The newest King of American Seafood has a mohawk under his crown. Chef Gregory Gourdet of a Portland, Ore., modern Asian restaurant won the ninth annual Great American Seafood. Competition Saturday afternoon in Hall J of the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center. He prepared a slow-cooked dish of chinook salmon, the Oregon state fish.
Louisiana's representative in the contest with 16 states came in second. Chef Keith Frentz, cooking with his wife, Nealy Frentz, as they do in their Covington restaurant, LOLA, made a black drum dish with farmers market maque choux, braised collard greens and pickled black-eyed peas in a cane vinaigrette.
In third place was Jack Gilmore, executive chef and owner of Jack Allen's Kitchen in Austin, Texas.
"It feels really amazing," Gourdet said minutes after he was crowned by last year's winner, James Smith, who is the chef for the state of Alabama and cooks in the capital in Birmingham.
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