We Need More Napkins

Every Monday in East Van, something special happens. People from all walks of life congregate on a small, South Indian restaurant to gorge on a mystifying delicacy… the $5.99 dosa!

The dosa is a strange, beautiful beast, one that you certainly don’t see rubbing shoulders with butter chicken in Indian restaurants of the West. It’s a (comically) large chick-pea crepe, which is crispier and more savoury than the traditional French preparation, similar in flavour to the crisp papadum. The first time one is presented to you, it’s visually perplexing and looks enormous, but that’s all part of the adventure.

The only way to attack this thing is with your hands, cracking and pulling and ripping until you get to the savoury curry filling. Once you get to your lamb vindaloo or chicken palak or any variety of vegan mix you scoop it up into the dosa, top it with the chili and coconut purees and devour. A warm, spicy cup of lentil soup accompanies. It’s bliss.

These things normally run $8-12, so understandably the place is packed on Mondays for the customer appreciation discount. You leave STUFFED, and for $5.99, you’re not going to find a better or more satisfying meal around. Get there early.

This year’s NYE Wild Game Dinner was a slightly more diverse affair than last year’s gut-busting meat-sweat party, but even with a few greens on the table it was still a smorgasbord of epic proportions.

We had a lot of ducks and geese this year, so a few of the ducks just got brined overnight and smoked. Don’t let the prettiness of the first picture fool you, it was minus ONE MILLION outside, but the ducks came out rich and full of flavour.

I also had a couple of big fatty geese, so I rendered the fat off of one and did a whole duck and goose confit. The duck was MUCH tastier in this preparation - the goose meat was bit too mealy, but it might have done better with longer, hotter cook time (confit calls for a very slow cook on the meat, and I think the advice I took this time around was a bit TOO low and slow). Regardless, complaining about the texture of your goose confit is like complaining about the seat warmers on your Rolls Royce.

To accompany the confit I made some crispy wonton chips, a salsa of pistachios, peppers and dried cranberries, and a mint raita. All put together it’s like the world’s most decadent nacho. I’ve done this a few times (with Moroccan-spiced braised lamb) and I think it might be my most ingenious creation in the kitchen. I NEVER miss having a restaurant, but every time I make this I wish I’d thought of it back in the old bistro days.

My father-in-law does a mean smoked candy salmon, and this year had both salmon and lake trout to offer. The salmon reigned supreme.

I made a pate of smoked chicken livers and braised apples, with some caramelized onions and pickled balsamic berries on the side. I love pate, and smoking the livers in advance added a great depth to the already succulent dish.

Fearing that we may not have enough food, Nancy brought a mac n cheese to the party. It doesn’t matter how refined or masterful the rest of the food is, if mac n cheese is on the table, it’s going to be the favourite. This was no different. I inhaled it.

And finally… SALAD?!?! Yes, that’s right, this year there was a salad. A great salad at that, and unlike last year, it didn’t take two hours before I could stand up and have a drink again. Success!

The first of two epic meals over the holiday season…

As I posted last year, my extended family celebrates Christmas the old Catholic way, with a huge pescatarian meal. There are always a few fish dishes, and my offering this year was some pickerel with a tapenade of roasted red peppers, Kalamata olives, capers, anchovies and roasted garlic, then topped with crushed walnuts. It was the winner, though Ashley’s lake trout topped with red curry and a salad of bok choy, peanuts and fresh mint would have taken the top spot had the fish not been so… fishy.

Of course, there are always crab cakes. This year’s batch wasn’t the greatest because we had to use canned crab meat (unlike last year, when I spent $60 on three stupid king crab legs), but they’re always a treat, especially when smothered with the roasted garlic mayo I made for the seared scallops.

The highlight of the whole meal was the coconut shrimp, drizzled with chili-lime yogurt and served over a bed of curried rice with currants and almonds. We had the luxury of having a deep fryer set up in the garage, so these were the crispy real deal.

