Seem Real Land

L'Abbaitoire

2011-11-01T21:05:00.000-07:00

The name itself would keep me away. Did they win a contest for the world's worst restaurant name? Was The Genocide Cafe already taken? But I kept hearing about this place, as if it's not just the dead animal thing happening here. There was actual cheffery at play. So I came here on Hallow's Eve to check it out. Halloweening kids trick or treated through the streets. We remembered our daughter Bit in a thin witch costume trick or treating in North Van in 84, her first Halloween here, age 6. It was 6 below. And the day she was born, Oct 25th, 1978 I took the bus from our down town apt to the distant Grace hospital and encountered numerous Halloweeners, including Coneheads on the bus. It's cold enough now that I don't involve myself with bus trips downtown and all the walking in the cold world that implies unless I have a very good reason. No snow yet, but it won't be long.
The chef from L'ab was on the TV daily news show which frequently features cooking segments. He made something called Crab Toast. It reminded me of Dale MacKay's great crab soup I had at Ensemble (see previous post) a few weeks ago. Crab is delicate enough as it is without some fool with a chef's hat throwing in a heavy ingredient and depriving you of its essence easily enough. But well done crab really shows me if the hat is on the right head in this town. So I made the long trek from upper North Van to the bowels of Vancouver's Historic Gastown to check out the toast. It's not Slovakia but it's pretty good. And some of the quickest and most pleasant waitstaff I've encountered in quite a while.
The online reviews raved about its clever cocktails and A Spot of Tea really appealed to me. On line, at least. Never, in the course of imbibing this cocktail, was I reminded of an actual tea, one of my favourite daily indulgences for over half a century. It wasn't a bad drink per se, though what 3 thick slices of cucumber were doing on top of a cup of tea is too perverse to even inquire about. My cousin David Wolowidnyk at West restaurant had made me a tea based cocktail once, as an accompaniment to my entree rather than from the bar menu. It was not only better than this "drink," it was not in the same universe of pleasure. But I did appreciate the citrus note the "Tea" thingie introduced to my crrrunchy crab dish. And I do mean crunchy. I expected to see a breakfast food captain appear in my bowl at any moment. But the teaspoon of orange marmalade the bartender claimed was in my "tea" (sigh) may have been just the reminder of citrus my palate needed to enjoy the crab dish. It wasn't a pretty goal, but the puck eventually entered the net. I was no longer hungry, after a mile walk in cold weather, and that's saying something.
Earlier in the day, I'd watched Dale McKay make a beet dish, promoting the upcoming Gold Plates event next week. I can never call in fast enough for a free ticket, but I love a good beet dish. All those Ukrainian genes no doubt. So I ordered the beets with pears and cheese. And suddenly the long trek in a cold country might as well have been a stroll on warm sand. To go to a place celebrating the execution of cows and having the best vegetarian meal since a couple of killer apps at Charlie Trotters in Chicago in 08, this was not only why I go to restaurants to discover, this actually brings forth a vision of my future food consuming self, in meatless heaven. My pairing was what I assumed was a passion fruit based cocktail called the Gastown Swizzle. It reminded me strongly and pulpily of an apriocot-sotted cockail I'd had recently at Market, that in no way complemented the tuna burger (to my surprise; Jean George's cocktails and mocktails have been reliably good as long as the place has been open). But not a straw-killing pulp. And the combination with the astonishing beet PEAR cheeeeze Fresh Mint course was admirable. I spoke to the bar tender on the way out and he explained just how much tea he'd poured into my drink, plus all that dentist-enriching marmalade. But for a tea lover like me, the name didn't deliver. Bacon gene-shaped good for soaking up the divine cheese. But it really was more than I could eat, and I was about as hungry as I get. The bread so lacking at Ensemble, with MacKay's life altering sauces, was far to too abundant here, like a great French restaurant trying to forget starvation under the Nazis. I promised them I'd be back as long as they keep doing things like that to beets. You'd expect Kerouac to peer out from behind the pears, and Ginzberg howling at the mint. You wouldn't be disappointed.

Eating in Vancouver, Sept. 2011

2011-09-15T14:05:00.000-07:00

Vancouver food lovers anticipated the opening of David Hawksworth's restaurant with glee. After all the fine meals we've had at West, surely his new place would be of that level, if not better? The place received a rave from the national newsmag Macleans. Hawksworth had a morel dish on his lunch menu. Fine dining in this town rarely means fine lunching, but surely it would be here. While showing visiting in laws around downtown, Fumiyo had let me off in front of Hawksworth the previous week around noon in search of lunch, but I was told to come back in a couple of hours, or make a reservation. I came back With a reservation a week later, specifically to sample the morels. After the revelation from Charlie Trotter about morels' possibilities in 2008, I was sure our local uberchef would do something exquisite with these wondrous fungi. I was wrong.
Topping pasta with peas is a bad idea to begin with. Starch on top of starch? Would you care for some more Starch with that? The broccolini wasn't as insulting an ingredient, and mixed with the occasional morel molecule, the whole did a fine imitation of a magic forest of interesting earthiness. However. I came for the morels. I was served an avalanche of starch and precious few appeals to the better angels of my palate. It reminded me of Hubert Keller's In the Shower in its sheer discard for its key ingredient. Thankfully Hubert's food at Fleur was relentlessly excellent after the pasta pummeling. I had no reason to order anything else from Hawksworth. The pom mocktail was vastly superior to the "food," just like Justin Lord's great mocktails towering over the rather dismal food at Per Se a year ago. I felt embarrassed for the city of Vancouver, that one of its best loved chefs could fail this spectacularly. Maybe I'll try one of his other dishes, providing I'm not paying for it.

The Eatery is a Japanese restaurant that advertises constantly in our entertainment weekly The Georgia Straight. Specifically it advertises its Tuna Tempura. That s0unds like a good idea to me. One of the best things I've eaten in Vancouver is a tempura dish, chicken wrapped with savoy cabbage and tasting like squid. Exquisite. I love COOKED tuna so how could go wrong here? We needed to feed visiting Japanese palates as well as meet Bit's friends Steph (who raved about the tuna here) and Dino & Krista and this seemed like a good place. It's been serving Vancouver customers since 1983 so it was probably doing something right. A very festive place. I had lived in the area in 1973 but rarely been there since and it was now surprisingly built up. A good place to go with a group of people.
The famous tuna tempura was OK. It tasted like pastry, not tuna. Maybe somewhere between a crepe and an okonomiyaki. Not worth driving all the way from Lynn Valley for, but not bad. I also had the chicken and cheese gyoza, a bit too spicy for me, and the sodden deep friend zucchini sticks. One thing the restaurant could do better is vegetables. I looked in vain for a mushroom dish. Tons of sushi options, but irrelevant to me. The other eaters seemed content with their orders. I'm glad to see an effort being made to serve something out of the ordinary (tuna tempura). Fusion is an essential path for our dining age, and at least The Eatery is trying.

Lumiere claimed to be the best restaurant in Vancouver for many years and I've had a couple of good meals there before. Even better bistro food at its brother restaurant DB Bistro Moderne after Daniel had taken both restaurants over. Unfortunately Daniel only brought menu selections from his great NYC places to the bistro, not to Lumiere. But the great Lumiere was supposedly well taken care of by local hot shot Dale MacKay.
I heard that Daniel had abandoned Vancouver and both his restaurants would close in March. I was able to get a reservation to Lumiere a couple of days before it closed for good. The above vid is from that meal. This was a few weeks after my life altering meals in the great French restaurants of Las Vegas, and in no way comparable. The servers raved about the fois gras mouse with nuts. I was reading for the 2nd time Paul Krassner's ebullient autobiography
Confessions of a Raving, Unconfined Nut and laughing violently between courses. The waitresses were chagrined at suddenly losing their jobs and wondered if what I was laughing at would distract them from their suddenly looming poverty. As the nuts were scattered rather carelessly through the mousse, I told them the dish would be better if, unlike Krassner, the nuts were confined. I don't think they were cheered.
The food was about what you get for the money in this town. About 1/1000th the experience that the same money would get you at Mix, Twist, Guy Savoy or Robuchon. And this is the best restaurant in town?

Ensemble is chef MacKay's answer to the end of his career at Lumiere. It is as superior to Lumiere as joy is to despair.
Fumiyo and I had seen Dale cook his award winning crab and melon soup on the early TV news a couple of weeks before. It was momentarily warm in Vancouver, and the dish looked refreshing. By the time I got to the restaurant on Sept. 14th, it was decidedly cooler in Vancouver and refreshing wasn't the adjective I most hoped to use. But the soup was indeed refreshing. Lots of crab but it never tasted like crab. Melon, etc. Whatever. It was an entirely new taste. A celebration.
Next up, another award winner, the black cod in BBQ pork broth. Heavy on the Asian influences- bak choy being the main solid in the soup, and yet, it spoke more to my palate of what Joel Robuchon has been able to achieve with Asian synthesized French food, thus earning him the title Chef of the Century. Vancouver food as good as Vegas? I didn't think it was possible, but once again, I was wrong. As I told my server, this wasn't a broth you sipped, it was something you dived into. This is what I was expecting from Guy Savoy famous truffled artichoke soup. This was something worth getting on a plane and traveling from the other side of the world to taste.
And the delights didn't end. The scallops in corn were another revelation. The dish reminded me of Daniel's corn foam at his flagship restaurant last fall. Only that was the idea, this was the realization of what that idea could be. It was as if Daniel weren't the #8 chef in the world and MacKay merely one of his employees, I'd swear the positions were reversed. Not since the Maya has corn been so profoundly understood and ecstatically celebrated
The eggplant dish was so good I kept trying to cut it into tinier and tinier bites to make it last longer. Only the drinks were sadly made. Lumiere couldn't make a drinkable specialty coffee if their life depended on it, and I'm sad to see that tradition of stunning incompetence carry over to MacKay's new place. Service, even in an empty restaurant, was relentlessly incompetent. Although I informed my server upon entering the restaurant that I was fiercely thirsty, after strolling around the area shooting vid for the past half hour, my frequently empty glass was of little interest to the "service." and though this is more a menu defect, the lack of bread to soak up the exquisite sauces I was feasting on diminished the meal. Nonetheless. The best food I've had in Vancouver, and the only food I've eaten here that one could confidently serve a visiting deity.

Lonsdale, 19th to 13th

2011-09-05T16:53:00.000-07:00

Aug. 14th, 2011

2011-08-29T14:18:00.000-07:00

July 28, 2011- Part 2

2011-08-14T15:40:00.000-07:00

July 28, 2011- Part 1

2011-08-08T19:14:00.001-07:00

May Vegas 7: And the music plays on

2011-05-21T15:44:00.000-07:00

After several days of eating during this trip, I noticed that what I had gotten the most enjoyment of wasn't the food but the photographs in 2 galleries, Jeff Mitchum in Bellagio and Peter Lik at the Venetian. Their glowing landscapes made more of an impression on me than anything on my plate. Coming to a big foodie event and enjoying some art more than food reminded me of the old joke, I went to a fight, and a hockey game broke out. That's partly because the big event in Vegas wasn't Uncork'd, but a title match between Congressman Pacman (No, I'm not making that up) and some other guy. Apparently 20,000 people were in town for the fight, many from the Philippines where the fighting congressman could be the next president. Images of the fighters were equally as ubiquitous as the Philippine fans. Walking around, shooting reflections (which is what I'm usually doing when the weather's good) and seeing the fight posters reminded me of the Steely Dan song Kid Charlemagne, which they say is about a boxer. So I put the two together. As every server who served me anything in Vegas said, "Enjoy!"

May Vegas 6: The Last of Uncork'd

2011-05-18T14:26:00.000-07:00

The last two Uncork'd events were Eating Las Vegas, a culinary conversation, and Viva Las Vegan, Steve Wynn's vegan options for his hotels, complete with cooking demonstrations and introductory lecture by Steve. The conversation was particularly enjoyable and I have to pick up the book the 3 critics wrote together, Eating Las Vegas 2011, The Essential Guide. One critic had a great line describing Wolfgang Puck's descent into Las Vegas: that isn't cooking, it's eating, reminded me of what Truman Capote said of Jack Kerouac's On the Road: that's isn't writing, it's typing. I'll definitely get a copy of their book before going to Vegas again.
The Vegan event thankfully started with sangria (mocktails also available). It was a little bland by my sangria standards but when I dived into the vegan fare, the drink went very well indeed.
I finally learned what to do with Gardein Chick'n: put heirloom tomatoes on it. Chef Kim Canteenwalla had a tomato soup and an heirloom tasting that were the high light of the event for me. Unfortunately, in the menu giveaways and cooking demonstrations, Kim's great tomato dishes were neglected (he described making a salad that had ingredients I couldn't eat). Chef Alex, whose restaurant mysteriously disappeared before I could make good on my reservation in Feb, demonstrated making an eggless pasta and someone else demonstrated making crabless crab cakes. None of the demonstrations were that well presented. The best talk of the event was actually Steve Wynn's moving tale about how he became a vegan the previous year. I left the event very inspired.
Outside of the Uncork'd events, I breakfasted on some wonderful grapefruit (and a great apple crepe) at Mon Ami Gabbi, every bit as good an experience as the server from Robuchon had told me about. When I went back to Bouchon for its great grapefruit I'd had there in Feb, I was told it wasn't on the menu so I had a bowl of berries instead. The crepes upstairs from Mon Ami, at Eiffel Tower were as good as Feb, as was the gnocchi and little pizzas called flambes at Fleur. I only had an appetizer, the gnocchi from Mix this trip- actually I ate a lot of gnocchi, and suspect that my diet is going to become a lot more gnocchi and crepe based in the future. The only full meal I consumed during my 5 days of this trip not part of Uncork'd was the swordfish wrapped lobster at Valentino. The restaurant had come highly recommended to me and though I had intellectually known what a VIP was, I had never had the actual experience before visiting Valentino. The waiter, Shawn and the manager Joe gave me the sort of service I would have expected if I were Barack Obama, not just a customer. When nothing on the cocktail list seemed to pair well with my entree, a glass of sangria was promptly created. Later, another waiter had remembered a new lemony grappa they had just gotten in and unlike the vile spirit I'd had in Italy, this grappa was exquisitely lemony. A serious discussion about what green vegies to have with my fish brought forth a wonderful plate of green and white asparagus spears covered with Parmesan. In my opinion, the foundation of Italian cuisine is tomato sauce. Great towering structures can be built upon that foundation. This lobster was one of the towers. A great meal, greatly enhanced by the service that came with a restaurant tour. As memorable meal as my Feb experiences.
Some jumpy footage of Steve is here:

May Vegas 5; Blue Man Chef

2011-05-17T15:52:00.000-07:00

Oobear Keller rocked out at the end of the Grand Tasting for 2011. I can imagine what he did in his own place, Fleur, also a party destination on Saturday night. Fleur rocks with its great drinks. I tried their sangria, which is best I had in Vegas, as well as a pear cocktail that was delicious. The absinthe was a better picture than a drink; it's ok if you like liquid licorice. Keller also conquers with small meals; this time I had the fig flambe and on another occasion, the heirloom tomato flambe, a kind of rectangular pizza- best lunch items that I'm aware of in Vegas, it is always a treat to go to Fleur. The experience is even further expanded by the service of Mariso, as generous as Scrooge reborn; the friendliness of Faryal erupts into reality like the Bellagio fountains, and Jill, whom I met only briefly on my last (4 trips in 5 days) visit to Fleur, and who seems to have just stepped out of a Beatles song (All you need is, Love). Wish we had a place this good in Vancouver.

