits.

Here’s how to incorporate rhubarb in your Mother’s Day menu »

Choose your favorite meat or use a combination of shrimp, chicken or steak as you cook up this sizzling dish paired with tortillas and toppings like salsa, guacamole and sour cream.

Get the recipe: Gold Medal Sizzling Fajitas

Browse Food Network’s Cinco de Mayo feast for more Mexican-inspired recipes.

On Monday, May 9, Tom Colicchio, Emeril Lagasse, Gail Simmons, Andrew Zimmern, Anne Burrell and many others in the food industry — will don their best as they join the James Beard Foundation at its annual Restaurant and Chef Awards Dinner.

In honor of the Rising Star Chef of the Year Award, we’re chatting with the 2011 nominees in this category. Yesterday, we caught up with Christina Tosi of Momofuku Milk Bar in New York City. Today, we’ll get to know Thomas McNaughton, chef at flour + water in San Francisco. McNaughton says that the Beard Awards, “Are a testament to the people that I’m surrounded by, not only in the kitchen but in our organization. It feels humbling to be among such talented peers.”

FN Dish: The theme of this year’s awards is “The Ultimate Melting Pot,” so what is your favorite type of ethnic cuisine?
TM: Korean

Find out what classic rock band Thomas would love to cook for »

Iron Chef Morimoto is serving up recipes to aid his Japanese homeland in Keep Recipes for Recovery, a 21-recipe cookbook filled with Japanese classics, fusions, haute cuisine and more. Donations start at just $10 –proceeds will go to The American Red Cross to help Japan recover from the devastation of the recent earth quake and tsunami. Last month, Chef Morimoto made his singing debut at The Thousand Hearts benefit concert to raise funds and awareness for the survivors of the tragedy. You can still donate to the benefit through Thousandhearts.org and see his vocal performance on YouTube.

Would you like to meet Chef Aarón Sánchez? In honor of his partnership with Cacique, the largest Hispanic cheese brand in the U.S., you and one lucky friend could have Sánchez “crash and cook” in your very own kitchen! To enter, visit and ‘like’ Cacique USA’s Facebook page from Apr. 13 to Aug. 31, 2011: http://www.facebook.com/CaciqueBrand.

Find out what Guy Fieri is up to »

Marcela’s beer-battered halibut is fried to a golden crisp and then topped with shredded cabbage and salsa for the ultimate fish taco.

Get the recipe: Baja Style Fish Tacos

Browse Food Network’s Cinco de Mayo feast for more Mexican-inspired recipes.

On Monday, May 9, Tom Colicchio, Emeril Lagasse, Gail Simmons, Andrew Zimmern, Anne Burrell and many others in the food industry — will don their best as they join the James Beard Foundation at its annual Restaurant and Chef Awards Dinner.

While categories like Best New Chef and Best New Restaurant tend to steal the spotlight, one category to keep your eye on is Rising Star Chef of the Year. According to the Foundation, “This award is given to a chef, age 30 or younger, who displays an impressive talent and who is likely to have a significant impact on the industry in years to come.” Past winners who hold this title include Nate Appleman and Andrew Carmellini.

Starting today, we’ll get to know each of the 2011 nominees up for this category a little better.

First up: Christina Tosi from the famed Momofuku Milk Bar in New York City. Tosi, who worked at WD-50 and Bouley before Milk Bar, is now known for her outrageously addicting desserts like Crack Pie, cereal milk soft serve ice cream and recently cake truffles.

“It’s an overwhelming honor to be singled out in a city and country of so many great chefs,” Tosi said when we asked her how it felt to be a James Beard nominee. “The awards have always been a great opportunity to get to know what’s going on in kitchens around the country, make new friends and celebrate one another’s passion for food, hard work and dedication to the job and industry.”

Find out what Christina can’t live without and the one person she’d love to cook for »

When you think about it, dough is just a mixture of flour and water. Yes, we usually use fancy flours and extra ingredients, such as eggs or yeast, to transform dough from its original simplicity into pasta noodle or bread varieties, for example. Still though, making dough need not be an intimidating process. In fact, here are four fool-proof recipes for classic doughs – bread, pizza, pasta and doughnut – that you might typically purchase instead of making from scratch. So bake a loaf of bread, roll out your own pizza dough and fry your own doughnuts because with recipes like these, there’s no need to make a trip to the store.

Move over, counter space-hogging bread maker. Ellie Krieger’s Whole-Wheat Cinnamon-Raisin Bread from foodnetwork.com uses no special equipment and is still so simple to make and consistently produces swirly good results. Best of all, it is far healthier than its sugar-laden counterparts from the grocery.

Read on for more recipes