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Cocktail Connoisseur: Ryan Maybee

Ryan Maybee is a restaurateur with expertise in the fields of wine, spirits and mixology. To him, the craft of bartending is more than just making a drink. Rather, he believes bartending is a true skill akin to the professionalism of chefs and their culinary educations. This belief in bartending as an art form has been the basis for his career and educational pursuits in the beverage industry.

In 2007, Maybee turned his vast knowledge and experience into a comprehensive consulting business. He launched RoundTable Marketing and Consulting, which specializes in wine list and cocktail menu development, staff training, and restaurant and bar consultation. Later that year, RoundTable partnered with beverage industry expert, Doug Frost, to create the Greater Kansas City Bartending Competition. The annual competition showcases some of the most talented bartenders in Kansas City and serves as a benefit for a local charity, the HALO Foundation.

In 2009, he opened Manifesto, a small, speakeasy like bar focusing on classically inspired cocktails using all fresh and homemade ingredients. In a short time, the bar has already received overwhelming local and national attention by being noticed in The New York Times, Esquire, and winning Small Wonder Bar of the Year 2010 by Nightclub & Bar Magazine.

The Rieger Hotel opened in 1915 and was home to many travelling salesmen, railroad workers, and passersby during Kansas City’s formative years. The three-story brick building has a long, rich history and much of the décor, including the tile floor and the bathroom fixtures remain original. It was originally owned by Alexander Rieger, the son of Jacob Rieger, who was the founder of J. Rieger & Co. Whiskey. J. Rieger & Co. operated out of Kansas City’s West Bottoms neighborhood, also known as “The Wettest Block in the World”, from 1877 to 1919. The whiskey distribution company became one of the largest in the country before Prohibition and the Volstead Act put an end to their success. But the Rieger name lived on here at the hotel, and in 2010 The Rieger Hotel Grill & Exchange brought back that classic name and identity. It’s our goal to honor the history of the Rieger name while adding a new and lasting landmark restaurant to Kansas City’s culinary landscape.

Recipe for The Pendergast:

1/2 ounce Bénédictine
3/4 ounce Sweet Vermouth
1 1/2 ounces Bourbon
Couple dashes of Angostura Bitters

Pour over ice. Stir to chill. Pour into glass. Zest with a lemon. Enjoy.

Tags: Doug Frost, Food, History, Prohibition, The Local Show, TLS207, Wine

Confluence of Art & Nature: Overland Park Arboretum & Botanical Gardens

Friends of the Arboretum Chair Dennis Patton discusses some recent changes at the Overland Park Arboretum and what is in store for the 300-acre attraction.

Visitors heading out to the Overland Park Arboretum are now greeted by a big surprise: a ticket charge. After more than two decades as a free attraction, the 300-acre outdoor venue just-off of 179th street and 69 Highway is now charging $3 dollars to enter and a buck for kids.

Thanks in part to the controversy over a bronze statue of a topless woman, last year was the best ever for the arboretum which is trying to get visitors to think of them as MORE than just a park. Joining us on The Local Show is the Chair of the Friends of the Arboretum Dennis Patton.

Tags: Art, Conservation & Nature, The Local Show, TLS318

Constructing Fields of Dreams: Scott Radecic & Populous

Nick Haines talks to Populous Senior Partner Scott Radecic about how the local sports architecture firm with a global reputation is playing an integral part in the London 2012 Olympic Games with their stadium design work.

The 2012 Summer Olympics start July 27 in London and Kansas City can be proud to play a big hand in the the almost month long global sporting event.

You may not know this, but London’s Olympic Stadium is designed by Populous, the sports architecture firm, with its world headquarters in the River Market right here in Kansas City. More than a hundred architects with Populous, which changed its name from HOK Sport in 2009, worked on the stadium design. The company has offices in London and around the world.

We sat down with Populous Senior Principal Scott Radecic to talk about how this local sports architecture firm is playing such an integral part in the London games and innovative sports venues around the globe.

Olympic Stadium | London 2012 from Populous on Vimeo.

Tags: The Local Show, TLS302

Coping With the Loss of a Fur Baby: Pet Grieving Support Group

Many of us have experienced the terrible sadness that accompanies the loss of a beloved family pet. Producer Justin Bond takes viewers inside the local Struan Center, where Dr. Raphael Smith conducts a Pet Loss Grief Counseling and Support Group.

Anyone who has experienced the death of a pet knows how heartbreaking that can be. But for some, the loss of a dog or a cat can be so emotionally wrenching it actually affects their physical and mental health.

