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Barbara Watanabe
808-585-8484
barbaraw@goforbroke.org
Award-Winning Chefs, Popular Bakery Take Over Kitchen for Evening of Aloha
Go For Broke National Education Center plans Nov. 13 event with ono dinner
(TORRANCE, CA - September 29, 2010)— Guests who attend Go For Broke National Education Center's (GFBNEC) Evening of Aloha gala dinner can look forward to a meal created by Chefs Roy Yamaguchi of Roy's internationally acclaimed restaurants and Akira Hirose of Pasadena's critically lauded Maison Akira, followed by a special dessert from King's Hawaiian Bakery and Restaurant. Evening of Aloha is scheduled for Saturday, November 13, 2010 at the Hilton Anaheim Hotel and information is available by calling GFBNEC toll free at 877-527-8110, emailing julia@goforbroke.org or clicking on the organization's website at www.goforbroke.org
Leading the kitchen takeover, Chef Yamaguchi's culinary creations have been a highlight of the Evening of Aloha event for eight years. Yamaguchi is recognized worldwide for his Hawaiian Fusion© Cuisine made from fresh local ingredients and European-style sauces with bold Asian spices. Chef Hirose has perfected casual fine French dining with Japanese overtures. He consistently makes dining a delicious experience and has been rewarded with a coveted “excellent” rating from the tough Zagat 2010 critics. King's has been treating Evening of Aloha guests to tastes of the Aloha Spirit every year since the event began in 2002. Its popular Hawaiian Sweet Bread is a mealtime staple throughout the 48 mainland states and Hawaii while in Southern California, King's walk-in bakeries and restaurants are local favorites.
Yamaguchi was born and raised in Tokyo, schooled at the prestigious Culinary Institute of America in New York and mentored by master chef Jean Bertranou and his right-hand Michel Blanchet at the incomparable L'Ermitage in West Hollywood, and he polished his cooking style of fusing French techniques with Japanese ingredients in some of Southern California's most outstanding restaurants. He's the son of a career military man from Maui and a mother from Okinawa. In addition to his restaurant empire, Yamaguchi is a cookbook author, television personality and host of his own PBS television series, Hawaii Cooks with Roy Yamaguchi. Yamaguchi is a former member of the GFBNEC Board of Directors and now serves on the organization's Board of Governors.
Born in Kyoto, Japan, Chef Hirose honed his culinary talents in France as a student of world-renowned Chef Joel Rubochon, in the kitchen at Maxime's of Paris, studying the art of pastry at Ecole de Lenotre and in Los Angeles at the unforgettable L'Orangerie. When he went back to Japan and opened his own restaurant, it became one of the Top 50 French Restaurants in the country. Returning to Los Angeles, Hirose gained a following among patrons of some of the city's best restaurants. And in 1994, he had the privilege of creating a menu for the Emperor and Empress of Japan. Hirose's hands-on cooking style at Akira has consistently earned awards and recognition from peers, diners and food critics, including the Southern California French Chefs' Association Chef of the Year 1998 and Pasadena Weekly's Best Chef of the Year 2000.
King's roots go back to 1950 on Hawaii's Big Island when founder Robert Taira opened a little storefront bakery in Hilo. Demand for his original Hawaiian Sweet Bread boomed and it wasn't long before he established a larger store in downtown Honolulu. As the market for King's Hawaiian Sweet Bread and dinner rolls continued to grow, the Taira family moved the flourishing business to Torrance, CA. Still, the family's attention to the mouth-watering kitchen-fresh quality of its baked goods remains the key ingredient of its success and the Aloha Spirit is the secret of its tasty goodness. The King's Hawaiian team and Taira family take pride in their foods and in their contributions to organizations such as GFBNEC.
Union Bank and Toyota Motor Sales, U.S.A., Inc., are presenting sponsors for GFBNEC's 9th annual Evening of Aloha. In addition to a delicious dinner, the crowd-pleasing fundraising event will feature Hawaii-style entertainment and a special program with the theme, Honoring the Past, Celebrating the Future.
Yamauchi, who served Alhambra as Mayor in 2007, is president and owner of Tri-Star Vending in Alhambra. Tri-Star was singled out as Asian Pacific Islander Business of the Year for the 49th Assembly District in 2004 and by Homeboy Industries as 2006 Employer of the Year. Yamauchi is actively involved with numerous community groups and is on the boards of several nonprofit and service organizations. Among these many commitments, he has been a Japanese American National Museum honoree and honorary advisor for the organization's annual dinner.
GFBNEC is a national nonprofit organization with a mission to educate the public about responsibilities, challenges and rights of American citizenship, using life stories of Japanese American soldiers of World War II. The organization's ongoing Hanashi Oral History Program has built an archive of more than 1,000 interviews with Japanese American World War II veterans that is the largest of its kind in the U.S. Its American Story Teacher Training Program provides curriculum materials with lessons about values and citizenship to schools from coast to coast and in Hawaii. And the organization incorporates its oral histories into teacher-training materials to give students real-life examples. Information about GFBNEC and its work is available at www.goforbroke.org
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