May Vegas 4: The Chefs

2011-05-14T20:34:00.000-07:00

One reason I wanted to attend Uncork'd was to meet the chefs and have whatever conversations possible. The night before the event began, dining with an interweb pillar at Twist brought forth the chef, or some other reason. He hovered over us, momentarily, not speaking English that I heard. I pointed to the Zezette dish and said, "c'est magnifique" which he acknowledged and moved on. Later, at the grand tasting (in the sense that "grand" is a word in the dictionary, and not a description of anything) I observed Chef Gagnaire conversing with professional celebrity Gordon Ramsay. They didn't appear to be speaking French. So when the chef was alone, I came up to him and said I loved his food, and also his novel/cookbook. I bet he never hears that. Then I described my reaction to eating his John Dory dish in February. He looked at me as if I'd just escaped from a mental institution. And hopefully, would be recaptured REAL soon. He went off to acclaim and nourishment and I then met Martin from the Chef Cook off thing I visited for lunch. He was so delightful, no matter what else had happened that day, if it were only relentless badness it would be cancelled by Martin's enthusiasm for ingredients that interest me. I have to go to his restaurant.
Earlier in the throngs of Tasting folks, I met chef Akira. I told him we shared a common Japanese moniker, most unusual for non-Japanese.. He asked if my mom were Japanese and I said no, my last name is from my wife. But I wanted to talk to him about his mushroom dish, and how the pickled mushroom set everything off so elegantly, yet thirst quenching on a hot day. His restaurant is called Yellow Tail and I would like to ask him how sustainable is his yellowtail supply? It is on the Avoid list from the aquarium. I want to be on Akira's side. So I trust that he is on the side of his sustenance.
The Grand Tasting gave me the opportunity to meet Jose Andres. I told the ebullient chef that I'd dined superbly at Jaleo in DC. He told me I had to dine at his places in Vegas. I didn't tell him of my adventures there, and regret saying all the negative things I posted in my two blog posts about them but told him I'd like to eat at his new mini-place E. I mentioned that my wife and I had spent a month feasting on tapas throughout Spain in 02 and he hugged me and told me I was his man. Does that mean I'll get a seat at E? We'll see. I would have liked to have asked him what he thinks of the proliferation of tapas places in the US, and specifically ask if he'd had the Basque Tapas that so enchanted me in Milford Connecticut during my recent trip to the East. Maybe I'll ask him some other time. It was great to see the Andres Vegas empire represented by the little scallops and limes I had enjoyed in my singular visit to that restaurant. Always lead with your best dish.
Actually the only dish I found memorable (not counting stuff I'd had before like Guy Savoy's truffle soup) was a little crab tidbit at the American Fish booth. I had introduced myself at the Savoy booth and mentioned I'd had the soup when I dined at Savoy in February. The woman working there called me by name and said they'd all read my blog review of Savoy. Made my week. The only thing I found truly vile was a tiny pineapple stuffed with fiery hot things. More of a bomb than dish, from Bobby Flay. It truly flayed my tongue. Thankfully one booth was serving Proseco. For a while, some good cocktails were also available but they ran out. One other chef I wanted to meet and had the opportunity was Jean Joho. I told him how much I enjoyed the vegetarian crepes at his Eiffel Tower restaurant in Feb. I also told the chef that it was my last meal in the Feb. trip and would be the last meal of this trip, on Sunday evening. He introduced me to his sous chef and assured me I'd eat well on Sunday. This was Friday, and on Saturday morning, I'm enjoying the great grapefruit at Mon Ami Gabi and see Chef Joho walking by. I discover he's an owner of Gabi as well. I tell him how much I enjoyed the apple crepe when I had previously breakfasted at Gabi. "They're completely different kinds of crepe" he instructs. Thankfully he's in charge of both of them.
I had wanted to meet Alain Ducasse since eating the amazing prawns at his restaurant Mix in Feb. The day after the Grand Tasting, with the Bocuse dinner cancelled, there was something called Better by the Bay at the artificial beach at the Mandalay Bay Hotel. There were only a few chefs compared to the Grand Tasting the previous night. I noticed Rick Moonen, famous for sea food, seemed to be serving hot dogs at both events. I got a tray full of Ducasse food including lobster and a fine bouillabaisse while Ducasse walked around like a scientist in a horror movie who has to deliver the bad news to the president. Waiting in line for half an hour for the food while being inundated with BBQ flames and loud music was not a lot of fun so I decided to leave without bothering Ducasse. On my way to the exit, I bumped into Hubert Keller, whose cuisine I've vastly enjoyed at Fleur and whose music I'd video'd at the grand tasting the previous night (see next blog post). Hubert invited me to the after party at Fleur at 11. Probably would have been more fun than the beach event He seemed full of joie de vivre. I would have liked to ask him about the hamachi (yellowtail) on the menu at Fleur, yet around the corner, in the same building, at the Shark Reef Aquarium in the sustainable seafood guide 2010, we are told to avoid yellowtail (imported, farmed). But he was having a good time and I didn't want to bother him.

May Vegas 3: Chef Showdown

2011-05-14T13:50:00.000-07:00

The Chef Showdown was actually my 3rd Uncork'd Event. On Thursday I attended the Locovore's Delight dinner with Bradley Ogden and then a party after that at Tom Collicchio's restaurant in the MGM Grand. The one memorable dish from Bradley was his halibut with morels in Meyer Lemon sauce. Exquisite. He also served some scallops, which didn't impress me, some fois and a lamb dish, neither particularly edible, as well as a delicious desert of strawberries in a boozy sauce. The highlight of my meal had to be the company, 3 couples from LA who were very entertaining and far more knowledgeable about food than me (I'm sure that's the case with most guests at Uncork'd). Tom's late party didn't seem to have anything I could eat, just sushi and steak tartare so I had a glass of champagne and left before the dueling grand pianos could induce deafness. The Chef Showdown, in a large educational space called Tuscany Kitchen at the Bellagio, was my first opportunity to actually learn something. The two young chefs, Akira Back of Yellowtale and Martin Heierling of Sensi, both surprisingly restaurants in the Bellagio, were tasked with producing one dish with scallops and the other with assorted mushroom. It could hardly be called a competition because the meals were already prepared for us, though we did get to watch the chefs at work in the kitchen part of the room and on big TVs throughout. Martin showed his fondness for southeast Asian food by adding tamarind to a seared sea scallop dish what also benefited from fermented rice flakes, ginger, lime, cilantro and compressed pineapple. A fantastic dish. Akira answered with a scallop pizza made from diver scallop carpaccio, Kewpie Mayonnaise and truffle oil on a grilled tortilla and the intriguing introduction of smoke from a new kitchen machine. That's what I learned from this event: get a smoke machine. Would also love Martin's recipe for that pineapple sauce. A very tasty Riesling accompanied the scallops, working very well with both pineapple and smoky scallops and pretty good by itself too. The mushroom course really contrasted the chefs. Akira stuck to just mushrooms. One part of his dish was an oyster mushroom dumpling. though its skin was rather tough the oyster mushrooms, braised in soy cream and mushroom broth and garnished with yuzu and cilantro, with some amazingly refreshing pickled mushrooms on the side. Delightful! Martin's mushroom dish was overwhelmed by the bacon wrapped rabbit loin. I would have enjoyed more of the Parisian gnocchi braised in mushroom stock, garnished with fava beans, peas and ramps. A red wine accompanied the mushrooms with its appropriately earthy terroir. The chefs also shared some interesting stories while they cooked. Akira told about using garlic that had been braised in milk 7 times. Someone asked him if he could tell if it was only 6 times. He could. That's why he's the chef and we're just there to eat.

May Vegas 2: Twist. Again

2011-05-13T15:11:00.000-07:00

Of all the great restaurants I ate at in Feb, only Twist has remained in touch with me since then. I appreciate that. Whether email updates about new items on their menu, the news that Chef Gagnaire would be in the kitchen in May and I should take advantage of that, to the fact that they'd actually read my blog account of dining there, I feel that Twist has my palate in mind. After deciding to go to Uncork'd, the first restaurant I wanted to go back to was Twist. Even with the John Dory off the menu, I'd read great reviews of the chef's Zezette broth and wanted to try some other seafood on his menu.
I found out about Uncork'd from a post by Eguletteer David Ross. David had been to all of the Uncork'ds and I had the privilege of hanging out with him first at Twist, and throughout the Uncork'd events, greatly expanding what I was able to learn from them all. I had no idea what he looked like, but he apparently recognized me from my tiny Egullet photo at the entrance to Twist, and we were then lead to the Chef's Table, overlooking the busy kitchen. They wouldn't have done that for me.
As you can see in the vid, we were bombarded with amuse bouches, just like my Feb. visit. The best one for me was what I called the little hamburger (actually a curry disc and goat cheese, and I am NO FAN of curry). The pastis cube was interesting. Not that it tasted good, particularly. What I like about the "modernist" food movement, of which Gagnaire is a star, is the idea that you can do anything with anything. Why not turn a beverage into a cube? Pastis doesn't make it for me any more than the Jack Daniels/Guiness delicacy made it for me in Feb, but I can imagine a cocktail or a liqueur I liked turned into a jelly and enhancing something I was eating. A sangria cube perhaps?
My Zezette broth was as good as I was expecting. Endlessly complex, as I would expect from Gagnaire, but also more filling than I expected for an appetizer. The cod cake is delicious, and the ratatouille pure opens up a lot of possibilities (we use ratatouille as an ingredient in yaki soba in our house) . The problem was I was too tired to enjoy the food. I had ordered the halibut, before realizing not only couldn't I eat anything else, I was in danger of falling asleep in my soup. Not a good thing to do in a restaurant. I usually wake up around 9 or 10. In order to catch my 6:20 flight to Vegas Wed morning, I had to get up at 3:30 to get to the airport on time and it was catching up with me. David had ordered the whole tasting menu, something I'd have loved to try to get a rich sense of the chef's possibilities but I was too tired even to finish my soup, or even my cocktail, the same one I raved about in the Feb experience. In later conversation, David said his food was good but not good enough to return considering all the great restaurants in Vegas he had yet to experience. I feel the same way about all those great places yet undined at, but still think there will be more Gagnaire goodness in my future.

Vegas Uncork'd 2011

2011-05-13T10:27:00.001-07:00

After the February trip, I wasn't planning to visit Vegas anytime soon. But in early April, I discovered in Egullet that a great epicurean event would occur there in May. It seemed like a good time to revisit that city. In particular, I was intrigued by the planned Toques off to Paul Bocuse event, a dinner prepared by the best chefs in France, among other places in honour of the French culinary icon. Alas, this was cancelled at the last moment, but some of the other events looked good on the Uncork'd website. By the time I discovered Uncork'd, some of the dinners I would have liked to have attended were already sold out, but I put together 8 events and made reservations at Twist, Mix, Valentino and Eiffel Tower for when I wouldn't be event-hopping.
Oddly, the Los Angeles suburb of Sherman Oaks seemed to frame my trip. My first dinner, Locovore's Delight with Bradley Ogden (I thought he was a city in Utah. Turns out to be the pioneer of the Locovore movement), I found myself sitting next to a couple from Sherman Oaks, actually a few blocks away from my parents house there. My last dinner in Vegas was at the great Italian restaurant Valentino, which has a branch in Sherman Oaks. I'm positive my restaurant loving parents would have dined there. Maybe.their spirits were following me around this trip.
After all the events in Uncork'd and the other restaurants I visited and revisited (must have gone to Fleur 4 times in 5 days) I never had food as good as the Feb. trip. Obviously restaurants take dishes off the menu as the seasons change. I was expecting to eat something other than John Dory at Twist. Was looking forward to eating the Gnocchi my server had reccommended in Feb. at Mix. Delighted that Chef's Joho's vegetarian crepe was still on the menu at the Eiffle Tower and the gnocchi were the same at Fleur, though in both cases I noticed less pesto in both dishes, compared to their Feb. presentations. As the February trip was transformationl, this trip seemed more structural. Feb. was about overthrowing the pharaoh of my food expectations. Uncork'd more of an instructional experience. I left individual events, such as Viva Las Vegan and the Chef's Showdown, very inspired to make new dishes and try new techniques, which is what Uncork'd seemed to be about. When I wasn't eating interesting food and guzzling premium wines, I had the opportunity to talk to many knowledgeable people at some length, as well as meet many of the chefs whose food so delighted me. A very satisfying 5 days. Would have been better if it wasn't 97 degrees outside, but you can't have everything.

Some useful words

2011-04-19T13:06:00.000-07:00

Since leaving Vegas, I've been looking for ways to explain to myself what happened to me when I ate the Prawns at Mix, the John Dory at Twist, the Crispy Sea Bass at Guy Savoy and viewed the city at sunset from the ascending elevator at THE Hotel. A recent movie about Canada's great environmentalist David Suzuki giving a speech summing up his long career, offered the following two paragraphs:

David Suzuki, Force of Nature

Now I am uplifted by the amazing story that has emerged from modern science. It tells us that a moment after the big bang, as matter spewed forth into an expanding universe, every particle exerted a tiny pull on every other particle. The universe is not mostly empty space, it is filled with evanescent tendrils of attraction, that some people call love. And that attraction is built into the very fabric of the cosmos.