Note: One of the best bites of food I ever had in my life was a coconut shrimp. It was on the streets of Havana, where restauranteurs often have a food sample handy to lure tourists into their eatery. Usually they’re easy to decline, but down one forgotten side street a grizzly man with a huge moustache emerged from a doorway with a crispy shrimp smothered in an herbaceous green sauce. It was unbelievable. He got lots of our business that night.

For the main starch, we had a potato and beet pave, baked with grated parmesan and fresh oregano.

Spanakopita is an old standard, but unlike the cabbage rolls and perogies (that were also on the table), the greek pastry is ALWAYS a highlight of my plate, now matter what else we serve. It’s such a perfect balance of flavours, and something I like just as much served cold the next morning.

Now dinner buns don’t usually make it to a blog like this, but these were homemade by my mother-in-law that day and were so buttery and delicious that they demanded acknowledgement.

It was a lot of people to feed (24? 25?) and everyone got stuffed. The wine of course flowed freely, and after we were done we all forgot about dessert.

Nothing like a really fancy breakfast, right? Not long ago, downtown Saskatoon charcuterie/cocktail joint Flint started doing a daily gourmet breakfast under the name Poached, and so while blowing government grant money on tour this winter my band hit it up for some very fine hangover dining.

I had the crepe filled with prosciutto, blue and Emmantal cheeses, shallots and pears. I adore savoury crepes and this one was absolutely divine, with the sweet (but still slightly crunchy) pear balancing the rich cheeses and cured meat. The crepe itself is such a perfect vessel for different flavours, being light, chewy and versatile enough for sweet and savoury fillings. I’ll eat them for pretty well any meal of the day. These crepes were cooked just right, with crispy brown ends on an otherwise soft and moist pancake.

We garnished our plates with some potato croquettes and bacon-wrapped pecans. An of course a table full of caesars. Poached certainly isn’t the cheapest place to eat, but if you’re in town and are looking for something really refined and delicious for brunch, check this place out.

Sushi is the best tour food. Compared to other typical road staples - pizza, fast food, gas station miscellany - sushi fills the belly without being heavy or gassy or bloating, which are all the things one needs to avoid before getting onstage and yelling for a half hour.

Before a show in Calgary this week, my band happened upon Sho, a relatively new and elegant urban sushi restaurant near the Chinook Mall. We had no idea what we were in for, which turned out to be some of the best sushi any of us had ever experienced.

Yeah, so we’re not your average punk band. As soon as we saw fresh oysters on the menu we snatched them up right away. Turns out just a tiny bit of wasabi is a perfect accompaniment along with fresh lemon juice.

This was a salad of smoked duck, pea shoots, fresh tomato slices and a ginger vinaigrette. Nice balance of flavours, with the sharp veggies and sour dressing nicely complimenting the rich smoky meat.

Normally gomae doesn’t get a lot of attention, but even this staple was done better than anywhere I’ve ever had. That’s the kind of place this is.

Now, the rolls. This is where the magic really happened. We only had two, but they were incredible, the first topped with grilled lobster tail and black tobiko, while the second was the most jacked spicy tuna roll I’ve ever had. There are almost no words; both rolls were such perfectly constructed morsels of succulence that the whole table was stunned. I’ve had sushi from Tokyo to West Hollywood, and I’ve never been so surprised by a roll before.

A few other treats that made their way to the table were a tuna-stuffed avocado that was tempura-fried, some piece of toro nigiri, and some small wonton cups filled with chopped scallop and roe.

If you’re passing through Cow Town, skip the steak and hit up this joint, it’s incredible.

Gumbo is one of my favourite foods in the world. This was one of the best there ever was…

It all started here, at the bullet smoker, one frigid Sunday in Regina. There were six deer slain on a hunting trip of my father-in-law’s and a few close friends, and one of them was smaller than the rest. We’ll call her Bambi. While most of the rest of the meat was cut up for sausage, Bambi was quartered so that we could smoke her hind legs.

