I've been away to north end of the island, and just driven back in the cold, cold rain. The roads were covered in a loose slush for the most part north of Campbell River. But they were gritted and clear, little traffic and beautiful wintery vistas to glance at. A light right foot and careful eye on the road (the occasional look at the vistas, okay), and we got over the passes, ready for coffee and lunch.
Just south of Campbell River is a shell garage, liquor store and a Lee's Famous Chicken And Ribs. The services are the last traffic lights before Nanaimo, and a clear run south. So we stopped in to fuel up. The services are spread out, like there was expected to be more built here. And why a BC Liquor Store exists in a highway services? Is it for last minute beer pick up before heading into the great depths of the Island back roads?
Lee's Famous Recipe Chicken looks like a shiny neon diner, all branded and bright red and yellow. I've never heard of it outside this one and one in Duncan. My research tell me they are spattered across the American Mid West.. in Ohio, Michigan and points south into Florida, and north into Wisconsin. And Vancouver Island. And Jordan. No idea why the sudden leap international to Duncan, but clearly a forward thinking franchisor decided there was a need for fried chicken here.
And not KFC joint. I got the three piece meal, a mix of light and dark meat, some spicy and some original 'honey dipped'. The meal came with a biscuit (for UK readers: doughy scone), gravy and my sideof choice: coleslaw. It was all far better cooked and prepared than your typical fried chicken joint. The batter was crisp, the meat still tender, and there was some flavour in there. In stead of the greasy dough-like poultry bits KFC offers up, we had fried chicken done well. It still looked like it had come from a bird. The spicy batter had a zing to it was sharp and interesting, rather than a muddy mess of heat I've had before.
The coleslaw was fresh and crunchy and not a mess of mayonnaise and wispy cabbage. The biscuit fresh and hot and well able to soak up the gravy... which was the sort of spiced gravy I don't really like. You get the same sort of thing at Swiss Chalet or St Hubert's. Too much paprika... however, my best friend tells me she loves that stuff and could drink it by the bucket load, so that's my just my take.
I tried a couple of the BIG potato wedges. They were skin on, lightly coated chunks. Good, firm chunks of spud. A little floury and heavy, but a nice change from the thin 'fries' beloved of McD's. The chicken sandwich special meal at under $8 is a bargain for hungry travellers needing a refuel. We all walked away happy, rating it 'would stop again, would like to see in Victoria'.
https://www.leesfamousrecipe.com/location/101--520-5th-Street-Nanaimo-BC
December 27, 2015
December 20, 2015
Fairfield Fish and Chips,
I'm a little buzzed. In my head I have this epic post about beer, fish, good friends, Star Wars, improv theatre and going out drinking before Christmas.
The fact the above sentence needed twenty two corrections (and this one thirteen) suggests it's only epic in my head. Just like the Phantom Menace was brilliants in the mind of George Lucas. Sure, my fans might accept it, but everyone else will point at it and laugh.
As they should.
So instead, I'll keep it simple.
You want good fish and well cooked potatoes?
Go to Fairfield Fish and Chips.
Fairfield fish and chips : 1275 Fairfield Road, Victoria, BC
... okay I'm told this is not enough detail. Damn you Andrea, and your rules you just made up that don't take into account my sobriety.
I went out for a beer or two with a good friend at the Ross Bay Pub, before heading to an improv show. In between, we had planned a trip to a good 'chipper' and get some fish and chips before Christmas. Turns out the Fairfield Chip Shop was on the way, and has very good reviews. The Fairfield Chip shop is a small place with no seats inside, with a short counter and few outside patio tables. It's winter, it's raining, so we didn't use them. We ran across the road and back into my friends mini-van.
We order haddock, halibut and small chips to share between us both. Best part of this: under $20 for fish suppers for two. And this included tartar sauce for us to share. We got our orders in under ten minutes, wrapped up in real newsprint and fresh paper.
The portions aren't huge. A good sized chunk, but not the massive whale tail you might get in a British chipper (for three times the price). Still it was clearly NOT a frozen chunk of a flesh, stored for days before being fast fried (Barb's place style).
It was a good serving size of fish, cooked for just the right amount of time. The meat had turned to white inside the batter. No under cooked translucent flesh. And no flaking apart, dry meat that felt like chewing bitter leaves. It was cooked to a tender white mass. The flavour of the haddock was there. All savoury yet ocean-sweet. Inside a crisp batter, that was not greasy. Big and puffy and golden brown, not over powering the fish. Not soggy and wet and slippery greasy. But crunch crisp, complimenting the fish.
The chips were solid chunks of potato. Cooked and still fluffy inside, with a warm crispness. And forward facing taste of the spud gardens. Not over powered by the fat or the flavours of the batter, or beaten into nothingness with an overcooked deep fry.
The only complaint was that the portions were about 2/3rds the size I'd want for a meal. For the price, it was huge value for money. But I was still a little hungry afterwards, and would have really wanted a bit more fish and a handful more chips. But, at under $10, it's hard to complain.
The fact the above sentence needed twenty two corrections (and this one thirteen) suggests it's only epic in my head. Just like the Phantom Menace was brilliants in the mind of George Lucas. Sure, my fans might accept it, but everyone else will point at it and laugh.
As they should.
So instead, I'll keep it simple.
You want good fish and well cooked potatoes?
Go to Fairfield Fish and Chips.
Fairfield fish and chips : 1275 Fairfield Road, Victoria, BC
... okay I'm told this is not enough detail. Damn you Andrea, and your rules you just made up that don't take into account my sobriety.
I went out for a beer or two with a good friend at the Ross Bay Pub, before heading to an improv show. In between, we had planned a trip to a good 'chipper' and get some fish and chips before Christmas. Turns out the Fairfield Chip Shop was on the way, and has very good reviews. The Fairfield Chip shop is a small place with no seats inside, with a short counter and few outside patio tables. It's winter, it's raining, so we didn't use them. We ran across the road and back into my friends mini-van.
We order haddock, halibut and small chips to share between us both. Best part of this: under $20 for fish suppers for two. And this included tartar sauce for us to share. We got our orders in under ten minutes, wrapped up in real newsprint and fresh paper.
The portions aren't huge. A good sized chunk, but not the massive whale tail you might get in a British chipper (for three times the price). Still it was clearly NOT a frozen chunk of a flesh, stored for days before being fast fried (Barb's place style).
It was a good serving size of fish, cooked for just the right amount of time. The meat had turned to white inside the batter. No under cooked translucent flesh. And no flaking apart, dry meat that felt like chewing bitter leaves. It was cooked to a tender white mass. The flavour of the haddock was there. All savoury yet ocean-sweet. Inside a crisp batter, that was not greasy. Big and puffy and golden brown, not over powering the fish. Not soggy and wet and slippery greasy. But crunch crisp, complimenting the fish.
The chips were solid chunks of potato. Cooked and still fluffy inside, with a warm crispness. And forward facing taste of the spud gardens. Not over powered by the fat or the flavours of the batter, or beaten into nothingness with an overcooked deep fry.
The only complaint was that the portions were about 2/3rds the size I'd want for a meal. For the price, it was huge value for money. But I was still a little hungry afterwards, and would have really wanted a bit more fish and a handful more chips. But, at under $10, it's hard to complain.
December 13, 2015
Subway Cook Street, Downtown Victoria
Andrea just deleted her link to my blog from her pages. She can't cope with this review, and can't have her friends see who she's hanging out with occasionally. If she doesn't, I will at least have to do a run with her which will involve my being mocked for about 35 minutes. That's okay. I have plenty of pride still.
But yes, I have eaten a subway sandwich on more than one occasion from Subway. My preferred meal near my down-town co-work space (hello, The Watershed) is Picnic Too's Breakfast Sandwich (The Better than Timmies, which they still don't call it that on their menu, funnily enough).
However, sometimes, I'm hungry and need something to keep going in the late afternoon after skipping lunch. Picnic Too is closed. So into Subway for a six inch tuna sub (okay, it's sometimes a foot long). Whole wheat bread, tuna, toasted with cheese, a layer of lettuce, tomato and cucumber, topped with hot sauce. Wrap up, take back to office.
I like this sandwich. Subway has this slightly odd smell to it. It's not a bad smell, it's the smell of the herbed bread wafting around with the fast toasting ovens melting cheese, with the slight whiff irony from 'Eat Fresh' as their slogan when they bring out huge bags of pre-cut lettuce, chilled and transported half way across a continent.
But this sandwich is still good. The cheese, the hot sauce all mingles together with the tuna-mayonnaise and makes a mess inside the bread. The bread is odd. It can barely stay together, like a dysfunctional couple at their mutual friends wedding. It doesn't completely fall apart under the load, but it tears and splits at the seams, obvious to everyone but the couple in question. You know it really can't hold it together for much longer, but it should just be able to make it long enough so the split is seen out of the public eye, somewhere less embarrassing.
That adds to it's charm, for me. The morass, tied in with the crisp lettuce and cucumbers (kept crisp by unknown means) has a flavour and consistency that I can't reproduce anywhere else. I've had great tuna melts (Hawk and Hen, for one) and tuna subs (Salt and Pepper Fox's delivery edition is a truly great thing)... and they are superior beasts for sure. They have nutrition and freshness and locality and care.
But they don't have guilty pleasure and speed and immediacy. They don't have Franks mingled in with processed cheese. They don't have the crinkle of the grease proof wrapper in my hands. If I get a packet of chips with it, there's the salty grease on my fingers and in my stomach that merges in there as well.
It's not high cuisine. It doesn't make me a better person. But I like a tuna sandwich from Subway, and I'm not ashamed to admit it in public.
But yes, I have eaten a subway sandwich on more than one occasion from Subway. My preferred meal near my down-town co-work space (hello, The Watershed) is Picnic Too's Breakfast Sandwich (The Better than Timmies, which they still don't call it that on their menu, funnily enough).
However, sometimes, I'm hungry and need something to keep going in the late afternoon after skipping lunch. Picnic Too is closed. So into Subway for a six inch tuna sub (okay, it's sometimes a foot long). Whole wheat bread, tuna, toasted with cheese, a layer of lettuce, tomato and cucumber, topped with hot sauce. Wrap up, take back to office.
I like this sandwich. Subway has this slightly odd smell to it. It's not a bad smell, it's the smell of the herbed bread wafting around with the fast toasting ovens melting cheese, with the slight whiff irony from 'Eat Fresh' as their slogan when they bring out huge bags of pre-cut lettuce, chilled and transported half way across a continent.
But this sandwich is still good. The cheese, the hot sauce all mingles together with the tuna-mayonnaise and makes a mess inside the bread. The bread is odd. It can barely stay together, like a dysfunctional couple at their mutual friends wedding. It doesn't completely fall apart under the load, but it tears and splits at the seams, obvious to everyone but the couple in question. You know it really can't hold it together for much longer, but it should just be able to make it long enough so the split is seen out of the public eye, somewhere less embarrassing.
That adds to it's charm, for me. The morass, tied in with the crisp lettuce and cucumbers (kept crisp by unknown means) has a flavour and consistency that I can't reproduce anywhere else. I've had great tuna melts (Hawk and Hen, for one) and tuna subs (Salt and Pepper Fox's delivery edition is a truly great thing)... and they are superior beasts for sure. They have nutrition and freshness and locality and care.
But they don't have guilty pleasure and speed and immediacy. They don't have Franks mingled in with processed cheese. They don't have the crinkle of the grease proof wrapper in my hands. If I get a packet of chips with it, there's the salty grease on my fingers and in my stomach that merges in there as well.
It's not high cuisine. It doesn't make me a better person. But I like a tuna sandwich from Subway, and I'm not ashamed to admit it in public.
December 06, 2015
Fig Deli, Mount Tolmie
Fig is a purveyor of Mediterranean food, tied in with a café . You can get a bout a dozen types of olives, cans of lentils, egg pasta's of brands I've never heard of, a 1001 tinned fish and a whole long wall of fresh from the deli salads, cheeses and meats.
Their café section is a little odd. A bit like eating in the aisles of Thrifty's, diners are surrounded by piles of bread and cans of tomatoes. The seating arrangements are small little tables, and all around you people are shopping for groceries or deciding on which baklava they want from the display.
So, when myself and the lovely Brunette visited last week, we didn't eat in. Instead, we ordered a couple of manoushi to go, with a pair of small side salads. Under $20 for a fresh, and big meal for two is a deal. Manoushi is Syrian flat-bread topped with spices and cheeses and (may be) meats. It's not unlike a pizza, but the dough is golden, softer and thicker. The toppings are drier, complimenting the fresh baked, fluffy dough. We had one topped with a pesto and sumac mix. This was aromatic, slightly spice and full of flavour. The other was topped with parmesan cheese and a mix of herbs. This made for a slightly crisper top that cracked and broke in your mouth to release the savoury, salty flavours.
We also got a bright green tabbouleh salad and some fattoush. The former had a pungency to herbs, cut with the richness of the tomatoes and green onions. The fattoush is a mix of lettuce, tomato, cucumber, roasted pita bread and olive oil dressing. The oil is cut with mint, and soaks into the pita bread, to combine up some deep flavours, balancing the lightness of the greens.
Very impressed with this combination, and am thinking it might be something I try again when working from home. A short work over to Fig will get the legs working, and let the brain rest for a bit. I just have to try and avoid buying too much of the fantastic breads on offer as well.
The place is family run, having moved from a smaller location. The owner, Yasser Youssef, has been in this trade for at least a long time, and knows how to source interesting and different food that you can't get on the shelves of Thrifty's or Save On. And his son is taking on the family business too, as we chatted to him as paid up to leave.
Fig Delicatessen, 1551 Cedar Hill Cross Rd Victoria, BC V8P 2P3
Their café section is a little odd. A bit like eating in the aisles of Thrifty's, diners are surrounded by piles of bread and cans of tomatoes. The seating arrangements are small little tables, and all around you people are shopping for groceries or deciding on which baklava they want from the display.
So, when myself and the lovely Brunette visited last week, we didn't eat in. Instead, we ordered a couple of manoushi to go, with a pair of small side salads. Under $20 for a fresh, and big meal for two is a deal. Manoushi is Syrian flat-bread topped with spices and cheeses and (may be) meats. It's not unlike a pizza, but the dough is golden, softer and thicker. The toppings are drier, complimenting the fresh baked, fluffy dough. We had one topped with a pesto and sumac mix. This was aromatic, slightly spice and full of flavour. The other was topped with parmesan cheese and a mix of herbs. This made for a slightly crisper top that cracked and broke in your mouth to release the savoury, salty flavours.
We also got a bright green tabbouleh salad and some fattoush. The former had a pungency to herbs, cut with the richness of the tomatoes and green onions. The fattoush is a mix of lettuce, tomato, cucumber, roasted pita bread and olive oil dressing. The oil is cut with mint, and soaks into the pita bread, to combine up some deep flavours, balancing the lightness of the greens.
Very impressed with this combination, and am thinking it might be something I try again when working from home. A short work over to Fig will get the legs working, and let the brain rest for a bit. I just have to try and avoid buying too much of the fantastic breads on offer as well.
The place is family run, having moved from a smaller location. The owner, Yasser Youssef, has been in this trade for at least a long time, and knows how to source interesting and different food that you can't get on the shelves of Thrifty's or Save On. And his son is taking on the family business too, as we chatted to him as paid up to leave.
Fig Delicatessen, 1551 Cedar Hill Cross Rd Victoria, BC V8P 2P3
November 29, 2015
Zomato is not for you
This piece is not about food and restaurants and eating out. Well, it is, but not about a specific place. Instead, it's a bit of a rant against the paucity of places to read decent, crowd-sourced reviews. The sort of review that tells you a little about the place and the appearance, but isn't forced into the breezing positive style that food magazines go. The sort of reviews that can give you a warts-and-all idea. 'The steak is excellent, but the potatoes were undercooked' reviews.
There was one such place. Urbanspoon. It had a very simple voting system, a comprehensive list of the restaurants in a city, and was relatively easy to search. It also allowed you to list the restaurants in order. You wanted to find what had been voted the best breakfast place in Victoria, that was open on a Sunday morning at 10 am... the 'spoon would do it for you.
