A suprising find....

We headed out for dinner on Saturday night without anywhere specific in mind. We eventually went to Whyte Ave to see if anything tickled our fancy. After some wandering and an attempt to get into one fully-booked restaurant we ducked into a well-known chain restaurant, (I'm too embarrassed to tell you the name) mostly because I needed to use the bathroom. We were so disappointed with the menu that we ended up ordering a small nacho plate to share so that we would have room for food from somewhere else afterwards. Our food took an unbelievable 40 minutes to arrive. We scarfed it down and got out of there as fast as we could. Just around the corner we stumbled upon "Flavours Bistro". The menu looked great, as did the atmosphere so we went straight in. The place had a candle-lit brick interior with funky modern art decorating the walls. We felt a bit under-dressed since we were both wearing jeans and sweatshirts but our friendly server didn't seem to hold it against us. We decided to order four small plates to share, rather than entrees so our server moved us to a slightly larger table to accommodate all of our plates. We had duck spring rolls, which came with a daikon salad and fruit coulis, a decadent and creamy portabello mushroom and goat cheese lasagna, a colourful heirloom tomato salad with grilled halloumi cheese and an olive and feta plate. Everything was absolutely gorgeous (I was kicking myself for not bringing my camera) and delicious. We spent less than $80 for all of it including a half bottle of wine. It was a great find and we will definitely be going back, with my camera.

Making friends with eggplant

Okay, so I am a self-proclaimed eggplant hater. I have always had something against it. All the eggplant I have ever tried has been mushy, bitter and too gross to look at, much less put in my mouth. The other day I decided to try and make eggplant my friend. I definitely had my doubts. Since I was already making pasta for dinner (I found a source for fresh pasta at the Strathcona Farmer's Market), I wanted to keep with the Italian theme. I remembered an old article from "Cook's Illustrated" that examined the best way to make Eggplant Parmesan so I dug it out of my pile of magazines and began my research. There are so many ways of making it: flouring, battering, deep frying, baking... but they all have one thing in common: salting the eggplant for at least 20 minutes before hand to tone down the bitter flavour and pull out some of the excess moisture. I opted to cut some 1/2 inch slices of a regular eggplant and give them a flour, egg, breadcrumb coating. I used some whole grain bread and blitzed it in the food processor until it had a panko-like texture, and added some freshly grated Parmesan, salt, pepper and cayenne for kick. I seared them in veg oil on high heat until they browned, about one minute a side, and put them on a rack to finish cooking in the oven for another 15 minutes. The final result was surprisingly good. They were super crispy and spicy on the outside and amazingly light and fluffy on the inside. Admittedly they tasted more like the crust than the eggplant itself, but I'm not complaining. Hugh took the leftovers to work the next day and said he preferred them because they were still crispy but a little more dense and filling. I will certainly be trying this dish again.

Asian food extravaganza

So my new favourite place to shop for groceries is T&T Asian supermarket (the one in the West Edmonton Mall). When I went there on Sunday I was blown away by the number of hard-to-find (even on Granville Island) Asian ingredients. By the end of my one-hour shopping spree I had loaded the cart with specialties like as Rose Apples, Honey Tangerines, kaffir lime leaves, betelnut leaves, and, most excitingly, pandanas leaves which I haven't come across since I went to cooking school in Thailand nearly three years ago. In addition to these goodies I decided to treat myself to a whole fish. I thought it would be playing with fire to eat fresh fish in a province that isn't attached to an ocean, but I don't intend to be without seafood for the duration of my time here. I picked out a beautiful looking 2 pounder, with bright clear eyes. I'm ashamed to say that I have no idea what kind of fish it was... there was no label and the fish monger didn't speak English. I can tell you that it was white fleshed with red scales and spiky fins (no it wasn't a snapper). The fish monger cleaned it up nicely for me (scales and all) which saved me a lot of trouble since I planned to deep fry the fish whole.

I put the whole fish in a wok about half full of hot oil. I gave each side about 4 minutes, until it was nice and crispy on the outside. For the sauce I sauteed about 3tbsp of shredded young ginger, a tbsp of garlic, in some veg oil. I added about 1 tbsp of calamansi/fish sauce (a fancy little blend I found at T&T) and 2-3 tbsp of sweet chili sauce and simmered it briefly. As soon as the fish was done, I spooned the mixture inside and over the fish and garnished it with some fresh red chilies and shredded kaffir lime leaf. The results were phenomenal. We desecrated the entire fish... only bones remained. For the side dishes I served up a quick stir-fry of tofu puffs and bean sprouts with garlic and ginger, and some gai lan with oyster sauce.