I had feared that the meat would be dry, but the deer was young and fatty enough that it was actually perfect for smoking. I treated it like a brisket but put more pepper and herbaceous elements into the rub to accent the game. The two legs sat in the smoker for most of the day, and came out with beautiful bark and very tender meat.

We ate it for dinner (along with a couple of smoked ducks - we’ll call them Daffy ad Donald) with a blackberry compote and a lot of wine. It ruled a lot.

Now, the gumbo you ask? We had a LOT more meat than anticipated, so the next day it was time for some creative leftovers. I had the smoked venison drippings as well as some bacon fat, which are the makings for one killer roux. And when you’ve got a killer roux, there’s nothing better than gumbo.

The key to a great gumbo is to let your roux cook slowly until it’s a rich dark brown. Your roux is the whole personality of the gumbo, so use the best fat and cook it right, fool. Once mine was almost done I threw in some spicy chorizo sausage to crisp up and render even more fat.

Because I wanted the venison meat to shine, I used a combination of beef and chicken stocks in my broth, instead of the lobster stock I usually use. As usual, I threw in some prawns at the last minute so that they would be just cooked by the time I served the gumbo. This particular batch also substituted some chopped kale for okra.

In a separate pan I fried up some of the leftover venison meat with a bit of beef stock, and served it as a heaping pile in the middle of the soup. This was so goddamn delicious, and is about as rich and bold as a soup can get. I LOVE cajun flavours and can’t wait to make it back to New Orleans. If I find a gumbo much than this when I’m there though, I’ll be shocked.

For my second time in seven days, I found myself in Saskatoon for a concert by a Canadian legend, this time the mighty Leonard Cohen. My mom and her husband were up for the show as well, so we chose Calories on Broadway for dinner, a long-time city favourite.

Calories offers innovative French cuisine with a rustic prairie twist, very well exemplified by this first dish, a rillette of local pork and goose. It’s served over a red cabbage slaw with cranberries and a pungent mustard sauce. Big bold decadent flavours - exactly how I like to start a meal.

Next was a special of the day: house-cured duck with a really crisp salad of pea pods, pumpkin seeds and root vegetables. The salad was the perfect foil for the rich, smoky duck, and the dish had a very farm-to-table feel to it.

Wanting to make sure we didn’t get to the show still a bit hungry (as we were the week prior, after our tapas meal at Duck Duck Goose), we shared the moules frites, a classic preparation executed perfectly. If I had one complaint it’s that I would have preferred a more shallow bowl, as it was really difficult to mop up any of the buttery liquor until most of the mussels were already eaten. First world problems, right?

Calories is famous for its baking, particularly its cheesecakes, so my mom ordered a slice for the table to share for dessert. It was white chocolate and almond with a strawberry coulis. Perfect! It reminded me why classic cheesecakes were my absolute favourites growing up, and why, for the sake of my waistline, I only indulge in the rich dessert maybe once or twice a year.

Duck Duck Goose is a small, fairly new tapas bar just off Broadway in Saskatoon. I’d seen the restaurant and been interested in it for a while as it’s right around the corner from Amigo’s, but never had the opportunity to dine there because trips to Saskatoon are usually a blur of cheap beer and punk rock. This past week, however, I finally got the chance to stop in for dinner before the Neil Young concert at Credit Union Centre. It did not disappoint…

Duck Duck Goose is the kind of quaint little spot I love, with only a handful of seats and a modestly-sized but adventurous menu, which is printed on individual cards and bound in a rustic paper folder. Given the style of small-plates cuisine, the wine list is surprisingly small but the choices that are there are decent, including this bottle of Penascal Tempranillo that our whet our appetites.

In true tapas style, the portions are very small and are meant to be shared, unlike many bastardized North American restaurants which often just equate “tapas” with “appetizers” and basically just offer expensive “fancy” pub menus. The food at Duck Duck Goose comes out slowly and deliberately, one plate at a time, allowing you to savour and focus on the specific flavours of each unique dish.