For voting, you gave a thumbs up or down. Or nothing... if you had no strong opinions. The rating was the percentage of thumbs up to total votes. Anything over 85% was worth visiting, as long as it had a couple of dozen votes.
Then, sometime this year, they got brought by Zomato. I had never heard of Zomato, but they appeared to have a large network in other countries. They replaced Urbanspoon's website with their own, and re-did the ratings with a 5 point scale. But they still took the Urbanspoon +/- as a base for their data. Which just leads to to odd results, for starters.
They also managed to have 'City of Victoria' and 'Downtown Victoria'. I have no idea of the difference between the two, and restaurants would be arbitrarily attached to one of the other. Saanich is a separate place. As is Oak Bay. So when searching for places to eat in Victoria, it'll not find things just over the municipal borders. Nor can you filter and re-order your search by rating. Instead it defaults to popularity. Which is a stupid first order for a restaurant. I don't care if it's popular. Cora's is popular. It doesn't mean it's -good-. Zomato acknowledge this is a bug, but it's not fixed. I have no idea what sort of system can't have a simple 'order by' feature fixed in a few days. Not weeks and months.
But worst still, I noticed a rapid drop off on participation. New restaurants aren't getting voted on or added with anything like the speed Urbanspoon did. It was rare that I'd be the first to add a new location on Urbanspoon. On Zomato, some places were open for months before they got a listing. So the data becomes out of data, and the frequency of new info has slowed down, making it less valuable, so it's less likely people post. A vicious cycle.
So, I've deleted my account, and I'm removing my 125+ reviews. I don't want my content shared on such a terrible site. It drives little traffic to me, and provides little value to it's users.
But looking around, there's not much better. Yelp is decent, but suffers from paid listings and the inability to link between the blog and the entry. Blogger's have egos. Okay, I have an ego. I like people to read my stuff... and in return, I'm happy to have people read other content on the site. Yelp also have form for charging companies for better reviews, which is kinda of defeats the trust you can out in the site.
Trip Advisor has, in general, good comprehensive reviews. However, they tend to be from tourists and visitors, so finding people to trust and follow is hard. Trip Advisor also appears to be far more likely to suffer from vandalism reviews, where people have axes to grind. For hotels and attractions, I find it great. For food, it's just okay.
After that, there's the Google Local pages for places, Facebook pages for individual restaurants, and... not much else. There seems to me to be a big gap in the market for an honest, easily to use review site for food.
Localfork.com anyone?
There was one such place. Urbanspoon. It had a very simple voting system, a comprehensive list of the restaurants in a city, and was relatively easy to search. It also allowed you to list the restaurants in order. You wanted to find what had been voted the best breakfast place in Victoria, that was open on a Sunday morning at 10 am... the 'spoon would do it for you.
For voting, you gave a thumbs up or down. Or nothing... if you had no strong opinions. The rating was the percentage of thumbs up to total votes. Anything over 85% was worth visiting, as long as it had a couple of dozen votes.
Then, sometime this year, they got brought by Zomato. I had never heard of Zomato, but they appeared to have a large network in other countries. They replaced Urbanspoon's website with their own, and re-did the ratings with a 5 point scale. But they still took the Urbanspoon +/- as a base for their data. Which just leads to to odd results, for starters.
They also managed to have 'City of Victoria' and 'Downtown Victoria'. I have no idea of the difference between the two, and restaurants would be arbitrarily attached to one of the other. Saanich is a separate place. As is Oak Bay. So when searching for places to eat in Victoria, it'll not find things just over the municipal borders. Nor can you filter and re-order your search by rating. Instead it defaults to popularity. Which is a stupid first order for a restaurant. I don't care if it's popular. Cora's is popular. It doesn't mean it's -good-. Zomato acknowledge this is a bug, but it's not fixed. I have no idea what sort of system can't have a simple 'order by' feature fixed in a few days. Not weeks and months.
But worst still, I noticed a rapid drop off on participation. New restaurants aren't getting voted on or added with anything like the speed Urbanspoon did. It was rare that I'd be the first to add a new location on Urbanspoon. On Zomato, some places were open for months before they got a listing. So the data becomes out of data, and the frequency of new info has slowed down, making it less valuable, so it's less likely people post. A vicious cycle.
So, I've deleted my account, and I'm removing my 125+ reviews. I don't want my content shared on such a terrible site. It drives little traffic to me, and provides little value to it's users.
But looking around, there's not much better. Yelp is decent, but suffers from paid listings and the inability to link between the blog and the entry. Blogger's have egos. Okay, I have an ego. I like people to read my stuff... and in return, I'm happy to have people read other content on the site. Yelp also have form for charging companies for better reviews, which is kinda of defeats the trust you can out in the site.
Trip Advisor has, in general, good comprehensive reviews. However, they tend to be from tourists and visitors, so finding people to trust and follow is hard. Trip Advisor also appears to be far more likely to suffer from vandalism reviews, where people have axes to grind. For hotels and attractions, I find it great. For food, it's just okay.
After that, there's the Google Local pages for places, Facebook pages for individual restaurants, and... not much else. There seems to me to be a big gap in the market for an honest, easily to use review site for food.
Localfork.com anyone?
November 22, 2015
Heron Rock Bistro, James Bay, Victoria
A long weekend, with Saturday seeing me at TEDx Victoria, and today doing some casting work for a show I am putting together. That's my humble-bragging, oh-woe-is-me I-am-so-busy entry line. I did however get to have brunch with breakfast friends (without the Brunette this week) at Heron Rock Bistro.
There may have been a wait list when we walked in. I am not sure. It go confusing, as some people were being written down on the list, but I wasn't when I asked for a table of four. As the next group got on the clipboard, I thought it best to check why I hadn't got on the exalted level of being written down. Still no idea, but we got sat in a booth 60 seconds later, so all was well.
Unless of course that was someone else's booth, and they are waiting, cursing my name. The curse probably was to dry out my toast. Or make the coffee watery. One of those two things, as the rest of the meal was good.
I ordered the Huevos Cubaneros. Two poached eggs on a mound of black beans, caramelized onions, crisp breakfast potatoes and some avocados. And a mess of other good hash like things. The mound was crowned by a good dash of Hollandaise and some finely chopped spring onions. Topped off with a little splash of the house hot sauce. The hot sauce had a smoky punch to it, which rounded of my dish nicely. It's a hearty dish, that combined a lot of good veg into something that still felt like a decadent breakfast.
It came with some toast, which was pre-buttered, but not a soft, warm round. It was a warm and dry and tough triangle, I ate all of it, but really shouldn't have. I like toast. This was not good toast.
My friends raved about the Corned Beef Hash, made with cabbage for some bite and a pile of the caramelized onions. The chef knows how to make a onion sweet, as it was also mentioned by the guy piling into the pulled pork special benny. This was pork on french toast, with coleslaw and apple and guacamole and far too many things going on. All good things, but like a ensemble cast movie, you sometimes want a hero to come forward.
And on that note, I leave you for another week, as I got more stuff to do tomorrow, it's almost midnight, and I am half asleep.
There may have been a wait list when we walked in. I am not sure. It go confusing, as some people were being written down on the list, but I wasn't when I asked for a table of four. As the next group got on the clipboard, I thought it best to check why I hadn't got on the exalted level of being written down. Still no idea, but we got sat in a booth 60 seconds later, so all was well.
Unless of course that was someone else's booth, and they are waiting, cursing my name. The curse probably was to dry out my toast. Or make the coffee watery. One of those two things, as the rest of the meal was good.
I ordered the Huevos Cubaneros. Two poached eggs on a mound of black beans, caramelized onions, crisp breakfast potatoes and some avocados. And a mess of other good hash like things. The mound was crowned by a good dash of Hollandaise and some finely chopped spring onions. Topped off with a little splash of the house hot sauce. The hot sauce had a smoky punch to it, which rounded of my dish nicely. It's a hearty dish, that combined a lot of good veg into something that still felt like a decadent breakfast.
It came with some toast, which was pre-buttered, but not a soft, warm round. It was a warm and dry and tough triangle, I ate all of it, but really shouldn't have. I like toast. This was not good toast.
My friends raved about the Corned Beef Hash, made with cabbage for some bite and a pile of the caramelized onions. The chef knows how to make a onion sweet, as it was also mentioned by the guy piling into the pulled pork special benny. This was pork on french toast, with coleslaw and apple and guacamole and far too many things going on. All good things, but like a ensemble cast movie, you sometimes want a hero to come forward.
And on that note, I leave you for another week, as I got more stuff to do tomorrow, it's almost midnight, and I am half asleep.
November 15, 2015
Murchie's Tea and Coffee, Downtown Victoria
It has been a very busy week here, so not much to report in, and I've not got much left in reserve to write about. But, before I hear celebrations from Andrea's blog, and her cheering a win on our weekly blogging challenge, I did have a very pleasant cup of tea and biscuit at Murchie's this week.
The contents of Government Street were huddling in from the monsoon that's hit Vancouver Island. It was a busy and damp place this past Saturday. The line up was long and there was a slow evaporation of the water in the air, make it humid among the rattling teapots and clinking of the china. The staff were doing a pretty stand up job getting us served though. One big pot of Earl Grey and a large white chocolate and cranberry cookie were presented to me for less than $5 and no hassles. There's a long array of choices for tea, and long array of choices of cakes and snacks too. My friend's order of a lemon tea and a Madeline took a bit longer, but we soon found two seater marble table to sit down and talk.
The tea was brewed just right, strong but not stewed into a tanin-flavoured filth. There was that sharpness of the bergamot balancing the black tea, creating a citrus filled aroma. Contrary to popular belief, Earl Grey tea was not made first in thanks to the Earl Grey for rescuing a mandarin's son. Bergamot is an inedible fruit from Italy, and wouldn't have been available in China. That said, the Grey family claims the tea was created for their ancestral pile in England, Howick Hall. Brewed with the oil to offset the heavy lime deposits in the water (that's the mineral lime, not the fruit lime, of course).
I don't know who first put white chocolate and cranberries together. I don't suppose it was minor nobility, though I do think they should possibly have had a life peerage. I value their contribution to biscuits, and the large saucer sized cookie served here was all good things. Moist, slightly chewy, tart but sweet.
Despite the hustle and bustle, and busy day they were having, it was actually a fine place to sit and have a serious conversation about a couple of projects. I didn't have to strain to hear, or worry if we were being over loud. I might start suggesting Murchies for other business meetings, as the continue stream of Habit coffee in my veins after 3pm is one day going to take it's toll.
The contents of Government Street were huddling in from the monsoon that's hit Vancouver Island. It was a busy and damp place this past Saturday. The line up was long and there was a slow evaporation of the water in the air, make it humid among the rattling teapots and clinking of the china. The staff were doing a pretty stand up job getting us served though. One big pot of Earl Grey and a large white chocolate and cranberry cookie were presented to me for less than $5 and no hassles. There's a long array of choices for tea, and long array of choices of cakes and snacks too. My friend's order of a lemon tea and a Madeline took a bit longer, but we soon found two seater marble table to sit down and talk.
The tea was brewed just right, strong but not stewed into a tanin-flavoured filth. There was that sharpness of the bergamot balancing the black tea, creating a citrus filled aroma. Contrary to popular belief, Earl Grey tea was not made first in thanks to the Earl Grey for rescuing a mandarin's son. Bergamot is an inedible fruit from Italy, and wouldn't have been available in China. That said, the Grey family claims the tea was created for their ancestral pile in England, Howick Hall. Brewed with the oil to offset the heavy lime deposits in the water (that's the mineral lime, not the fruit lime, of course).
I don't know who first put white chocolate and cranberries together. I don't suppose it was minor nobility, though I do think they should possibly have had a life peerage. I value their contribution to biscuits, and the large saucer sized cookie served here was all good things. Moist, slightly chewy, tart but sweet.
Despite the hustle and bustle, and busy day they were having, it was actually a fine place to sit and have a serious conversation about a couple of projects. I didn't have to strain to hear, or worry if we were being over loud. I might start suggesting Murchies for other business meetings, as the continue stream of Habit coffee in my veins after 3pm is one day going to take it's toll.
November 08, 2015
Bin 4, Downtown Victoria
Bin 4 just celebrated its fourth anniversary by offering it's "Heritage Burger" for just $4 on November the 5th. The delightful Brunette of my acquaintance, her daughter and I took advantage of this offer. The venue was busy, with a short line-up and every table in use inside. As expected when you make an offer this good: the normal price is $12.
Bin 4 is in the small Harris Green strip mall on Yates Street. It's a small space, that they've crammed in a lot of tables, but without making it feel cramped. There's also a small patio space, that was well in use to deal with the demand, despite it being an autumnal day. They've got one long bar for some seating, a half dozen booths and a few high tables along one wall. It's a bit dark inside, lit with moody lights bouncing off the brown walls. All very modern lounge.
The Heritage Burger (Bin 4... no idea why they name their burgers after wine storage areas) is their base burger: 4oz (I think) of BC beef from 63 Acres, bacon aioli, lettuce, tomato served on a Brioche Bun. Now before we get too excited about '63 Acres' being a small farm, it's not. It's a meat supplier, who specializes in hormone free, BC cows. Well cow carcasses from particular partner farms. So it's pretty good meat. Just not a single source, 'we know the burger came from Daisy-Dandelion, daughter of Buttercup-Tulip the Fourth' meat. We all went for the added cheddar to make it a cheeseburger.
The meal came out relatively fast... after we got the wrong order the first time, and the wrong sides the second time. Both corrected quickly, and we have to give some allowance for the sheer volume of people in the venue that day. The staff were still super pleasant, despite (as they told us) being busy and non-stop for their entire shifts.
The brioche makes a denser, rich carrier for the patty. The patty is a thick, fresh cooked hunk of meat. The meat was flavourful and dense. They were slightly on the dry side, maybe due to the high volume in the kitchen that day, but certainly not ruined. Just one side of great... a little more juice would not have gone amiss, that's all.
The fries were good, fresh cooked and hot, with sufficient crunch to go with the warm and earthy centers. We tried three different aoili's with the fries: a bacon, a truffle and a basil. All were a dense thick paste to dip into. The truffle version was subtle. It had a light trace of the deep intense savouriness I associate with truffle oil. The bacon was more of the same from the burger, a nice salt accent. The basil version was really good, with the full flavour of the herbs coming through. I think we all voted that it was the best of the dips.
Overall, for $5.50 for a burger, we didn't go wrong. I'd said I would pay full price, thinking it was a $15 burger, but at $12.00 sans cheese, I might go for it again. It's tasty, well made and good ingredients.
Bin 4 is in the small Harris Green strip mall on Yates Street. It's a small space, that they've crammed in a lot of tables, but without making it feel cramped. There's also a small patio space, that was well in use to deal with the demand, despite it being an autumnal day. They've got one long bar for some seating, a half dozen booths and a few high tables along one wall. It's a bit dark inside, lit with moody lights bouncing off the brown walls. All very modern lounge.
The Heritage Burger (Bin 4... no idea why they name their burgers after wine storage areas) is their base burger: 4oz (I think) of BC beef from 63 Acres, bacon aioli, lettuce, tomato served on a Brioche Bun. Now before we get too excited about '63 Acres' being a small farm, it's not. It's a meat supplier, who specializes in hormone free, BC cows. Well cow carcasses from particular partner farms. So it's pretty good meat. Just not a single source, 'we know the burger came from Daisy-Dandelion, daughter of Buttercup-Tulip the Fourth' meat. We all went for the added cheddar to make it a cheeseburger.
The meal came out relatively fast... after we got the wrong order the first time, and the wrong sides the second time. Both corrected quickly, and we have to give some allowance for the sheer volume of people in the venue that day. The staff were still super pleasant, despite (as they told us) being busy and non-stop for their entire shifts.
The brioche makes a denser, rich carrier for the patty. The patty is a thick, fresh cooked hunk of meat. The meat was flavourful and dense. They were slightly on the dry side, maybe due to the high volume in the kitchen that day, but certainly not ruined. Just one side of great... a little more juice would not have gone amiss, that's all.
The fries were good, fresh cooked and hot, with sufficient crunch to go with the warm and earthy centers. We tried three different aoili's with the fries: a bacon, a truffle and a basil. All were a dense thick paste to dip into. The truffle version was subtle. It had a light trace of the deep intense savouriness I associate with truffle oil. The bacon was more of the same from the burger, a nice salt accent. The basil version was really good, with the full flavour of the herbs coming through. I think we all voted that it was the best of the dips.
