Nov. 16, 2023

Chef Dan Myers has proven his skills in local food competitions but wanted to test them on a national stage.

The general manager at Crawford’s Bar & Grill did that last week at the World Food Championship in Dallas, where he was named reserve champion.

“I really wanted to do something more out of Sioux Falls to prove I could do well with other chefs outside of Sioux Falls,” Myers said. “To get second place in my category, I proved it to myself.”

Myers has been part of the restaurant scene in Sioux Falls for a couple of decades. He started cooking in 2003, and his first executive chef position was at Crawford’s when it was under different ownership. In 2013, he started Elite Cafe & Catering and opened Myers’ Deli & More in 2018. Myers returned to Crawford’s in 2021 when the Ode brothers bought it.

The World Food Championship competition draws qualifiers worldwide in 12 categories – everything from seafood and burgers to bacon and desserts. Myers competed in the World Chef Championship, earning a personal invite from one of the organization’s directors after participating in a couple of qualifying events earlier this year.

Myers started with 20 chefs in the first round Nov. 9, being tasked to create a dish using molecular gastronomy, which he knew would be the requirement in advance of the competition.

“I play around with it a lot,” Myers said of molecular gastronomy, a scientific approach that applies chemistry to food preparation. He used it in his winning dish for the Cleavers Chef Challenge in March. The discipline, however, is “completely out of the realm of what we do here in South Dakota,” he said, adding that while some chefs here might use spherification techniques to create caviar-like additions to a dish, the more typical “steak-and-potatoes” plates satisfy many customers.

Myers made it to the second round with the top seven chefs with his sous vide, double-smoked pork belly with strawberry chocolate mole sauce, strawberry habanero caviar with a sugar dome and a strawberry jalapeno cannoli.

In the second round, which was Nov. 11, Myers again had 90 minutes to create a dish. This time, the food had to incorporate winter truffles.

With Crawford’s winning Downtown Burger Battle entry from January, the Truffle Jam, Myers knew where to find his inspiration.

His dish featured lamb chops wrapped in bacon and winter truffle, berny potato croquette, truffle cheese spread, tomato jam and truffled watercress salad, garnished with a pretzel tuile.

Myers’ wife, Casey, and Andrew Morgan of Crawford’s served as his sous chefs.

“It was the scariest thing I’ve ever done,” Casey Myers said. “It was huge, way different than any competition we’ve done. Lots of people we know made finals. It was great being surrounded by so much talent.”

The second round featured 10 judges, five of whom were celebrity chefs, so each team had to plate 10 servings. The winner, Robert Rose of Vin Alegro in Discovery Bay, California, will compete in May 2024 against the 11 other category winners at the World Food Championship’s Final Table.

With his reserve champion finish, Myers has a guaranteed spot in next year’s competition and plans to compete again, yearning to make it to the Final Table.