What I realized was that Guujaw and the Haida don’t see themselves as ending at their skin or their fingertips. To be Haida was to be connected to the land. That the air, the water, the fish, the trees and the birds were all a part of who the Haida are. Their connection to the land was their history their culture, the very reasons why Haida are in the world.

I recently finished the book The Fruit Hunters by Adam Gollner. His description of eating a particular fruit seemed tangential to what Suzuki was talking about.

For Joyce, the idea of the epiphany in the everyday was about “a sudden spiritual manifestation.” Beauty, or truth or God, can exist within anything, particularly in the places that are so evident that we’d never think to look.

These jaboticabas, full of promise, seemed to be pointing at revelations that I had yet to experience. Holding them, I felt like something miraculous had fallen into the palm of my hand, like the answer to a prayer I hadn’t even realized I was making.

From the North Vancouver library, I picked up clawing at the limits of cool, Miles Davis, John Coltrane and the Greatest Jazz Collaboration Ever, by Farah Jasmine Griffin and Salim Washington, and found these quotes about one of my favourite musicians, John Coltrane:

p. 6

Once Trane reached his mature stages, it was as if he were dealing directly in spirit matter, with the medium of music serving as a material expression of a higher force.

Two generations later, saxophonist Joshua Redman would say of Trane’s music: “At certain times in my life this music has kind of swept me up and transported me to a place where I can sense that there is something greater than the material existence of things. And a fabric that binds the material world together and offers an escape from that world."

Just before I moved to Japan in early August, 1971, my cousin had taken me to The Troubadour, a popular club in LA, to see Cannonball Adderley perform. This concert was recorded as the album The Black Messiah. I remember being so entranced my cousin thought I'd gone so far into the music I'd never return to real life. Unfortunately, I did return, and caught my plane for Japan a few days later, but the memory of that transcendent musical experience is the closest my memory lets me get to the "worlds" Suzuki, Gollner and the writers of Clawing describe, and I found myself entering via my menu choices at those Vegas restaurants. Just signed up for a foodie event in Vegas in early May called Vegas Uncorked where I'll have an opportunity to meet the chefs who created those reality-defying recipes. It would be great if I could talk to them in French, but we'll see what happens.

Vegas 12: Reflectomania

2011-02-21T13:07:00.001-08:00

This is one of the first shots I took on a bitterly cold morning near my hotel, the Palace of Imps.

These two were taken around the Bellagio, a much more pleasant experience.

From here on, I think all of these are of reflections of Citycenter. Wish it were that interesting on the inside.

Vegas 11: The Fremont Street Experience

2011-02-20T15:46:00.001-08:00

Vegas 10: Vegan Wynn and The Eiffel Tower

2011-02-20T10:07:00.001-08:00

I'd read on Egullet that Steve Wynn had some vegan options available at his self-named hotel. After breakfast at Bouchon on Thursday, I walked over to the Wynn to investigate and saw Steve Wynn himself walking down one of the aisles. He didn't look particularly healthy or happy. Guess that Vegan cuisine isn't working for him. I would have asked him if he's tried Charlie Trotter's vegan dishes but I didn't want to bother him. The following day, to celebrate the news from Egypt, this time I took a bus up to the Wynn and prepared to try its vegie dish pictured above. I love inari skins and these are filled with water chestnuts and other goodies. My server tells me the sauce makes the dish and he's right. Very peanuty. The cilantro is very good with the sauce. It's a lot of food by my standards for breakfast. I'm told it's actually on the lunch menu but they make it for me anyway at 10 AM.
After this brunch, I take another bus way out to the old downtown. Pix in next post. Back to my hotel to wait for the limo from Robuchon. When I walked past the Eiffel Tower replica, I noticed the menus of both their outdoor reason Mon Ami Gabi and the indoor place up in the tower. The indoor place, called The Eiffel Tower Restaurant featured, in the Vegetarian section, Baked Herbed Crepe, Artichokes, Walnuts, Slow Roasted Tomato Coulis and Basil Pistou for $29. Considering the overall ambiance of the place, I really wanted to try that Crepe, not alas, Mon Ami Gabi's food though my Robuchon guide raved about it.
A few hours after I'd let my Robuchon feast digest, I put on my winter coat again (getting a surprising amount of work here in Vegas) and walked over to the Paris hotel to try the crepe. It wasn't the view of Mix from Monday but it was certainly a good view of Vegas. I'm inundated with Amuse Bouches even though I really only want the crepes. Finally the crepes are served and they are worthy of Robuchon, or any of the other great chefs I've been enjoying. Chef J Joho has mastered French cuisine as well as any of his contemporaries here in Vegas. I discover that The Eiffel Tower Restaurant is part of the Lettuce Entertainment Group from Chicago. I tell my greeter that I'd dined at Lettuce's great Chicago fish house L20 3 years ago at the beginning of this quest to find the best possible food. Here I am at another Lettuce place as my last restaurant in Vegas. Fitting.
While waiting for my flight back to Vancouver on Saturday afternoon, I pick up a bio of Wynn that he probably wouldn't want to see me reading in his hotel. It's a good thing his last name isn't Lose.
I wonder if all these great chefs ever compete? Not that I have much tolerance for competition but just as one tapas bar in Barcelona depends on its neighbours having equally delicious tapas to keep up its quality, I think Chef Andres in particular would benefit from having small plate restaurants around his 2 places here that would steal his customers if he served less than stellar food. Hubert Keller's gnocchi or braised hamachi would empty out Andres's places if people had the chance to compare them nearby. And most of the great meals I've had on this trip have been quite small, though sometimes quite expensive. You get what you pay for.

Vegas 9: Robuchon

2011-02-19T11:53:00.000-08:00

And finally, the founder of the quest.

It was an article in The Vancouver Sun about Robuchon that got me interested in pursuing these kinds of restaurants in 2006. The chef of the century? What does that mean? I wanted to find out.
Before dining at the Robuchon mansion, I had to survive the day. I was awakened with chest pains at 3 AM the previous night, after premonitions of death leaving Picasso, only the 6th best restaurant I'd dined at in the previous 4 days. Maybe I actually was dying of too much good food. Maybe that deep fried cod at Bouchon at 10 PM? Or a heart attack? I read for awhile as the pain subsided. When I later awoke at 9, the Egyptians had gotten rid of Mubarak. Watching the struggles in Egypt had been my main activity in Vegas when not dining. I've identified with Egypt since reading about it in 3rd grade (when I discovered they worshiped cats, they had my interest for life) and though it's only a tourist's interest, I wanted to go there at some point and want the best for its people, however long ago their cat-worship was. I too felt oddly liberated. From heart attack, Keller's cooking oil or whatever, it was great to be alive. Using my 3-day bus pass, I went over to the Wynn up the strip to sample it's fabled (on Egullet) Vegan cuisine for breakfast but that will be in the next post. I then spent a less than intriguing hour in the old downtown, a long bus ride from the Strip and only occasionally photogenic. See 2 blog posts from this.
Back in my Imperial Palace room, I'm told I'll be picked up by a gold limo with MGM Grand written on the side. I see no such car. Finally one of the hotel workers who is involved with traffic inquires who I'm waiting for, and when I describe my missing limo, I'm directed to a black SUV with no writing on it. Finally I'm headed to Robuchon land.
After a pleasant sunset ride, I'm let in through large gates. I'm deposited at a very impressive building. Was Louis XVI expecting me? I'm told to wait for my server and my check says her name was Jennifer appears. Like my own private guide. We discuss what I've eaten on my trip. She suggests I try L'Atelier which I will do on my next visit. Also recommends Mon Ami Gabi at the Eiffel Tower. I don't tell her I'm planning to eat crepes in the upstairs restaurant later this evening. I had looked at the Gabi menu and nothing on it intrigued me, unlike the vegetarian crepe on the Eiffel Tower menu. But I'm still at Robuchon. I don't think I have ever been in a more luxurious room than the one in which I finally dine. I get a pretty good fruity cocktail to start with as my amuse bouche is a tin of caviar and the drink goes along way to make these buttery fish eggs on crab meat highly edible. I don't remember ever eating caviar or wanting to, but it goes deliciously with the insistently paired bread.
The langoustine ravioli reminds me of the soup at Guy Savoy. Good, but I was expecting more intricacy. It is satisfying. The cabbage pairs well with it. But I wouldn't rank it with the best food I've had in Vegas.
The Sea Bass, called Le Bar, hits it out of the park. I've ordered a Lemon Drop to keep with the cocktail theme and avoiding wine completely. The lemony drink marries the bass which is already married to the tomatoes and this marriage is made in 70s sitcom heaven. I know you're as tired of reading it as I am of typing it, but it's the best piece of fish I've ever eaten. This Robuchon dude can cook. The artichoke is fantastic, and still an artichoke. Who knew? And the asparagus? Jose should eat these, to taste what asparagus spears are supposed to taste like. The octopus is also exquisite, along with its helpful foam. Actually my first bite is of cauliflower. Joel knows what to do with vegies. I'm served his famous mashed potatoes. It's basically potato-flavoured butter. At the conclusion to this rather small meal, I'm very satisfied and very full. I avoid desert and have a cup of tea which comes with the meal. The lemon drop had cut the butter overpresence in the langoustines and the potatoes. A mildly spiced citrus tea ends my meal perfectly. I know I'll be eating crepes in the Eiffel Tower in 3 hours but I savour every minute at Robuchon. They actually summon the gold limo to return me to my anti-hotel. Sure is fun, not being dead.

Vegas 8: Picasso

2011-02-18T16:43:00.000-08:00

I had originally planned to dine at Charlie Trotter's but it disappeared. Then I had a reservation for Alex but it too disappeared. So Picasso sounded good. Not one of my top thousand painters but his paintings would not hurt my enjoyment of the food, I thought. I was right.
Amuse Bouche: too hot to comfortably do it as a shot. The quail egg overwhelmed the salmon, a bad idea. Long egg aftertaste I was unhappy about. It then took a while for the soup to kick in. I mistake mushroom for marshmallow. Both are good. Not great. The Campari in the cocktail balances the sweetness and really makes the soup. My server suggests a new pairing has been born. Back to the soup. I close my eyes to savour the duxelles and they are profoundly savoured. The purpose of taste A is to combine with taste B and create taste C. This works. The Campari cancels the marshmallows.
The shrimp are amazingly bland, with all those vegetables. They lack the intensity of the shrimp from Mix, but what doesn't? Cutting tomato and combining with the shrimp helps. The third shrimp is the best, covered with mushrooms. Exquisite mushroom aftertaste. When I opened my eyes I was astonished I was still here. I thought I'd gone to food heaven. What I thought were mushrooms were instead intricately prepared artichokes. I do love this vegetable. Later artichokes that taste just like potatoes. Wow.
With the turbot, the asparagus works. Not as soft as I'd prefer, but hot, with the hollandaise sauce and the jus, it's quite successful. The turbot and the asparagus create a tasty synthesis. Am I eating fish, vegetable or some creature Picasso has created with a fish head and an asparagus body? But much more enjoyable than one of his creations. I try the turbot without the asparagus and my tongue complains, "hey, where's the asparagus?" Last bite of fish soaked with hollandaise, profoundly buttery. I'm starting to get full on a rather small quantity of food. Must be all that butter. I feel I have to stop before I turn into the spirit of pleasure and float away. Desert items loom before me like giant Macy's balloons. The greatest reaction I had to anything here wasn't the ambiance which is delightful or any of the fine food, it was in the little book they gave me about the art on the walls. Picasso's son designed the room's carpet to match the colours from his dad's paintings, which were selected by his mom. The sheer inventiveness of Picasso and his whole family. Like Gagnaire's approach to the langoustine. Endlessly inventive, undeterred by constant failure. My server had promised me a little fruit plate and the key word little I took too seriously. Only the sabayon was good and light, made from grapefruit, lemon lime and egg whites. As I was leaving the restaurant, I told my server that it was my first time to eat turbot and he said it was in the same family as John Dory. I told him I had John prepared by Gagnaire on Tuesday night and he said Gagnaire was the best chef in Europe. I wonder what all those Spaniards think about that? Walking back to my hotel, I wondered if I was starting to OD on good food, and I still had Keller's cod to eat later that evening.

Vegas 7: Bouchon. Tom Keller returns from the dead.

2011-02-18T15:13:00.001-08:00

I never expected to eat Thomas Keller's cooking again after the debacle in Per Se a few months ago. However, in prepping for this trip, I watched the No Reservations episode from Vegas where Tony was raving about the Beignets de Brandade de Morue. I asked if I could get an item from the dinner menu for breakfast. No, I'd have to come back in the evening. I made a reservation as late as I could, surprised how easy it was. Consider how difficult it is to get in to The French Laundry or Per Se. And now on Thursday morning here at 8:30 I was expecting multitudes, but there are just a few of us here. I order the grapefruit seen above. I had been addicted to frozen pink grapefruit from 1985-2000. On some profound chemical level, I appreciate this fruit. This is the best grapefruit I've ever eaten. Hunter Thompson couldn't hallucinate a tastier grapefruit. And the chamomile tea, called Rare Cargo Organic Chamomile and Fruit, is the best tasting chamomile I've ever tasted and chamomile is my favourite tea.

And Keller doesn't stop. The quiche is also the best in its class. I've been making quiches since my friend King Kong (no not that one, this one's a podiatrist in Encino) and I got into French food in the 60s. In this quiche, the eggs hadn't completed decided which state they wanted to be in. There was a precarious aesthetic. a mystery tension for the taste buds: how good can this be? The vinaigrette has a delightful aroma. The quiche also has a wondrous smelling pastry.