The first to arrive at our table was the ricotta gnocchi with sage butter. This was a beautiful way to start the meal, as the gnocchi were so soft that they melted on your tongue, waking the tastebuds up in a really creamy, comfortable way.

Next came lamb and pork meatballs, that were very tasty though admittedly the most pedestrian dish of the evening. What really elevated the dish however was the fantastic olive oil that accompanied; as someone who was recently given a handcrafted bottle from a family vineyard in Greece, I can tell you this oil was the real deal.

This may look like soup, but was actually the scallop ceviche, swimming in a lemon harissa sauce. The bites of sashimi-grade scallop were delicious, and the whole table was mopping up the brine with their bread. It could have used some tortilla or pico de gallo to flesh out the portion a bit, but regardless the flavours were right on point.

The charcuterie platter was a nice mix of homemade and imported deli meats, including a house-cured duck prosciutto, which was the obvious standout. Again, a hint of mustard or some pickled onions would have rounded out the plate, but it’s tough to argue with a selection of meats this tasty.

My personal favourite was the grilled halloumi cheese with dressed greens. Ashley used to bring a grilling cheese back to Saskatchewan from Quebec that was very similar to this, and it’s one of my all-time favourite flavour experiences. The first time she ever fried some up for me, standing in her parents’ kitchen in north-end Regina, I swear my knees buckled and my eyes rolled into the back of my head. I didn’t have quite the same experience with this halloumi, but it was very decadent and satisfying nonetheless.

And for anyone still hungry after all those small plates and tiny bites, there’s a duck poutine to stick to your ribs. The crispy confit is a very necessary add-on, and everything from the truffle fries to the grilled mushrooms to the duck gravy absolutely took this Canadian classic to the moon. I grew up in Ottawa and have had plenty of Quebecois poutine - I dare to say that this one is pretty well as good as they get.

A couple of months ago, my wife was watching a show on the Food Network and saw Michael Smith - the sort-of-creepy Canadian chef who always seems like he’s talking to a three year-old - make the most insane lasagna in the world. She declared right then that Smith’s Lobster Lasagna di Carnivale was the meal she wanted for her 30th birthday, and this week her dreams came true. Lasagna isn’t usually very note-worthy or innovative; it’s a comfortable classic that everyone’s mom has made for a million family dinner. But this particular recipe is truly obscene…

We’ll start from the bottom up: the tomato sauce begins with a handfuls of diced pancetta AND prosciutto, frying in extra virgin olive oil. Garlic, onions, shredded carrots and red wine add dimension, and fresh thyme rounds it out. When you’ve got pancetta and prosciutto in your tomato sauce, you’re off to a good start.

After a layer of sauce and noodles comes a layer of Italian sausage meatballs, pictured above before being baked off. I never would have thought to put a meatball in a lasagna - let alone one made from sausage meat - but it’s actually a great way to include more savoury meat and huge leap from the thick bolognese we’re all used to.

Now for the real decadence: four lobster tails are quickly poached off and added to grated mozzarella, parmesan, ricotta, marscapone and fresh basil. I was smart and got my father-in-law to pick up the ingredients for this layer, which set him back a cool $75. Ha!

There’s a layer of prosciutto on top of the lobster cheese sauce, which is topped with more noodles and tomato sauce.

Before it goes in the oven to bake, it’s topped with a final layer of mozzarella, parmesan, and balls of bocconcini. Like I said, it’s obscene.

It’s almost difficult to describe the end result. Think about all of your greatest memories of Italian food: mom’s pasta on the dinner table, scarfing down cheesy pizza as a kid, amazing and authentic Little Italy restaurants in cities like Montreal, Ottawa or Toronto, gulping wine with a great homemade red sauce, or maybe you’re lucky enough to have actually been to Italy. This lasagna was like all of those things rolled into one: comforting and cheesy, but also decadent and complex. So many layers of flavour. Heaven!

