Il Covo Trattoria, James Bay, Victoria

The Superior Cafe  served up some excellent food, for both brunch and evening meals.  Apart from its questionable live music choices, it was one the best lesser known eateries in Victoria.  Sadly, there was ownership changes of the building, and the chef and restaurateur moved on, and it became a supper club.   And then nothing...

Until this summer, when Il Covo opened.  I'd vaguely heard about a new place opening, but hadn't really enquired much, with a list of other places I wanted to try for evening dining, and a limited set of opportunities.  Then I had a Wednesday evening booked with the gorgeous Brunette of my Acquaintance, and I'd seen a re-tweet of a BC Hydro candle-lit evening offer.  With the Il Covo on the list, and after looking it up, I decided this was the place to try out.

We arrived early, and had to wait outside while they prepared the candle.  The Superior used to have a cluttered feel, with a lot of art, odd tables scattered around and an awkwardly placed stage.  This has been considerably cleaned up, with a more formal lay out of the seating. The stage has gone, opening up the room with a large picture window at one end.  The high ceilings, lit by a huge chandelier (dim electric bulbs, not candles even for this event) made for a much more open, easy feel.

The place was dark and intimate for this BC Hydro special: being green by dining out by candle light.  Even if candles are probably more expensive in terms of energy to produce than the hydro-electric powered bulbs.  But also a little more romantic.  And it made us realise how dark it must have been living in candle-powered houses in the 1700's.  It also made the menus a lot harder to read, though I noticed one expert diner had their own pocket flashlight.

We settled in with a cocktail.  The Brunette opted for a Negroni, made specially with an Artichoke based Vermouth, which she had loved at Be Love.  The bartender went and found it in their back bar when asked, which was good of them to make a substitution. I went for a saffron infused martini.  Which was a little dry for my tastes, so they sweetened it up.  This made it perfect to sip along with my meal, keeping the taste buds alive and interested.  The Negroni got a full thumbs up too.

For starter, we shared a platter of 'Antipasto mistto della casa', a mix of vegetables and meat.  The pickled and roasted peppers were fantastically sweet.  The pesto and mozzarella piles with a juicy tomato had all the flavours that you expected in Italian food.  The fatty mouth feel of the cheese, the basil and olive oil richness and the tart sharpness of tomato. The other parts were almost as good, but these two items stood out. We were also served two bowls of bread, with an olive oil and balsamic vinegar dipping mix.  I made the school boy error of eating far too much of it before my pasta arrived.  But it was so good.  Light and crumbly with a just crusty enough crust.

Still, I had just room left for my 'Pesto alla Genovese'.  A pile of linguine, covered in a rich pesto sauce and mingled in with new potatoes and green beans.  The potatoes were waxy and had a rich, earthy flavour, set off with the pesto sauce. I could have eaten a pile of these without the pasta. The pasta was al dente, cooked just right to carry and cradle the sauce. And the green beans didn't disappoint.  Blanched beans are one of my favourite foods as they work well so many cuisines, and give a firm bite to food but with a tender, almost sweet flavour.

The Brunette went for the seared yellow fin tuna.  I've often had over-cooked and tough tuna steak, or worse still, its seared to a mush on the outside, but a cold purple on the inside, with neither part having any flavour.  Il Covo turned my views on tuna steak around.  This was juicy and flavourful.  There was a touch of the brine in the steak, setting of the meaty, umami flavour of the flesh.  The vegetables included more of the roasted peppers, with a zesty sauce on top.

The meal was finished with a small morsel of chocolate truffles.  We got those to go, stuffed to the gunnels with the bread, entrées and antipasti.  Our server boxed them up nicely, though the cream and strawberry topping had gotten all a little smushed around the tin foil tray.  After a spot of digestion back at the VicInPerson ranch, we ate them with a cup of tea, and they were much appreciated.

The downside to the romantic candles was the inability to see the food.  I think it would have looked as great as it tasted, but we just don't know... until we go back.

