Simsbury Restaurant Owner Nominated for Prestigious Chef Award

The owner of one of northern Connecticut’s finest restaurants has been named a semifinalist for a prestigious award.

Tyler Anderson, owner of Millwright’s at 77 West Street in Simsbury, is one of two Connecticut semifinalists in the Best Chef: Northeast category of the 26th annual James Beard Foundation Awards.

The restaurant’s web site says Anderson “draws on a foundation of age-old French cooking techniques. That foundation supports culinary methods specific to historic New England, such as the practice of roasting vegetables in salt over a wood fire.”

Local ingredients play an integral role at Millwright’s. Anderson “has made the commitment to buy 80 percent of the ingredients used in the kitchen from purveyors in New England and upstate New York. He also takes the farm-to-table concept one step further. Millwright’s has partnered with a farm that will grow most of its organic produce,” according to the web site.

Anderson and Bear’s Smokehouse owner Jamie McDonald will soon be opening a new restaurant in West Hartford called The Cook and the Bear.

Dan Magill of Arethusa al Tavolo in Bantam is the other semifinalist from the Nutmeg State.

Finalists will be announced March 15 during a press conference at the Presidio Officers’ Club in San Francisco. Winners will be announced May 2 at the 2016 James Beard Awards Gala at Lyric Opera of Chicago.

Photo credit: www.millwrightsrestaurant.com