Andrea Mitchell and Patrick O’Connell. – Courtesy photo
Even at D.C.’s ritziest events, you don’t often see conspicuous consumption the way you do in New York or L.A.
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But such was the case Wednesday night at the Mellon Auditorium, as the Inn at Little Washington celebrated its 30th anniversary with an event as grand as Washington ever sees. For the final live auction item, six of the top American chefs who were honored during the program — Daniel Boulud, Charlie Trotter, Thomas Keller, Alice Waters, Gary Danko and Dean Fearing — offered a dinner for 12 in the winner’s home, with a course cooked by each of their top deputies.
The bidding quickly eclipsed $25,000, but egged on by Trotter (who put in two bids of his own), the deal got sweeter and sweeter. A suite at the Ritz Carlton on Central Park was thrown in. Then it became dinner for 16. Then each chef threw in an additional dinner for four at their restaurant. And magnums of wine from their personal cellars. Then Boulud offered up his home in Manhattan, as Trotter volunteered Keller to make breakfast for the group.
The bids crept up and up toward six figures, until Trotter delivered the coup de grace. “We’re going to offer a picture of Patrick [O’Connell, the inn’s chef-owner] naked in a chair if you get it over 100 [thousand].”
That did the trick, as guest Sean Dobson finally ended it with a $105,000 bid.
The auction was in keeping with the extravagant nature of the $575-per-plate (and up) evening.
“There are more people in this room than there are residents of Little Washington,” O’Connell joked.
Five hundred to be exact. And serving them were 140 wait staff members, not including service captains, sommeliers or the staff members from the inn who were there to oversee things.
O’Connell said the only things he could compare it to would be an Irish funeral or a Jewish wedding, “so I’ll toast all of you with a shot of Irish whiskey. Mazel tov.”
The evening raised more than $575,000 for Five & Alive, an international relief charity for children.
