Award winning Maine chefs and restaurants will work together on Sunday, June 22 to prepare a four course meal, plus an array of hors d’oeuvres, on beautiful Cow Island, in Casco Bay, as part of Southern Maine’s Share Our Strength’s third annual Taste of the Nation.

Hors d’oeuvres will be prepared by Chef Sam Hayward, Fore Street; Harding Lee Smith and Joe Boudreau, The Grill Room; and Lawrence Klang, Camden Harbor Inn.

The first course, from Steve Corry’s 555, will be a chilled cucumber soup with crème fraiche, salmon tartar, and fragrant fresh dill oil. The second course, prepared by Hugo’s owner Rob Evans, will be organic Maine asparagus spears with farm fresh egg and parmesan vinaigrette. For the third course, Back Bay Grill owner and chef Larry Mathews Jr will prepare olive oil poached hybrid striped bass with preserved lemon, fennel confit and piccholine olives. A fourth course, roast loin of lamb with Maine white beans in a red wine sauce, served with seasonal vegetables, will be prepared by Cinque Terre’s chef, Lee Skawinski.

Dessert will be prepared by two chefs, Jeff Landry from Eve’s at the Garden, who will make a potato and coconut blini with vanilla crème fraiche and fresh tangerine caviar, and Bryan Dame, from The Edge in Camden, who will make two desserts: an Allen’s coffee brandy flavored whoopie pie and a version of the camp classic s’mores, using  homemade marshmallows and fudge made with Andrews Brewing Company’s porter.

In addition, the tickets for the event include specialty cocktails made with Diageo Reserve Portfolio spirits and wines from Wente Vineyards. Wente Vineyards is California's oldest family owned and continuously operated winery. Founded in 1883 by C. H. Wente, the winery is now managed by the fourth and fifth generations of the Wente family. The winery farms nearly 3,000 acres of estate vineyards in the Livermore Valley, San Francisco Bay, and Arroyo Seco, Monterey appellations, two premier Central Coast winegrowing regions.

100% of the funds raised at this event will go to organizations fighting to end childhood hunger. Share Our Strength Southern Maine 2008 funds will go Cultivating Community, East End Kids Katering, Maine Equal Justice Partners, and Preble St. Resource Center.

Locally, Taste of the Nation is sponsored by Stonewall Kitchen, Whole Foods Market Portland, L.L. Bean, Time Warner, Weichert Realtors, and FairPoint Communications.  The Taste of the Nation is sponsored nationally by American Express.