Hosted by the Jimmy Fund Council of Western Massachusetts, the event will take place at Chez Josef on Friday, Jan. 25, from 6:30-9:30 p.m. and will feature tastings, a drawing and a silent auction of various items and sports memorabilia. There also will be a DJ.
AGAWAM—Salmon seared on a 2-inch thick piece of pink Himalayan salt served with a small micro-greens salad with grilled peaches and crumbled goat cheese infused with cranberries.
That’s what Chef Marcel Ouimet, executive chef at Chez Josef in Agawam, served at a previous Chefs for Jimmy event, and though he has not settled on this year’s menu, he promises it will be something guests perhaps haven’t seen before or a different preparation of a delicious dish.
He and some 30 of western New England’s culinary greats will participate in the 23rd annual Chefs for Jimmy to support adult and pediatric cancer care and research at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.
Hosted by the Jimmy Fund Council of Western Massachusetts, the event will take place at Chez Josef on Friday, Jan. 25, from 6:30-9:30 p.m. and will feature tastings, a drawing and a silent auction of various items and sports memorabilia. There also will be a DJ.
This year’s fund-raising goal is more than $100,000 for the lifesaving mission of the Jimmy Fund and Dana-Farber.
Co-chair Michael B. Katz founded the event 23 years ago. He has long been a Jimmy Fund supporter because of the positive experiences persons he knew had with Dana-Farber and because the institute treated his father for nearly three years beyond his original leukemia diagnosis and prognosis.
“Anyone who has ever battled cancer knows there are happy times and bad times during the treatment process,” Katz said. “When you’re facing a serious illness, it does become a battle—you’re trying to live. Cancer is a killer disease.”
Ouimet knows at least three people who were treated at Dana Farber, and he said the hospital staff exudes the message that “we are here together as one to get you through this.”
Most people know someone who has or has had cancer, a “catastrophic illness that has touched everyone,” Ouimet said.
He has participated in Chefs for Jimmy since its inception. “That’s how you do things in business. It’s not all for yourself; you need to give back,” he said. “And it plain ol’ feels good. Giving is much better than receiving.”
This year’s fund-raising event will be the second Hasbro-themed event; the first with a Monopoly theme was a great success, Katz said, noting that the inventor of The Game of Life, Reuben Klamer, is planning to attend this year’s Chefs for Jimmy.
“I guarantee if you go, you’ll have a great time,” he enthused. “We’ll have the best restaurants in the area and let them show off.”
The event is a way to showcase a restaurant or catering business to more than a thousand people.
Ouimet likes his food offering to be about presentation as well as taste. “Guests like to watch how we put (the food) together; it’s not just plopped on a plate,” he said. “It’s very visual.”
Presenting sponsors of the event are the Winer Levsky Group of UBS Financial Services Inc.; the event honors the memory of Neal Webber, a long-time supporter of the Jimmy Fund, “who fought bravely against his cancer, but eventually lost that battle,” Katz said. Webber was the owner of Kittredge Equipment Company, a major supplier of hotel and restaurant equipment in Massachusetts and Connecticut.
The evening’s theme, “Winning the Game of Life,” is based on Hasbro’s classic game The Game of Life. Participating restaurants and caterers will create dishes and décor to complement this theme.
The restaurants donate their food, and several other local businesses support the event with in-kind contributions.
Elegant Affairs of Springfield will serve bread pudding with whiskey sauce, a favorite Peg Boxold, president of Elegant Affairs, said some call “heaven in a pan.” Some like it so much, they come back for seconds and thirds.
“This is a way to give back to the community,” Boxold said, adding that the Jimmy Fund is “an incredible organization” and a “great cause.”
She has been involved with Chefs for Jimmy for more than 20 years.
The timing of the event is “perfect,” she said, because by late January “people are holidayed out” and are tired of being “inside and cooped up,” so the well-organized event is “a great time to get out.”
A list of participating restaurants and their dishes may be found at
www.jimmyfund.org/chefs-for-jimmy.
Since 1990, Chefs for Jimmy has raised about $1.5 million for adult and pediatric cancer care and research at Dana-Farber.
The first Chefs for Jimmy included eight restaurants, and that number has varied to more than 40.
The Jimmy Fund supports Boston’s Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, raising funds for adult and pediatric cancer care and research to improve the chances of survival for cancer patients around the world. It is an official charity of the Boston Red Sox, as well as the official charity of the Massachusetts Chiefs of Police Association, the Pan-Massachusetts Challenge and the Variety Children's Charity of New England. Since 1948, the generosity of millions of people has helped the Jimmy Fund save countless lives and reduce the burden of cancer for patients and families worldwide.
For more information about The Jimmy Fund, go to www.JimmyFund.org.
Tickets to the event are $75 and are available only in advance by phone at 800-525-4669 or online at jimmyfund.org/chefs-for-jimmy.