Overall, for $5.50 for a burger, we didn't go wrong. I'd said I would pay full price, thinking it was a $15 burger, but at $12.00 sans cheese, I might go for it again. It's tasty, well made and good ingredients.
November 01, 2015
Roast, Downtown Victoria
Unexpectedly, I won a $30 voucher for Roast courtesy of the Zone FM and Pol's Burger club. I have no idea when I entered this draw, but here was a gift card, loaded with money to spend on food. Sweet. So after watching the very silly and very amusing WEREWOLF improv show at the Intrepid, myself and the Brunette of my Acquaintance headed over to the Victoria Public Market. This is a space that always seems under busy. It some excellent food vendors. The pie shop (Victoria Pie Co) is wonderful and makes pies (both proper savoury pies and fruit pies) that are sublime.
But on the other hand, it has over-priced Olive Oil (Olive the Senses), a shop whose business must be doing well, but I don't get why. In fact, most things in the market seem over priced for what you get, but the shops seem to be staying open.
So Roast. They specialize in serving up roasted meats in sandwiches or salads, to go. They have large slabs of meat on display, all roasted and ready to carve. Huge triangles of pig fat, all crisped up, just like a massive pork scratching. And a large rack of rotisserie chicken, turning and cooking just so.
For $13, we got a fresh roasted chicken, straight out of the oven. The skin was crispy, and the smell of rosemary and lemon wafted over us briefly before the bird was sealed into a plastic to-go bag. It was a no-brainer for me. Half a pound of beef, or roasted chicken. As previous readers will note, I love chicken in all its forms. Oh yes, it was local and ethically raised. The Brunette checked.
We added in a hand tossed salad. That consists of a big tray of leaves, a scoop of meat and some extras. We decided on lettuce leaves, rare beef cubes, black quinoa, pumpkin seeds, cucumber and tomato mixture. Unsure what to dress it with, we asked for some advice. The gent behind the counter suggested the simple Italian.
Good call by him, as I would have ruined it with a garlicky Ceasar topping. Instead we had this lovely light, tasty salad, that mingled the flavours well, and kept its crunch. The meat in the salad was pretty secondary to the effect. Though it was nice and all. If I ordered from there again I'd not bother with the protein additions.
The roast chicken we paired with some home cooked potatoes and a big baguette from the French Oven. Such beautifully light bread. The chicken was crispy and moist, with the rosemary coming through, but not obscuring the meat. There's probably four good servings on the bird. Maybe more if you stretch it out a bit more. A bit more than a Thrifty's fresh roasted bird, but tastier too.
We could have topped up the meal with meatballs, or sauces. They do a line of sandwiches as well with fresh roasted meats. But this set up did us well. $25 was pretty good value. Not outstanding bargain of the week, but worth it for a good quality of food.
We did have dessert with a cherry and custard brioche from the French Oven Bakery, which we paired with a Persian ice cream from Kid Sister. Both were fantastic, with the Brunette still lyrcial about the lightness and taste of the brioche twenty-four hours later. I think it fair made her day.
But on the other hand, it has over-priced Olive Oil (Olive the Senses), a shop whose business must be doing well, but I don't get why. In fact, most things in the market seem over priced for what you get, but the shops seem to be staying open.
So Roast. They specialize in serving up roasted meats in sandwiches or salads, to go. They have large slabs of meat on display, all roasted and ready to carve. Huge triangles of pig fat, all crisped up, just like a massive pork scratching. And a large rack of rotisserie chicken, turning and cooking just so.
For $13, we got a fresh roasted chicken, straight out of the oven. The skin was crispy, and the smell of rosemary and lemon wafted over us briefly before the bird was sealed into a plastic to-go bag. It was a no-brainer for me. Half a pound of beef, or roasted chicken. As previous readers will note, I love chicken in all its forms. Oh yes, it was local and ethically raised. The Brunette checked.
We added in a hand tossed salad. That consists of a big tray of leaves, a scoop of meat and some extras. We decided on lettuce leaves, rare beef cubes, black quinoa, pumpkin seeds, cucumber and tomato mixture. Unsure what to dress it with, we asked for some advice. The gent behind the counter suggested the simple Italian.
Good call by him, as I would have ruined it with a garlicky Ceasar topping. Instead we had this lovely light, tasty salad, that mingled the flavours well, and kept its crunch. The meat in the salad was pretty secondary to the effect. Though it was nice and all. If I ordered from there again I'd not bother with the protein additions.
The roast chicken we paired with some home cooked potatoes and a big baguette from the French Oven. Such beautifully light bread. The chicken was crispy and moist, with the rosemary coming through, but not obscuring the meat. There's probably four good servings on the bird. Maybe more if you stretch it out a bit more. A bit more than a Thrifty's fresh roasted bird, but tastier too.
We could have topped up the meal with meatballs, or sauces. They do a line of sandwiches as well with fresh roasted meats. But this set up did us well. $25 was pretty good value. Not outstanding bargain of the week, but worth it for a good quality of food.
We did have dessert with a cherry and custard brioche from the French Oven Bakery, which we paired with a Persian ice cream from Kid Sister. Both were fantastic, with the Brunette still lyrcial about the lightness and taste of the brioche twenty-four hours later. I think it fair made her day.
October 25, 2015
Nourish in the Harbour, James Bay, Victoria
Nourish has two locations. One is out at the Horticultural Centre of the Pacific in the backroads of Saanich (and a short run from the Vancouver Island Tech Park, having passed it many a time while running). The second newer location is in an old converted house in James Bay.
It's a BIG converted house. We aren't talking a small starter home. It's a heritage house, a big wooden building, stretching over three storeys (I've been in the unrenovated attic. It looks like my crazy great aunt's attic. If I had a crazy maiden great aunt). The first floor has space for 40-50 covers and a coffee bar. Plus the fully functioning kitchen. On the second floor, there's more dining space and meeting space if you want to book a nice, vintage feeling area for an intimate cocktail reception.
Back on the ground floor, there's the main business of the general admission cafe/restaurant, pushing out brunch. The philosophy is natural ingredients, nutrient-rich foods and seasonal choices. Combined with a desire to make interesting food, and not just quinoa, kale and aubergine stew for everyone.
There was plenty of tasty, tasty kale for those that want it. One of our group didn't, choosing to pass on the option of an Eggs Benedict piled up on a green-bean-and-kale base (Benny in the Moment), instead of the normal muffin. Even my love of the green leafed 'super food' passed at that option. We also passed by on the small cups of bone broth that were on the brunch menu. It's all very good, I am sure, but not before I have had my coffee!
Instead, I went for a standard breakfast, paired with an americano coffee. The coffee was good, rich and smooth, with a big flavour to wake up my morning. So it didn't last to long in the cup. Was offered plenty of refills of drip coffee, but decide to hydrate with the rosemary infused water on the table. I assume it was meant to be in the milk bottle, and not a poor cleaning job by the Avalon diary from whom the bottle had been purloined (those things have a big deposit on them, wonder if they know there's about $100 of glassware here?). The water didn't really taste of rosemary.
The breakfast was a platter of good stuff: a fistful of kale dressed in a light dressing, two soft poached eggs with thick golden yolks, a slice of seed toast, some potatoes and a herb and leek sausage. The kale was kale. If you like kale, you'll like it. If you don't, this is raw kale. It tastes of raw kale. The seed toast was crunchy and mostly seeds. One slice with a smear of butter and little bit of the soft apple was tasty.
The potatoes were rich and earthy and flavourful. They probably could have been fluffier or crispier... they weren't new waxy spuds, so the consistency of them was -like- they were slightly undercooked. They weren't but, something didn't seem quite right.
The sausage was a let-down (my fault for not choosing the bacon). It had no flavour beyond the seasoning, and tasted like it had been boiled or steamed, with very little time on the grill. Grill time makes meat taste better (in general) by the chemical reactions that occur when it browns. And when the fat in the meat gets a chance to melt and merge around with the rest of the filling. Wasn't impressed with whatever they had done here instead.
Two of my friends had the pancakes. These were more like big slices of fresh cake. Huge thick triangles of oatmeal. There wasn't much of them, though.
The dining room is great, bright airy and comfortable. The food is served to please the eyes, the staff are bright and cheery, and everything seems to be working in the right direction. The menu is encased in an old hard backed book. Maybe there's just a little sense of trying a bit too hard to be different that unsettled me a little?
That all said I think I'd go back to try some other dishes out. I like the concepts and the rest of the menu looked good, and I did feel good and ready to face the world.
It's a BIG converted house. We aren't talking a small starter home. It's a heritage house, a big wooden building, stretching over three storeys (I've been in the unrenovated attic. It looks like my crazy great aunt's attic. If I had a crazy maiden great aunt). The first floor has space for 40-50 covers and a coffee bar. Plus the fully functioning kitchen. On the second floor, there's more dining space and meeting space if you want to book a nice, vintage feeling area for an intimate cocktail reception.
Back on the ground floor, there's the main business of the general admission cafe/restaurant, pushing out brunch. The philosophy is natural ingredients, nutrient-rich foods and seasonal choices. Combined with a desire to make interesting food, and not just quinoa, kale and aubergine stew for everyone.
There was plenty of tasty, tasty kale for those that want it. One of our group didn't, choosing to pass on the option of an Eggs Benedict piled up on a green-bean-and-kale base (Benny in the Moment), instead of the normal muffin. Even my love of the green leafed 'super food' passed at that option. We also passed by on the small cups of bone broth that were on the brunch menu. It's all very good, I am sure, but not before I have had my coffee!
Instead, I went for a standard breakfast, paired with an americano coffee. The coffee was good, rich and smooth, with a big flavour to wake up my morning. So it didn't last to long in the cup. Was offered plenty of refills of drip coffee, but decide to hydrate with the rosemary infused water on the table. I assume it was meant to be in the milk bottle, and not a poor cleaning job by the Avalon diary from whom the bottle had been purloined (those things have a big deposit on them, wonder if they know there's about $100 of glassware here?). The water didn't really taste of rosemary.
The breakfast was a platter of good stuff: a fistful of kale dressed in a light dressing, two soft poached eggs with thick golden yolks, a slice of seed toast, some potatoes and a herb and leek sausage. The kale was kale. If you like kale, you'll like it. If you don't, this is raw kale. It tastes of raw kale. The seed toast was crunchy and mostly seeds. One slice with a smear of butter and little bit of the soft apple was tasty.
The potatoes were rich and earthy and flavourful. They probably could have been fluffier or crispier... they weren't new waxy spuds, so the consistency of them was -like- they were slightly undercooked. They weren't but, something didn't seem quite right.
The sausage was a let-down (my fault for not choosing the bacon). It had no flavour beyond the seasoning, and tasted like it had been boiled or steamed, with very little time on the grill. Grill time makes meat taste better (in general) by the chemical reactions that occur when it browns. And when the fat in the meat gets a chance to melt and merge around with the rest of the filling. Wasn't impressed with whatever they had done here instead.
Two of my friends had the pancakes. These were more like big slices of fresh cake. Huge thick triangles of oatmeal. There wasn't much of them, though.
The dining room is great, bright airy and comfortable. The food is served to please the eyes, the staff are bright and cheery, and everything seems to be working in the right direction. The menu is encased in an old hard backed book. Maybe there's just a little sense of trying a bit too hard to be different that unsettled me a little?
That all said I think I'd go back to try some other dishes out. I like the concepts and the rest of the menu looked good, and I did feel good and ready to face the world.
October 18, 2015
I Kyu Noodles, Downtown Victoria
I Kyu Noodles is a rather unassuming location in Victoria's Chinatown. It has got no neon banners, or gaudy scrolls. Just a window and a menu posted in it, with a sign above the door 'I Kyu Noodles'. Inside, it's also the same basics. Chairs and tables that have seen far better days, with nasty looking fabric covering in the booths. The chalkboard lists the about a dozen options on noodles, all of which are echoed in the simple menu. There are another dozen starters, ranging from fried spring rolls to small pork dumplings.
Nice and simple. The noodle options range from udon to rice noodles and stringy egg noodles. I went for the house made udon with chicken, while my friend ordered the coconut curry dish.
The chicken udon was delicious. Chewy, but not tough noodles, made as thick strings of dough. This is how I imagine udon to be, hearty and solid and just slippery enough to slurp up a little. The chicken and sauce was savoury and coated the noodles just enough to get the flavour in, without soaking the dish. We had crisp broccoli florets, too. To complete the dish, there were chunks of onion cooked to tender, to add a little bite to the flavours. This chicken was tender but had been browned enough to add a little more umami to the dish.
Really good. And washed down with plenty of green tea.
My friend's coconut noodles were large enough to float a small inflatable boat in. In fact, after we finished, members of the Navy came in and practiced a few emergency rescue exercises. Unusual, I know, but it takes all sorts on Fisgard.
Nice and simple. The noodle options range from udon to rice noodles and stringy egg noodles. I went for the house made udon with chicken, while my friend ordered the coconut curry dish.
The chicken udon was delicious. Chewy, but not tough noodles, made as thick strings of dough. This is how I imagine udon to be, hearty and solid and just slippery enough to slurp up a little. The chicken and sauce was savoury and coated the noodles just enough to get the flavour in, without soaking the dish. We had crisp broccoli florets, too. To complete the dish, there were chunks of onion cooked to tender, to add a little bite to the flavours. This chicken was tender but had been browned enough to add a little more umami to the dish.
Really good. And washed down with plenty of green tea.
My friend's coconut noodles were large enough to float a small inflatable boat in. In fact, after we finished, members of the Navy came in and practiced a few emergency rescue exercises. Unusual, I know, but it takes all sorts on Fisgard.
October 11, 2015
The London Tube, Downtown Victoria
A restaurant so new, it is not on Zomato yet. Zomato (aka Urbanspoon lobotomised) has not yet updated their listings to include this place, or the fact that City of Victoria and Downtown Victoria are pretty much the same place.
The London Tube is the hotel restaurant for the Best Western on Johnson Street. This was also once home of De Dutch and later 'Stones throw'. It has been open for about a month now. I fear no-one yet knows of it's existence, instead lining up for worst food in other locations that don't really deserve it.
This Sunday, after running an easy (ha!) 21.1 km around the city, myself and 3 other finishers of the run met with friends in the London Tube. We had out pick of any table in there, so we took a big long table near the back. There's several big comfortable booths, and 2, 4 and 6 place tables. They are riding on the London theme, with fake signs from London landmarks, like Carnaby Street. I am not sure what the London Underground would say about their use of the Underground logo, but no-one should get too confused... this is Victoria, Canada, not Victoria Station.
The menu is just long enough, with several brunch options, a pile of burger choices and some British inspired main courses. You got your scotch eggs, fish and chips, and chicken curry. They say people reckon the chicken curry is the best in the city. That's a very large claim to make... but I saw enough today that I am curious to see if they can back it up.
I ordered the Three Pancakes. At some point on my run I got a craving for pancakes. I'd normally have chosen the full english or what has the most chicken in it. But this time, my head said pancakes. I then got bacon, scrambled eggs and sausages added to it. Minor nitpick: when I get additional sides, it is always nice to have them on the same plate as the main course. Two rashers of bacon don't look as attractive as three big pancakes with two rashers of bacon fitted onto the plate. Admittedly, with the eggs, bacon and sausage, they'd have needed a bigger plate for me this morning.
The pancakes were, soft and fluffy and most edible. The sausages were breakfast sausages, slightly herby. They had that bite of the skin done just right so your teeth sink through it with a satisfying piercing of the tube. The eggs were scrambled to the turn, still moist. The bacon was bacon. There are better rashers to be had in town, but this was done decently. I got a nice jug of syrup to pour over my pancakes, which was better than the single serving packet of butter. Again, it just looks nicer to have two pats of butter rather than a plastic package. They brought out hot sauce, and had all the other condiments you need for breakfast ready to go.
The coffee... tasted like it had been stewed a little too long. Was not a fan of the coffee.
