A Foodie Weekend in Toronto

Had a wonderful weekend in Toronto – it was a last minute thing to escape – just too much going on and don’t feel like I’ve recuperated from the holidays. So Jon and I ran away. Saturday morning, we got up early and went to yoga at White Oaks – if you’ve never been, I think it’s Niagara’s best fitness club, it’s certainly the most luxurious.

After yoga we headed up to Toronto and checked into the Hyatt Regency on King St. I book this the night before because of the rate. They were giving away rooms at $119 per night. I almost didn’t book it, thinking it was going to be a bad experience, but the Hyatt has a great reputation so I took a chance. We checked in and it was beautiful! Our room was very contemporary – just the way we like it and our stay was fantastic.

We dropped off our bags and bundled up. We headed east on King stopped into Roy Thompson Hall to see what was playing – a Mozart concert! I love classical so we bought a couple of tickets and headed over to Queen for a bite to eat.

Queen street certainly has changed from my memory of it. No longer is it flooded with trendy restaurants, but more clothing shops have taken over and the restaurants are fewer and far between. We walked by one and it was packed with what seemed like locals, not tourists so we went in. It was the Queen Mother Café, the décor was very pubby, menu incredibly eclectic with healthy salads, Asian and Indian dishes. The food was great, the ambience bustling and noisy – perfect for big city dining – a great place with even better prices.

We walked the Toronto streets for a while going in and out of shops and found ourselves at the Art Gallery of Ontario. It was closing in less than an hour so we didn’t go in, but found the gift shop fantastic! This is where I’m doing my Christmas shopping this year.

We went back to the hotel, got out our iPads. I brought a bottle of Nyarai Cellars Sauvignon Blanc (it's my favourite these days!) (www.nyaraicellars.ca) so we poured a few glasses and headed downstairs. The hotel charges for internet service but Starbucks doesn’t so we picked a plush corner of the lobby close to Starbucks and sure enough, the internet worked. We sipped on wine and surfed the net in search of our next travel destination - dreaming of a warmer destination.

Still full from lunch, we headed to the concert – it was fantastic! No better than fantastic! Music Director Peter Oundjian did a great job and the symphony was stunning. I listen to classical all the time and don’t claim to know much about it except I like most of it, but listening to it live, it really takes you in and vibrates right down to your soul – amazing!

On our way back to the hotel we stopped into Oliver Bonnaccini’s new eatery O & B Canteen at the TIFF Bell LightBox Centre. The atmosphere is sleek and modern with a casual ambience. It was lively and while the menu was small, the choices great and the food delicious. I had the beet salad with salmon which was great but Jon had the steak which was a bit disappointing – a tough piece of overcooked meat even though we’d asked for medium rare. Oh well, all was still good.

The next morning we bundled up and headed over to Spadina for coffee. We stopped into a little place that I won’t mention. It was a bit dirty and their idea of Chai Latte and mine don’t really agree. We walked up to Chinatown and did some shopping in the many grocery stores that spill into the sidewalks with foods, flavours and smells as foreign to me as a trip to China. It’s an exciting discovery and we bought lots of stuff for Jordan, our vegetarian son including green papayas for one of our favourite salads.

Chinatown is getting ready for the Chinese New Year with all sorts or decorations and firecrackers. In the midst of the grocery stores I found Tap Phong Trading Company. It’s a giant store filled with kitchen utensils, dishes, pots and pans, machinery from toasters to restaurant quality mixers and ovens. We spent the better part of the afternoon just in Tap Phong’s and left with loads of new stuff for our kitchen. It’s really cheap too! – I mean dirt cheap!