Bon Sushi, Royal Oak, Victoria

It's been a long week, made longer by a Saturday morning in the office testing some code because this is not my full time job.  I say that with the conceit that most people reading this don't know me in real life, when I realize that my regular readers are friends and family (hi Mum!), with a scattering of people linked in from Urbanspoon and Google searches.

So for those people, on with the review.  I pulled off into the Royal Oak plaza for something to eat, and recalled there was a Sushi place there.  Perfect to keep me going for the day.  I duck in through the rear entrance, and am guided from the pick up area to a small table next to the cashier desk, handed a menu and left alone to decide.

My normal sushi choices at a place I haven't been before is BC Roll and Katsu Don.  No BC roll here, and no close equivalent that doesn't involve cream cheese.  Instead I order two pieces of Salmon Nigiri and two pieces of Tuna Nigiri, with their Katsu Don.

The nigiri is a large slice of fish, draped over a small block of rice arranged so it almost hides the white grains.  It's a long thin diamond shape, not too thick and the cut runs across the muscle, which makes sushi feel interesting in the mouth, as well as given more taste.   The cuts were fresh, and worked well with the light soy sauce provided.  The rice was was cooked just right, not too sticky, not too hard.  Very good indeed.

The Katsu Don was not served how I expected it.  I am used to a large bowl of rice, with some breaded pork cutlet, an egg and a few bits of fried onion.  Maybe a little bit of steak sauce dumped on top, or a teriyaki sauce squirted in lines over the sliced cutlet.

Here it was plated up, with a smaller pile of rice on one half of the plate, just enough to hide under the cutlet, which was a good sized piece of meat.  On the other side of the plate was a heap of greens and three yellowy slices of pickled something (beets, perhaps?), and a little ramekin of a gingery, thick vinaigrette.  The cutlet was topped with a good amount of the light brown steak sauce common to Japanese restaurants.  And it was good.  Cooked so it was still moist and tender on the inside, but with plenty of crunch on the outside, I was disappointed when I finished the last bite, even though I was satiated.  The salad made a nice counter point to the rich, savoury meat, with a crisp bite, added to by the dressing and the crunchy, acid of the pickles.

I was at first disappointed that I was given a knife and fork, but you know what?  It made it far easier for me to eat, and enjoy, and not make a mess everywhere.  With a bowl, one can lift it to your mouth and scoop in the rice.  Not so easy with a plate.

I also liked a couple of nice little touches here.  The green tea was softer and less harsh than some genmaicha (roasted rice and green leaf) teas I have had.  Refreshing and gentle.  I also liked the chopstick rest, which made it easier to manage your cutlery while chewing over the Nigiri.

Service was fair, they seemed to have forgotten about me at one point, despite there being four tables and two servers.  But once they recalled the guy hiding behind the plants next to the cashier desk, all was well.   Certainly would go back again for a longer meal.  Pleasantly surprised.

The Half Marathon

My second running of the Victoria Half Marathon happened this weekend.  So not much time to write long reviews of places I ate, or to describe in shocking detail the difference between hash browns and country potatoes.

Saturday was a day with the Brunette, and a nice cup of tea in the Bengal Lounge at the Empress.  Very nice tea, very nice service.  Must go back for the curry sometime.  This was followed up by shopping for running shoes (sales! discounts) and a quick Bento Box at Shiki Sushi.  Rice with steak sauce and little bits of Katsu Chicken.  Tasty stuff.  Filled a need.  Price is good.  Then home, lazy evenings and sleep.

I got up early my body clock decided 5am in the morning was a reasonable time to wake up, even if I did need my rest before the run.  Drank a lot of water, had a banana and jumped in the car.  Then jumped out as I discovered I was missing my race number.  Then back in the car.  And then back put again as I try to find my headphones.  And then finally off, down town, park up and walk to start line.  And the huge queue for the port-a-potties. Thanks to th guy who pointed out the men's standing, open air pillars.  Though it is weird to urinate with hundreds of people behind you....

And then we ran.  I was pacing myself and a friend to finish in two and half hours.  So we started near the back of the pack, to let the faster runners have free space.  Sadly, many people aren't that thoughtful and we spent the first kilometre dodging around walkers.  Annoys me no end.  If you are gonna be walking the course, just hang back.  The extra 3 minutes to cross the line doesn't matter, but lets everyone settle down earlier.