My friends had the breakfast poutine, which was a pile of country-fried potatoes, big cubes crisply fried, then smothered in a gravy . Inside that mess was a lot of cheese curds, some eggs and a few chunks of meat too. I tried a bit. I liked it. I also got favourable reports of the the breakfast sandwich and the beans. I wonder if they home bake their beans?
Overall, this was an improvement to the Stonesthrow. There's a bit more passion and care on the plate. It's not going to blow you away on the breakfast side, but your going to get something decent, with new cue and good service. Now, they just need to fix the TV to go away from the Shaw music channel...
The London Tube is the hotel restaurant for the Best Western on Johnson Street. This was also once home of De Dutch and later 'Stones throw'. It has been open for about a month now. I fear no-one yet knows of it's existence, instead lining up for worst food in other locations that don't really deserve it.
This Sunday, after running an easy (ha!) 21.1 km around the city, myself and 3 other finishers of the run met with friends in the London Tube. We had out pick of any table in there, so we took a big long table near the back. There's several big comfortable booths, and 2, 4 and 6 place tables. They are riding on the London theme, with fake signs from London landmarks, like Carnaby Street. I am not sure what the London Underground would say about their use of the Underground logo, but no-one should get too confused... this is Victoria, Canada, not Victoria Station.
The menu is just long enough, with several brunch options, a pile of burger choices and some British inspired main courses. You got your scotch eggs, fish and chips, and chicken curry. They say people reckon the chicken curry is the best in the city. That's a very large claim to make... but I saw enough today that I am curious to see if they can back it up.
I ordered the Three Pancakes. At some point on my run I got a craving for pancakes. I'd normally have chosen the full english or what has the most chicken in it. But this time, my head said pancakes. I then got bacon, scrambled eggs and sausages added to it. Minor nitpick: when I get additional sides, it is always nice to have them on the same plate as the main course. Two rashers of bacon don't look as attractive as three big pancakes with two rashers of bacon fitted onto the plate. Admittedly, with the eggs, bacon and sausage, they'd have needed a bigger plate for me this morning.
The pancakes were, soft and fluffy and most edible. The sausages were breakfast sausages, slightly herby. They had that bite of the skin done just right so your teeth sink through it with a satisfying piercing of the tube. The eggs were scrambled to the turn, still moist. The bacon was bacon. There are better rashers to be had in town, but this was done decently. I got a nice jug of syrup to pour over my pancakes, which was better than the single serving packet of butter. Again, it just looks nicer to have two pats of butter rather than a plastic package. They brought out hot sauce, and had all the other condiments you need for breakfast ready to go.
The coffee... tasted like it had been stewed a little too long. Was not a fan of the coffee.
My friends had the breakfast poutine, which was a pile of country-fried potatoes, big cubes crisply fried, then smothered in a gravy . Inside that mess was a lot of cheese curds, some eggs and a few chunks of meat too. I tried a bit. I liked it. I also got favourable reports of the the breakfast sandwich and the beans. I wonder if they home bake their beans?
Overall, this was an improvement to the Stonesthrow. There's a bit more passion and care on the plate. It's not going to blow you away on the breakfast side, but your going to get something decent, with new cue and good service. Now, they just need to fix the TV to go away from the Shaw music channel...
October 04, 2015
Revisits, Downtown Victoria
SuLT Perogi Bar.
So it was only two weeks ago I first went. But had to go back with the lovely Brunette to try out the evening menu.
I was happy, but not impressed, by the breakfast. The dinner I had was fantastic. 3 Green Kale perogies, 3 Clam Perogies, a mushroom gravy with cheese curds (the Poutine topping) and a small bowl of green salad. Under $20. Plenty enough to feed us both happily.
The perogies were deep fried under the poutine topping. The kale ones (Green) are fantastic... that deep savoury flavour of kale I love, with a red chilli spice. The clam and bacon ones were good too, with the filling flavours mingling and working well together. It'd be easy to make everything lost in the sauce and the doughy outer. They don't do that here. The gravy on top was tasty too. I will go back again for this meal, with a different sauce on top... and see how the dumplings come out when not fried. I suspect excellent.
Oh, and full marks to the green salad. Plenty of different leaves and veg, to make it interesting, and just a light vinaigrette on top. I really hope this place grows and grows.
The Churchill
Been over a year since they opened. I love the Church. I love their fine range of beers, their staff with the knowledge of what they are serving, the hundred yard long polished bar, and the cost booths. I loved the Oktoberfest special night we walked into. I loved the Paulaner Salvator beer special I had two pints of. I love the accordion players and the massive beer steins my friends won. And the smaller Paulaner glass I won.
I hated the next morning when I woke up from them and the other couple of pints I tried.
But I also love meeting friends there and being able to chat in an environment that's busy, up-tempo, but not over-burdened by loud tunes or a echoed buzz of other people.
Long may they thrive as well
Cora's
Speaking of places that I hope thrive, I am not talking about Cora's. I will however upgrade them from truly terrible to merely bad. I don't get the long line ups there. There's nothing exceptional about the food. There's nothing exceptional about the service. There's nothing exceptional about the environment. There's not even anything great about the price.
It's a refectory that serves a lot of food. They have this gimmick of piles of fresh fruit. I guess that's the part that sets it apart, and as I don't like fresh fruit, it's lost on me.
But still, if I want a dried burger, topped with a smear of electric yellow, flavourless hollandaise, I know where to go. If I want my cheese processed and my eggs pre-cooked into a folded sheet, I know where to go. If I want staff too busy to serve their customers well, I know where to go. But seriously, Victoria, there's a hundred places in town that do breakfast better than Cora's. I bet Hawk and Hen was half empty at the same time. So why the line-up? It's a mystery to me.
So it was only two weeks ago I first went. But had to go back with the lovely Brunette to try out the evening menu.
I was happy, but not impressed, by the breakfast. The dinner I had was fantastic. 3 Green Kale perogies, 3 Clam Perogies, a mushroom gravy with cheese curds (the Poutine topping) and a small bowl of green salad. Under $20. Plenty enough to feed us both happily.
The perogies were deep fried under the poutine topping. The kale ones (Green) are fantastic... that deep savoury flavour of kale I love, with a red chilli spice. The clam and bacon ones were good too, with the filling flavours mingling and working well together. It'd be easy to make everything lost in the sauce and the doughy outer. They don't do that here. The gravy on top was tasty too. I will go back again for this meal, with a different sauce on top... and see how the dumplings come out when not fried. I suspect excellent.
Oh, and full marks to the green salad. Plenty of different leaves and veg, to make it interesting, and just a light vinaigrette on top. I really hope this place grows and grows.
The Churchill
Been over a year since they opened. I love the Church. I love their fine range of beers, their staff with the knowledge of what they are serving, the hundred yard long polished bar, and the cost booths. I loved the Oktoberfest special night we walked into. I loved the Paulaner Salvator beer special I had two pints of. I love the accordion players and the massive beer steins my friends won. And the smaller Paulaner glass I won.
I hated the next morning when I woke up from them and the other couple of pints I tried.
But I also love meeting friends there and being able to chat in an environment that's busy, up-tempo, but not over-burdened by loud tunes or a echoed buzz of other people.
Long may they thrive as well
Cora's
Speaking of places that I hope thrive, I am not talking about Cora's. I will however upgrade them from truly terrible to merely bad. I don't get the long line ups there. There's nothing exceptional about the food. There's nothing exceptional about the service. There's nothing exceptional about the environment. There's not even anything great about the price.
It's a refectory that serves a lot of food. They have this gimmick of piles of fresh fruit. I guess that's the part that sets it apart, and as I don't like fresh fruit, it's lost on me.
But still, if I want a dried burger, topped with a smear of electric yellow, flavourless hollandaise, I know where to go. If I want my cheese processed and my eggs pre-cooked into a folded sheet, I know where to go. If I want staff too busy to serve their customers well, I know where to go. But seriously, Victoria, there's a hundred places in town that do breakfast better than Cora's. I bet Hawk and Hen was half empty at the same time. So why the line-up? It's a mystery to me.
September 27, 2015
Hawk and Hen, Downtown Victoria
I'd seen that "Hawk and Hen" was coming into the spot once occupied by The Podium. The Podium was a big "sports bar" that failed to offer up sports in any way that differed from the other 15 places in town. I can watch a TV with sports on and drink beer in many places. If your not giving the live commentary on the feature matches, and really pushing the 'place to watch' angle, then your just another bar.
So Hawk and Hen has a big location to fill, with lots of seats, so I was a little surprised to see the soft opening (no website I could find till very recently) and the west-coast niche it was filling. Seems like a big ask to fill and 100+ seater place on a regular basis. But, I did see that Liam Quinn was named as executive chef. Liam runs the "Salt and Pepper Fox" (review), and if you work downtown and haven't had sandwich delivery from him yet, you should try it. So, I was expecting good, fresh local food.
I got good, fresh food. I have no idea where the albacore tuna I ate came from. In fact, I have no idea where you find albacore tuna in general, and who smokes it to this rich, velvety, powerful flavour. But I do know that the Tuna Melt I had was great. Thick slices of the beautifully rich, meat, slapped onto a thick wedge of crusty white bread, covered in cheese and grilled to a cheesy, gooey mess. The cheddar had enough bite to balance the soft white bread, and the tuna itself. Yes, you can make a tuna melt at home... but this was a really good one.
I had mine with a side of Rösti potatoes. These are grated potatoes, cooked into a crisp pattie. Like a (proper) hash brown that had been cooked longer and with more fat. Crunchy, and still rich and earthy. Yum. Would order these again and not be disappointed. The dish was completed with a small pile of greens, which featured long shavings of celery, and a simple french dressing.
My friends complimented the meatballs as being big, rich and juicy, though the tomato base they were in was a little too chunky... the smoother sauce with the hash met with much more approval. The bacon served with the benny was big, thick and cooked to a stiff crisp... but not so far that the tasty bacon grease had all dried up.
The service had a couple of small problems: one item we ordered was no longer being made (the bread and butter pudding), but it took a trip to the kitchen to find that out. Apparently it was not selling. We mentioned that was odd to take it off for a place that had just opened. We were told it had be at least a month they'd been in business... I guess long enough to know what doesn't sell.
Our table and another also had to have follow-ups to check how some of the orders should have their eggs cooked. In a brunch first place, this should be a second nature to always ask.
That said, the service was fast, there were plenty of refills on coffee and water. The staff did seem enthusiastic about the food they were serving as well, which is key when for a place pushing local produce.
This has definitely gone on the revisit for brunch list. We all said we'd go back again, highly enjoying the food.
So Hawk and Hen has a big location to fill, with lots of seats, so I was a little surprised to see the soft opening (no website I could find till very recently) and the west-coast niche it was filling. Seems like a big ask to fill and 100+ seater place on a regular basis. But, I did see that Liam Quinn was named as executive chef. Liam runs the "Salt and Pepper Fox" (review), and if you work downtown and haven't had sandwich delivery from him yet, you should try it. So, I was expecting good, fresh local food.
I got good, fresh food. I have no idea where the albacore tuna I ate came from. In fact, I have no idea where you find albacore tuna in general, and who smokes it to this rich, velvety, powerful flavour. But I do know that the Tuna Melt I had was great. Thick slices of the beautifully rich, meat, slapped onto a thick wedge of crusty white bread, covered in cheese and grilled to a cheesy, gooey mess. The cheddar had enough bite to balance the soft white bread, and the tuna itself. Yes, you can make a tuna melt at home... but this was a really good one.
I had mine with a side of Rösti potatoes. These are grated potatoes, cooked into a crisp pattie. Like a (proper) hash brown that had been cooked longer and with more fat. Crunchy, and still rich and earthy. Yum. Would order these again and not be disappointed. The dish was completed with a small pile of greens, which featured long shavings of celery, and a simple french dressing.
My friends complimented the meatballs as being big, rich and juicy, though the tomato base they were in was a little too chunky... the smoother sauce with the hash met with much more approval. The bacon served with the benny was big, thick and cooked to a stiff crisp... but not so far that the tasty bacon grease had all dried up.
The service had a couple of small problems: one item we ordered was no longer being made (the bread and butter pudding), but it took a trip to the kitchen to find that out. Apparently it was not selling. We mentioned that was odd to take it off for a place that had just opened. We were told it had be at least a month they'd been in business... I guess long enough to know what doesn't sell.
Our table and another also had to have follow-ups to check how some of the orders should have their eggs cooked. In a brunch first place, this should be a second nature to always ask.
That said, the service was fast, there were plenty of refills on coffee and water. The staff did seem enthusiastic about the food they were serving as well, which is key when for a place pushing local produce.
This has definitely gone on the revisit for brunch list. We all said we'd go back again, highly enjoying the food.
September 20, 2015
SüLT Pierogi Bar, Downtown Victoria
SüLT. I keep reading it as Slut. An unfortunate name, if you ask me. Or maybe a good name as it has at least stuck in my head. The name in Danish means hunger, while in Estonian, its "head cheese". Norwegian it can also mean famine. In Hungarian, it means 'baked'. I have no idea where it comes from (Polish doesn't have a word that matches).
But what it means in Victoria is a long under construction eatery, offering a "pierogi focused restaurant serving new Canadian cuisine". It seems likes there's been something being built in the Lower Yates Street location for a long time. Formally the home of a dark and foreboding internet café, it's not a big open loft-style space. The ubiquitous polished wood that's modern interior design. There's exposed ducting and lighting wires, a long table in one corner and a full-length bar seating in front of the kitchen window. The kitchen looks huge and takes up much of the back of the building.
We went in for brunch today, to check out what they had to offer overall. The menu sells triplets of pierogies, fresh made and in a few different flavours: chicken, pork, kale, clam and bacon, traditional. With fancy names like 'cluck', 'oink' and 'green'. Three doesn't seem much, but for $4 or so, that's not too bad, and all serving can be topped off with sauerkraut and cream, or a pile of poutine, or a bunch of other combos.
I ordered the breakfast special, five 'squeak' pierogies with two poached eggs, some pork belly and a dollop of Hollandaise. The dumplings are big, fat and well stuffed. Six would be a good solid meal, especially coupled with the trimmings. It was a big solid breakfast. They are soft on the inside, with a punch of cheese and garlic savoury goodness. The outside had been crisped up after the cooking process to add a bit of a crisp texture, but just slightly.
The eggs were poached very runny, and the yolks were a pale yellow, and slightly watery. To me, at least, not a sign of a great egg, and there wasn't the richness of flavour from the eggs you can get from some local hens. Still, they were cooked perfectly well. The pork belly was a little over cooked. It was an inch or so cubed, with layers of crisp pork fat and flavourful meat. As it was just on the wrong side of done, the meat had dried out a bit.
I got mine with a big fat coffee, which was dark and smooth. The sort of coffee I want for breakfast., Not burnt, Not too, too strong or fancy. But sitting up in the cup, and giving you a wake-up pinch at least. The staff were more than attentive to bring around refills, as well as refills of water.
I really did enjoy the pierogies, as will have to try the other styles.. especially the kale ones for Andrea's quest for the kale dishes in Victoria. The rest of the breakfast was average. I really liked the environment and the staff, so definitely one to revisit... and I reckon it will feed a good niche being able to get a smaller meal for under $10, if that's what suits you.
But what it means in Victoria is a long under construction eatery, offering a "pierogi focused restaurant serving new Canadian cuisine". It seems likes there's been something being built in the Lower Yates Street location for a long time. Formally the home of a dark and foreboding internet café, it's not a big open loft-style space. The ubiquitous polished wood that's modern interior design. There's exposed ducting and lighting wires, a long table in one corner and a full-length bar seating in front of the kitchen window. The kitchen looks huge and takes up much of the back of the building.
We went in for brunch today, to check out what they had to offer overall. The menu sells triplets of pierogies, fresh made and in a few different flavours: chicken, pork, kale, clam and bacon, traditional. With fancy names like 'cluck', 'oink' and 'green'. Three doesn't seem much, but for $4 or so, that's not too bad, and all serving can be topped off with sauerkraut and cream, or a pile of poutine, or a bunch of other combos.
I ordered the breakfast special, five 'squeak' pierogies with two poached eggs, some pork belly and a dollop of Hollandaise. The dumplings are big, fat and well stuffed. Six would be a good solid meal, especially coupled with the trimmings. It was a big solid breakfast. They are soft on the inside, with a punch of cheese and garlic savoury goodness. The outside had been crisped up after the cooking process to add a bit of a crisp texture, but just slightly.
