Event location:
The Madison Hotel
One Convent Rd., Morristown, NJ

Thursday, March 1, 6:30 p.m.
Members and guests: $175
Tables of ten: $2,000 or $2,500

For reservations or more information,
call Barbara d'Onofrio-Getze at (800) 626-8097.

Although the term is usually reserved for golf tournaments and yachting regatas, this "invitational" is about food. The invitees are all chefs, some from local New Jersey restaurants, others from as far afield as Boston and Providence, Rhode Island. And for the fifth year in a row, they are all gathering at the Madison Hotel to raise money for the Beard Foundation. The best part is, you're invited, too.

As in years past, this event is being chaired by Foundation president Len Pickell. To lend a hand this time around, he's enlisted Foundation trustee Nina Griscom, no stranger to star-studded Beard events and gatherings of great chefs. Coordinating the menu is none other than Hudson Valley Foie Gras's Michael Ginor, a galloping gourmet if ever there was one. It's no wonder so many of the invitees R.S.V.P.'d that they'd be thrilled to come.

Kirk Avondoglio is driving from Perona Farms in Andover, New Jersey. Makers of some of the best smoked salmon, pastrami salmon, and other specialty gourmet products, Perona Farms is also the place in northern New Jersey to tie the matrimonial knot. Lincoln Carson has been serving crowds his stylized Italian cucina since the second the doors flew open at Todd English's new Olives in the W Union Square hotel.

Just around the corner, Rocco DiSpirito has turned his multi-influenced seasonal French fare into a sensation at Union Pacific. The press can't get enough of his charm, his creativity, or his bay scallops with sea urchin and mustard oil vinaigrette. Ehab Habashi has home team advantage at this friendly contest of gastronomic gusto. He cooks at Rod's 1890s Restaurant in the historic Madison Hotel, site of the event, and you can be sure his "classic French and Italian cuisine executed with a fresh twist" will fare well, in both senses of the phrase.

James Beard Award-winners Johanne Killeen and George Germon practically invented the genre of casual, Mediterranean-inspired cooking at their revered Al Forno restaurant in Providence. From grilled pizzas to wood-fire-oven-roasted chicken, their light, seasonal, and strongly flavored cooking has inspired chefs and diners alike. If you've only ever made it to Short Hills for the shopping, then you've missed the real draw-Walter Leffler's neo-European cooking at the award-winning Hilton at Short Hills, which one local critic called "a culinary dream come true."

Tim Schafer cooks with more than fresh, top-of-the-line ingredients and culinary finesse, he cooks with passion at his eponymous new American bistro. At least that's what his followers at Ale Street News-he's known for cooking with beer-The Star-Ledger, and Zymurgy, not to mention his business card, say. Zagat called Tim Schafer's Cuisine a "standout" with "innovative, interesting fare."

The distance from the center of the Boston restaurant scene to Beantown's most innovative French-inspired cooking is Radius, where James Beard Award winner Michael Schlow has got the right formula. The combination of his extensive training and attention to detail have made good on Corby Kummer's prediction that Schlow would "raise Boston's national profile."

There's no denying that Edward Stone has almost single-handedly elevated the perception of inn dining at the Bernards Inn in Bernardsville, New Jersey. His sophisticated approach to new American cooking has helped earn the Inn too many awards to list here. His fellow statesman, Wally Weaver, runs the kitchens of The Grille & The Grape in Red Bank. Called by "The Artful Diner," a local reviewer, "excellent . . . one of the best in the area," the Grille has been attracting widespread attention since it opened last June.

Don't expect a hand-delivered invitation. R.S.V.P. today!