Hoosier Cuisine Archives : TRAVEL/FOOD

At one time, almost every stream, creek, and river had at least one mill, using water to power the grinding stone, turning grain into flour. Now few mills are left in Indiana but the one in Story survived and the bottom floor is an event area and the top floor a place to stay.

A view of the general store, built in 1916 after the original burned down. The basement is The Story Still, a place to get a drink, so called because a still was found on the property during Prohibition. But, of course, stills were found throughout Brown County both before, during and after Prohibition. The main floor is the dining room with the original potbelly stove (electricity didn’t come to Story until around 1949), and the four rooms upstairs are for overnight guests and, some say, for the Blue Lady who checked in and never checked out over a century ago.

The Culinary Crossroads Spring Dinner Series returns for its fourth year and kicks off April 8 at Highland Golf & Country Club in Indianapolis.

Launched in 2021, the dinner series has become our centerpiece event as we raise funds for the Greg Hardesty Scholarship Fund at Ivy Tech Community College. The dinner series runs for four Mondays, April 8-29, and each week features three chefs – plus a featured pastry chef – who collaborate on a fabulous four-course menu, complete with wine pairings.

This year our theme is Onward and Upward, and in addition to spotlighting top Indianapolis chefs, we’ll also be featuring chefs from around the state. The dinners include a complimentary cocktail hour with delightful appetizers from each chef as well as a sparkling wine, a signature cocktail and a local beer.

Here’s the 2024 Spring Dinner Series chef lineup, with desserts each week provided by pastry chef and Ivy Tech instructor Hattie Shoemaker:

April 8 — Featuring chef Chris Eley of Smoking Goose, chef Toby Moreno of Highland Golf & Country Club and chef Marcus Daniel of Bridgeport in Fort Wayne.
April 15 — Featuring chef Tracey Couillard of Public Greens, chef Eli Laidlaw of The Alexander and chef Charisa Perkins of Copper House in Evansville.
April 22 — Featuring chef Alan Sternberg of Bluebeard, chef Tyler Shortt of Tinker Street and chef Ming Pu of Brooklyn & the Butcher, The Exchange and Outcast in New Albany.
April 29 — Featuring chef Ryan Nelson of Late Harvest Kitchen, chef Patrick Russ of Newfields and chef Jeff Ford of J. Ford’s Black Angus in Terre Haute.

Tickets are $350 for two; tables seat six and are $1,000. Tickets are available at Eventbrite; to purchase for the whole series, or to arrange for seating with other ticketholders, please email info@culinarycrossroads.org.

About Culinary Crossroads

Culinary Crossroads is an organization that shines a spotlight on the people, products, places and services that define Indiana’s culinary landscape and help make Indiana the place where people want to live, work and play. Our mission is to create content and initiatives that promote education and awareness about our culinary community and to amplify the voices that support this underlying goal.

While you’ve probably heard of “Hoosier Hospitality” – our state’s reputation for friendliness is certainly well deserved – you may not have thought of Indiana as a place with great food, rock star chefs, award-winning specialty products and outstanding culinary destinations. But here at Culinary Crossroads, we help people see Indiana in a way that maybe even longtime residents haven’t seen it before. After all, we’re at the Culinary Crossroads of America. We’ve got something special here in Indiana, and we can’t wait to fill you in.

Through our web content, social media and initiatives that promote community and collaboration, Culinary Crossroads is helping to grow a more robust statewide culinary culture by showcasing the restaurants, chefs, competitive cooks, farmers, producers and purveyors that define Indiana food.