We loaded the car and headed for new Longo’s on York street in Maple Leaf Square. Everyone in Niagara is talking about it so I just had to go. Parking is free if you spend more than $30 and if you’ve ever bought groceries, you know that’s no problem. The store really focuses on ready made foods, but Longo’s makes them themselves. They look wholesomely good and delicious. You can buy ready made take out or eat it in their cafe. The store is a little short on staple cleaning supplies, but that’s ok, we can shop at cheaper bulk stores for those items and shop here for fresh and delicious food. My only complaint is that I wished they’d offer more local foods. They also have a wine shop, kitchen for cooking demonstrations and a café.

But here in Niagara I’m loving my Commisso’s Food Store in Niagara Falls, it’s the closest thing to the new Longo’s with ready made foods. At Commisso’s they have in-house chefs that cook up delicious dishes all day and you can take them home or eat in their trendy, modern café.

Anyway, I’m home and in case you’re wondering where the pictures are – there aren’t any; my camera is still in for repair. A great foodie weekend!

Wine Books for Local Food Donations

Tis’ the season for giving and that’s exactly what Niagara Cooks is hoping to do. Author Lynn Ogryzlo has purged her wine library of over 100 titles and offering them up for a donation to The Craig Award.

Here’s how it works. You pick a title you’d like and it’s yours for a donation. Some titles have a $10 price attached to them and that’s the least amount of donation accepted, others with no amount you can have for whatever you’d like to donate.

The books are lovingly read and lightly handled so most of them look as good as new, there are however, a few with a look of being thoroughly loved.

Choose from the eclectic pile that includes anything from The Oxford Companion to Wines, by Jancis Robinson to Wine Tastes, Wine Styles by Andrew Jefford. There are books on South Africa and others on health, like The Save Your Heart Wine Book. There are some by Simon & Schuster as well as William & Sonoma. There are books about cooking with wine, tasting wine, learning about wine and lots of coffee table style books from the experts; all great for holiday giving for an aspiring student, an eager enthusiast or a winetasting pro.

The Craig Award is a new research scholarship program funded by the Ogryzlo’s and run through Niagara College. It’s to financially encourage students and farmers to work together on innovative agricultural projects that have a positive outcome for Niagara’s local food culture.

Please join the Ogryzlo’s this holiday season, give the gift of wine and food reading while creating a stronger local food community in Niagara.

For a listing of the books, go to www.NiagaraCooks.ca

Niagara's Saffron Harvest

It’s saffron harvest season in Niagara! Robert and Melissa Achal of NOEB Lavender on Niagara Stone Road in Niagara-on-the-Lake are in full saffron harvest. Over 400 pots, each with one crocus bulb bloom intermittedly and Robert has to hand harvest each one.

The harvest runs from mid November to mid December, these little pots burst with beautiful blossoms. It’s Robert Achal’s job to pick each flower, open it up and remove the 4 stamens waiting inside each one of them.

Robert is originally from Figi and everything he does from growing his exotic plants and making them into lines of cosmetics are traditions he learned from his home country and from his grandmother who is an herbalist in Figi.

The worlds largest saffron production comes from Iran. It’s where Robert got his crocus bulbs. Every second year the bulbs are divided and there are waiting lists of companies waiting for the division of the bulbs so they can begin their own saffron production. Robert put his name on that list and in October, they arrived. The new bulbs usually take a year to flower but amazingly, they began to bloom in November. “They must like their new home”, says Robert.

The saffron harvest runs approximately 4 weeks. It starts when the flowers begin to bloom and ends when they no longer bloom. Each bulb can give off 3 to 4 flowers during harvest. Robert himself hand harvests his crop every day. He refers to the crocuses as a fall crocus. It’s is not the kind you grow in your garden, if you use the wrong kind of crocus stamen it could be very poisonous.

To harvest saffron, the entire flower is pinched off the stem of the plant, then each flower is opened and the stems removed very carefully. If a saffron thread is broken upon removal, it is useless, so each one is handled very delicately. A saffron stamen goes from red at the bottom to orange at the top and the redder the saffron, the higher the quality.