The birthday girl was not disappointed.

Here’s one of many reasons I love Texas: as you travel along any of the state’s many freeways, particularly the ones that connect between Dallas, Houston, Austin and San Antonio, there are COUNTLESS real pit barbecue joints, usually every couple of miles. It’s unlike anywhere else in the world - this is truly the Golden Mile of low and slow barbecue. The diners, truck stops and roadhouses constantly whiz past you on your drive until you just take it anymore and have to pull over to give in to deliciousness. And the best part is that all these little hole-in-the-wall stops are better than most barbecue you’ll pay top dollar for in a big city.

Hinze’s is just one of those many stops, on the road from San Antonio to Houston. It’s just like any other: gaudy, simple, and pumping out a rich smoky aroma that can be smelt before even getting to the parking lot.

Most of these places offer either meat by the pound or combo plates, and have very straight-forward menus. I’d been eating a lot of brisket so I decided to switch it up with the chicken and ribs. Like I said, even though the place was kind of a road-stop dive, this plate was hands and feet above anything offered in my hometown of Regina.

Note: Regina has the worst barbecue selection. It’s bizarre that such a meat-and-potatoes city can’t support even ONE really great pit barbecue restaurant, but it’s the sad truth. We have three restaurants and a food truck, and all of them disappoint to different degrees. See the mac and cheese pictured above? That was some creamy decadent shit. One time I tried to order the same side from a “barbecue” joint in Regina and got FUCKING KRAFT DINNER on my plate. And not even REAL Kraft Dinner either, it was one of those individually-packaged microwavable styrofoam cups of KD that you can get at gas stations. AND THEN THEY UPCHARGED ME THREE DOLLARS FOR IT.

Yup, if it wasn’t for all the radical gun-toting, bible-thumping, arterie-clogging, Hannity-loving, science-loathing, K-Mart-shopping, sweat-pants-wearing conservatives in the state, I could really get used to living in Texas. Sigh.

Galveston is Houston’s beach-resort town on the Gulf, but it definitely has a bit more of a beat-up vibe than some of the state’s other beach destinations. Still, it has the pier which is lined with roller coasters, the beach which extends for miles, and a TON of seafood. Like, it’s tough to find a restaurant on the whole strip that DOESN’T have shrimp at the top of its list. So, you know, when in Rome…

We hit up Landry’s, which is admittedly a chain that operates several franchises throughout Texas and other southern states, but it’s proximity to our hotel, beachfront patio and fairly interesting menu made it worth checking out.

Yes, I love oysters. There’s a reason that when things are going well, the old saying goes that “the whole world is your oyster.” I’ve spent a fair bit of time in this blog worshipping these slimy pearls of the sea, so I’ll just say that it was a real treat after a week of heavy meat-eating to start one of our final meals of the trip on a really fresh note.

Now we had originally planned our vacation for New Orleans before Hurricane Isaac forced us to re-route west, so for months I’d been looking forward to devouring Cajun cuisine - one of my absolute favourites - for every meal. I can’t say I was disappointed to spend a week eating mind-blowing barbecue instead, but when I saw a combo plate of fried crawfish, dirty rice and crawfish etouffee on the Landry’s menu, I leapt at the opportunity.

Craw-dads are great, and taste sort of like a cross between shrimp and crab. One of my all-time crack foods is fried shrimp and cocktail sauce, but if you’re in the south, fried crawfish are even better. Etouffee meanwhile is a real Cajun treat, a thick stew similar to a gumbo, made from a rich, dark roux and shellfish. Served over dirty rice, it doesn’t get much better, and is a prime example of the bold, unique flavours of the region.