After dining at Picasso, see next post, I went back at 930 PM to Bouchon for the cod. It really didn't compare to the other fish I've eaten in Vegas, either the cod at Mix or anything else. It was edible. The servers were astonished I'd just come for that dish, though they kept saying it was a good choice. I'm shown a copy of the Keller cookbook with this dish in it and told to take a pic with my phone. I don't have a cell phone, but I do shoot this vid. One server came by and inspected my plate to see if I were eating the dish with tomatoes, a key ingredient. The more I eat, the more I become annoyed at the fried outer texture which isn't agreeing with me at all. The inner cod still tastes good and the tomato helps. It's not as good as the perfect breakfast nor even as good the the turbot I had a few hours earlier at Picasso. But it's better than the vegetarian garbage I was served at Per Se. So Tom Keller can cook. A quiche. At least. Maybe my expectations of Andres were too high, my expectations of this Keller too low.

Vegas 6: Say It Ain't So, Jose

2011-02-18T12:55:00.000-08:00

I was really looking forward to eating at Jaleo. Although one for 3, the scallop lime thing, isnt much of an average for China Polano, that was new territory. Jaleo is where Andres comes from. I remembered his red pepper stuffed with cheese and further back, I remembered feasting on tapas in Spain in November 2002. Coming out of Caesar's Palace after the great meal at Guy Savoy earlier on Wednesday evening, I thought I saw what looked like Chef Andres entering the hotel with a bunch of other men. I was going to say hello, and if I had a second of his time, I'd ask if he has sampled the Basque tapas I discovered in Milford Connecticut recently. I'm also interested in eating at Bazaar, Andres's newish place in LA, a city I've had a lot of good food in over the years. When I finally get to Jaleo about 3 hours after leaving Guy Savoy, I find it large and full of apparently happy people. I'm delighted the place is so successful. When Fumiyo and I were on a bus from Avignon to Barcelona, as soon as we had crossed into Spain, the bus stopped for us all to eat and we discovered cooked white asparagus in the truck stop menu. Our bodies were craving vegetables we couldn't get enough of while traveling through Italy and France. Wonderfully soft and tasty. So when I saw asparagus on Jaleo's menu, I was sure this was the same dish I had on the road in Spain. And it was served in a tin can, like the great canned sea food from Espinaler. I was so looking forward to that first melting soft bite of asparagus and good Spanish cheese. But the asparagus spears were as hard as the penises of aroused robots.

The main item on the menu that brought me to Jaleo was the deep fried dates wrapped in bacon. After the fantastic bacon ice cream with figs at Le Bernardin recently, I had an idea what this would taste like. Just like I had that memory from the Spanish truckstop, not a useful preparation for Chef's Andres' asparagus mistake. I had first had dates in Mexico in 1953. I liked them. I first had bacon in 1963, I liked it too. They should go together. At least in this restaurant, they did not. It was like eating sad sand.

This is the red peppers stuffed with crab. I make a version of this at home. I melt some cream Havarti cheese and add an equal amount of crab. I put a few green olives at the bottom of a red pepper (orange is even better) pour in the crab/cheese, then top the pepper with a big tomato wedge and bake till the the pepper skin is soft. Cheese stuffed pepper is pretty standard Mexican food. I'd had Jose's cheese filled peppers at his DC Jaleo so I decided to try the crabby peppers here. Compared to the previous two tapas, it was highly edible. Of course, by this time I was quite hungry. Before I could "enjoy" these peppers, a plate was dropped a couple of meters from me. Glass went flying. As it was being swept up, I found a large piece near my stool. "You have good eyesight,"I was told. If only. I took my shoe off to see if it had any glass in it. My thumb and fingers were invaded by broken glass just picking up my shoe. My server Michelle thankfully didn't charge me for the two tapas I didn't like, and offered me another order. The sangria was really good. I was offered a book in which to write my comments to the chef, but glass-injured fingers were not easy to use. I wonder if Andres, and Spain in general is still that appealing. I was planning to go to Spain, particularly the Basque region and Barcelona again, as my next culinary destination, but maybe not.

Vegas 5: Fleur x 2

2011-02-17T11:39:00.000-08:00

Think this is a bad pciture? The food was worse. Hubert Keller's famous "In the Shower," which is mac and cheese with lobster. Theoretically. There may have been a few lobster chunks but it hardly looks like the dish displayed in the Vegas magazine. As I arrived at the airport on Monday afternoon, there was Hubert advertising Fleur. on the baggage claim area wall. I had made a lunch reservation here as soon as Fleur opened a few weeks previous. This was supposed to be really good. The Gruyere cheese smelled enticing. But basically it's just macaroni.

My server Faryal, surprised I didn't savour the Shower as much as other diners, made some recommendations including this gnocchi. I was initially interested in Hubert's cooking when I saw on the website for his San Francisco restaurant, "Vegetarians will be pleased to know that Chef Keller is more inspired than ever regarding his non-meat dishes." Thus far my favourite part of Fleur was the really comfortable lounge chair my feet delighted in after the long walk from my hotel. Then I have a gnocchi. It's dreamingly good. As good as my seafood courses at the other restaurants, which were as good as food can be. So this Keller really CAN cook! I'm elated. And it's so simple. Reminds me of what Jean-George Vongerichten said to David Chang on sampling Chang's Heirloom tomato/Tofu/Shiso dish: Why didn't I think of this!

In continued chat with my server who observes I'm not yet full, we discuss other vegetarian options and she suggests the onion soup with truffle oil. I'm encountering so many truffles in this eatathon I fear a sort of Stendahl Syndrome of the taste buds. Doesn't mean I'm going to turn them down however. There seems to be a process involved, pouring from the pitcher into the little cup. "Not your traditional onion soup<" says the server, quite accurately. It's wonderful. The Mandalay Bay Hotel, where Fleur is located, also has an aquarium. I plan to return tomorrow and see it as well as trying the Flight of Fruity Cocktails on the menu and see if the gnocchi is as good as it tastes today.

The aquarium is interesting but it's not really a good idea to visit an aquarium before going to eat some fish. While contemplating my trio of tasty cocktails, I order the gnocchi again and a fish dish with shitake and soy ginger foam. Should be an interesting pairing, but I'm on a roll (as they'd say in Vegas) with great cocktails after the wondrous drinks at Mix and Twist did their magic with the sublime food.
The green drink is called Sumo. As someone who used to follow the sport when I lived in Japan in the 80s, I tell my server, a different woman this time named Mariso, that Sumo is usually associated with beer drinking in Japan. Maybe things have changed since then. This Sumo is wonderfully floral (in a restaurant called Fleur, that's a good idea). I have to search around on my palate to find the yuzu, but There It Is, Yes, as an aftertaste. Moriso tells me it's the newest cocktail. It goes superbly with the gnocchi, as does a glass of ice water. The gnocchi is just as good as it was yesterday. My second tiny cocktail reeks of peach. And I love fresh peaches. I love peach flavoured tea and when I used to eat pies, peach was my favourite. But a good peach cocktail is a revelation to me. I try it with a gnocchi as well as my mushroom foamed fish and both are exquisite. The braised hamachi joins the gnocchi as well as the fish feasts at Mix, Twist and Guy Savoy at the peak of culinary possibility. I then try a sip of the Fleurtini with the hamachi. Nope. The fleurtini strives for but doesn't achieve symbiosis with the fish. I think its sweetness, which isn't at all overpowering, clashes too much with pickeled shitake and soy ginger foam. I was expecting more sour apple in the drink. My first meal in Vegas, on Monday afternoon was that vast salad with the delightful granny smith slices so I was looking forward to more sour apple goodness. That meal also included a superb mimosa made with their home made lemonade, an ade so tasty it gave home a good name. So I knew there were good drinks to be had in this city. And the food quality just doesn't stop. Back to the Fleurtini: the pomegranate just doesn't come through as much as the peach or yuzu in the other two drinks. My tiny cocktails are now completed so I order a large passion fruit drink. I want to compare it with the Tuesday night's perfect passion fruit drink at Twist. About the only thing they have in common: they both contain alcohol. This drink, the Passion Pisco, just tastes like booze. If Hunter Thompson were here, I'd offer it to him. Mariso suggests the Caesar Salad which I'm sure is just as deconstructed as the onion soup but I have a big dinner coming up in 3 hours. Instead, I opt for coffee as theatre. An Affogatto, usually just for dinner guests but Moriso offers to make one for me. Fun with liquid nitrogen. Best show in Vegas.

Vegas 4: Guy Savoy

2011-02-16T16:32:00.000-08:00

And I thought the chef's name was Savoy, as in Savoy Cabbage (makes the best cabbage rolls). Nah, it's French: salve wa. Good thing I knew that when I went in. Entering a temple of food, one must not be inappropriate.
Caesar's Palace was a short walk among furiously smoking people from my dump, the Imperial Palace. I don't think the hotel has any interesting evocations of one's last visit to Rome, certainly not compared to The Venetian or NYNY which is at least sly. But it is grand. I was surrounded by well lit sculpture and enough gold to choke a tax collector. Didn't mind waiting in the lobby a few minutes for Guy Savoy to open. Adjust dinner jacket, now fouled with smoke. A costume of coughing.

I am served by two men, one tall and one short. Reminded me of a book I used to read my daughter at night, about a tall man who was always given a short bed in a hotel, while his short friend always received a bed too long. I was offered a cart of champagne. Which would I choose? After inquiring about the amuse bouches, I dismissed the roses, perhaps prematurely. What I really wanted to say was "which is cheapest?" but it seems a ludicrous question in this restaurant. I went with a dry one. Dry is good for me generally. Upon getting my bill later, I discovered the glass cost more than my fish course. But all things chemically considered, it was worth it.

First up, some sort of bread thing with fois gras and truffle. I didn't taste either of them individually, just the bread but it sort of swam in them, beautifully augmented by the champagne. I don't recognize this as a bread, just some sort of sodden softness.
The French burger once again alters reality. Just as Tommy Keller's artichoke coronet at Per Se a few months ago sent me back to an Italian restaurant in Van Nuys in 1956, this burger transported me to the very first good hamburger I ever ate. Also Van Nuys, late 1962. We weren't killed by Russian missiles. We could eat beef! My parents first fumbles in that direction were disastrous, but we started going out for hamburgers and Van Nuys in 1962 had some great burgers. This was that experience. And the burger was the size of a postage stamp.
I had to re inhabit my 2011 body. The dislocation, the sudden transport to that distant time was so intense. And exhausting. Particularly when I have to suddenly come back and talk. Yes, it was very good. I explain that I'd just traveled to a distant era, and was told, yes, that's what the food's supposed to do. It isn't just Tommy Keller. A successful taste transports you to where you need to be but could not otherwise get to. An unsuccessful taste merely mires you in where you are.
The champagne hasn't been on the table long enough to change flavours but it does, perhaps because of the food. It seems crisper. I needed it with the theatrical amuse. The crab reveal at the end had only a crab aftertaste, nothing within the moment to savour. This is becoming a theme.
And finally the black truffle soup. I'd read such extravagant praise of this soup, I thought it was the best thing I'd eat here. It was OK. There was something addictive about it. I kept spooning it into my mouth yet I wasn't actually enjoying it all that much. Sometimes an artichoke would make its appearance. Maybe I should have had a wine pairing with this, as the dish clearly needs more of an assist than I'm getting from my ice water. The gnocchi I had at Fleur this afternoon not only blew this away, even Hubert Keller's deconstructed onion soup was a far more interesting soup. Maybe because the French burger altered reality so severely a few minutes ago, this soup just couldn't keep up. But it was warm. An antidote to all known winters. Maybe the soup exists in a different dimension than flavour? You gotta give the chef some slack, when you're paying this much for a bowl of soup. The brioche accompaniment was an interesting texture. But there were already too many textures and not enough interesting flavours.
Enough bread on that bread cart to save Ukraine from starvation under Stalin. My relatives starved to death, while I contemplate bread as architecture.
I finally selected a juniper berry bread. I like berries in general, and their juniperocity in this chunk o'bread might well recall the citrusy gin that so inflated my enjoyment of the meal at Mix on Monday. I used to live on fruit bread sandwiches with sharp cheddar when I first came to live in Vancouver in the early 70s. Fruit and bread, or fruit and anything is usually a very good idea.
I enjoyed the juniper bread, though it made me wish for another one of those great gin tonics from Mix two nights before. When it was insisted that I have some lemon bread with my sea bass, I am usually on the side of citrus-influenced anything.
The multi-level dudes were right. The bread goes wonderfully with the sea bass sauce. The crispy sea bass features skin that I could actually eat. This has never happened before. This is a miracle. It is called sea bass "with delicate spices" which turn out to be the peppers so precisely targeted to your tastes you could invent mathematics from their trajectory. The pepper was an immense part of the meal, its lingering aftertaste from one dish influencing how I'd react to the next. Not an unusual experience in this level of foodery, but done most exquisitely here.
Chef Savoy's use of the term "delicate" for the pepper here reminds me of Phil Austin's use of the word "kindness" in his story The House of Little Men and the Firesign Theatre play A Shadow Falls Upon A Land." It is a concept upon which civilization depends, for our species as much as the parliaments of ourselves. Being delicate, like being kind can only be beneficent.
When I left the restaurant, something very strange happened. Thankfully I was holding on to the railing at the top of the stairs when a tsunami overtook me. As the light we see from the sun is from 8 minutes ago, I seem to have been hit from an overload of my senses brought on by Guy's food 8 minutes after my last bite. If it had happened after I'd taken a step down the stairs, I would probably have lost my grip and died. Memo to Guy Savoy: Killing your guests with pleasure is not a sustainable business plan. Even in Vegas.