But apart from that, I had a fine old time.  The run down around Beacon Hill Park to Dallas Road fills me with joy and a light footed feeling.  The elusive runner's high and a state of sub-concious happiness that makes you forget you are exerting yourself.  The we saw the Brunette on the turn around at 13 km, provisioned with a banana and fresh electrolyte water it was a nice easy feeling back to Dallas Road.  The last two to three kilometres were harder, but my friend did a grand job sticking to the pace, and we cruised home about ninety seconds under our target time.

Water and a quick change in the View Street Parkade (sorry to the truck owner who had to see that) and met everyone (The Brunette, with her daughter; Andrea who run great despite some water issues, my co-runner and her man) at The Guild for a big fry up.  Lashings of coffee, sunny-side eggs and chunky sausage and a meatloaf sized slice of black pudding.  Thank you, The Guild.  Just what I needed.

A quick medicinal chai at Be Love and a dissection of the race with Andrea and I headed home, for a rest.  Now for Turkey dinner!

Purple Garden Chinese Restaurant, Mount Tolmie

The Brunette of my Acquaintance and myself had had a hard days doing things.  You know weekend things, like shopping, cleaning, delivering tickets for the Day of Boardgamers (plus one for cross promotion), generally Getting Things Done.  We were hungry, and had planned to go to the Heart of Asia on Cedar Hill Cross.  Except it was Opening Soon.  Which meant not open yet.  Despite there being a 'Grand Opening' banner up on Friday, and today.  I am sure it'll all be open and serve me soon.  But Saturday was not that day.

So instead we headed into the Purple Garden buffet.  A place that I had heard of from old students of UVic as being okay.  As I'd been past it about two thousand times, I figured it was time to actually go in the place.

Entry is through a parking garage and down some steps into bowels of the earth.  A faint damp smell came to my nose, and the paint work and carpet felt like it was possibly new around the mid 90's.  That certain air of ageing, rather than aged.  That aura of having been once a shiny pebble, but not having been kept up.  Still, it wasn't dirty, or fetid, or scruffy.  It was well lit, and tables were large and the seats comfortable (and far step up from the old school chairs I'd once sat in for a strange cafe curry in Sheffield, UK).  There was a large buffet selection, and the server brought us tea to the table straight away.

So we dropped our bags and headed to the food line.  There's about 40 dishes, ranging from your standard spring rolls and yam balls to green lipped muscles and fish curry.  Plus green, red and blue jello, and a side table with BBQ pork lettuce wraps.  I dug in with a little bit of everything that took my fancy.

The highlights were the ginger beef (is this made from red cows, we wondered), very gingery, crispy and a not over sweet thick dark sauce on top.  The black pepper steak had plenty of bite, with good thick slices of beef, just cooked to tender, not to tough.  The vegetables in it were fresh and crisp.  And the fat, flat noodles were delicious.  The salt and pepper shrimp was particularly spicey, and the bit sizes had a squeaky tender snap to them.

On the other side, the chicken balls were doughy and dry.  The muscles were over done and dry.  Or so the Brunette reported.  I avoid shell fish in a buffet situation.  I didn't need to find out if they were bad by sitting on the toilet for the rest of the evening.  The pork rice was really mediocre too.  A sort of blandness, punctuated with savoury undertones of over cooked pork.  The shanghai noodles weren't for me either.

The spring rolls were decent enough, and duck was not too fatty but also not with that gamey, meaty taste I love from the aquatic fowl.  The dessert chocolate peanut cake felt like it had been made for a kids party that had just been cancelled, by the birthday boy himself, on account of not getting the red bike he wanted from mother and father.  As they let me top it up with a big scoop of ice cream from the freezer, it finished things off well enough, and I figured it was his loss not to have his sweet course.

We paid up ($15/head, cheaper for kids of certain ages) and left.  With full bellies, and no repercussions.  If I went back, I'd hit up the beef and noodle stations for sure.  But can't think I'd rush back, as there's other places with better Chinese fair in town.