My dad and brother had various seafood combo plates, and from I got to sneak off their plates and into my mouth, everything was delicious. One highlight was the parmesan-crusted shrimp topped with lump crab pictured above, which sounds like amateur hour but was actually one of the most savoury mouthfuls of shrimp I’ve ever eaten.

Another highlight was the classic bacon-wrapped shrimp, stuffed with pepper jack cheese and jalapeno. Remember, there’s no such thing as a “guilty” pleasure when you’re in Texas…

Yeah, Banff is a tourist trap, a town lined with German and Russian and Japanese people buying stuffed moose dolls from overpriced gift shops. But it’s also beautiful, and an easy getaway for prairie folks who want a weekend of mountains, rivers and the finest food the Rockies has to offer.

The BEST restaurant in Banff for exciting, innovative fine dining is The Bison, located on the less-busy Bear Street. With a menu that showcases rustic local ingredients and a very refined palate, it’s the best dinner spot in town for a gastrophile with a few bucks to throw around.

As my wife and I often do, we chose to eat a series of appetizers as opposed to mains for our anniversary dinner. Why taste two things when you can taste four?

First up, and setting the bar impossibly high, was a crispy pork belly and parsnip soup, drizzled with birch syrup and finished with fried sage. It’s as good a soup as I’ve ever had: incredible rich and creamy, with perfect balancing notes from the syrup and the herbs. And the pork, my god, the pork. Smoky, a bit sweet, and wonderfully textured with a crispy skin and melt-in-your-mouth meat, it was absolutely to die for.

Next was a skillet of corn chowder, prawns, chorizo grits, charred jalapeno and crispy bacon. This was also very rich but in a homey, comfortable way, particularly for someone who just spent time in Texas. The grits were actually formed into patties and fried, which I’ve never tasted before and was a textural surprise. But holy shit, the jalapeno definitely retained its heat, and I almost choked on my first big bite of it.

Next was a braised bison ravioli, topped with two diver scallops, herbs, roasted garlic and brown butter sauce. This was definitely another major highlight of the meal. Each bite was an amazing balance of savoury braised meat and a perfectly cooked and seasoned scallop, bound by the homemade noodle. Very decadent, yet the brown butter sauce was surprisingly restrained, which kept the dish from being overwhelming.

Finally, a ground elk tourtiere with red pepper relish and caramelized pear. The ground meat beneath the pastry was seasoned with sweet Moroccan-style spices, which provided a nice flavour detour from all the other heavy-hitting French/American dishes.

Finally for dessert we had sampling of homemade ice creams, the three flavours of the evening being honey basil, dark chocolate cinnamon, and chai tea, all served in crispy little cones. Perfect!

Now, as if the Bison wasn’t amazing enough already, directly below it is its sister restaurant, the Bear Street Tavern, which is a far more casual atmosphere and promises simply PIZZA AND BEER. But just because the food is more casual, it doesn’t mean they take it - or the farm-to-table philosophy - any less seriously than they do upstairs.

Caesars at the Tavern come garnished with a piece of tender smoked bison, wrapped around a piece of bocconcini. Not much more I need to say about that.

If there’s one thing the Tavern does, it delivers on the advertised promise of “ridiculously good pizza.” Wood-fired and on a thin, homemade crust, it’s the pub pizza you’ve always wanted but never quite get. The pie we ate was “The Godfather,” topped with prosciutto, olives, roast garlic, grana padano and fresh arugula. The best.

On another trip to the Tavern we decided to try some of the other dishes on the menu, which is small but full of refined pub classics. The caesar salad, which I NEVER normally order, was fantastic: topped with a beautiful flower of crispy pancetta and dressed with a pink peppercorn dressing and balsamic drizzle, it’s certainly not the standard soggy salad that accompanies bad take-out pizza.

Finally, the pork belly mac ‘n’ cheese, with whole chunks of crunchy cauliflower, aged white cheddar and a bacon cream sauce. Not the “heart-smart” option, but needless to say, it was divine. And HEAVY.

And here is me, very, very happy.