Vegas 3; Let's Twist Again

2011-02-15T16:27:00.000-08:00

Pierre Gagnaire sits atop French cuisine like a gargoyle giggling at the ant-like humans below. I'd been wanting to sample his food since first learning about its existence when an article in a local newspaper (about Robuchon) made me google World's Best Restaurants. Aha. That was always a goal of my parents, to eat the best food they could find wherever they went. I've just been dining on whatever for many decades. Maybe it was time to go back to the family tradition.
Quintessence, a sort of mystery novel-cookbook by Gagnaire and This, includes a recipe for John Dory. My friend Frank consumed a John Dory at one of our favourite local restaurants, Bonetta a couple of years ago- all I knew of its existence until reading that recipe. So On Tuesday, Feb. 8th I went to Pierre's Vegas den looking forward to John, Pierre's much praised Langostine, and the kind of ambiance one would expect with food of this caliber. Would it's beverages be up to last night's Mix? A serious competition. Could Johnny the Door live up to the Perfect Cod and the prawn entrance to superior realities?
The Passion Fruit beverage was really good. No, I mean really. The wine pairing thing just doesn't work for me more often than not, but the fruity intricacies of the appropriate cocktail has taken my appreciative palate where wine takes the real connoisseurs. Perhaps. Through amuses amusing and not so, through the 5 kinds of langoustine preparations and finally King John Dory himself, the passion fruit (one drink, and not a large one-it was Just That Good) perfectly complemented it all. I was even provided with a couple of magazines to peruse while waiting for the food. It was beyond human hospitality. I was in the land of elves. John Simon tinkling the ivories in the background.
Onward to Bouche amusement. You can see them on the vid. 3 bread sticks dipped in some kind of oil Something with wasabi and sake, which sounds Japanese, like hara kiri. Some sort of goat cheese (where is John Barth's Giles Goat-Boy when you need him?), a Jack Daniels square, and the last, a palate cleansing apple sore bit. I take my first sip of the passion fruit cocktail and it is SPECTACULAR. The amuses do not. The wasabi thing is just weird. Goat cheese surprisingly good after a couple of abject failures. The only real winner though is the frozen applesauce, or whatever it is. My love of apples is Edenic, and Pierre escaped the otherwise precipitous fall into the pit of unfriendly food by doing apples right. Now let's see what he does with the Langoustine.
First dish. Fantastic. Sour and complex, like great food should be. As good as anything I will eat in this trip of unrelenting perfection. The 2nd course is baconesque and must be the greatest BBQ flavour I've ever experienced. The cracker dissolving in my mouth makes me cough. I survive. Even if I didn't, it would be worth it. The mousouline is neither great nor terrible. The gelee tastes Japanese, like Unit 731. The raw langoustine is so vile it makes me want to exit this reality as soon as possible. 2 and a half out of 5. Good average in baseball. Way bad in one of the world's best restaurants. It's a matter of personal taste.
My first piece of John Dory is exquisite. The best piece of fish I've ever tasted. How often have I said that before? Expectations were high. How often can one say "best" without diminishing that superlative? I think on some chemical level my palate knew that. Like the heirloom tomato dish at Charlie Trotters that didn't overload my aesthetics as much as turned the top of a mountain into the propulsion for a rocket ship with the morel dish to come. When comparing one great thing with another, you're always talking about things at the same level; great things. And I've only had one piece of the John Dory. It is different from every other piece of fish I've eaten. And better.
The artichoke cream doesn't really taste like artichokes (a recurring theme in this trip), but combined with the other ingredients, it's a wonderful adventure. Only the fois gras, though not particularly meaty, is just not that appealing. I know, separating a French Chef from his fois is about as easy as separating Popeye from his spinach. Back to King John. As I had my third piece of this fish, the song Crimson and Clover, done by a female singer, not the original 1968 single, came on the music system. It was never a favourite song of mine, even in the era when music meant the most to me, but it was a good song. This version particularly good. But the quality of the song wasn't the point. Nor was the quality of the fish. For some reason, they came together upon me and I dissolved. It was as intense an experience as the previous night's prawn alteration of reality.

Vegas 2: China Poblano

2011-02-15T13:14:00.000-08:00

Upon discovering that Jose Andres had just opened two places in Vegas, I was thrilled to add them to my already impressive list of places to dine. I had discovered Andres' original Jaleo when I was in DC in 2005. That tapas place provided the best food I ate on my 10 day visit to the US East Coast, a trip full of restaurants and talented chefs. I'm sure I liked Jaleo so much because it reminded me of the great tapas my wife and I grazed on during our several weeks in Spain in 2002. Bringing tapas to North America was akin to Prometheus delivering fire to humans in the Greek myth. Tapas are by their nature inventive and Jose's mixing of Mexican and Chinese foods sounded like something done by an inventive chef.
I prepared for this meal, my first lunch reservation, by doing some Tai Chi exercises in my hotel. Not just for the exercise, which my legs needed after prodigious amount of walking they had withstood the previous evening- chi was also a pronunciation note for Andres' restaurant. It's Chi (as in Tai Chi) Na, not our usual English pronunciation of the country where Chi rhymes with Rye. Unfortunately it didn't take as long to walk to the Cosmopolitan building from my hotel as I expected. After reading the great New Yorker article about he new CityCenter complex just opened in Vegas (oddly I read the article last October when I was still feasting in NY). I just assumed the glassy billion dollar buildings would be endlessly photogenic. Well, not endlessly. There'll be a blogpost devoted to reflections later in this series. Now it's about the food.
As you can see, China Poblano deceptively advertises itself as Open long before it actually is. It's only the take-out windows that are open early. I had to wait til noon to get in
I'm the first customer in the restaurant. I've studied the menu since it went online a few weeks ago and figured the scallop ceviche and the shrimp mojo would make a good lunch. I ordered ice water, which I needed after all that walking and photographing. The waiter asked if I'd like anything else to drink. I noticed a pitcher of red liquid and inquired what it was. Called Agua Fresca, made from prickly pear, water and sugar, I was offered a sample. It was interesting. In the same way as being in a car accident could be called "interesting." Things were not starting off well.
That abruptly changed when the tiny scallops and limes arrived on my table. The servers seemed to be divided into Mexican and ?Chinese? One of the Mexican men said he was very dubious about this dish when he first saw it. But it was surprisingly good. I was instructed to insert the scallops in my mouth and then squeeze the limes into my mouth at the same time to mix the flavours, like a shooter. Intense. Wondrous. Reminded me of Grant Achatz's attempts at invention at Alinea, which is now ranked #1 in the Americas. But Achatz needed a whole kitchen chemistry lab to come up with his creations- this was simplicity, with stones. Not the aesthetically overwhelming view from Mix, but at least something is happening visually. In the episode of No Reservations Tony Bourdain shot in the Basque country, one of the restaurants featured stones combined with food made to look like stones, to bemuse the diner. Here at least I knew which were the scallop/limes and which were inedible stones. Unfortunately, that wasn't always the case in Andres-land, as you'll discover when you get to my review of Jaleo later in the blog trip.
Shrimp mojo: shrimp, sweet black garlic, roasted poblano peppers. The peppers were the highlight of the meal. OK, not exactly a highlight. Think low hill you wouldn't mind walking up if you had arthritis. The best part of this tapas was squeezing the leftover key limes over the shrimp. And I'm still hungry.
There are some special plates celebrating Chinese New Year. This was on that list, which does not appear on the website menu. My bill lists it as Plentiful Year Jiaozi. It may or may not be the Vegetable Jiaozi from that menu, perhaps someone reading this will know. It brought me closer to being full and further from being hungry but little in the way of culinary entertainment I had come to this city for.

Vegas 1: Mix

2011-02-14T19:11:00.001-08:00

My quest for the best possible food, which began in Chicago in 08 and continued in New York City last year, finally brought me to Vegas on Feb. 7th. The first restaurant on my list of places to try was Alain Ducasse's Mix restaurant, high atop THE Hotel at the bottom of the Strip.
Actually I'd had lunch 3 hours before. I was unfortunately staying at The Imperial Palace Hotel because it was the cheapest room I could find, and its ambiance reflected its price. Lunch in one of its dining spots, called oddly enough Hash House A Go Go: Twisted Farm Food, I hadn't eaten since some delightfully msg-free chicken noodle soup in the Vancouver airport around 10 AM and by afternoon I needed to eat something. I figured a salad wouldn't be too filling. Unfortunately I had failed to read the restaurant blurb on the sign downstairs advertising the place: Hash House A Go Go is home to the biggest helping in the western world, quoth Best of Las Vegas. My salad was the size of a large pizza! Tasty with granny smith apples, some nuts and cheese and sagey fried chicken. But I had a serious restaurant awaiting me at 6:00. I decided to walk off the salad (I ate maybe 1/5th) by walking to THE Hotel. Although all my dinner reservation restaurants say that men are supposed to wear jackets, I seemed to be the only male in a dinner jacket on the 2 mile walk. I felt ridiculously overdressed and was viewed with some strangeness by the other people in the street. Made me feel like a gaijin (foreigner) in Japan.
I'd read that Mix has a great view (better than its food) but I didn't realize how great until I got in the elevator. As it climbed up to the 65th floor, the lights of the strip hotels combined with the lights of the city and were mirrored in the reflective surface of the nearby Mandalay Bay Hotel. It was the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. The images above are from later in the evening. I had a cocktail in the lounge waiting for the restaurant to open. The Stockholm Imperial proved too sweet. I was debating a more sour beverage at the lounge when it turned 6:00 and the restaurant was ready for me. I'm led into a delightful restaurant space by my server, Scott, who would provide excellent service for the rest of my visit. We carried on the topic of drinks, and he suggested a citrus gin tonic. That sounded refreshing. It turned out to be Extremely Refreshing and the perfect accompaniment for the food.
I had studied the online menu before even making a reservation at Mix the previous month. As I was ordering, eying the Sea Bass, Scott told me it was Real Sea Bass, not the pretend sea bass from Chile that was actually a different fish. From the list of Ducasse Classics, I picked the Sauteed King Prawns with crunchy marinated vegetables in coral vinaigrette as an appetizer. Before I could even mention the appealing Cod dish, Scott raved about it. I vaguely recall having fish in brown butter in France about 9 years ago, and recalled it being very tasty. The style of cooking is called Grenobloise.
My amuse bouche was identified as curried cauliflower. I see cauliflower a lot in fine dining these days. For some reason, it tasted to my palate like asparagus. An intentional deception or just my taste buds playing tricks on me?
No trick involved with the King Prawns in their vegetable ceviche. I was worried that one of the green things might be avocado, which I find poisonous. No, it's zucchini. I'm relieved. I dive in.
And find myself in another universe.
Exactly how I chemically interacted with the prawn would made a great novel. A blog can no more do it justice than my images above show just how beautiful the lights were. That's 2 life-altering experiences (the view from the elevator at sunset, the prawns) in less than an hour.
He could see how much I was enjoying the food, so Scott the Server inquired how I was enjoying the gin. "It's nice to see someone enjoy gin in this vodka-soaked world," he tells me, and then confides, "Vodka is gin without the flavour." Well said. Great service makes great food even greater. When I asked about the various flavours in the prawns and ceviche, Scott told me the sauce was made from the prawns themselves, lobster and verjus. "Ducasse uses his sauces in layers," I'm told.
The best cod I've ever tasted starts with the fried parsley on top. I usually fry up some parsley when I fry up a tuna steak marinated for a few days in oil, soy sauce and pineapple juice but what I do and what Ducasse does shouldn't be part of the same sentence. As I dug down into the meat of the cod, the brown butter sauce continued to blow me away. I had to titrate my chewing to enjoy all the subtle ways the cod played with my palate. Chew. Savour. Chew. Savour some more. I feel like I've just invented philosophy, a new way of thinking about food. The croutons in particular are the best use of this crunchy divinity since Chef Pino's gold medal winning mushroom soup I had at the food Olympics 3 years ago. And that's competition!.
The problem with slow eating is that the food becomes cold before I finish it. A glass of California Chardonnay has accompanied the dish and I try and mix it with with cod portions but feel like a failed alchemist. A skill I have yet to learn. When the wine was being discussed, its buttery nature seemed like a plus, combined with the brown buttered cod. This became less the case as the cod cooled. I asked Scot if he could bring me some fresh parsley and a couple of lemon wedges. He wasn't sure if Mix had any fresh parsley. The search was successful, and a plate of the non-fried greenery and nature's best palate-cleanser appeared. Would the two parsley's combine productively? Not really. Too much butter. Or maybe I'm just overwhelmed with the whole experience, both visual and culinary.
After the meal, Scot brings me yet another cocktail, this one on the house. He mentions vanilla bean and I can smell that. I'm in search of citrus, and it finally sneaks in when I get through all the foam on top of the drink. I feel like a pirate in reverse, uncovering instead of burying treasure. A lifetime of enjoying citrus is resurrected. Overwhelming aftertaste of passion fruit, fitting for the end of a passionate meal. Did the great image on the elevator prepare my senses to be expanded as much as this meal demanded? I'll have to compare it to the following meals during the week, all of which will be eaten without the greatest possible view. Will they be as good?

Oriental images from SFU

2010-10-22T17:01:00.001-07:00

SFU with Fumiyo

2010-10-21T15:58:00.000-07:00

Bistro Basque and Lessons from the East

2010-10-21T11:32:00.000-07:00

The best food I had on the trip wasn't in NYC nor in Montreal, but at Bistro Basque in Milford, Conn.
I guess Tony Bourdain is right about the Basque region being at the culinary frontier at this time. My first tapa, called Tapas Cazera: a napoleon of shitake mushrooms, red cabbage, spinache and duck confit, was in itself a great reason to go the Basque regions of France and Spain. My 2nd tapa, called a Lomo, offered pork tenderloin, tetilla cheese, piquillo pepper and black olives, was almost as good. Could I make either of these delicacies? Actually the 2nd best food I had was Lili's mustard salmon. I love mustard on chicken and broccoli (though not necessarily together) but I'd never thought of a mustard sauce for salmon until Lili prepared it. The most memorable restaurant foods were the amuse bouche artichoke coronet at Per Se along with the shrimp at Daniel. I learned from the sommelier at Per Se of amazing possibilities in mock tails that I will certainly be exploring. I've already made a fair copy of the tuna steak with olives, capers and tomatoes dish from Capsuto Freres. Next I'll try and make the scallop dish that so enchanted me at Le B. This week I went out to take pix for the first time since coming back from the great art museums of the East. Did I take better pix? Judge for yourself in the next couple of blog posts. I'm even more enthusiastic about culinary and visual beauty than before I journeyed to the east, and that's saying a lot.

