Kenmore Blogging Summit Experience – Day 2

**WARNING:  This is gonna be a LONG post, so get comfy!!**

This morning I woke up and thought, “HOLY CARP!  I am in CHICAGO!” … this experience (and we haven’t even done the BIG stuff yet) has been AMAZING!

Saturday — 8am — Breakfast:  There was a large spread of food – yogurt, granola, fruit, all kinds of pastries!  I watched the snow fall gently to the ground while I ate.

9 am — We headed to the Kenmore Live Studios and started learning!

Chef Suzy Singh started things off by giving us some slow cooker tips (1 – clean your slow cooker with white vinegar & warm, sudsy water. 2 – if you can, cook on low. 3 – do NOT lift the slow cooker lid. 4 – when you do, lift the lid straight up so the condensation doesn’t get dumped in.)

Chef Suzy (can I call her that?) taught us how to make Kitchari and homemade Yogurt.

Did you know that people are drawn to foods that have white, red and green in them?!  (New to me!)

Slow Cooker Challenge – 1st annual slow cooker challenge!

We signed up for groups the night before, so after naming our teams – we were “The Cool Kids” – we were given a basket full of food with one mystery ingredient and we had to CREATE a slow cooker dish.  Our mystery ingredient was the turnip and we made a lentil stew.

     

When we were done with the slow cooker challenge, the Director of Marketing – Samuel Monnie – spoke about Kenmore and gave some really great information.

Something I didn’t know – Kenmore has introduced over 400 new items to the market over the last few years.  400?!  That’s a HUGE number!  

The best thing I pulled from his speech – “Kenmore is NOT your Grandmother’s brand.”

Then, Thomas Salvo spoke about the new Grab ‘N Go Refrigerator and the 50/50 Dual Oven.

Grab ‘N Go:

— 31 cubic feet

— uses vacuum panels for high efficiency insulation (so that you have more space in the fridge, but the footprint is the same)

— LED lighting on the top AND sides is space efficient

— 3 drawers in the freezer for organization (they are not designed to be pulled out)

50/50 Dual Oven:

— BOTH ovens are true convection ovens

— fits a 28 pound turkey in either oven (Did you know that 99.7% of turkeys are 28 pounds or less?!)

— this oven does not come in gas

Next, Marty Olsen spoke about laundry products.  In 2011, Kenmore was named most energy efficient in all laundry brands.  The newest Kenmore laundry pair – The Front Load HE Steam Washer & Dryer – will be released in March of this year and they use SmartMotion Technology.

Kenmore has this super-cool Kenmore Connect Symbol on select products (this number will grow over time), and on those products, you can run a diagnostic so when you have to phone the call center, they can listen to the recording and attempt to diagnose the problem over the phone.  If there is a problem with your product, the call center will schedule for someone to come out, and they will already know what part(s) to bring with them! {This is such a neat concept to me!!}

White Board Challenge – Write your brilliant ideas down on the white board (remember what you write) and the Kenmore folks will pick out their favorite top 10 ideas.

My idea – a thermometer so that you know exactly what temperature your oven is and if it’s at what you have it set for.

Lunch!  Truffleberry Market catered lunch and it was awesome!  Turkey wraps, chips, pesto pasta, caprese … LOTS of choices!

Vacuum Exercises – Mark Bayer taught us how to use the vacuum AND exercise at the same time.  I honestly don’t think I’ll ever do that – haha – but I guess you never know!  He also told us about his new healthy bar – the Mark Bar – full of good-for-you stuff.

Vacuum Challenge – We got into our groups and had to make a video highlighting the features of the vacuum we were working with. The Cool Kids did an “Aliens are Coming” skit!  It was SO funny!

Michelle (who will probably kill me for posting this) in her foil alien hat!

Keynote Speaker – Evan Hansen (the Editor in Chief at Wired.com)

“Well-researched blogs get lots of great respect.”

“Content speaks – Continue to evolve.”

“Don’t get too attached to one way of doing things” {This really hit home for me because I am such a creature of habit and I don’t LOVE change.}

“Overall development is slow – don’t be discouraged.”

“We will hit bumps in the road, but ultimately, we will recover.”

Chef Cassie Green – Owner of The Green Grocer – taught us about smoothies.

Basic Smoothie Recipe:

2 cups fruit – 1 cup greens – 1 cup liquid – 1/2 cup ice.

Make Me a Better Person Smoothie:

1/2 cup raspberries – 1 cup strawberries – 1/2 cup tangello – 1/2 cup mint – 1/2 cup kale – 1 tsp maca powder – 1 Tbsp chia seed – 1 cup hemp milk.  BLEND.  ENJOY!

Time to announce the WINNERS from the day’s challenges!

Slow Cooker Challenge: Tie (YIKES!) between Fox Force Five and The Cool Kids (my group).  Ultimately, Fox Force Five won!  Each member of their team got a Kenmore Slow Cooker!

Vacuum Video Challenge: Samuel Monnie decided on the winner for this challenge.  We watched the videos and he announced The Kenmore Elite group as the winner!  Each member of their group got a Flip Cam!

White Board Challenge: The Kenmore group decided on the top 10 ideas, and we each got to vote for our favorite.  Winners for the 4th and 5th place won a new Kenmore Toaster, 3rd – 1st place won a new Steam Iron and the GRAND PRIZE winner (GO MICHELLE!!) won a new Kenmore 50/50 Dual Oven (yea, remember the one ^^ up there?!  THAT one!)!!  SUPER COOL!

The End.  It was an absolutely amazing day!  A group of us went out for Chicago pizza for dinner (what’s being in Chicago without having Deep Dish Pizza?!).

        

To connect with Kenmore you can:

Follow them on twitter.

Like them on facebook.

Thanks again, Kenmore!! 

**Full Disclosure: I received an all expense paid trip to Chicago for the Kenmore Blogging Summit.  All thoughts and opinions are my own.