To cook with saffron you must soak real saffron in water before you use it then pulverize it with a mortar and pestal. Then you’re ready to add it to dishes for amazing colour and flavour. It’s great in a saffron curry sauce, you can make a saffron cake, it goes well with lamb and seafood pastas and of course the quintessential saffron dish is Bouillabaisse.

Robert is happy to be growing the real thing. For a few years now he’s been growing what is known as a “poor man’s saffron” or Egyptian saffron. This is really a Calendula flower and not a crocus. It doesn’t bleed like real saffron so it doesn’t colour a dish as well. The flower petals are dried and cured and as it does this, the petals shrivel into threads that look like saffron. It’s a great substitute, but it’s not the real thing.

Crocuses are beautiful, delicate little flowers and as I gaze at them in Robert’s greenhouse, appreciating their beauty, I wonder who thought that removing the little stamens, drying them and pulverizing them would make a great ingredient in seafood dishes. I don’t know who had such an amazing mind, but I’m sure glad they did.

NOEB Lavender, 758 Niagara Stone Rd, Niagara-on-the-Lake

Catching some Silver Bass

If you live in Niagara s I do it’s there’s always something new to eat, something special to discover. This week I got a call from Rod Minor in Port Colborne.

Rod is fisherman and he fishes the waters of Lake Erie. There’s nothing better than the fresh, clean flavours of lake fish. I tend to prefer them to the oily, density of salt water fish. I find them easier to cook with because you can add some verjus and no matter what accompanies with lake fish, it all offers clean, fresh flavous.

This week Rod pulled some beautiful Silver Bass from Lake Erie. So I told Rod I’d take 3 whole ones – no filetting, just clean them and I’d cook them whole. I was feeling like a little dinner presentation was in order.

Wow, when I got to Minor Fish (176 West St) the 3 fish were so large I began wondering who I’d have to invite for dinner. One of the Silver Bass alone would feed both my husband and I.

On the way home I sorted out what I’d do with them so I made a quick detour to the grocery store for a few boxes of coarse salt.

I washed the fish inside and out, put a few herbs and bit of verjus in the cavity and laid them on a 2-inch bed of salt. Then I covered them with an inch of salt. I left the heads and tails exposed for presentation, then I roasted them for almost an hour.

When they were ready to serve, I chipped away at the salt crust, brushed away any remaining salt, peeled away the skin and began eating the flesh. Oh my gosh!! This fish was succulently juicy, the tender meat flaked beautifully and my husband and I devoured one in the blink of any eye. It was a big one though, so we were very full.

Tonight we’re taking the other 2 to my uncles house for dinner. I’m taking the pickerel cheeks also. I just couldn’t resist, when I was waiting for my Silver Bass to be packaged up, I saw these silver-dollar sized pickerel cheeks. I’m going to bread them and cook them up with some bacon and herbs – perhaps I’ll fry up some sage chips. Them I’ll make a spicy aioli to dip them in – they should be good.

If you live in Niagara I highly recommend a beautiful drive out to Port Colborne to Minor Fish. The 3 large Silver Bass only cost $6.75! A feast to last 3 days and at shockingly low prices – get out there before Rod reads this email and contemplates raising his prices.

Farmhouse Grill

On Saturday Jon and I found ourselves in Keene, Ontario with a few minutes on our hands. If you know Keene, you know there’s not a lot to do, so we looked for a place to have coffee and in the middle of a not-a-lot-happening place, we found the most amazing diner.

There it sat on the crosssroads of Keene’s main intersection – Farmhouse Grill. For 2 lovavores, this was the perfect place to sit and have our coffee. Jon turned off the road to park and out of the diner came a group of rather rough looking guys, they were a motley crew of hard core farmers for sure, almost made us city folk want to just drive by.

We parked the car next to a large tractor and more people came out of this little diner. We walked inside and it was packed. People were lined up at the counter ordering take-out coffee and more were seated, eating large platters of typical breakfasts of sausages, eggs and homefries.