The eggs were poached very runny, and the yolks were a pale yellow, and slightly watery. To me, at least, not a sign of a great egg, and there wasn't the richness of flavour from the eggs you can get from some local hens. Still, they were cooked perfectly well. The pork belly was a little over cooked. It was an inch or so cubed, with layers of crisp pork fat and flavourful meat. As it was just on the wrong side of done, the meat had dried out a bit.
I got mine with a big fat coffee, which was dark and smooth. The sort of coffee I want for breakfast., Not burnt, Not too, too strong or fancy. But sitting up in the cup, and giving you a wake-up pinch at least. The staff were more than attentive to bring around refills, as well as refills of water.
I really did enjoy the pierogies, as will have to try the other styles.. especially the kale ones for Andrea's quest for the kale dishes in Victoria. The rest of the breakfast was average. I really liked the environment and the staff, so definitely one to revisit... and I reckon it will feed a good niche being able to get a smaller meal for under $10, if that's what suits you.
September 13, 2015
Tumeric, Langford
After watching "Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation", myself and the lovely Brunette of My Acquaintance wandered into Langford proper for something to eat. I was on a tight budget that day, but sharing a curry seemed like a good idea, so we walked into Tumeric on Goldstream road to see what we could get.
The outside doesn't look very exciting, being part of a strip mall. Glass doors, slightly faded signage in the windows and no real view inside. Even just through the door, you are in a narrow walkway between a cashier's desk and a low wall seperating you from some of the dining area. Once through, the space opens out, with a large area for small groups, a patio space outside, and a raised area with large bench tables for bigger family groups.
This was much more welcoming, and we got seated pretty much wherever we wanted, so we took a large solid wooden table, out of the way of the patio doors. The weather was cooling down that weekend, and we wanted warmth and coziness.
The menu's a decent length, with plenty of options, but not trying to have every possible version of curry known to man. We select a vegetable biryani, daal Maharani and a large plain naan. This we got with some chai tea.
The tea was great, a warming mix of spices, served strong but with plenty of milk too. Warming, and comforting. The daal, a creamy lentil stew, lacked a bit in flavour and texture. It needed some bite. Either in the lentils, or the garlic, or the ginger... or something. It wasn't bad, just not particularly inspiring.
The biryani was decent, a nice mesh of flavours in the spices, and a nice mix of vegetables. We ordered it medium, and it had a warmth to it that was hotter than I expected, but not unpleasant. It was just a rice dish, and not served with a vegetable curry sauce that I would often get in a british curry house. No matter, the daal worked with it instead.
The Naan bread was excellent. It was soft and pliant, with a bit of a crisp edge to it. It wiped up the juices from the daal, and was easily big enough for us to share one with out feeling left out on the breads.
Overall, for $14 each (including a tip), this was a decent evening meal, in a nice surroundings, with plenty enough in the portions to satiate us. They did tell us all about the buffet lunch special ($12.99), which, if out in Langford, sounds worth trying once. We had a conversation about UK curries. We talked about how butter chicken doesn't seem to be a thing over there, but the balti dish is. The servers had never heard of the balti, Seems it is a very UK-centric style of the cuisine.
Ah well. Compared to Amrikko's and the Sizzling Tandoor, it's not as good. But it's helping dissolve the idea I had that you can't get a decent curry in Victoria.
The outside doesn't look very exciting, being part of a strip mall. Glass doors, slightly faded signage in the windows and no real view inside. Even just through the door, you are in a narrow walkway between a cashier's desk and a low wall seperating you from some of the dining area. Once through, the space opens out, with a large area for small groups, a patio space outside, and a raised area with large bench tables for bigger family groups.
This was much more welcoming, and we got seated pretty much wherever we wanted, so we took a large solid wooden table, out of the way of the patio doors. The weather was cooling down that weekend, and we wanted warmth and coziness.
The menu's a decent length, with plenty of options, but not trying to have every possible version of curry known to man. We select a vegetable biryani, daal Maharani and a large plain naan. This we got with some chai tea.
The tea was great, a warming mix of spices, served strong but with plenty of milk too. Warming, and comforting. The daal, a creamy lentil stew, lacked a bit in flavour and texture. It needed some bite. Either in the lentils, or the garlic, or the ginger... or something. It wasn't bad, just not particularly inspiring.
The biryani was decent, a nice mesh of flavours in the spices, and a nice mix of vegetables. We ordered it medium, and it had a warmth to it that was hotter than I expected, but not unpleasant. It was just a rice dish, and not served with a vegetable curry sauce that I would often get in a british curry house. No matter, the daal worked with it instead.
The Naan bread was excellent. It was soft and pliant, with a bit of a crisp edge to it. It wiped up the juices from the daal, and was easily big enough for us to share one with out feeling left out on the breads.
Overall, for $14 each (including a tip), this was a decent evening meal, in a nice surroundings, with plenty enough in the portions to satiate us. They did tell us all about the buffet lunch special ($12.99), which, if out in Langford, sounds worth trying once. We had a conversation about UK curries. We talked about how butter chicken doesn't seem to be a thing over there, but the balti dish is. The servers had never heard of the balti, Seems it is a very UK-centric style of the cuisine.
Ah well. Compared to Amrikko's and the Sizzling Tandoor, it's not as good. But it's helping dissolve the idea I had that you can't get a decent curry in Victoria.
September 06, 2015
The Victoria Fringe, One Show
Last night, I saw my last fringe show, For Body and Light's "Bear Dreams" at the Metro Studio. In short, it was excellent.
There. Done. Can I go now?
Not really. It's probably useful to now write some words that help the reader understand why I liked it so much, so they can judge whether my reaction is something they would share. Some description, some short analysis, and then we can be done.
Recently, the UK Guardian's literary critic wrote a piece about how bad Terry Pratchett is as a writer, and how is mediocre writing is a waste of everyone's time. Problem is, he hasn't read the authors work beyond a few pages, and his break down of the work he's reviewing is somewhat lacking. Contrast with this piece by Jacqueline Rose on "Gone Girl" and "Girl on a Train". Here the critic breaks down the work, in context, on why they are disturbing and un-rewarding books.
That makes a great piece to read. The author has given you something to muse over, and you can think more about whether you'd like to read the books anyways. You can understand much more about them, and also, if you've read them, think about your own reaction to them in a different way.
What's this got to do with "Bear Dreams"? Well, it got a One Star review from the Times Colonist arts reviewer. Of course he can give any level of review he so likes. But the review itself, to me, was not a good review, as it left anyone reading it with a view of the show that is different from what I saw, and throughly enjoyed. If you are giving out such low marks, it's really got to be something devoid of merit.
"Bear Dreams" is a mix of spoken word poetry, dance, spectacle and audio guitar loops. The poet, Ian Ferrier, recites in hushed tones a story about travel, discovery and a love of Canada. A journey through time and memories of the cold, dark winters that the original (and later) settlers to this place came across, struggles against and made their home.
The music is simple, emotional and moody. Use simple chords and rhythms, looped and varied, the sounds keep a tempo with the words, and with the on stage action. At times it's simple movement of the three dancers, moving light around, cast shadows and beams over the audience and the stage. At other times, the music and movement intensifies, with the two principals running, diving and rolling over the entire space. They use lights, pillows and their own bodies to recreate and retell the words spoken.
Stephanie Marin-Robert, the choreographer, paints the pictures of love, of winter and the voyageurs with her dancers, and herself. The two principals, Danika Cormier and Joachim Yensin-Martin, use the space to retell a love story of the Thompsons. The Thompsons, David and his Metis Wife Charlotte, discover and explored many parts of central Canada. They show the finding new space in the wilderness, and use a large silk net to create further images and patterns on the stage, as Ian narrates an audio tapestry.
In the finale, some of the audience is invited on stage to create a tent with this large silk net, and use small green and violet torches to re-image the aurora borealis. The shows builds to this point, with the music and the dance becoming more and more urgent, until we are left with the tension relieved as the tent whisks away, and the music and story ends as the Bear awakes from his dreams.
This show is more than it's parts. It's creating a large, mood driven piece, that's intense, that's trying to create a tight emotional response in your belly. That's trying to make you feel something more than laughter or joy. A sense of belonging and sense of place.
How it does that may not be for everyone. But it does what it's trying to do well. There's no bum notes, or overly earnest appeals to the crowd. It's a piece of moving, living art, that you look at, and either accept or reject. It's a time for reflection, and a space for thinking.
It's really not the sort of thing on paper that I would of thought I'd like. But I did. I loved it, like I loved "Coming and Going" last year.
I hope I have fulfilled some of my brief as a reviewer, and you can now judge whether you think it is a show worth seeing when it comes to Vancouver, or if its not for you. If I have swayed you in either direction, mission accomplished.
[[ I know Ian Ferrier, the poet, from last year's fringe when he billeted with me, and he billeted here again. I say this for full disclosure of any bias. ]]
There. Done. Can I go now?
Not really. It's probably useful to now write some words that help the reader understand why I liked it so much, so they can judge whether my reaction is something they would share. Some description, some short analysis, and then we can be done.
Recently, the UK Guardian's literary critic wrote a piece about how bad Terry Pratchett is as a writer, and how is mediocre writing is a waste of everyone's time. Problem is, he hasn't read the authors work beyond a few pages, and his break down of the work he's reviewing is somewhat lacking. Contrast with this piece by Jacqueline Rose on "Gone Girl" and "Girl on a Train". Here the critic breaks down the work, in context, on why they are disturbing and un-rewarding books.
That makes a great piece to read. The author has given you something to muse over, and you can think more about whether you'd like to read the books anyways. You can understand much more about them, and also, if you've read them, think about your own reaction to them in a different way.
What's this got to do with "Bear Dreams"? Well, it got a One Star review from the Times Colonist arts reviewer. Of course he can give any level of review he so likes. But the review itself, to me, was not a good review, as it left anyone reading it with a view of the show that is different from what I saw, and throughly enjoyed. If you are giving out such low marks, it's really got to be something devoid of merit.
"Bear Dreams" is a mix of spoken word poetry, dance, spectacle and audio guitar loops. The poet, Ian Ferrier, recites in hushed tones a story about travel, discovery and a love of Canada. A journey through time and memories of the cold, dark winters that the original (and later) settlers to this place came across, struggles against and made their home.
The music is simple, emotional and moody. Use simple chords and rhythms, looped and varied, the sounds keep a tempo with the words, and with the on stage action. At times it's simple movement of the three dancers, moving light around, cast shadows and beams over the audience and the stage. At other times, the music and movement intensifies, with the two principals running, diving and rolling over the entire space. They use lights, pillows and their own bodies to recreate and retell the words spoken.
Stephanie Marin-Robert, the choreographer, paints the pictures of love, of winter and the voyageurs with her dancers, and herself. The two principals, Danika Cormier and Joachim Yensin-Martin, use the space to retell a love story of the Thompsons. The Thompsons, David and his Metis Wife Charlotte, discover and explored many parts of central Canada. They show the finding new space in the wilderness, and use a large silk net to create further images and patterns on the stage, as Ian narrates an audio tapestry.
In the finale, some of the audience is invited on stage to create a tent with this large silk net, and use small green and violet torches to re-image the aurora borealis. The shows builds to this point, with the music and the dance becoming more and more urgent, until we are left with the tension relieved as the tent whisks away, and the music and story ends as the Bear awakes from his dreams.
This show is more than it's parts. It's creating a large, mood driven piece, that's intense, that's trying to create a tight emotional response in your belly. That's trying to make you feel something more than laughter or joy. A sense of belonging and sense of place.
How it does that may not be for everyone. But it does what it's trying to do well. There's no bum notes, or overly earnest appeals to the crowd. It's a piece of moving, living art, that you look at, and either accept or reject. It's a time for reflection, and a space for thinking.
It's really not the sort of thing on paper that I would of thought I'd like. But I did. I loved it, like I loved "Coming and Going" last year.
I hope I have fulfilled some of my brief as a reviewer, and you can now judge whether you think it is a show worth seeing when it comes to Vancouver, or if its not for you. If I have swayed you in either direction, mission accomplished.
[[ I know Ian Ferrier, the poet, from last year's fringe when he billeted with me, and he billeted here again. I say this for full disclosure of any bias. ]]
August 30, 2015
The Victoria Fringe, Three Shows
Victoria Fringe is something I have grown to love. My first experience was on a last minute date to see a feminist show about Penis's, which turned into a really powerful story about domestic abuse. The year after I took a day to myself to go go around to a few shows, and there found out about the hosting program. Last year I hosted the indomitable Ian Ferrier, poet and musician for "For Body and Light". Myself and the Brunette saw a couple of shows, and I went to Ian's show solo. The latter was great, and completely not the sort of thing I'd have gone to normally. Spoken word, guitar loops, dance, and storytelling all wrapped up in a most atmospheric whole.
So, this year, I offered to host Ian again, and got a few free tickets for letting him use the spare room at Vic-In-Person towers. Result.
Ha! with Wes Borg
This is a 75-minute long one-man show about a young guy from Saskatoon becoming a comedian., based on the jokes written by his girlfriend. Wes does all the characters, ranging from a gruff Saskethwan farmer, a gay queen, and a big black Torontonian comedian. He flips between each voice rapidly, altering his pose and voice in a blurring whir. It's amazing to watch and not as hard to follow as you'd expect.
The story uses the audience to represent the audiences at each location the story takes us, describing the highs and lows of being on the road, away from a heavily pregnant wife. Many turns of luck show up for the meteoric rise, and of course, the inevitable fall. But this ends up being the making of our hero, and we end with the happy ending that makes Canadian sense after all.
Wes puts a lot into the show, he's manic for about 75 minutes, not letting up and must have lost about 10lbs in sweat. The anger, fear and panic he exudes feels real at times. The story loses itself somewhere in the middle, and could have been 10 minutes shorter, but it ends as well as it starts, and was well worth watching.
Porn and Pinochet with Andy Caneti
My favourite of the three shows I saw. This is an autobiographical story of growing up as a Chilean in Canada, and later as Canadian in Chile. Andy weaves his story through many different little anecdotes of his parents being something very different from the other parents he saw in Canada, and his own realization when he moved back to Chile how much different his own personality was from his classmates in Sasketchwan.
Along the way, he discusses whether he really did lose his virginity at age 13, his first experience with video-taped porn, having to keep on the good side of the pro-Pinochet supporters in Chilean, and his relationship with his parents.
While the narrator is a stand-up comedian by day, this is less stand-up and more story telling... though it's funny and there are many punchlines. There's also some insights into his life and some heartfelt moments of his own realizations. No spoilers but there is plenty of emotion along with the yuks towards the end.
Two by the Catador Theatre group
For some reason I thought this was a one-handed play, but it's a multi-part piece, which has two stories running side by side, using a simple point of divergence: a missed call on the cell phone. We watch the lead characters go through their day, intertwining with each other, and a couple of set pieces which show the tedium of their jobs at a coffee shop. These scenes had a lot of walking around on the set, and the heavy footsteps didn't add a rhythm to the show but instead made a distracting noise. They intertwined the two stories here a lot, but instead of being offset mirrors, they were a jumbled mess of action.
Then we get the best and the worst act. The noisy bar. The best, as the acting and writing here was compelling and interesting. The worst as I had to really strain to hear the dialogue over the background music in the bar. Which is a shame, as both sets of dialogue were well acted and well written, advancing what we knew about the central character and her relationships with other people that were not yet clear. This part, where the two parallel stories were the same but very different was good stuff.
Until the ending act. Which, as warned, contained scenes of violence and sexual assault. But it was both telegraphed earlier, and one dimensional. It just felt like an easy answer and ending (and a tragic ending too) without much examination, or even a build up of tension beforehand before the release. In the end, the story had good parts, but overall didn't hang together very well for me.
....
So, this year, I offered to host Ian again, and got a few free tickets for letting him use the spare room at Vic-In-Person towers. Result.
Ha! with Wes Borg
This is a 75-minute long one-man show about a young guy from Saskatoon becoming a comedian., based on the jokes written by his girlfriend. Wes does all the characters, ranging from a gruff Saskethwan farmer, a gay queen, and a big black Torontonian comedian. He flips between each voice rapidly, altering his pose and voice in a blurring whir. It's amazing to watch and not as hard to follow as you'd expect.
