Chef Damaris Phillips, entrepreneur, podcaster, cookbook author and Food Network Star winner, will team up with her friend and My Morning Jacket drummer Patrick Hallahan for a Song Summit Supper Club titled “A Celebration of Kentucky Summers” on Aug. 28. Credit: Photo courtesy of Damaris Philli ps Chef, entrepreneur, podcaster, cookbook author and TV personality Damaris Phillips will host “A Celebration of Kentucky Summers” during a Song Summit Supper Club on Aug. 28. The event, which will settle in at Le Depot Brasserie, will feature a four-course dinner inspired by the music of My Morning Jacket. The band’s drummer, Patrick Hallahan, will also be on hand for the unique culinary experience, said Phillips, who won the Food Network Star TV competition in 2013. “Patrick has a fantastic pallet and will bring those flavors and stories to the dinner,” she said. The Song Summit event is similar to the Bluegrass Supper Club, an experience Phillips founded with Coby Ming. “We celebrate Kentucky and tell stories of Kentucky, and we’re just picking up what we do with some music sprinkled in,” she said. “So. I’m taking what I’m doing food wise and getting to partner with Patrick to bring the music of My Morning Jacket alive.” The Song Summit event is not the first pairing of Phillips and Hallahan. “We are actually really good friends, and many of the guys of My Morning Jacket are from Louisville,” she said. “By nature Patrick and I met along the way and started a company together called Hallahan Phillips Events.” The company hosts curated and highly activated events, according to Phillips, who is also cofounder of the “What’s Fun” podcast with fellow Food Network Star competitor Nikki Dinki. “They are all centered around nostalgia and getting grown-ups to feel wonder and magic again,” she said. “It was funny because I had been asked to do the Song Summit before I knew Patrick was going to be there, and it was the same for him. Then it just happened to partner us up.” The two friends had a “ball” coming up with a menu, Phillips said. “We’ve been able to tinker around in my catering kitchen and play around with recipes,” she said. “Oh, and getting that peanut butter pudding surprise dessert together was such a delight.” “Peanut butter pudding surprise,” as many My Morning Jacket fans know, is a refrain from the band’s song, “Highly Suspicious.” “Patrick has always wanted to make that dish because, for years, people have been asking for the recipe,” Phillips said. “So that immediately shifted us into thinking how we could base every course on a song.” But as Phillips discovered, My Morning Jacket songs don’t have a lot of food-based lyrics. “So, it’s been a delight to listen to the songs, and asking fans what food they would think of when listening to My Morning Jacket,” she said. Many fans zeroed in on the band’s song “Squid Ink,” Phillips said. “Unfortunately, Pat has a shellfish allergy, so that was out,” she said. “But this is how things kind of worked. We looked at songs and decided to get into more of the emotion and nostalgia and the overall vibe of a song or the vibe of an album.” The two experimented with different songs, Phillips said. “Sometimes when we got into things, we found the food wasn’t tasting how the song feels,” she said. “So we would try something different.” Phillips enjoyed seeing Hallahan get into the first round of tasting. “He would say things like, ‘I need more green,’” she said with a laugh. “So, one of the dishes is entirely inspired by summer in Kentucky during the 1990s.” The dinner will also include a surprise that pays nod to Kentucky’s past, Phillips said. “We’re doing a little amuse-bouche, if you will, that’s not on the menu,” she said. “When you start every dinner party in Kentucky, this will always be an appetizer, and we’re going to walk around with it at the beginning of the evening.” Phillips’ has her own vision of the Supper Club experience.  “I would love people to have the plate in front of them when a song comes on, and I would like them to take a moment to be with the song and with the dish,” she said. “Then Pat would tell us some behind-the-scenes stuff about the song, how the song was written, or relay a memory about it that will endear us to the song more. And then I’ll throw in some stuff about the food.” In addition to cooking for the Supper Club, Phillips will cook up some vanilla wafers and peanut butter tahini cookies for a Friday and Saturday bake sale that runs 11 a.m.-7 p.m. and serves as a fundraiser for the Song Summit Foundation. The Song Summit Foundation is the Song Summit’s philanthropic arm that supports up-and-coming musicians. Other chefs who will participate in the sale include Stephanie Izard and Andrew Zimmern. “When people ask what my signature dish is, I want to say banana pudding, but the most important part of it all is the vanilla cookie,” Phillips said. “And I don’t think people realize you can home bake vanilla wafers.” Making homemade vanilla wafers isn’t complicated, she said. “All the ingredients are basic, but the way you put them together and the way the cookies come out reminds you that simple things, done correctly, equals magic,” Phillips said. Phillips’ peanut butter tahini cookies are gluten free. “You would not know it, though,” she said. “I always want to make something for everyone, especially people who have dietary restrictions. My husband’s a vegetarian, and I know many people who are gluten free.” Phillips is thrilled to be invited to participate in this year’s Song Summit. “I love music,” she said “I love food, and I love anything that is focused on mental health,” she said. Phillips appreciates the mental-wellness aspect of the Song Summit   “I never started in food to competition cook or prove that I was the best,” she said. “I started in food because I believe that cooking is a tool that we should all fundamentally use every single day because it is the right pace of being human. We need to be living at the pace where there is time in our life to cook.” Phillips isn’t fond of making food quickly and the trend of 15-minute meals.   “I keep asking myself, what are we hurrying to do — more work?” she said. “Are we just rushing to get the dinner made so we can just watch TV?” The chef wondered out loud what would happen if people slowed down, told stories and laughed while cooking and washing dishes.  “Some of the best conversations I’ve ever had come after the holiday meal when we’re drying the china,” she said. “And the best conversations are made when we’re doing piddly work. Snapping beans, peeling potatoes, washing the glasses.” Phillips, who has written two cookbooks to date, said she would love to take her love of food and being on TV one step further. “I would love to be a talk-show host, or president or governor — let’s go with governor,” she said with a laugh. “I would love to be the next human who gets to help people how to be human. I believe my medium is food, which helps remind people who to live and prioritize our lives. I think all of us are looking for a leader to tell us this is enough, this is how you make a difference. Now, I don’t think that means taking over the world, but somebody’s got to do it. So it might as well be Damaris.” Damaris Phillips at the 2026 Song Summit Song Summit Supper Club: ‘A Celebration of Kentucky Summers’ with Patrick Hallahan of My Morning Jacket When: 5 p.m. Friday, Aug. 28 Where: Le Depot Brasserie, 660 Main St. Tickets: tinyurl.com/3w2x3yaj Web: songsummit.com and damarisphillips.com The post Chef Damaris Philips celebrates Kentucky Summers at the Song Summit appeared first on Park Record. ...read more read less