A bit of the tropics descended on Midtown on Wednesday night for the Central Park Conservancy’s "A Taste of Summer" benefit, which this year, its 12th, brought together 38 New York restaurants to dole out bite-size offerings to donors.
With the Barbados Tourism Authority on board as a sponsor, the event included plenty of touches evoking the country's balmy setting, including yellow and white linens, giant palms, seashells and starfish, and projections of leaves on the ceiling of the main tent. (Additionally, the massive three-tent culinary compound looked very much like a cabana.) Organizers positioned the event as a kickoff to summer.After Jamaica’s successful sponsorship of the event in 2005, the conservancy’s manager of special events, Jill Pall, reached out to several tourist bureaus in seeking a partner for 2007’s benefit. Brian A.M. Green, business development manager south and southeast of the Barbados Tourism Authority, cited a variety of reasons why the event was “a perfect fit” for his organization, including the travel-friendly crowd, the upcoming Taste of Barbados (the country's evening of tasting similar to a Taste of Summer) in November, and the release of Zagat Survey Best of Barbados (the first Caribbean guide for the publisher). Additionally, “Barbados is known as the culinary Mecca of the Caribbean,” he said.Restaurants participating this year (all by invitation only,
and donating their time and food) included Tavern on the Green, Blue Water
Grill, the Capital Grille, Asia de Cuba, Crumbs Bakery, Park Avenue Summer, and
Quality Meats. “We try to have the same restaurants come back every year,” Pall said, “and if there’s a hot new restaurant, we try to get them involved as
well.” New features of the event this year included a separate dessert tent and a V.I.P. tent offering dishes from all seven of Jean-Georges Vongerichten's restaurants. (The chef upped his participation from two stations in 2006.)
Amazingly, the event raises only about one percent of the conservancy’s annual budget; this year's benefit brought in $600,000 from 1,000 attendees. “It’s a fund-raiser, certainly, but we also see it as a friend-raiser,” said Terri Coppersmith, vice president of development and external affairs for the conservancy. “It’s a good place to be with friends and get to know each other in a relaxing setting. And it’s a good way to showcase the park at night.”