The story uses the audience to represent the audiences at each location the story takes us, describing the highs and lows of being on the road, away from a heavily pregnant wife. Many turns of luck show up for the meteoric rise, and of course, the inevitable fall. But this ends up being the making of our hero, and we end with the happy ending that makes Canadian sense after all.
Wes puts a lot into the show, he's manic for about 75 minutes, not letting up and must have lost about 10lbs in sweat. The anger, fear and panic he exudes feels real at times. The story loses itself somewhere in the middle, and could have been 10 minutes shorter, but it ends as well as it starts, and was well worth watching.
Porn and Pinochet with Andy Caneti
My favourite of the three shows I saw. This is an autobiographical story of growing up as a Chilean in Canada, and later as Canadian in Chile. Andy weaves his story through many different little anecdotes of his parents being something very different from the other parents he saw in Canada, and his own realization when he moved back to Chile how much different his own personality was from his classmates in Sasketchwan.
Along the way, he discusses whether he really did lose his virginity at age 13, his first experience with video-taped porn, having to keep on the good side of the pro-Pinochet supporters in Chilean, and his relationship with his parents.
While the narrator is a stand-up comedian by day, this is less stand-up and more story telling... though it's funny and there are many punchlines. There's also some insights into his life and some heartfelt moments of his own realizations. No spoilers but there is plenty of emotion along with the yuks towards the end.
Two by the Catador Theatre group
For some reason I thought this was a one-handed play, but it's a multi-part piece, which has two stories running side by side, using a simple point of divergence: a missed call on the cell phone. We watch the lead characters go through their day, intertwining with each other, and a couple of set pieces which show the tedium of their jobs at a coffee shop. These scenes had a lot of walking around on the set, and the heavy footsteps didn't add a rhythm to the show but instead made a distracting noise. They intertwined the two stories here a lot, but instead of being offset mirrors, they were a jumbled mess of action.
Then we get the best and the worst act. The noisy bar. The best, as the acting and writing here was compelling and interesting. The worst as I had to really strain to hear the dialogue over the background music in the bar. Which is a shame, as both sets of dialogue were well acted and well written, advancing what we knew about the central character and her relationships with other people that were not yet clear. This part, where the two parallel stories were the same but very different was good stuff.
Until the ending act. Which, as warned, contained scenes of violence and sexual assault. But it was both telegraphed earlier, and one dimensional. It just felt like an easy answer and ending (and a tragic ending too) without much examination, or even a build up of tension beforehand before the release. In the end, the story had good parts, but overall didn't hang together very well for me.
....
August 23, 2015
Ross Bay Pub, Fairfield, Victoria
I haven't done music bingo in a while. It's a fun enough reason to sit in the pub, have a bevy and laugh with your friends. It's even better when you win two prizes for your efforts of recognizing the words in a chorus and marking it on a grid.
Which is what I did on Saturday night with a friend and some of her friends. At the Ross Bay Pub. The Ross Bay used to be a White Spot and is now a corner pub in a strip mall. From the outside, it looks like a cafe with darkened windows and a secluded patio. Inside, it's narrow, with a some tables up on a higher level, and some high tables scattered around the front as well, making it feel cramped, even if it isn't really.
We gathered around a six person table and were served waters pretty quickly. Drink service took a bit longer, as there'd just been a rush of new diners, probably all here for the music bingo. Still I got the Saturday special pint of Lucky (just for a change, right?) and ordered the BLT sandwich.
The Lucky Lager was cold and wet. It disappeared quickly as I'd just cycled down and was thirsty. It was replaced by a pint of the Russell Blood Alley Bitter. This lasted much longer (most of the evening). It's rich, flavourful pint, with a nice complex set of malty and hoppy flavours. Mmmm.
My food was pretty good as well. A mid-size door stop of a sandwich, a good pile of lettuce and tomato, and a couple of rashers of bacon. Not stuffed full of meat, but it worked out well. The fries were big, beef-eater cut planks of potatoes, covered with some sort of crispy batter. This gave them a big crunch, but also made them stick together.
Two of my friends shared a huge platter with wings, waffle fries, calamari, potato skins and onion rings. This was a big pile of stuff and was more than enough for two folks. I tried a bit of the Calamari, and it was decent... a bit peppery, but the flesh was tender and not rubberized.
The stuffed Yorkshire went down well too and was served in a big pile. This was to make it look like a massive portion while it was just a big one instead. The veggie pizza at the table looked just average, and like the base had been pre-toasted. The rack-o-ribs was a full foot long or more of juicy ribs, that I am told were good too.
All in, the food has a more than passing grade. It's pub food, done well, but with no frills or extras. And no reason why it should be frilly or fussy. It's not that place, it's a community corner pub. With it's big TVs and music bingo.
The bingo is hosted by an amiable, and occasionally funny compere. He'd toured and played in a band called 'Shag' for a while. So he dropped in a few celebrities names of people he'd met, and bands he loved as he played them. I agree, Blondie is not disco, but there they were in the 70's Disco round. It was fun for two rounds, but after that, I could have done with a bit of low-level music, coupled with a kicked back chat with the people at my table, rather than another round, featureing classic rock snippets.
Still, we won 3 prizes out 9 at our table... I took home a Molson Canadian branded cooler bag. I won another one earlier in the evening (with golf balls) but passed this on to my fellow brit at the table who realized the uses it might have for taking beer around the disc golf courses.
Cycled home, a full belly and a happy memory. Not a bad spot, and will visit again.
Which is what I did on Saturday night with a friend and some of her friends. At the Ross Bay Pub. The Ross Bay used to be a White Spot and is now a corner pub in a strip mall. From the outside, it looks like a cafe with darkened windows and a secluded patio. Inside, it's narrow, with a some tables up on a higher level, and some high tables scattered around the front as well, making it feel cramped, even if it isn't really.
We gathered around a six person table and were served waters pretty quickly. Drink service took a bit longer, as there'd just been a rush of new diners, probably all here for the music bingo. Still I got the Saturday special pint of Lucky (just for a change, right?) and ordered the BLT sandwich.
The Lucky Lager was cold and wet. It disappeared quickly as I'd just cycled down and was thirsty. It was replaced by a pint of the Russell Blood Alley Bitter. This lasted much longer (most of the evening). It's rich, flavourful pint, with a nice complex set of malty and hoppy flavours. Mmmm.
My food was pretty good as well. A mid-size door stop of a sandwich, a good pile of lettuce and tomato, and a couple of rashers of bacon. Not stuffed full of meat, but it worked out well. The fries were big, beef-eater cut planks of potatoes, covered with some sort of crispy batter. This gave them a big crunch, but also made them stick together.
Two of my friends shared a huge platter with wings, waffle fries, calamari, potato skins and onion rings. This was a big pile of stuff and was more than enough for two folks. I tried a bit of the Calamari, and it was decent... a bit peppery, but the flesh was tender and not rubberized.
The stuffed Yorkshire went down well too and was served in a big pile. This was to make it look like a massive portion while it was just a big one instead. The veggie pizza at the table looked just average, and like the base had been pre-toasted. The rack-o-ribs was a full foot long or more of juicy ribs, that I am told were good too.
All in, the food has a more than passing grade. It's pub food, done well, but with no frills or extras. And no reason why it should be frilly or fussy. It's not that place, it's a community corner pub. With it's big TVs and music bingo.
The bingo is hosted by an amiable, and occasionally funny compere. He'd toured and played in a band called 'Shag' for a while. So he dropped in a few celebrities names of people he'd met, and bands he loved as he played them. I agree, Blondie is not disco, but there they were in the 70's Disco round. It was fun for two rounds, but after that, I could have done with a bit of low-level music, coupled with a kicked back chat with the people at my table, rather than another round, featureing classic rock snippets.
Still, we won 3 prizes out 9 at our table... I took home a Molson Canadian branded cooler bag. I won another one earlier in the evening (with golf balls) but passed this on to my fellow brit at the table who realized the uses it might have for taking beer around the disc golf courses.
Cycled home, a full belly and a happy memory. Not a bad spot, and will visit again.
August 16, 2015
Shirley Day, Shirley, BC
Shirley was named in honour of the joke in Airplane that ends with the punchline: 'Don't Call Me Shirely'. Surely.
Shirely is a small community on the road out of Sooke towards Jordan River, Port Renfrew and the edge of the Pacific. As you travel through the woods on the border of the Juan De Fuca, you'll pass a swathe of B&B's, cabins and getaway lodges. There's small holdings and farms, a meadery and The Shirley Delicious Cafe. Next to the Shirley Fire Hall and the social centre of this settlement.
The lovely Brunette of my Acquaintance knows the area well, selling her baked goods and jams at a market there every couple of weeks. But once a year, there's the Shirley Fun Day, where everyone in the area and beyond comes togther, buys local produce, meets, greets and eats BBQ salmon. All intended to raise funds for the fire hall and to keep the community centre running.
It makes the rural crowd proud. They chat to the neighbours that they may not see quite as often, bond over shared experiences and check in with each other. Meanwhile, the kids run around and cause gentle mayhem. And the urbanites in their BMWs drive out to buy the most exquisite chocolate brownies I have ever had ($1 a square).
I could have spent a small fortune on veg and jarred preserves, but came away with some fresh Arugla sprouts. And a belly full of BBQ Salmon. Which was delicious, especially with a heaping mound of fresh salad (probably not locally grown) and a chuck of tasty olive oil bread. And some rice. Pretty good meal for $12.50.
I also managed to win a case of Joia Natural Sodas and a new baseball cap in the silent auction. The Brunette is not so keen on me wearing a cap all the time. I maintain it keeps the sun out of my eyes and the sweat of my neck. Though as The Libertines once wrote:
Shirely is a small community on the road out of Sooke towards Jordan River, Port Renfrew and the edge of the Pacific. As you travel through the woods on the border of the Juan De Fuca, you'll pass a swathe of B&B's, cabins and getaway lodges. There's small holdings and farms, a meadery and The Shirley Delicious Cafe. Next to the Shirley Fire Hall and the social centre of this settlement.
The lovely Brunette of my Acquaintance knows the area well, selling her baked goods and jams at a market there every couple of weeks. But once a year, there's the Shirley Fun Day, where everyone in the area and beyond comes togther, buys local produce, meets, greets and eats BBQ salmon. All intended to raise funds for the fire hall and to keep the community centre running.
It makes the rural crowd proud. They chat to the neighbours that they may not see quite as often, bond over shared experiences and check in with each other. Meanwhile, the kids run around and cause gentle mayhem. And the urbanites in their BMWs drive out to buy the most exquisite chocolate brownies I have ever had ($1 a square).
I could have spent a small fortune on veg and jarred preserves, but came away with some fresh Arugla sprouts. And a belly full of BBQ Salmon. Which was delicious, especially with a heaping mound of fresh salad (probably not locally grown) and a chuck of tasty olive oil bread. And some rice. Pretty good meal for $12.50.
I also managed to win a case of Joia Natural Sodas and a new baseball cap in the silent auction. The Brunette is not so keen on me wearing a cap all the time. I maintain it keeps the sun out of my eyes and the sweat of my neck. Though as The Libertines once wrote:
There are fewer more distressing sights than that
Of an Englishman in a baseball cap
And we'll die in the class we were born
Well that's a class of our own my love
A class of our own my love
(A Time for Heroes)
We left the country idyll to the sounds of the loudest Electronic Dance Music I've heard since I went to 'rave' aged 19. Apart from that, if you are out that way, stop in to the cafe, or the Sunday markets.
August 09, 2015
The Salt and Pepper Fox, Food Delivery, Downtown Victoria
I am working at the Watershed a couple of days each week. I recently hosted a packed lunch boardgame session there. The food was ordered in from the Salt and Peper Fox. I assumed the Salt and Pepper Fox was some older dude with gray hair and a smooth, louche manner. Instead, he's much younger, with no greying hair, and a friendly, effective manner.
The Salt and Pepper Fox specializes in handmade, brown bag lunches. These are delivered to your workplace, as long as you've ordered before 3 pm the day before. There's a small but good selection of sandwiches, 3 sides salads, and a bunch of extras, like pop, chips and cookies.
I ordered the Mum's egg salad, with a kale caesar (because I love my kale) and a bag of Hardbite salted chips. It arrived all wrapped up in a big brown paper bag. My name on. Just like my Mum would have made for me if she'd been in North America where the brown paper bag lunch is a thing. Instead, I used to have lunch in a plastic lunch box, with a thermos full of orange squash, and a sandwich roll, on a home baked bread roll. If it was salami, the filling would not always get eaten (sorry mum). If it was ham or cheese, it was eaten with much happiness.
But enough nostalgia.
The caesar had a smooth, creamy dressing, that wasn't slapped all over the leaves, but instead just enough to add a zest to the dark lush green leaves. The croutons were crunchy, showing they'd only been added to the salad recently, and not allowed to soak and go soggy. Very nice.
The sub-style sandwich was overflowing with a fresh egg mayonnaise and big chunks of mature cheddar cheese. The eggs were rich, golden, flavourful chunks, that were offset by the slightly salty bite of the cheddar. There was a liberal helping of crisp iceberg lettuce to add a little crunch to the proceedings. A very fine sandwich, a two napkin affair as the filling escaped the bread.
The chips were 'Hardbite'. They do a decent enough crunchy bag of chips. I can't get excited about them. They rounded out the $12 meal nicely. That's the meal deal: 1 sandwich, 1 side, 1 salad. There's plenty of eating in there to fill you up. I'd probably leave the side for an afternoon snack next time... and go for a fresh baked cookie.
The roast chicken and harvati got two big thumbs up from the rest of the group. I'd probably give the tuna a go next time... tuna, cheddar and a fresh red pepper sauce sounds like a good combination to me.
Monday's lunch menu is always a special edition but I have no had a chance to try it yet. This isn't as cheap as Subway. But this is also delivered, saving you time and effort, and you are getting great, healthy food. My next packed lunch board game session is coming up on the 18th, and I'll be ordering again
http://www.saltandpepperfox.com/
The Salt and Pepper Fox specializes in handmade, brown bag lunches. These are delivered to your workplace, as long as you've ordered before 3 pm the day before. There's a small but good selection of sandwiches, 3 sides salads, and a bunch of extras, like pop, chips and cookies.
I ordered the Mum's egg salad, with a kale caesar (because I love my kale) and a bag of Hardbite salted chips. It arrived all wrapped up in a big brown paper bag. My name on. Just like my Mum would have made for me if she'd been in North America where the brown paper bag lunch is a thing. Instead, I used to have lunch in a plastic lunch box, with a thermos full of orange squash, and a sandwich roll, on a home baked bread roll. If it was salami, the filling would not always get eaten (sorry mum). If it was ham or cheese, it was eaten with much happiness.
But enough nostalgia.
The caesar had a smooth, creamy dressing, that wasn't slapped all over the leaves, but instead just enough to add a zest to the dark lush green leaves. The croutons were crunchy, showing they'd only been added to the salad recently, and not allowed to soak and go soggy. Very nice.
The sub-style sandwich was overflowing with a fresh egg mayonnaise and big chunks of mature cheddar cheese. The eggs were rich, golden, flavourful chunks, that were offset by the slightly salty bite of the cheddar. There was a liberal helping of crisp iceberg lettuce to add a little crunch to the proceedings. A very fine sandwich, a two napkin affair as the filling escaped the bread.
The chips were 'Hardbite'. They do a decent enough crunchy bag of chips. I can't get excited about them. They rounded out the $12 meal nicely. That's the meal deal: 1 sandwich, 1 side, 1 salad. There's plenty of eating in there to fill you up. I'd probably leave the side for an afternoon snack next time... and go for a fresh baked cookie.
The roast chicken and harvati got two big thumbs up from the rest of the group. I'd probably give the tuna a go next time... tuna, cheddar and a fresh red pepper sauce sounds like a good combination to me.