MOMA and Daniel

2010-10-18T16:34:00.000-07:00

This was taken on Tuesday when Dex tried to fill my eyes with the Gug, The Frick, and Met and MOMA, only to discover the Musuem of Modern Art was closed that day. So we went back on Wed. This was my 2nd trip to MOMA. Dex had taken me to it when I was in NYC in 2005. The first four flours were filled with so much bad art I couldn't believe it. I haven't seen so much hideous art in one place since I spent 3 weeks in Italy in 2002. I really wanted to get out of there before its anti-aesthetic began to shrivel my eyes, but finally on the 5th floor, oh, they do know what good art is! I'm astonished. Indeed, the 5th floor of MOMA has as much good art in it as the Musee d'Orsay in Paris, my favourite museum of much the same thing. So when Dex brought me back here I was more than a little dubious. My fears were in vain.
Dex's membership allowed us to preview two new shows that I actually enjoyed. Maybe they hid all the hideous art that day, knowing I was coming. I remember seeing the Rockefeller room 5 years ago, filled with garbage as were all the rooms in flours 1-4, and thinking the Rockefellers could afford to buy Vermeers; don't they know the difference?
The reason I haven't enclosed any images from MOMA is that their website is rather threatening about such things.
Dex pointed out that the vast Monets needed vast galleries to view appropriately, not the narrow gallery where they could be found. Well, any Monet is better than no Monet.
Each of these are reasons by themselves to visit NYC: The Vermeers, Le Bernardin, Daniel, the 5th floor at MOMA. The only other city I know of with this many treasures would be Paris and in NYC my miniscule French is Not a Problem!
After steeping in good art, we went back to Dex's neighbourhood and had some tapas. OK, not Spain quality but I was hungry and they weren't bad at all. Then Doc and Lili came over to Dex's to pick my up and take me to Daniel. The Spotted Pig post I posted yesterday was actually a meal consumed on Saturday afternoon and MOMA/Daniel were both savoured on Wednesday.
And speaking of savouring:

Daniel Boulud is doing something right.

I left Per Se feeling like Jacob Marley, covered in chains. I left Daniel feeling like Scrooge played by Alistair Sim, discovering he's not dead, doing somersaults.
What made Daniel's food so good? Perhaps it is the realization of his desire to create another world. As the Firesign Theatre seek to create another world where people could go to escape the bad ones they were in.
Doc Technical, Lili and I were welcomed into Daniel as if we were truly welcome. Intriguing cocktails appeared:a champagne mojito for Doc, a kir royale for Lili and a my tie, something that would never appear around my neck but did my throat much good.
For amuses as you can see on the vid, variations on cauliflour. Actually I remember liking the curry thing less that I said on the vid, curry never being a good idea, and the salmon thing, at least it wasn't as fishy as the bouche that did not amuse at le B. But the shrimp. Ok, that's as good as the artichoke cornonet at Per Se. That's world's best restaurant caliber food.
There are so many things on this menu we want to eat, Doc told one of the servers who insisted we'd be happy with just the 3 courses. I wanted to try the heirloom tomatoes, which Doc ended up with, but I'd had langoustine's only once, at a seafood restaurant called Lobs in Florence in 2002, and as I'm particularly fond of both prawns and lobsters, their crustacean cousin called to me, see what Daniel could do.
I had a bite of Doc's tomatoes. I didn't spend enough time savouring the bite to say anything interesting about it. Were I to come here again, that's what I'd order. On the other paw, the langoustines were....
Corn and Corn foam? Almost as far back as people have been growing food, and the latest culinary iteration in one meal. What struck me was how the corn entered the middle ground of the langoustine's taste, and took it over like Aragorn took over Middle Earth. Daniel had become king of the middle earth of the palate. This is no small feat. While other chefs contend for the edges and usually fall off, Daniel takes the langoustine back to where it lives, and brings us along on a sea of satiation.
Followed with a Duo of Beef: Black Angus Short Ribs with Stewed Lentils, Carmelized Salsify, Wagyu Terderloing, Red Wine Glazed Pearl Onions, Carrot Confit, Sauce Bordelaise.

Salsify seems to be the ingredient I can most count on encountering at this level of NY restaurants and I'm always delighted with it. The Wagyu, when thinly sliced and melded with the vegies and sauce, was immaculate. The short ribs? Uh, no. A woman who was serving and offering advice had suggested either a French or a California wine pairing, explaining what each would do for the beef. She picked just the right wine for the Wagyu, but the short ribs were just too heavy. Another server appeared and, seeing I wasn't finishing the ribs, explained how long the beef had been braised in wine for. I'd seen a video of this on Daniel's website awhile ago. I knew Daniel was Mr. Meat from his famous hamburger; that's why I went for the Duo of Beef. But it was too heavy to continue. Loved the Wagyu and the vegies though. Next time I'm here, I'll check out what Daniel does with fish.

Desert floated me back up into the stratosphere I'd been in up to the short ribs. Champagne helped. This is food and service you'd expect from elves.

The Spotted Pig

2010-10-17T00:00:00.000-07:00

I don't know if enough can possibly be said about the Firesign Theatre. They've been babbling amongst themselves since 1966, and it would be a hard record to beat. But, as they tell us, it's a new record every time.
A friend turned me on to Peter Bergman and his crew when they moved to KRLA-AM in April, 1967, and I've rarely shut up about them since.
When I first went online in 1993 and discovered an actual community of Firesign fans, it was like coming home after 20 years lost at sea. In the primitive web of the time, I discovered Elayne, who had started a zine promoting the Firesigns after they'd broken up in the early 80s, and kept the fire alive for the fans that would create their future incarnation. She introduced me to the lads themselves and many good things have happened since then. Elayne started an online chat for fans of the Firesign Theatre in 1995, and the connections made through that chat have brought us all to The Spotted Pig in 2020.
Oink.

Yes, they really do make grilled cheese sandwiches that big. "Doc's" cidre was surprisingly weak, unlike my man Doc Technical, but my tart, advertised as prosciutto and ricotta tart with marjoram, but actually an intriguing forest of elevating enrichment, made me see how such a light cidre would have its benefits. Trajectories well planned. April deserves her name and her fame.
Lili was eventually served and everyone seemed quite happy with their meals except Elayne, the mother of the feast, whose pancakes were not as advertised. That may or may not have been Celebrity Chef Bloomfield in the kitchen; we never found out. Elayne continued to make hilarity a breathable substance. More neurons connect. The better world the young Firelads of the mid 60s imagined is gradually brought into existence by those tentative enlightenings. And really good food is the least of it.

Per Se

2010-10-15T12:26:00.000-07:00

I had never entered any restaurant (or any other building) with as much anticipation as I entered Per Se with New York friends Dex and Myrna on the evening of Sept 28th. It was only 4 years ago that I discovered that the world's restaurants were rated, or even cared about such things. The first restaurant list I read listed Per Se as the best restaurant in North America, along with its California clone The French Laundry, and the creator of these restaurants was the Zeus of North American cuisine. I had already had a divine lunch at Le Bernardin. But that was lunch! It had taken me 2 years to save enough money to go to Per Se, and the ever-so-difficult reservation had to be booked 2 months in advance, the longest advance time of any restaurant I knew. I know Per Se had fallen behind both Daniel, where I would dine the following day, and North America's new number 1, Alinea, where I had dined in 2008 in Chicago. But this was still Thomas Keller's temple. What's not to anticipate?
I opted for The Tasting of Vegetables, while my companions had the Chef's Tasting Menu. As the best food I've ever eaten has been from the vegetable course at Charlie Trotter's, I assumed Keller could transcend creations of a chef who'd fallen off the top 100 list. He was, after all, Zeus.
My companions ordered wine with their meal. I had read in Egullet that Per Se had particularly inspired non-alcoholic beverages paired with its food upon request, so I made the request.
We began with 2 amuse bouches. The first, a marble-sized pastry filled with warm guyere. My problem with a "bread course" in any restaurant is that bread fills me up- which should be the job of the food! This was a wonderful antidote to the whole idea of a bread course. It increased instead of decreasing my appetite, which was considerable after all that walking in New York City. The heated cheese reminded me of the the warm squash centre in the ravioli created by Vancouver's Iron Chef Rob Feenie when he had his own restaurants here, certainly one of greatest culinary creations in Vancouver's history. Things were starting well.
For our continued amusement, we were served coronets, like tiny ice cream cones. Dex and Myrna got salmon coronets, which Keller describes creating in the Fine Food and Film DVD extra to the Kelleresque film Ratatouille. My artichoke-filled cornonet sent me into distant childhood as precipitously as the critic in Ratatouille upon sampling the dish the film is named after. I was suddenly transported to an Italian restaurant in Van Nuys, California in 1956. We had just moved there from Yorkton, Saskatchewan, a town whose familiarity with Italian food would have been cans of Chef Boyardee spaghetti at the grocery store. I don't remember what I ate at that long ago Van Nuys restaurant. Perhaps the coronet evoked the sawdust aroma mixed with pasta sauce? Only a time machine could tell. In various interviews with him that I'd read or viewed, Keller talked about wanting to take diners back to their childhoods. His wizardly succeeded and I'm only on the amuses.

CARAMELIZED SALSIFY "VELOUTE"
Pomegranate Reduction, Medjool Date "Marbles" and Black Winter Truffle Puree

The salsify dish is subtle. Different levels of flavour, wonderfully matched with the Yuzu Fizz the sommelier, Justin Lord has prepared for me to have with it. Yuzu is one of my favourite things about Japan, along with Ton Katsu and the movies of Satoshi Kon.

As I was enjoying this, my companions were dining on Keller's most famous dish,
"OYSTERS AND PEARLS"
"Sabayon" of Pearl Tapioca with Island Creek Oysters and Sterling White Sturgeon Caviar
which Keller describes inventing in the Ratatouille DVD extra. I've only been able to eat oysters without puking once, at Alinea. Unfortunately, that's about the best thing I can say about that restaurant, now ranked #1 in North America.

HOLLAND EGGPLANT "A LA GRENOBLOISE"
"Haricots Verts et Jaunes" with Parsley Shoots

To go with this, Sommelier Lord came up with a drink made from equal parts Reeds Ginger Beer, lightly steeped jasmine tea and Navarro Vineyards Gewurztraminer Grape Juice.
The gingery beverage magnifies an already excellent eggplant dish. Lord said he was really proud of making it and pairing it with the eggplant and it came on like a tsunami. It was both intense and beneficent.

COMPRESSED PERSIAN CUCUMBERS
Slow Roasted Beets, Horseradish Panna Cotta, Red Ribbon Sorrel and Gold Beet Glaze

This wasn't so good. Too beety. Like all good Ukranians, I love beets, but no other ingredients were tasted. Where were the Persian cucumbers? Were they stopped at Thermopylae? The ginger drink helped, but I couldn't finish the beets. The server asked if he could bring me something else, but I stuck with the already prodigious collection of food awaiting me.

BUTTER ROASTED SWEET POTATO
Brussels Sprouts, Pearson Farm's Pecans, Frisee Lettuce and Blis Maple Syrup Emulsion

The sweet potato, is alas, a sweet potato, probably my least favourite vegie. Keller's skill couldn't overcome my dislike for it, unlike Chef Grant Archatz's magically edible oyster dish at Alinea.
Lord came through with another winner, a drink with 2 parts Red verjus, 1.5 parts Navarro Vineyards Pinot Noir Grape Juice and 1 part Boylan's Cace Cola. I avoided the potato, but savoured the beverage. Unfortunately, there were now 3 beverages on my table before me. all with very different flavours.

MUSHROOM POT PIE
"Matignon" of Root Vegetables, Eckerton Hill Farm's Chestnuts, Watercress Salad, Fines Herbes Creme Fraiche and Madeira Cream

As he was carving the top to expose the pie, the server assured me I'd enjoy this dish. He was right. Unfortunately, the crunchy chestnuts interfered with my enjoyment of the mushrooms. As the greatest thing I've ever eaten was a morel at Charlie Trotter's, I had high hopes for this pie. Alas. It wasn't a complete failure, like the beets and sweet potato. A single, instead of a home run.

MASCARPOI\lE ENRICHED PARSNIP "AGNOLOTTI"
Honeycrisp Apple "Parisienne," Young Onions, Swiss Chard and Pickled Mustard Seed "Beurre Blanc"

Finally, a home run. A dish worthy of being featured in Ratatouille.

"SMOKEY OREGON BLUE"
Per Se Graham Cracker, Poached Quince, Celery "Ribbons" and Tellicherry Pepper "Aigre-Doux"

The server had been raving about the great Oregon blue cheese. Charlie Trotter's magical Morel was from Oregon. I have friends in Oregon. Two of my favourite writers, Ursula K Leguin and Barry Lopez are Oregonians and I even like the band Oregon. Maybe the cheese should have stayed in Oregon. What most impresses me is what I assume to be a beet, but it isn't beety at all. I tell the server this, and he informs me it's actually a quince. The cheese has a tendency to clog my teeth, rather than impress me. I give some to Myrna, who likes blue cheeses. I'm reaching the point now where it's hard to eat any more food, even if it's as good as the agnolotti.
Lord has concocted yet another brilliant beverage, this one I believe from Rose grapes. But the purpose of a good drink IS NOT to wash cheese out of my teeth. Sounds like Mao, who used to wash his mouth with green tea instead of brushing his teeth.

"SELLES-SUR-CHER"
Thyme Sable, Greenmarket Peaches, Belgian Endive and Arugula with Walnut Marmalade

Not bad.

HUCKLEBERRY AND BUTTERMILK SHERBET
Oat Crumble, Oregon Huckleberries "Demi-Sec" and Buttermilk Chantilly

This is wonderfully balanced. I can't believe the fruit could be improved upon (I'm partial to berries, ANY berries) but it is. Good work, Keller.

"PB & J"
Peanut Parfait, Crystallized Lemon Verbena, Toasted Virginia Peanuts and Concord Grape Sherbet

This seems to be the crux of Keller's cooking: the ticket to your childhood. I loved peanut butter and jelly sandwiches as a kid. As we were vegetarians, I didn't have a lot of choices. The problem with this is the same as with the blue cheese: it stuck to my teeth. The sherbet helped and the grape slices were even more helpful, not to mention the heavy lifting done by the faux Rose. But it didn't work. Instead of traveling back to my childhood, I felt like an old man with tooth problems.

"GLACE A LA VANILLE"
Cardamom Grissini, Bartlett Pears and Root Beer Syrup

The ingredients sound good, but I was too full to notice them. The companions were also complaining about the quantity of food. The only complaint about quality I overheard was the fact that the
BUTTER POACHED NOVA SCOTIA LOBSTER
Caramelized Black Mission Fig, Belgian Endive, Watercress Leaves and Fig Chocolate Sauce
combination didn't seem to work. Chocolate sauce on lobster? I watched them filling up on meaty things that didn't interest me at all. They also ate a fish,
CRISPY SKIN FILLET OF LUBINA
Fork Crushed New Crop Potatoes, Cherry Belle Radishes, Hearts of Romaine and Red Wine Vinegar Vierge
that interested me in that I'd never heard of Lubina and have yet to taste it. I wonder what Le Bernardin could do with it.