The tale of a middle-aged woman so devastated by her dog’s death that she had to be put on a life support system is just one extreme example. But pet owners who even months after a loss still have trouble eating and sleeping are common and in Kansas City mental health professionals say they are increasingly treating patients for chronic depression brought on by the death of a pet. At the Struan Center in south Kansas City psychologist Dr. Raphael Smith runs a regular pet grief group therapy session. KCPT and producer Justin Bond got a rare opportunity to take its cameras inside to witness a recent meeting.

Tags: Mental Health, The Local Show, TLS330

Creative Control: Jacqueline Chanda

Randy Mason sits down with Jacqueline Chanda to discuss all things Kansas City Art Institute.

Finally this week, we welcome Jacqueline Chanda to the show. Don’t recognize that name? She’s the new head of the Kansas City Art Institute that has been making news of late and not just because it is eyeing up plans to open a downtown location.

She’s the 23rd President of Kansas City’s venerable art school and she took time out of her busy schedule to sit down with Randy Mason.

Tags: Art, The Local Show, TLS315

Culture Alfresco: Denton Yockey & Starlight Theatre

With the curtain about to rise on another season of top Broadway shows and big name concert performers at Starlight Theatre, we caught up with Starlight's man in charge, Denton Yockey.

A new season of live theater is about to get underway at Starlight Theatre. The Swope Park theater with its iconic towers has been entertaining Kansas Citians under the stars for more than 60 years.

Starlight is one of only three outdoor theatres of its size and type still operational in the United States. The Muny in St. Louis and Wolf Trap in Vienna, Virginia are the others. With the curtain about to rise on another season of top Broadway shows and big name concert performers, we caught up with Starlight’s man in charge, Denton Yockey.

Here is a look at the upcoming Broadway Shows:

In The Heights
June 5-10

Memphis
July 10-15

Peter Pan
July 24-29

Elton John & Tim Rice’s Aida
August 3-12 at The Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts

La Cage Aux Folles
August 28-September 2

The 2012 Concert Season is also filling up with artists such as Barry Manilow, James Taylor, Crosby, Stills & Nash, My Morning Jacket, Band of Horses, Phish, B.B. King, Il Divo and many, many more.

Tags: Local, Music, The Local Show, TLS228

The Deadliest Mental Illness: Eating Disorders

The Local Show presents a special episode on local trends and issues surrounding the important topic of eating disorders, which affects millions of Americans - women and men.

Free Referrals to Services and Counseling in KC…

Approximately 200,000 women and men, girls and boys in the Kansas City Metro area suffer from an eating disorder. The JFS Eating Disorder Resource Center connects individuals and their families to support services and access to treatment.

Call 913-327-4690

This week on The Local Show, we take you inside the hidden world of eating disorders. Later tonight, KCPT brings you a national documentary that chronicles the millions of Americans suffering from anorexia and bulimia. Remarkably, they are conditions that have the highest fatality rate of all psychiatric disorders. Yet, as your about to see, it’s becoming increasing difficult to get a health insurance company to cover its treatment.

You will hear several stories from people suffering from these devastating illnesses in Erasing Eating Disorders, a national public television documentary coming up at 8 p.m. here on KCPT, or immediately following The Local Show if you’re watching the rebroadcast of this program.

Nick Haines sits down with Mary Beth Blackwell, Director of the Eating Disorder Resource Center at Jewish Family Services, and Kori Hintz-Bohn, Executive Director of the Renew Counseling Center, an intensive outpatient program for eating disorders, based in Olathe.

We take you inside a local group home for women learning to overcome their eating disorders. Thalia House in Fairway, Ks. is a six person transitional home designed to fill an unmet need–to help women who have been released from hospital for anorexia and bulimia but are not quite ready to resume their normal lives.

Coming up at 8:30 here on KCPT, POV shows Girl Model which show an unseen side of the modeling industry as talent scouts recruit pre-pubescent girls overseas.

Can we as a society help decrease these startling eating disorder statistics? We are bombarded with messages with what to eat, not eat, what diet to be on, how to look, how to dress from the media. Media messages come from movies, television, magazines, or what brand clothing we wear. Last year at Johnson County Community College, they screened the new film America the Beautiful 2: The Thin Commandments about our country’s obsession with beauty and thinness.