We found a table and sat down. It was a busy little place, decor was exactly what I’d expected – I figured it would have to be casual and rustic to make its patrons comfortable and it was. The longer I sat and the longer I watched the activity, I found myself relaxing and warming to it. This place definitely had charm; at the very least it was completely organic.

Jessica, our waitress finally had a minute to come over. She brought menus and a cloth to clean the table. We decided we’d eat because the menu was absolutely irresistible! The Famished Farmer Special was the large meal we’d noticed when we arrived. Jessica tells us it’s popular, especially the homefries that are made from potatoes they peel themselves.

Jon was wavering between the Barn Raising Omelette and the Farmers’ Daughters Choice. I went for the Traditional Farmer’s Breakfast. All of the meat used in their restaurant is local. I’m not surprised, we were in Keene to meet a cattle farmer; this seems to be cattle territory.

I hear they’re famous for their Traditional Back Kitchen Burgers that Eva makes. Eva works the kitchen and often comes out to serve customers the meals she’s made them. Being totally unprepared for this place, I wrote my notes on a napkin.

If you’re looking for the real deal in country conviviality, then take a Saturday drive to Keene for lunch. Make sure your GPS takes you through the backroads and along the Trent River system for a great drive.


Farmehouse Grill
Located at the 4 corners in Keene
705-295-4242

O & B Canteen
I'm in Toronto at O & B Canteen, a casual eaterie on KIng St West. What a great place! WonderfuL atmosphere! Casual, refreshing. Ordered the Thai coleslaw and it was eye popping good. Israeli cous cous was a bit boring, my take is that if it was just slightly warm the flavours would be much much better. Actually, I predict they would be eye-popping great! Entree was lamb gnocchi another really bland dish but the Calabrese pizza hit a home run. Dessert could't be better, light as a cloud, freshly lemony perfect!

Check it out it really is a fantastic place and my guess is that they will have the food sorted out soon enough.

Tomorrow is the Ontario Culinary Tourism Summit and I'm looking forward to discovering what's new in local food across the province!

The Best Greek Memories

Well I think I left you all in Santorini didn’t I? The thing with blogging is that when you’re really busy, you just can’t leave to share it. There were rays of sun to catch, bottles of wine to sip, amazing dishes to savour, quaint little villages to explore and stunningly beautiful scenery to bath in. Now that I’m back and almost caught up (are we ever caught up!!) I am reminiscing the best parts and it’s the perfect time to share.

After my rude beginning with bad food and exorbitant prices I wised up – come on, tell me you’ve all been there! Santorini is simply an amazing island. For a winter population of 2,000 it has the most sensational restaurants. Here are my 3 favourites…….

Perivoli, (www.perivoli-restaurant.gr) Exo Gonia beach. They’re calling it Greek creative cuisine, but I call it nothing short of the best culinary experience I’ve had so far. It’s a blend of amazingly light textures, bursts of flavours and surprising presentations. Many say that 1800 in Oia is the best restaurant on the island and while I think it’s great, it can’t hold a candle to this new restaurant that is leagues ahead of anything else on the island.

Seleni (www.selene.gr) in Pyrgos. This is Santorini’s quintessential farm to table fine dining restaurant. I first discovered Selini about 10 years ago when it was in downtown Fira, now it’s on a high point on the island in a little village called Pyrgos. The bus will take you there and with Santorini’s new more modern buses you can dress up for one of the best meals on the island.

Sea Side by Notos (www.seaside-restaurant.gr) Perivolos Beach. This is an exciting place to be with white washed benches and boat-lounges, extreme design and even more extreme food presentation on the plate – and it’s extremely delicious! Just to sit on the beach lounges and sip on a chilled cocktail surveying the sea is a job I wouldn’t pass up.

Nichteri at Kamari beach was recommended to me but I never made it there. I'm planning to back in the summer of 2012, if anyone is interested incoming along, I know the best places to stay, eat, drink - and oh yea, shop!