Dex later, comparing Le B with Per Se, said Per Se put on a good show, Le B offered a good meal.
To go back to baseball metaphors, if Jose Bautista hit as many home runs this year as Keller hit with this menu, Jose would be back in the minor leagues.
Overall, I would say the meal reminded me of a meal at West, perhaps my 10th favourite restaurant in Vancouver. Expensive. Pretentious. Sometimes tasty, but always with the best possible drinks.
After a day spent absorbing the vibrant colours of the paintings at the Guggenheim, not to mention my man Vermeer at the Met and the Frick, plus wandering around the city in search of appealing reflections (see below), I was interested in seeing the plating at Per Se. In the DVD extra I keep alluding too, Keller prides himself on the exquisite visual impact of his dishes. It was really too dark to appreciate. Maybe he needs French Laundry light. I doubt the food would be any better there though. Although sommelier Justin Lord lives up to his name, Keller's food reminds me why Zeus is no longer believed in. I left Le Bernardin in the afternoon feeling I'd been dining on Mt. Olympus. The only time I felt in the realm of gustatory greatness at Per Se was the few seconds I spent with the artichoke coronet. The rest of the time I could have been in a 2nd tier restaurant in Vancouver.
As we drove back from Per Se to Dex and Myrna's place in lower Manhattan, we were so full that every restaurant we passed on the drive was painful to observe. The whole idea of food had become painful.

The Met and the Frick

2010-10-12T13:10:00.000-07:00

Actually we went to the Met before Le B. I had been there 5 years earlier, as well as the Frick and what I most wanted to see in these museums on my 2nd visit were the Vermeers, which had so enchanted me when I first saw them. In the last episode of his recent PBS series, Bill Moyers talked with one of my favourite authors, Barry Lopez, who described moving to NYC as a child and seeing the Vermeers at the Frick and the world of aesthetics opening up to him at that time.
I also wanted to see the Egyptian wing, especially any statues of the Cat god Bastet which first sparked my interest in Egypt in 3rd grade in 1959. In one of their Hour Hour radio shows in 1970, after a trip to the East Coast, Firesign Theatre members David Ossman and Phil Austin talked about going to a room in the Met they described as a hobbit room. I was determined to find it, and still make our lunch reservations at Le B.
Although I speedily viewed everything in the Egyptian wing, (I liked some paintings of hawks that looked like Art Nouveau a few millennia early) I couldn't find any statues of Bastet.
I did find one cat that didn't exactly inspire worship. The Vermeer, however....

Young woman with water pitcher is one of the best Vermeers (and thus, best pix). “The artist achieved a quite balance of primary colours and simple shapes. These subtle calculations …in the execution of the work.” The hat/shall surrounding the woman’s face make it look like a hovering ufo, or the moon with a face.
The Met has 3 more Vermeers, Allegory of the Catholic Faith, which has great blues in it but the woman's face is bizarre. Even more bizarre than the women's face is the other 2 Vermeers,
Study of a Young Woman and Woman with a Lute, both of whose heads look more like skulls than living women. Intentional? Still, it was worth coming all the way to NYC from Vancouver to gaze upon the woman with the water pitcher.

Hart room is the earliest … room in the American wing. Its exposed oak timbers, large fireplace and small cavement windows are typical of 17^th cent New England interiors. The room is furnished in fine examples of late 17^th century Mass. furniture. Home of Samuel and Sarah Norton Hart of Ipswich, Mass. 1680.

I deduce this is the room that Ossman and Austin were referring to when they visited this museum 40 years ago.

This Wentworth room, next oldest in age of the period rooms, looks like where Bilbo would entertain his non-hobbit sized friends.

After the astonishing food at Le Bernardin mentioned in a previous blogpost, we walked over to the Frick collection to see this:

There were more Vermeers, but this one stood out for me. The woman looks so happy!
I watched a few minutes of a film being shown on a room at the Frick, about the collection. The film said that Mr. Frick was particularly interested in collecting images of beautiful women. Although there were many beautiful women walking around the gallery, I didn't see any in the paintings. This woman at least looks happy, as happy as I was after the divine meal I'd just consumed.

The Guggenheim & Le Bernardin

2010-10-09T16:31:00.000-07:00

Red Cross Train, Gino Severini

Broken Forms, Franz Marc

Morning in Village After Snowstorm, Kasmir Malevich

Blue Painting, Kandinski

The Unfortunate Land of Tyrol, Franz Marc

Smokers, Fernand Leger

Paris, Chagall

The ceiling, The Gug.

After a rousing bowl of fruit at a Ukranian place near Dex's place, we went to the Guggenheim Museum, the one art destination I didn't get to on my previous trip to NYC 5 years ago. This is only the 2nd Frank Lloyd Wright building I've been in, the first being the Robie House in Chicago on my visit there in 2008.
There were a couple of exhibitions there I was particularly interested in: Broken Forms and Kandinsky at the Bauhaus. We took the elevator as high up as we could get but couldn't take the ramps down for the best view because they were setting up a new show. The art I saw was spectacular. Above are a few of my faves.
The rain was walling down when we emerged from the museum. A man was trying to sell umbrellas by telling the crowd that the rain wasn't going to stop. It did. We had a lunch reservation at the greatest seafood restaurant on the continent, Le Bernardin. On my microcassette recorder, I noted:

Salmon amuse is surprisingly fishy though it does mellow in my mouth. Needs white wine. With water, too fishy.

(Dex says it's savoury.) He makes it with poached and smoked salmon rolled up in zucchini. Sounds much better than this.

Rosemary and olive bread, still warm, looks like cigar, with 2 kinds of butter. Hope my fish is as good as this bread.

First bite of this scallop is beyond belief. The high note is the lime. Eventually you taste the pepper, which complements everything else. Doesn’t taste like scallops so much as it tastes like an ingredient in an amazing recipe. The sauce is dependent on the scallops for its quality. When I finish them and try the sauce by itself, not nearly as good, a bit too astringent. With the scallops, its the emperor in the land of lime. The pepper begins as a confident undernote to the lime and remains as a perky aftertaste

Monkfish dipped in sake is extraordinary. Dipped in pureed turnip and ginger alone, it’s a bit salty. The trick is the combination. A fantastic idea and preparation. What I thought were capers are actually shimeji mushrooms. Delicious. I had a parker house roll, warm and pleasantly soft, to soak up left over sake sauce: extremely good. Dex said it would make a fine soup.

For desert, figs with bacon ice cream. Tea Master tea which has citrus and spice in it. Dex has black sesame and cherry desert.

Figs, nuts (?) candied red wine dribbled around the food, the bacon ice cream doesn’t taste like bacon at all, a fantastic combination has rewarded my adventuresome pick.

The scallops in lime and coconut milk were the best scallops I've ever eaten. The whole meal left me feeling rapturous. Great inspirational images and food too! And it was still the afternoon.

P.E. Trudeau Airport - New York City

2010-10-09T12:23:00.000-07:00

Whenever I have a camera handy, I'm usually taking pictures of reflections, as anyone who reads this blog knows all too well. My 1:30 flight to NYC was canceled and when I was finally aboard a plane at 4:00, I was told the plane may be stuck on the tarmac or circling La Guardia because of weather in NYC. That didn't happen, and I was finally delivered by my youthful friend Dexter Fong's place in Manhattan in time to dine at Capsuto Freres. I had the tuna with olives, a very filling meal. Dexter and his wife and I all had the stuffed zucchini flowers from the daily specials. Special indeed!

A Journey to the East: Montreal

2010-10-08T16:45:00.000-07:00

On the weekend of Sept. 25th, I flew to Montreal to meet my friends Stephen and Catherine Huddart, their future rowing star son Kaj, and their future film making sensation John. My first evening in town, we feasted at Madre. Although never mentioned in this video, I had the cod. The chef is from Peru and a celebrity in Montreal. Previously, he had worked at Daniel, a restaurant I'd visit a few days later in New York. Quinoa has to be one of greatest ingredients of all time. Only the 2nd Peruvian place I've eaten in, after the place on Lake Geneva our friends took us to in 2002, where I had my first Pisco Sour. Stephen had once had a business in Peru, a country whose name seems to be asking you as question. They may have forgotten the secrets of the Incas, but they still know how to make great food.

Labour Day on Lonsdale

2010-09-11T12:17:00.000-07:00

2nd and Cambie to VCC, part 2

2010-09-02T14:25:00.001-07:00

2nd and Cambie to VCC

2010-09-01T12:49:00.000-07:00

There's never enough art

2010-08-18T16:17:00.000-07:00

A couple of artist friends came to visit over the summer. Mike from Portland and John Petrie from Australia. The link John Petrie Sculpture>/a>
will show you what John does. Hopefully Mike also has a website to display his paintings and will let me know its address.
Although we may like or dislike individual works of art, art is in our genes, and there's never enough beauty.

Denman Avenue

2010-07-27T12:17:00.001-07:00

It's a Round Round World

2010-07-08T14:17:00.000-07:00

June 22, 2010

2010-07-03T18:53:00.001-07:00

Self Portrait

2010-06-24T00:53:00.000-07:00

Vermeer visits Steveston

2010-06-13T23:17:00.001-07:00

DB Bistro Moderne

2010-05-20T11:13:00.001-07:00

The only thing I'd eaten at db Bistro Moderne was a hamburger last year. I wanted to try some of their other food, so I took advantage of a price reduction in honour of Daniel's NYC restaurant becoming the 8th best restaurant in the world and went there this week. As an amuse bouche, my meal started with a small duck pate tarte. The mustard overwhelmed the duck. As I was waiting for it to swim into my taste buds, I enjoyed the pastry.
I've only had good pork twice in 22 years in Vancouver. My first mouthful of this Pork Terrine a la Grandpere was very good. But then it left a strong, meaty and rather unpleasant aftertaste. That went away when I begin mixing the meat with the pickled vegetables and mustard. I told the server it was a lesson on what to do with mustard. I had been served several types of bread earlier, and used a piece to soak up the last of the mustard and tapenade. Should have combined the bread with the pork.
I had great bouillabaisse in France and at Vancouver's Cassis restaurant. This was totally different. From the herbed halibut to the saffron potatoes and onions so different I had to ask what they were. And then there were the mussels. I've never been able to eat them before. In this magnificent soup, they were actually delicious. Even Alinea had only been able to serve me an edible oyster, not a delicious one. The broth flavour stayed with me for hours. Like Alinea (now rated #1 in North America, #7 in the world, above Daniel) I had to have a lesson from the server on how to eat it. The dish of crackers and sauce were to be employed to dip into the soup and then savour the combination. Much more successful than Alinea's lessons in culinary strangeness. And this is only a minor league Daniel property in the provinces. What would his food taste like at his flagship restaurant? I hope to find out.
A delightful citron desert. Not sweet, the most important thing I want from a desert. Different kinds of sour. I thought the red thing was made from raspberries, but I'm told it's actually cassis. The graham cracker crumbs are also vastly appreciated. A NY friend, Dex, had told me of a friend who'd eaten at Daniel and left so hungry had had to go elsewhere for another dinner. I thought that might happen with this meal as I was never actually full, but neither was I hungry.
I was however very satisfied.

Fun with gardening

2010-05-17T00:32:00.001-07:00

Capilano University

2010-04-29T09:33:00.000-07:00

Fishworks vs Ocean

2010-04-28T10:24:00.001-07:00

Our local entertainment paper, The Georgia Straight said new North Van restaurant Fishworks was the best new suburban restaurant so I had to try it. I'd been studying the menu for awhile. I was intrigued by the arctic char with rhubarb as I'm always looking for new ways to mix fruit with fish, etc. One of the newspaper reviewers said the rhubarb overpowered the char and I discussed this with the server. I told her of the sole I'd recently had twice at Market, which I consider the best restaurant in Vancouver, for fish or anything (pizza in particular). Although its delicate sole came with a powerful sauce, the sole wasn't overwhelmed but highlighted. Another reviewer had raved about the trout so I eventually went with that.
I think what most intrigued me about the Dinner menu was this walnut and porcini soup. I told the server how much Chef Pino deserved his gold medal for inventing his porcini and chestnut soup, rightfully chosen food of the year in BC a couple of years ago, so of course I wanted to compare this soup with Pino's. Not in the same league, but highly edible. A very large serving I couldn't finish, as I had to save room for the trout. The combination of walnut and porcini fragments were tasty and the soup was satisfying, but not electrifying like Pino's. As the restaurant had just opened, I was presented with a whole wheat roll right out of the oven, with sage and walnut butter. I thought the walnuts in the butter would go well with the soup nuts and was proved correct.
Whole Ruby Trout, “en papillotte”, Leek, Kalamata olives, Beurre blanc - 21

A thrilling meal. From the sublime sauce to the trout that seemed to melt in it, to the leek and olive stuffing, and finally the vegetables, also mixed with the sauce. The whipped potatoes were the best potatoes I've ever eaten. The parsnip was such a novelty I didn't recognize it and had to ask the server what it was. A miraculous new taste. The sauce remained with me for the rest of the evening. Not only astonishingly good food (not that hard to find in Vancouver) but with quick and helpful service. As opposed to my last reviewed restaurant here, Ocean.
After the great tempura (for me) and pumpkin croquettes (for Fumiyo) we had at the end of March at Ocean, we went back to celebrate my birthday in April with 4 friends. For some reason, the fantastic Big Foot Tempura was off the menu, although everything else was the same. No, the chef couldn't cook it for me. Fumiyo ordered the same croquettes, which still say pumpkin on the English menu, but are now potato. Not the exquisite potatoes of Fishworks, just normal potatoes, and very disappointing to Fumiyo. The menu promised brown rice sushi. As I haven't been able to eat white rice since 1986, the thought of brown rice sushi was one of the reasons I wanted to come back to Ocean. Although I ordered its delicious-sounding smoked salmon, lemon and cucumber roll with brown rice, a couple of hours after I had ordered it and long after everyone at my table and every other table in the restaurant had been served, I was finally told that they only had white rice. Yet another menu deception. But that wasn't the worst of it. We had arrived at the restaurant at 6:30 and ordered promptly. I decided on the mushrooms in foil, thinking it would be similar to the mushrooms in foil I'd been enjoying for the past 15 years at Zen Sushi in West Van. How long does it take to cook mushrooms in foil? The meal finally arrived at 9:00. Did they have to grow the mushrooms first? It wasn't as if I hadn't reminded them every few minutes, as everyone else was served. What could explain the delay? The chef came out and appologized and gave us a discount on our bill, but these people do not deserve a business license. I left Fishworks last night full of contentment and look forward to many more meals there. I look forward to Ocean sinking beneath the waves, and being replaced by a restaurant that actually believes in truthful menus and is aware of the concept of service.