And finally, there are three things not to say to someone with an eating disorder according to the eating recovery center:

1. Why can’t you just eat?
2. Everybody hates their body sometimes
3. Yes, I’ll keep your eating disorder a secret

Eating disorders are the deadliest mental illness. A woman with anorexia nervosa is 5.6 times more likely to die than another woman of her same age. The most frequent causes of death from eating disorders are suicide (32 percent), complications associated with anorexia (19 percent), and cancer (11 percent). The average age of death for an individual with anorexia is only 34 years.

WARNING SIGNS

Resources:

National Eating Disorder Hotline at 1-800-931-2237.
Thalia House
Jewish Family Services Eating Disorder Center
NEDA

The first ever Kansas City NEDA Walk will be on Saturday, June 15 from 8-11 a.m. at Berkley Park at the KC Riverfront.

Tags: Eating Disorder, Healthcare, Mental Health, The Local Show, TLS325

Debates of the States: Medicaid Expansion Deal

Producer Sam Zeff explores the debate over Medicaid changes in Missouri and Kansas.

Welcome to this first Local Show of this brand New Year. If you thought the fight over what so many now refer to as Obamacare was over, it’s not. It has simply moved to state capitals.

While the Supreme Court upheld most of the Affordable Care Act, it left up to states whether to expand Medicaid. Medicaid Expansion is going to be one of the most contentious issues lawmakers wrestle with in Topeka and Jefferson City as they prepare to start new legislative sessions in both states.

It’s one of those issues that gets complicated fast. In this report from Sam Zeff, we try to make sense of it all, by picking apart what’s at stake so we can better understand the arguments on both sides. KCPT’s reporting on healthcare issues is funded in part by a grant from the Health Care Foundation of Greater Kansas City.

Production support provided by:
Majestic Rhinos, LLC
film & digital moving pictures
www.MajesticRhinos.com

Tags: The Local Show, TLS317

Debt Feeling: Cargo Container Critique

Sculptor John Salvest used 105 cargo containers to send a message. The temporary installation rests directly across from the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. The red, white and blue containers spell “IOU” on one side and “USA” on the other. The piece is supposed to provoke commentary about our monetary policy and current debt crisis and spark discussion about both our economy and the role the Federal Reserve plays in it. As you can imagine the Fed was none too pleased with the project and initially fought its installation. See it for yourself…now through October 16th.

What sort of message do you think the artist is trying to send?

Tags: The Local Show, TLS208

Deciphering the Healthcare Code: The Affordable Care Act 101

This week, The Local Show tries to help crack the code of the Affordable Care Act in a panel discussion with regional healthcare leaders shot on location at The Kauffman Foundation.

It is more than two and a half years since Congress passed and the President signed the Affordable Care Act. And it has been a good three months now since the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the federal healthcare law. This week, The Local Show goes on location at the Kauffman Foundation for a conversation with regional health leaders to get a status report on how Kansas and Missouri are implementing these reforms and how the law is impacting small business owners, the uninsured, college students and those with pre-existing medical conditions.

It’s complicated…head scratching stuff. Do you know what a state health insurance exchange is? It’s one of the basic questions we get to the bottom of in this program.

Also, a quick reality check on the Affordable Care Act. Did you Know that while many of its most controversial provisions don’t go into effect until 2014, you can keep your college age kids on your health insurance plan until their 26. That is in effect now. And insurers are no longer allowed to charge women more than men simply because of their gender. Plus, insurance companies can no longer charge or require a co-pay for over 60 preventative care services.

Currently, 48 million Americans don’t have health insurance. The Affordable Care Act is supposed to dramatically diminish that number by providing, finally in this country, an affordable option for most Americans through the creation of new insurance pools managed by the states where people could get coverage at a reasonable price.

States are to start enrolling patients starting next year so that by 2014 they would be covered by health insurance, but as of now, only 15 states have established those so called “state health exchanges” and Kansas and Missouri are not among them.

In Missouri, there’s a statewide issue on the ballot November 6th that, if approved by voters, would block the governor or any Missouri agency from creating a state health exchange without approval from voters or the legislature.

In Kansas, Governor Brownback has chosen not to work towards establishing an exchange until the results of the Presidential election are known.

The panelists for this discussion include:

Jay Anghoff, Regional Director
U.S. Health Department

Andrea Routh, Executive Director
Missouri Health Advocacy Alliance

Sheldon Weisgrau, Director
Health Reform Resource Project

Ryan Barker, Public Policy Director
Missouri Foundation for Health

Cindy Hermes
Kansas Insurance Commission