The next night I decided to try and remember a recipe from Thai cooking school: Sesame Chicken in Pandanas leaves. The original recipe calls for marinating chicken in fish sauce, sesame oil and roasted sesame seeds, before wrapping in up in a pandanas leaf to form a little bundle and deep frying the whole thing. I wanted to go for a healthier option so I decided to steam the bundles in a bamboo steamer, and the results were just as good. The chicken was extremely flavourful and very juicy. For our side dishes I threw together a quick Phad Thai (fried noodles) and some more of the Gai Lan, this time with ginger and chili. The real treat for this meal though was the Pandanas Infused Coconut Ice Cream that I made for dessert. I steeped a couple of the leaves in 180z of hot coconut milk and half a cup of sugar. On the side I whisked two eggs with a quarter cup of sugar. I tempered the egg mixture with the coconut milk and added two cups of whipping cream before chilling it all in the fridge. Once cool, I popped it in my ice cream maker and voila: a smooth, creamy, fragrant Thai-inspired ice cream.

Dining Out- A totally greek experience

One of the Edmonton restaurants I have been eager to try is Koutouki - yes the one featured on the "Family Restaurant" on the Food Network. I have to admit that I didn't have high hopes for the place. After a year or two most "celebrity" restaurants seem unable to keep up the high level of service that made them famous in the first place. Nevertheless, I made my reservation for a Saturday night.
To start off, we arrived 25 minutes early for our reservation and were greeted by a huge lineup of people pouring out the front doors. I did my best to squeeze past them to speak to the Hostess (who is also the manager) and was thrilled to find out that they could seat us right away (ignoring the angry glares from the still-waiting customers). We were given a tiny little table in a busy little nook (not that there were any sections that weren't busy). The atmosphere was great. Loud traditional Greek music was blaring, candles covered all the table tops, and creeper vines crawled from pot to pot over our heads. Yianni the owner was doing his rounds. Our excitement was brewing.
We took no time at all to decide that we were both going to have: the Meze sampler, a meal with over a dozen different dishes, for the measly cost of $32 a person. There was no question about which wine to have: Retsina is the only choice for a Greek meal. It took a little while for the server to take our order and bring the wine but it helped to build our anticipation for the meal to come.
First course was traditional Greek salad, pita bread with hummus, tzatziki, eggplant dip and a jalapeno feta dip. We were so hungry by this point that we were literally scarfing the food down. We were also thrilled to discover how much better our acidic Retsina tasted with what we were eating.
I was impressed by the calamari that followed. I consider myself a bit of a calamari connoisseur and it definitely met my standards. Lamb dolmades (stuffed grape leaves) and some yummy Greek meat balls came next. By this point I was already stuffed and couldn't believe there were more courses to follow. Soon there were the best Spanikopitas I have ever had, perfectly browned and flaky on the outside, perfectly seasoned on the inside. Next came chicken with rice. I was already as full as I could be so I tasted my chicken (which was wonderfully moist) and pushed the rest of it across the table for my boyfriend to finish up. I edged my plate and cutlery towards the side of the table for the server to take away, and was promptly informed that the meal wasn't over. There was still a lamb and potato course. So we ordered another bottle of wine which arrived at the same time as the belly dancer. The music was turned right up and she danced her way through the restaurant, encouraging people to join her in a hip-wiggling show down to earn a shot of Ouzo, poured straight out of the bottle down the guest's eager throat. Even I danced. Needless to say, it really added to the atmosphere, as did the table dancing, plate breaking, and chain of guests dancing shoulder to shoulder in a parade through the kitchen. When the lamb arrived I could do little more than try it (and it's intensely flavoured lemon-potato companion). It was an obscenely huge portion which thrilled my boyfriend as he polished it off, along with the rest of the Retsina. And to polish off the fabulous meal the manager came around the restaurant with free shots of Ouzo for everyone. By the end of the evening we had a bill of about $150, but I couldn't imagine a better way to spend the money. We were so full we could hardly move, but we were already making plans for when we would be eating there again.

My Mission

My decision to move to Edmonton, from the gastronomic melting-pot of Vancouver, was initiated by only one factor: my five-plus-year relationship with my boyfriend. Having lived in different provinces for nearly three years, and with at least another year of his auto-mechanic's apprenticeship to complete, I decided that it was time to either make a go of the relationship or kiss it goodbye. I knew that leaving Vancouver would mean more than just giving up my job cooking for a hugely successful catering company. It would also mean letting go of my prime-location West End apartment. I would have to say goodbye to all my friends and look forward to a hypothermically cold winter with a lot of alone time.Strangely, I knew I could handle all of those things. My fear was that I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to survive in a city that was reputed to have absolutely no food scene.
I had no worries about finding a job. Jobs are a dime a dozen in Alberta. Everyone is hiring all the time. My concern was how I would make dinner without daily trips to Granville Island? Where would I find my specialty asian ingredients to cook with? What was I going to do without Sushi? What would social gatherings be like without an impressive spread of gourmet pot-luck and discussions of fine wines and devine cheeses?
I decided to go ahead and make the move. My life was going to change in a huge way, and I was going to make it my mission prove that an obsessive foodie such as myself can survive in Edmonton. It was just going to take a little work.