Gala to extol the flavors of Maine Chef, Baldaccis develop all-local inaugural menu

AUGUSTA – John Baldacci is famous for his fund-raising dinners, but there won’t be any spaghetti on the menu Thursday night at his inaugural gala.

Baldacci, who will be sworn in as Maine’s governor this afternoon, instead chose to highlight foods made and grown in Maine. He and his wife, Karen, worked closely with Bangor chef and culinary consultant Cheryl Wixson to feature an array of local seafood, meat, cheeses, condiments and other products.

“I really worked with Karen Baldacci – this is her priority,” Wixson said by phone from Augusta on Monday. “They’re both very committed to this state and that was something they really, really wanted to do.”

The event is expected to draw more than 5,000 people to the Augusta Civic Center on Thursday, which presented a challenge. The food needed to be festive, portable and entirely unfussy, because the last thing people want to do at an inaugural ball is to spill sauce all over their gown or suit.

“The question was, ‘What can we do that is easy to eat?'” Wixson said.

The answer? Food stations, heaped with hors d’oeuvres such as mussels steamed in white wine and garlic, smoked seafood, cheeses and jams, hand-cut ravioli, chicken roulades and bite-size desserts. Wixson got the idea for the food stations from the many corporate auto shows she has attended with her husband, who owns a Chrysler-Dodge dealership in Bangor. And it has worked in the past at large-scale events she has coordinated.

“You have the opportunity to

have little nibbles throughout the evening,” she said.

The menu includes more than 300 pounds of cheese ravioli from MainStay Pasta in Castine; 100 pounds of cultivated mussels from Maine’s Best Seafood of Brooklin; smoked mussels, scallops, shrimp and salmon; a selection of dairy and goat cheeses from State of Maine Cheese Co. in Rockport; condiments by Stonewall Kitchen of York and Raye’s Mustard Mill of Eastport; chicken roulades and chicken cheddars by Barber Foods of Portland; desserts by Fogarty’s of South Berwick; carving hams from Ballard’s of Manchester; and a selection of breads made by the civic center staff.

“It all just fell into place,” Wixson said. “I love working with all these people. They’re all so excited to bring this to the civic center.”

She also loves working with the Baldaccis, who have been close friends of Wixson’s for years.

“I was very flattered when they asked me to do this,” Wixson said, “because I believe in the state of Maine, too.”