Monday's lunch menu is always a special edition but I have no had a chance to try it yet. This isn't as cheap as Subway. But this is also delivered, saving you time and effort, and you are getting great, healthy food. My next packed lunch board game session is coming up on the 18th, and I'll be ordering again
http://www.saltandpepperfox.com/
August 02, 2015
Top five brunches in Victoria
I'll admit it, I have had this posting on hold for a while for the week where I just don't have anything new to post and write about. I just can't keep it back any longer, but in no particular order, here's my list of top brunch spots in Victoria:
1) The Fernwood Inn. The two egg breakfast is a great deal, but the steak and eggs skillet is fantastic. Eat here on a hot summer's day, on the patio. Enjoy the parsnips muddled up into the breakfast potatoes, the big meaty pork sausages or the apricot toast. Prices are a little high, but you pay for the quality.
2) Glo. The beef short rib hash has all the right combinations for a meat eater's breakfast: potatoes are done with plenty of flavour and starch to fill you up, protein exuding a rich, savoury flavour and eggs letting out a golden yoke to add richness to the piles of veggies hash underneath. You can get a wind-shaded spot outside, or enjoy the quiet indoors any time of the year. Why this place is not rocking every Sunday is probably due to the location out of the down core.
3) The Blue Fox. If it just was as quiet as Glo, I'd probably not have anything else to write about, as I'd just go there all the time, and this blog would merely be 52 weeks of eating at the Blue Fox. However, this isn't the Worst Idea of All Time (and anyways that would involve eating at Cora's every Sunday for a year). Instead, it's a rare treat that remind me how good the basics of food can be done.
4) The Guild. The full works breakfast at the Guild is a heart attack on a plate. If you ate it every day, never exercised and washed it down with a pint of melted ice cream. As the start to set yourself up for a long day's hike/renovations/moving a friend out of their fifth-floor walk-up apartment after a relationship-ending fight, it's a grand start. I love the mix of west-coast and English-style gastropub at the Guild. And the fact it's never too busy.
5) Spoons. Only if you can catch it when it's just busy enough to be good for people watching, and not so busy the wait is half a day. They do traditional breakfast here with plenty of everything. Or they twist it up a notch or five with a some extra combination, like breakfast fajitas or a massive side of poutine with your pulled pork benny. Go for a diner style experience, and you'll be more than happy.
I think that's my top five. Other favourites include Avalon, Picnic Too and Ferris's upstairs. It's a hard list to confine to just five in Victoria. And indicates the high bar you have to clear here to be notable.
EDIT: Uptairs at Ferris's no longer does a brunch menu, I am reliably informed. No more Weekend Crossword...
1) The Fernwood Inn. The two egg breakfast is a great deal, but the steak and eggs skillet is fantastic. Eat here on a hot summer's day, on the patio. Enjoy the parsnips muddled up into the breakfast potatoes, the big meaty pork sausages or the apricot toast. Prices are a little high, but you pay for the quality.
2) Glo. The beef short rib hash has all the right combinations for a meat eater's breakfast: potatoes are done with plenty of flavour and starch to fill you up, protein exuding a rich, savoury flavour and eggs letting out a golden yoke to add richness to the piles of veggies hash underneath. You can get a wind-shaded spot outside, or enjoy the quiet indoors any time of the year. Why this place is not rocking every Sunday is probably due to the location out of the down core.
3) The Blue Fox. If it just was as quiet as Glo, I'd probably not have anything else to write about, as I'd just go there all the time, and this blog would merely be 52 weeks of eating at the Blue Fox. However, this isn't the Worst Idea of All Time (and anyways that would involve eating at Cora's every Sunday for a year). Instead, it's a rare treat that remind me how good the basics of food can be done.
4) The Guild. The full works breakfast at the Guild is a heart attack on a plate. If you ate it every day, never exercised and washed it down with a pint of melted ice cream. As the start to set yourself up for a long day's hike/renovations/moving a friend out of their fifth-floor walk-up apartment after a relationship-ending fight, it's a grand start. I love the mix of west-coast and English-style gastropub at the Guild. And the fact it's never too busy.
5) Spoons. Only if you can catch it when it's just busy enough to be good for people watching, and not so busy the wait is half a day. They do traditional breakfast here with plenty of everything. Or they twist it up a notch or five with a some extra combination, like breakfast fajitas or a massive side of poutine with your pulled pork benny. Go for a diner style experience, and you'll be more than happy.
I think that's my top five. Other favourites include Avalon, Picnic Too and Ferris's upstairs. It's a hard list to confine to just five in Victoria. And indicates the high bar you have to clear here to be notable.
EDIT: Uptairs at Ferris's no longer does a brunch menu, I am reliably informed. No more Weekend Crossword...
July 26, 2015
Juma Food truck, Food Truck Fest, Victoria
The food truck fest was a wash out for me this Friday. I got downtown as the heavens opened, so hardly had a chance to scout around and see what interesting things were on sale. Once the water starts dropping down the back of my t-shirt, I'm done. I met my (damp) friends and then headed to a small silver caravan that had a chalkboard offering steak specials and an organic lentil dahl. I thought about a steak or the Chinese five spice chicken wings, but this wasn't the weather for meat al fresco.
I got the dahl. 3 minutes later, I had a medium sized cardboard tray filled with Basmati rice, wilted greens and a healthy spoonful of a rich brown lentil stew. We headed to my friends apartment to eat, and on the way back, the poppadum shards took the worst of the rain. I can't really rate how good these were. Even the best in the world would have gotten soggy.
The rest of the meal was great. The lentils with spicy, but not with an intense heat. A flavourful, wholesome mouthful. The greens counter-balanced the earthy tones of the curry. The rice was cooked perfect. I liked it. I'd order more if I can find them again.
So looking to find out where they were from, I found the website, and discovered it's a farm-to-fork operation, producing their own meat and veg to serve. The lovely brunette of my acquaintance would approve of their home raised, happy chickens. I guess it's now a case of following them on twitter and seeing if I'll be nearby again.
As for everything else there... my friends said the Mac and Cheese from the Mac truck was awesome, and the burger was big, fat and delicious. Sorry for the lack of details. It wasn't a detail sort of day.
EDIT: https://streetfoodapp.com/victoria/juma ; This will help you find Juma, and I guess other food trucks in town.
I got the dahl. 3 minutes later, I had a medium sized cardboard tray filled with Basmati rice, wilted greens and a healthy spoonful of a rich brown lentil stew. We headed to my friends apartment to eat, and on the way back, the poppadum shards took the worst of the rain. I can't really rate how good these were. Even the best in the world would have gotten soggy.
The rest of the meal was great. The lentils with spicy, but not with an intense heat. A flavourful, wholesome mouthful. The greens counter-balanced the earthy tones of the curry. The rice was cooked perfect. I liked it. I'd order more if I can find them again.
So looking to find out where they were from, I found the website, and discovered it's a farm-to-fork operation, producing their own meat and veg to serve. The lovely brunette of my acquaintance would approve of their home raised, happy chickens. I guess it's now a case of following them on twitter and seeing if I'll be nearby again.
As for everything else there... my friends said the Mac and Cheese from the Mac truck was awesome, and the burger was big, fat and delicious. Sorry for the lack of details. It wasn't a detail sort of day.
EDIT: https://streetfoodapp.com/victoria/juma ; This will help you find Juma, and I guess other food trucks in town.
July 19, 2015
Northern Quarter, Downtown Victoria
The Friday Night Quiz at the old Fort Street Cafe was a night of legends. Much loved and admired, so much so I still get hits on my post about it years after the Fort closed down. But Benji and his team are back, with Torin Egan. Torin ran the food at the Superior Cafe. Another place I really liked, and that is also closed now. So if two old favourites team up, you expect good things.
The Northern Quarter is the result. Looking to have some of the vibe of live music and entertainment from the Fort, with interesting food and drink of the Superior. It captures aspects of both, I feel in my two visits, but with something different. It misses the rough, underground (literally) feel of the old Fort Cafe, and also the high art decor of the Superior. Instead, it feels more like a big open loft apartment, with a big open space from the up front stage to the square bar at the back. There's copious art on the walls. There's lots of solid, tough wooden tables, regimented into rows. The floor is polished concrete, the ceiling has a wavy set of slats hanging from it. These probably do wonders for the acoustics.
I went in for a quick brunch this past Sunday. In short, it's pretty good. It didn't hit the top level of places in Victoria (Glo, Blue Fox, Picnic Too, etc), but it's a solid second tier in Victoria. The best features of the Eggs Benedict I had were the bacon jam under each soft poached eggs, and the house made tomato ketchup. Both had pep and zing to them, that worked with the dish. The eggs were soft with a nice runny yolk, but a solid white, so the whole thing kept it together, rather than being underdone and oozing. The garlicky hollandaise was fresh and not over rich. I would like to have seen a bit more garlic bite in it, but not everyone wants their breakfast to make them reek all day.
The coffee was plentiful, smooth and rich. It was kept topped up by an efficient floor staff who made an effort, and went that bit further than just asking for my order. Benji was working the floor, making sure all his guests were looked after, saying hi to everyone he knew, and making friends with those he didn't. The staff were all great.
I like the space, and I like the effort they are making to get good local music in, have social events, and bringing back the Quiz night. They have a firm vision to have good food and good entertainment, to build a local scene for all sorts of talent. I will hopefully convince my group to dine here again for a second opinion.
The Northern Quarter is the result. Looking to have some of the vibe of live music and entertainment from the Fort, with interesting food and drink of the Superior. It captures aspects of both, I feel in my two visits, but with something different. It misses the rough, underground (literally) feel of the old Fort Cafe, and also the high art decor of the Superior. Instead, it feels more like a big open loft apartment, with a big open space from the up front stage to the square bar at the back. There's copious art on the walls. There's lots of solid, tough wooden tables, regimented into rows. The floor is polished concrete, the ceiling has a wavy set of slats hanging from it. These probably do wonders for the acoustics.
I went in for a quick brunch this past Sunday. In short, it's pretty good. It didn't hit the top level of places in Victoria (Glo, Blue Fox, Picnic Too, etc), but it's a solid second tier in Victoria. The best features of the Eggs Benedict I had were the bacon jam under each soft poached eggs, and the house made tomato ketchup. Both had pep and zing to them, that worked with the dish. The eggs were soft with a nice runny yolk, but a solid white, so the whole thing kept it together, rather than being underdone and oozing. The garlicky hollandaise was fresh and not over rich. I would like to have seen a bit more garlic bite in it, but not everyone wants their breakfast to make them reek all day.
The coffee was plentiful, smooth and rich. It was kept topped up by an efficient floor staff who made an effort, and went that bit further than just asking for my order. Benji was working the floor, making sure all his guests were looked after, saying hi to everyone he knew, and making friends with those he didn't. The staff were all great.
I like the space, and I like the effort they are making to get good local music in, have social events, and bringing back the Quiz night. They have a firm vision to have good food and good entertainment, to build a local scene for all sorts of talent. I will hopefully convince my group to dine here again for a second opinion.
July 12, 2015
Picnic Too, Downtown Victoria
My first comment to Andrea on Picnic Too was:
"better than Tim Hortons"
This was not acceptable, she said via her Twitter account:
"Saying picnic is better than Timmy's is like saying it's better than dogs*** #obvious #nocomparison"
I followed up on Twitter with:
"For the record, it was MUCH better than Timmies. Flavour, fresh veggies, proper smooth Americano "
This passed the Andrea test. Or at least she didn't come around my apartment, knock on my door and leave a paper bag of turds on fire on the carpet outside my door. And that is acceptance if you ask me.
I went back with my brunch crew this morning to go a for second round. I got there early and hooked up to the WiFi, on the wooden table in the window. The inside space is small and comfortable, with a variety of low and high seating, and walls covered in a maze of wooden slats. The staff are all super pleasant.
I ordered my 'better than Timmies' breakfast of an Americano and Breakfast sandwich again. Guess what? It's just as good as last time. For $8, this a bargain. The Sour Pickle may give you more for your dollar, but nothing I know is this level of quality for under $10. Tasty crisp sandwich with all the right textures and colours melting together. The pro-tip if that you can double it for a lunch meal.
But even after that, I had buyer's envy. The plates of full breakfast that came out smelled like home. A home where hot buttered toast and rosemary and eggs and bacon are on the breakfast table. A home where you have awoken from a deep sleep on crisp cotton sheets, and the thickest, most comfortable pillows imaginable. Breakfast is ready, and you are just refreshed enough to function within twenty seconds of opening your eyes. You walk to the sunny kitchen table, where everything is ready for you.
It smelled like that. It looked like it smelled. I assume it tasted that way as well. The breakfast burrito was a tightly rolled mass of eggs and meat. The red potatoes on the side of the platters had been squashed gently, spilling out their white insides into the buttery covering. The bacon was crisp. The yolks golden. The congee was full of greens and
The Empire doughnuts they sell are stuffed to the gunnels with fillings. They are not a sorry sad affair, with a squirt of fake jam into a defrosted sugary lump that has been made two thousand miles east.
I need to go for a run again down Fort Street soon, and then go and eat at Picnic Too again. The next time I will go beyond the sandwich.
July 05, 2015
The Sour Pickle, Downtown Victoria
Hands down the best cheap breakfast and lunch in Downtown Victoria.
It's not fancy, it's not going to serve you free range bison on top of artisan bread rolls made by refugee farmers from the Okotoks. The eggs are eggs made from battery hens, the bread comes from huge loaves, pre-sliced on delivery, the bacon is unsmoked and simple.
That's fine. When my BLT and coffee give me change from a ten dollar bill, that's value. Especially when the food is fast, fresh and well prepared. Two slices of brown bread, a thick slice of tomato, crisp lettuce bed and a couple of rashers of bacon. Nothing to complain about there. It's not the world's greatest BLT. But it's a good one.
To go with it, there's a small pile of crisp fries. Wedged shaped potato chunks with the skin, they have a crispy outside and a fluffy centre. There's not much of a potato flavour in there, but they are also decent, and work well with the hot sauce. The hot sauce has a fair kick to it, just for the warning. It's not just for flavour effect.
My friends got a thick Monte Cristo sandwich which looked to be overflowing with ham and chicken. The sandwich was scoffed up with no trouble at all and a happy smile on the recipient's face. The two egg breakfast also got approval by my friend with a lighter appetite.
The service was friendly and kept the coffee levels topped up. They serve water in thick plastic beakers, and for some reason, cold water never tastes right to me in plastic beakers. But I have to stay hydrated. My neighbour told me so as I left the building this morning.
The Sour Pickle is small, maybe 20 seats, and simply adorned. Shoved in between Swans and a Hairdressers, they use floor area well, and it's close enough to main areas of the town to be convenient. They are very welcoming to children, with books and crayons for them to be entertained with.
It's not fancy, it's not going to serve you free range bison on top of artisan bread rolls made by refugee farmers from the Okotoks. The eggs are eggs made from battery hens, the bread comes from huge loaves, pre-sliced on delivery, the bacon is unsmoked and simple.
That's fine. When my BLT and coffee give me change from a ten dollar bill, that's value. Especially when the food is fast, fresh and well prepared. Two slices of brown bread, a thick slice of tomato, crisp lettuce bed and a couple of rashers of bacon. Nothing to complain about there. It's not the world's greatest BLT. But it's a good one.
To go with it, there's a small pile of crisp fries. Wedged shaped potato chunks with the skin, they have a crispy outside and a fluffy centre. There's not much of a potato flavour in there, but they are also decent, and work well with the hot sauce. The hot sauce has a fair kick to it, just for the warning. It's not just for flavour effect.
My friends got a thick Monte Cristo sandwich which looked to be overflowing with ham and chicken. The sandwich was scoffed up with no trouble at all and a happy smile on the recipient's face. The two egg breakfast also got approval by my friend with a lighter appetite.
The service was friendly and kept the coffee levels topped up. They serve water in thick plastic beakers, and for some reason, cold water never tastes right to me in plastic beakers. But I have to stay hydrated. My neighbour told me so as I left the building this morning.
The Sour Pickle is small, maybe 20 seats, and simply adorned. Shoved in between Swans and a Hairdressers, they use floor area well, and it's close enough to main areas of the town to be convenient. They are very welcoming to children, with books and crayons for them to be entertained with.
It'll probably never win an award, or make any top hipsters lists. It will get my business again.