The Windows of Langley, Washington

2010-01-13T16:54:00.000-08:00

Fraiche

2009-11-30T17:08:00.001-08:00

Dino and Krista took me to Fraiche, my first fine dining experience in a while. Great view overlooking the city. An extraordinary beverage, a Pomegranate Sparkling Cocktail: Proseco, pomegranate liqueur, vodka, sweetened with a sugar cube and pomegranate caviar.

I asked the server if heirloom carrots are as good as heirloom tomatoes and was assured they were. They certainly are in this soup, with a carmelized onion with horseradish mousse and golden beets along with the historic rabbit pleaser. Maybe the best carrot dish I've ever tasted.

Smoked black cod, sweet corn risotto, shimeji mushrooms and preserved lemon. Amazing.

Dungeness crab cake, pureed bouillabaisse. Filled with crabby goodness. The green thing has avocado in it. Nuff said.

Dino had the seared scallops, lobster ravioli in yuzu-butter sauce. Yuzu makes even bad food tastes great. This was not bad food.

Krista had the prosciutto-wrapped venison, with Yukon gold whipped potatoes and huckleberry jus. I didn't try any but it probably went well with the red wine they ordered.

Striped bass, home made pasta, grilled asparagus, cherry tomatoes. I'd last had striped bass at the wonderful restaurant Beckta in Ottawa in October, 2006. This was not in that category. Once I removed the skin, it was much fishier than I would expect, considering the high quality of the appetizers. . The vegies and the paired wine made the striped bass pretty good, but I wished I'd ordered the cheese souffle on the menu.

Called a Curious George, iced coffee with banana liqueur. Too sweet. I'm no longer curious.

Dunbar, Pt. Gray Village

2009-11-09T22:53:00.000-08:00

Business Park, Canada Way

2009-11-06T14:53:00.001-08:00

UBC 4

2009-10-23T01:07:00.001-07:00

UBC 3: Oct 19, 2009

2009-10-22T16:57:00.000-07:00

Broadway: Collingwood to Balaclava

2009-10-20T19:32:00.002-07:00

4th: Granville to Vine

2009-10-20T19:32:00.001-07:00

UBC 2

2009-10-16T12:25:00.001-07:00

UBC 1 Oct 7,2009

2009-10-13T22:17:00.001-07:00

Heather to Alder

2009-10-10T10:58:00.000-07:00

Kerrisdale

2009-09-22T10:57:00.000-07:00

17th & Main to Broadway to Heather

2009-09-21T12:04:00.000-07:00

Fraser, Alma & 4th

2009-09-15T13:20:00.001-07:00

Park & Tilford Centre, and more Main St.

2009-09-13T11:03:00.000-07:00

Main Street 1

2009-09-02T23:40:00.000-07:00

Cop Shop

2009-08-30T13:37:00.000-07:00

Downtown August

2009-08-19T20:33:00.001-07:00

Lynn Valley Centre

2009-08-18T15:54:00.000-07:00

The 4 Seasons Hotel

2009-08-18T14:03:00.000-07:00

Granville Island 2

2009-08-08T11:59:00.000-07:00

Granville Island 1

2009-08-06T15:23:00.001-07:00

Lonsdale

2009-07-28T12:00:00.001-07:00

Brentwood, etc

2009-07-26T23:52:00.000-07:00

Park Royal

2009-07-26T00:52:00.001-07:00

Hastings: Renfrew-Lakewood

2009-07-19T16:12:00.000-07:00

Downtown July

2009-07-18T21:09:00.000-07:00

Burnaby Heights 2

2009-07-17T11:22:00.001-07:00

Burnaby Heights 1

2009-07-16T01:13:00.000-07:00

More Marine Drive

2009-07-14T22:25:00.001-07:00

Timbre!

2009-07-12T15:04:00.000-07:00

We take care of a small dog named Channel when her human is out of town. When in town, they live above a restaurant on Commercial Drive called Timbre.

We decided to check it out. Miraculously, it had a cidre, Rock Creek, I was unfamiliar with. After all that walking on a sunny street, the cidre was delicious.
I've been experimenting with Bruschetta recently so decided to give theirs a try. The goat cheese really elevated it to another level.
Fumiyo had the crab cakes. I've never had better.

Marine Drive, July 11

2009-07-12T00:27:00.001-07:00

Commercial Drive, July 10

2009-07-10T19:28:00.001-07:00

Walking Around Downtown, July

2009-07-06T11:16:00.001-07:00

Serendipitous Exquisiteness

2009-07-05T09:59:00.001-07:00

Bin 941 tortures poor people

2009-07-04T15:49:00.000-07:00

The two Vancouver restaurants, Bin 941 and 942, are tapas restaurants of some renown in this town. I had eaten at Bit 942 a few years ago and remember their so-called "tapas" were the size of meals, what in Spain would be called "raciones" as I recall my Spanish food terms. Not cheap as tapas should be, but the food was good. I recall a portabello tower that was a sizable meal and worth it. In the local TV guide, it was mentioned that the Bins were now serving Pinxos, the Basque word for tapas, by which the Bins meant very small portions. But for $5.00. You can eat very well for $5 in Spain but not in Vancouver. I was intrigued.
After a couple hours wandering around downtown Vancouver taking pictures on a hot day, I got to Bin 941 a few minutes after it opened at 5:00. There were only 4 Pinxos on the menu, a bison dish that didn't interest me at all, calimari which I love but with chili sauce which I avoid, and two that appeared to me: smoked halibut, summer bean salad, olive oil, fresh lemon, crispy shallots; and fresh Qualicum Beach scallop ceviche, minted watermelon, coconut foam.
The halibut pinxo turned out to be a single bite of fish and seemingly endless collection of peas that had died and gone to hell for sins against taste. I have never seen a collection of such mouth watering ingredients turn into a meal that bad before. Is the chef in competition to see who can make the worst food in the city, and torture the most poor people? He should pay people $5.00 to eat this garbage, though you'd have to be desparately poor and hungry to accept.
Before the food arrived, I was tired and thirsty from a couple of hours of taking pictures on a hot summer day. As I sat down and looked at the menu, I didn't see sangria so I asked if they had it by the glass. Turns out they call it Bingria here and indeed, a small glass shortly appeared which I almost instantly emptied. I ordered another, before finally finding it on the menu and being shocked at its price. I drank the 2nd glass VERY SLOWLY.
The watermelon pinxo looks better than it tastes (see above). Not bad, just not particularly memorable. Made better with small sips of the "Bingria." My 2nd bite revealed a most unexpected ingredient. I had to waste far too much of the expensive beverage washing away the chili. I asked the waitress about it and she asked the chef and the fact that Thai chilis were also in the dish was confirmed. I asked for a glass of ice water. I got a glass of water, no ice, but still its freeness almost made up for that fact. I identified the chilis in the dish and shunted them aside. The "coconut" nature of the foam was too understated to work with the heavy mint flavour/watermelony distinctive sweetness. The scallops weren't particularly memorable. At least my taste buds weren't insulted (once the chilis were identified and sent to their own private Gitmo). Still, to entice the legions of poor people in Vancouver to dinner and then inflict food of this hideousness upon them is to make poverty even harder to take. I think Bin should stick to torturing the rich. They can at least afford to wash away the insults with pricey Bingria. Maybe the halibut thing could be offered to people on death's doorstep. They would take a bite and then refusing to let such rot be their final meal, they'd live on in search of a good meal to go out on.

Canada Day

2009-07-01T21:43:00.001-07:00

The Past is a Foreign Country

2009-05-27T11:55:00.001-07:00

Who are these people? The tall boy on the right was a friend and the boy tearing up the book taught my how to play chess. The others have vanished from memory. I just found this picture in the last box of my parents' photos I've gone through. It was taken at Eunice Knight Saunders School, which I attended from Sept. 61 until the school closed down in June, 63. I had mentioned this school in a recent Firesign Theatre chat and to my astonishment, got an email from someone who also attended this school. I was in grades 6-7 and the person who emailed me said he was in first grade at the time. My memories of this school are few. It had horses and a swimming pool, both actually required classes. But in 63, the school was falling apart, perhaps due to a lack of concern or cognition on the part of Mrs. Saunders, who kept firing teachers. Alzheimer's? Often I'd go to school and there's be no classes, which is why the book-tearer in the picture taught me to play chess. I also wrote a lot of plays. I haven't played chess in decades and the plays I wrote in the early 60s are as alien to me now as that vaguely remembered school.
I googled Eunice Knight Saunders and discovered there was a group of old students online. They also remember the horses and the pool (although without the trepidation I remember its high diving board) but they remember it much more fondly that I do. I don't remember them at all, if I knew them then. Same is true for my Junior High (Milliken, in Van Nuys) and High School (Montclair, also in Van Nuys). I walked around Milliken when I was last in LA a few years ago. It now seems to be gated. But at least I can see through the gates. Montclair is as fiercely closed as Sauron's castle. It was a motel when I attended (65-68), most famous for having the last episode of The Fugitive filmed there than for anything academic. It had no library, no labs, and such a bare bones athletic programme that I was the tennis coach. Although the school must have been half female, I only remember one girl, from the tennis team and my French class, and two boys, who were in the grade above me and stayed friends for a few years after we graduated. About the only pleasant memory I have of my 3 years there was a debate I was in. There was a student, whose first language wasn't English, as I recall. In the debate, he sounded like Elmer Fudd. Unintentionally. It was the funniest thing I'd heard up until that point in my life. I had totally forgotten it until I saw his name among the alumni. I recognized a couple of names but his was the only name that triggered a memory. I see Elmer is now a famous professor and probably has no more memory of that debate than I did until seeing his name on the school website. If I heard a tape of that debate today, would it still be hilarious? Probably not.

The multiplicity of selves becomes more intuitive as the time span increases. Social psychologists have found certain differences in how we think of ourselves versus how we think of other people—for instance, we tend to attribute our own bad behavior to unfortunate circumstances, and the bad behavior of others to their nature. But these biases diminish when we think of distant past selves or distant future selves; we see such selves the way we see other people. Although it might be hard to think about the person who will occupy your body tomorrow morning as someone other than you, it is not hard at all to think that way about the person who will occupy your body 20 years from now. This may be one reason why many young people are indifferent about saving for retirement; they feel as if they would be giving up their money to an elderly stranger.
"First Person Plural," by Paul Bloom, The Atlantic, Nov. 2008

That captures it well. The person I was 40-50 years ago is as alien to me as the other people in old pictures. These pictures are post cards from some distant place I had once visited but no longer can even imagine. At the end of his life, my father went back to live in his childhood more than 80 years in the past. My mother is going the same direction. Such Alzheimer's-enforced resettlement may be beneficial for the species but is much less so for a family. Rather than visiting the foreign country of my past, I'd prefer to visit actual foreign countries.

Food and Maps

2009-04-26T16:46:00.000-07:00

Frank, Dave Samuels and I were supposed to have lunch at the great little French place Casis next to Frank's office, but it was closed due to an absent liquor license this week. So we walked over to another nearby place Frank knew, only it was closed too. Finally we went into the largely deserted Tinteltown Mall to eat at a restaurant in their food court (I know that doesn't make sense) Wild Ginger, where I had some excellent tea before. Handed their cocktail list, we wisely kept to tea. Who would want a duck fart?

Frank had their special peach tea, with flowers that blossomed as the tea steeped.

Dave and I had the Black Rose Tea I'd so enjoyed on my first visit here. Still outstanding, but I think I preferred Frank's peach specialty.

Frank and Dave had lunch specials. I just had this big bowl of mushrooms. The one that looks like a liver is called an abalone mushroom, new to me and exquisite. Much better than the animal it's named for. The little black ones that look like brussel sprouts turned out to be straw mushrooms that Dave was familiar with. Also excellent.

Walking to the nearby Skytrain station, Frank pointed out the odd map globe outside the station. Instead of Cuba, Japan had miraculously moved into the Caribbean.

Nothing next to Korea, where Japan should be on an accurate map.

After walking around downtown for several hours (see previous blog post) with my camera, I made my way over to the Four Seasons Hotel. Their Yew restaurant (named for the wood above) was having a special No Passport Required month featuring the cooking of Japan, from the 4 Seasons Restaurant there. I was expecting something quite beyond what I could get in Japanese restaurants in Vancouver, and that is very good indeed.

King Crab Soup, Sake, Daikon and Shiso. Very crisp and refreshing. I asked the waiter if the mixologist could make a cocktail specifically for these creations. There was a sake pairing, but it was some local sake I'd had before and resolved never to have again. Even though Yew started out as a bar, with a restaurant growing around it, my request was repulsed. You'd think a mixologist at such a high end place would relish a challenge, but obviously he's not up to David Wolowidnyk standards.

Plum-glazed Kurobuta Pork Loin, Kabocha squash, Bamboo, Watercress and Lotus Root.
Looks better than it tasted. The squash tended to overwhelm the pork and other vegies. Very rarely have I had pork in Vancouver as good as one routinely gets in Japan. This was not one of those occasions.
Pink Grapefruit Parfait, Ginger and Vanilla Consomme, Almond Milk Caviar. Like a deconstructed cocktail.

Walking Vancouver April 21, 2009

2009-04-25T11:21:00.001-07:00

Illuminate Yaletown

2009-02-28T19:19:00.000-08:00

Vancouver's first Illuminate Yaletown light and music festival. My friend Jeremy Scott's band Tea played in a car dealership as fans milled about the minis. Unfortunately, my favourite local restaurant Cioppino's served me a tasteless black truffle and prawn dish followed by a far too fishy sea bream that was the day's special. I would rather have eaten one of the ice sculptures.