June 28, 2015
James Bay Tea House and Restaurant, James Bay
Afternoon Tea is apparently a big English Tradition. Something I only ever had once in the UK before I moved here, at a small, 70's decorated tea room in Halifax. I was there collecting money for charity as a student, and we decided to have an afternoon tea after the lunch rush and before the commuters set off home. I don't recall much about it, except there were little cucumber sandwiches with the crusts cut off and a massive pot of strong tea.
I've had plenty of Cream Teas (which involve piling as much clotted cream and jam on to a fragile scone as possible). I've had Scottish High Tea which involves a lot of meat before the tea and bread and is effectively a dinner-time meal. But Afternoon tea with tea cups and petit-fours and pinky fingers crooked out is something that is a special event, not a household thing.
Now, in the space of six months, I've had two Afternoon Teas in Canada. The expensive, but incredibly practiced one at the Empress, and the lower budget version at the James Bay Tea House. These are two different ends of the experience. The first is all formal, in gorgeous surroundings and everything has to be just-so. And the price point reflects it.
The James Bay Tea House is in a wooden heritage house (or at least looks like it from the outside). Inside, the tables have white cotton tablecloths, and a pile of condiments in the middle. The walls are adorned with a variety of china plates and pictures of the Queen, Winston Churchill, and Kate Middleton and her baby. With a pair Union Flags to set things off to show this is meant to be BRITISH and PROUD. If you look at older pictures of the insides, the walls used to be crammed with double the amount of Royal memorabilia, the pillars covered in horse brasses, and high shelves with commemorative tea sets. All a bit much, and I'm glad they've toned it down.
Myself, with the lovely Brunette of my Acquaintance and a friend of ours, visited on a quieter afternoon for a natter and a catch up. I've been told to be nice about the Tea Room. The Brunette enjoyed herself and thought it was a very lovely place. Our friend also enjoyed the Afternoon Tea we got served.
I'll relay what I thought as we go through. We got two smaller afternoon teas along with a veggie burger for the Brunette. It was served with hash browns. They were cubed, parboiled and sauteed potatoes for those on Hash Brown Watch. Rich, red skinned ones, perfect for that sort of treatment.
The tea room had run out of clotted cream. So we had extra butter to go with our jam. Not quite the same thing, and a shame, as the scones and crumpet served on the lower deck of the triple layer of food were excellent. The scones were moist and crumbly with a good helping of dried fruit inside. The crust was crunchy, but not crisp. The second layer had some more scones, which I think were of a slightly different provenance. They did the trick too.
On the top, we had three small petit fours: a butter tart, a square of Nanaimo bar and something lemony. The butter tart was fantastic. Buttery, rich and sweet. I don't like Nanaimo Bars. The coconut base doesn't do it for me. This didn't have much of a desiccated coconut flavour at all, so I enjoyed it.
The teapots had little-knitted cosies on them. This didn't help me much when mine had a bad case of spout dribble. I'm afraid the table cloth was left a lot wetter than when I sat down. The brew was good and strong. Not Red Rose, as far as I could tell. I'd drink it again, for sure. We got a nice china tea cup and saucer to drink out of. I could crook out my little finger if I wanted. I managed to drink using the handle, rather than a paw wrapped around it. The Brunette has been training me to be seen in polite society.
The service was okay... we had to call back for cutlery, and it was a little slower than I'd have expected for a quiet afternoon. But there was service, and we got everything we wanted with a smile and pleasant attitude, so not really a big deal.
Overall, this is a pleasant enough spot. It serves a decent set of food for a fair price. You don't get the silver service of the Empress, and the view is a crossroads on Menzies Street, not the Inner Harbour. But at 25% of the price, and a short, short work for the Empress, I'd send a visitor here if they want English style tea room without breaking the bank.
I've had plenty of Cream Teas (which involve piling as much clotted cream and jam on to a fragile scone as possible). I've had Scottish High Tea which involves a lot of meat before the tea and bread and is effectively a dinner-time meal. But Afternoon tea with tea cups and petit-fours and pinky fingers crooked out is something that is a special event, not a household thing.
Now, in the space of six months, I've had two Afternoon Teas in Canada. The expensive, but incredibly practiced one at the Empress, and the lower budget version at the James Bay Tea House. These are two different ends of the experience. The first is all formal, in gorgeous surroundings and everything has to be just-so. And the price point reflects it.
The James Bay Tea House is in a wooden heritage house (or at least looks like it from the outside). Inside, the tables have white cotton tablecloths, and a pile of condiments in the middle. The walls are adorned with a variety of china plates and pictures of the Queen, Winston Churchill, and Kate Middleton and her baby. With a pair Union Flags to set things off to show this is meant to be BRITISH and PROUD. If you look at older pictures of the insides, the walls used to be crammed with double the amount of Royal memorabilia, the pillars covered in horse brasses, and high shelves with commemorative tea sets. All a bit much, and I'm glad they've toned it down.
Myself, with the lovely Brunette of my Acquaintance and a friend of ours, visited on a quieter afternoon for a natter and a catch up. I've been told to be nice about the Tea Room. The Brunette enjoyed herself and thought it was a very lovely place. Our friend also enjoyed the Afternoon Tea we got served.
I'll relay what I thought as we go through. We got two smaller afternoon teas along with a veggie burger for the Brunette. It was served with hash browns. They were cubed, parboiled and sauteed potatoes for those on Hash Brown Watch. Rich, red skinned ones, perfect for that sort of treatment.
The tea room had run out of clotted cream. So we had extra butter to go with our jam. Not quite the same thing, and a shame, as the scones and crumpet served on the lower deck of the triple layer of food were excellent. The scones were moist and crumbly with a good helping of dried fruit inside. The crust was crunchy, but not crisp. The second layer had some more scones, which I think were of a slightly different provenance. They did the trick too.
On the top, we had three small petit fours: a butter tart, a square of Nanaimo bar and something lemony. The butter tart was fantastic. Buttery, rich and sweet. I don't like Nanaimo Bars. The coconut base doesn't do it for me. This didn't have much of a desiccated coconut flavour at all, so I enjoyed it.
The teapots had little-knitted cosies on them. This didn't help me much when mine had a bad case of spout dribble. I'm afraid the table cloth was left a lot wetter than when I sat down. The brew was good and strong. Not Red Rose, as far as I could tell. I'd drink it again, for sure. We got a nice china tea cup and saucer to drink out of. I could crook out my little finger if I wanted. I managed to drink using the handle, rather than a paw wrapped around it. The Brunette has been training me to be seen in polite society.
The service was okay... we had to call back for cutlery, and it was a little slower than I'd have expected for a quiet afternoon. But there was service, and we got everything we wanted with a smile and pleasant attitude, so not really a big deal.
Overall, this is a pleasant enough spot. It serves a decent set of food for a fair price. You don't get the silver service of the Empress, and the view is a crossroads on Menzies Street, not the Inner Harbour. But at 25% of the price, and a short, short work for the Empress, I'd send a visitor here if they want English style tea room without breaking the bank.
June 21, 2015
Ground Control Cafe, Downtown Victoria
I am now a digital hobo. I've started in business for myself, and part of that will mean working in various coffee shops and wi-fi friendly cafes, as convenient places to dock up between meetings. Or to have meetings in. Expect this blog to be covering convenient lunch spots for the mobile knowledge worker over the coming weeks.
The Ground Control Cafe resides on the first floor of Fort Tectoria, ViaTec's new space for IT entrepreneurs and go-getters. ViaTec promotes Victoria as a place for technology, and use the space to incubate start-ups and early stage companies. Their sponsorship with Shaw means they have access to some of the fastest internet in town, and they share it with anyone using the cafe space. The space is a little dark, with the only external light coming through the front doors. But it's comfortable, with plenty of space, multiple desks for working at, and a comfy sofa area as well for more relaxed working.
The Cafe itself is a small booth at the front entrance. Jill, the owner and operator, runs the shop with a big smile and friendly demeanour. She makes a good Americano, which got my gears working last Friday, while I struggled with working out how to do my books for the last couple of months. There was a great soundtrack playing of 60's Americana, or you can easily stick in your own headphones if that's not your thing to work to.
For lunch, I ordered up a second cup of coffee, straight from the filter this time, and a large grilled chicken sandwich. The panini was prepped earlier and taken fresh from the fridge into the press. Once ready, it was brought out to me by Jill, two halves cut to show off the sliced chicken deli meat and the rich red peppers. This was a good meal, with the pesto flavours working well with the chicken and the crisp, warm bun. $6 well spent.
So, good spot to work from, good food, good service.
The Ground Control Cafe resides on the first floor of Fort Tectoria, ViaTec's new space for IT entrepreneurs and go-getters. ViaTec promotes Victoria as a place for technology, and use the space to incubate start-ups and early stage companies. Their sponsorship with Shaw means they have access to some of the fastest internet in town, and they share it with anyone using the cafe space. The space is a little dark, with the only external light coming through the front doors. But it's comfortable, with plenty of space, multiple desks for working at, and a comfy sofa area as well for more relaxed working.
The Cafe itself is a small booth at the front entrance. Jill, the owner and operator, runs the shop with a big smile and friendly demeanour. She makes a good Americano, which got my gears working last Friday, while I struggled with working out how to do my books for the last couple of months. There was a great soundtrack playing of 60's Americana, or you can easily stick in your own headphones if that's not your thing to work to.
For lunch, I ordered up a second cup of coffee, straight from the filter this time, and a large grilled chicken sandwich. The panini was prepped earlier and taken fresh from the fridge into the press. Once ready, it was brought out to me by Jill, two halves cut to show off the sliced chicken deli meat and the rich red peppers. This was a good meal, with the pesto flavours working well with the chicken and the crisp, warm bun. $6 well spent.
So, good spot to work from, good food, good service.
June 14, 2015
Jamie's Italian, Covent Garden, London
I was in Central London on a hot day, walking around and just generally enjoying visiting the capital. I decided I needed a bite to eat, and being in Covent Garden area, there's a whole surfeit of options. I came across Jamie Oliver's Italian Kitchen and stopped by to scan the menu. Jamie's got his detractors, but I like his passion for food and his simple dishes with good ingredients. I like how he gets getting stuck in with both hands when cooking, with no messing around wit odd gadgets. His faux Cockney matiness along with his explanations to an unseen and unheard interviewer just off to the side of the camera were artifice. But they at least made him stand out from some of the more boring TV chefs in the 90's.
The menu reflected this attempt to be the every man. Words like 'great', 'tenner' and, I'm sure 'nosh' abounded in the columns of options. Simple line drawings broke up the text listing fresh ingredients and easy, breezy preparations. I went in. It seemed like a good idea. A bowl of pasta and a salad would give me some nutrients before I went to the pub for the third day straight.
Before I walked in, I had no idea this was a large chain that had taken off Britain. I assumed it was a lower budget version of his other offerings, with maybe one or two branches. I didn't know otherwise until I left and mentioned it to friends. But this is a big chain restaurant. There's a small patio area accessible via a set of sliding doors. Though in use, but not full, I wasn't offered a seat outside, and instead sent to sit against the wall of Jamie's books. Hundreds of copies of his recipe books adorned the shelves. I thought about taking one down to read but was worried I might splatter the pages with sauce, and have to buy a copy to lug back to Canada. My bag was heavy enough already.
There were a lot of white tiles on the rest of the walls, the parts visible behind the chalkboards advertising different specials - fish special, cocktail special and bruschetta special. One waiter served me tap water ('still or sparkling, sir?', 'Thames, please'), then disappeared for the rest of the service after taking my order. A different waiter brought the pasta, and a third brought the bruschetta. A fourth brought the bill and a fifth took my money. A sixth and seventh were hanging at the front desk. No-one came by to check if the food was okay. All the guys had groomed beards and tired back ponytails. They had posh accents and pressed trousers and shiny shoes. Like there was a special clone factory for them somewhere in Leicester Square.
The pasta I ordered was the Rigatoni Pomodoro. It promised a sweet tomato sauce with garlic, basil, hard cheese, mascarpone and herby breadcrumbs. I think Jamie must have run out of breadcrumbs. There was none in the sauce. The pasta was mostly a solid al dente... the first bite was underdone, but the rest just fine. The sauce was disappointing. I've done better with a can of tomatoes, an onion and a lump of butter. The basil was scattered on top, not flavouring the food. The creaminess of the cheese lost in the sauce. The sauce that hinted of rich ripe tomatoes, the way a casino hints of winning millions. You hope for it. You see how it might happen. But you don't get it. It just was not worth it the price (6.25 Pounds or $12 Canadian for a small portion), rather than being an abject failure. I expected more from Jamie.
The bruschetta was a different story. A spring vegetable creation, it piled curls of courgette (zucchini in Canada, but I'm in London, so it's courgette) on a minty, bashed pea and creamy cheese base. The idea of freshness and growing vitality came through in the dish, and met the promise of the chalkboard special description. There was a zest and a bite to the flavours. The texture of the peas offset the cloyingness of the cheese. The courgettes added some heft to the dish and gave up their flavours to a bright olive oil dressing. The bread base was a little thin, and a little small, but that's a quibble. If the pasta had been as good as this, I'd have no complaints.
But as it is, Jamie's Italian Kitchen is just another eatery. It's farming out a brand of food that's priced over its value, playing off on the celebrity name. Plus, I am not sure I can forgive being forced to listen to terrible 80's music while I dined.
The menu reflected this attempt to be the every man. Words like 'great', 'tenner' and, I'm sure 'nosh' abounded in the columns of options. Simple line drawings broke up the text listing fresh ingredients and easy, breezy preparations. I went in. It seemed like a good idea. A bowl of pasta and a salad would give me some nutrients before I went to the pub for the third day straight.
Before I walked in, I had no idea this was a large chain that had taken off Britain. I assumed it was a lower budget version of his other offerings, with maybe one or two branches. I didn't know otherwise until I left and mentioned it to friends. But this is a big chain restaurant. There's a small patio area accessible via a set of sliding doors. Though in use, but not full, I wasn't offered a seat outside, and instead sent to sit against the wall of Jamie's books. Hundreds of copies of his recipe books adorned the shelves. I thought about taking one down to read but was worried I might splatter the pages with sauce, and have to buy a copy to lug back to Canada. My bag was heavy enough already.
There were a lot of white tiles on the rest of the walls, the parts visible behind the chalkboards advertising different specials - fish special, cocktail special and bruschetta special. One waiter served me tap water ('still or sparkling, sir?', 'Thames, please'), then disappeared for the rest of the service after taking my order. A different waiter brought the pasta, and a third brought the bruschetta. A fourth brought the bill and a fifth took my money. A sixth and seventh were hanging at the front desk. No-one came by to check if the food was okay. All the guys had groomed beards and tired back ponytails. They had posh accents and pressed trousers and shiny shoes. Like there was a special clone factory for them somewhere in Leicester Square.
The pasta I ordered was the Rigatoni Pomodoro. It promised a sweet tomato sauce with garlic, basil, hard cheese, mascarpone and herby breadcrumbs. I think Jamie must have run out of breadcrumbs. There was none in the sauce. The pasta was mostly a solid al dente... the first bite was underdone, but the rest just fine. The sauce was disappointing. I've done better with a can of tomatoes, an onion and a lump of butter. The basil was scattered on top, not flavouring the food. The creaminess of the cheese lost in the sauce. The sauce that hinted of rich ripe tomatoes, the way a casino hints of winning millions. You hope for it. You see how it might happen. But you don't get it. It just was not worth it the price (6.25 Pounds or $12 Canadian for a small portion), rather than being an abject failure. I expected more from Jamie.
The bruschetta was a different story. A spring vegetable creation, it piled curls of courgette (zucchini in Canada, but I'm in London, so it's courgette) on a minty, bashed pea and creamy cheese base. The idea of freshness and growing vitality came through in the dish, and met the promise of the chalkboard special description. There was a zest and a bite to the flavours. The texture of the peas offset the cloyingness of the cheese. The courgettes added some heft to the dish and gave up their flavours to a bright olive oil dressing. The bread base was a little thin, and a little small, but that's a quibble. If the pasta had been as good as this, I'd have no complaints.
But as it is, Jamie's Italian Kitchen is just another eatery. It's farming out a brand of food that's priced over its value, playing off on the celebrity name. Plus, I am not sure I can forgive being forced to listen to terrible 80's music while I dined.
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