Author: Dan Dickinson

A man’s gotta eat

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My whole life for the past few months has been about work: Go to work, come home, eat dinner, open the laptop, do more work, sleep (not enough), wake up still thinking about work. Repeat.

I’ve still managed to get some pretty good meals into me though, and with good friends too.

A few weeks ago Nellie and I went to Rodney’s for the first time with a bunch of colleagues. It was a fun night, but a funny thing happened too: our server and I slowly came to the realization that we went to Dalhousie at the same time, lived in the same residence, and played intramural basketball against one another. Small world.

Not long after I met up with my buddy Pat, in town from Milwaukee, at the Monk’s Table.

Earlier this week Nellie and I went to an Ontario Wine Society event at Barque Butcher Bar. We tasted several Pinots from a single vineyard (the Lowrey vineyard in St. David’s ON) but made by four different wineries: Bachelder, Leaning Post, Adamo, and Five Rows (who own the vineyard). Barbecue isn’t what you’d normally think of as a wine pairing, but it was damned tasty. If I find myself out around Roncy again I’ll definitely find my way back there.

Last night we reprised our recent meal at NAO, this time with T-Bone and The Sof. It was even more epic than the first one: a ton of great starters, three delicious steaks (order of deliciousness: the swinging rib Canadian prime; the David Blackmore wagyu rump; the bone-in US prime) and sides, and some outstanding wine. The sommelier (who remembered us from last time) picked a couple of bottles that weren’t on the list, and both were tremendous: a Babosa Negra from the Canary Islands, and a Forefront Cab Sauv from California.

.:.

Cover photo from the Barque site

 

Cover photo from NAO’s site

New And Old

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I’ve been intrigued by NAO Steakhouse — a Japanese-influenced steak place, in an old Yorkville house that used to be Boba — ever since it opened. A friend used to work there, but we never quite made it in during her tenure, and for whatever reason we just hadn’t gotten around to making reservations. This week was a tiring one at work though, so we decided on Thursday to try a new place to end the week on a fun note. So we landed here.

First we stopped in at Boxcar Social for an espresso and some drinks. I like that I can get great versions of both there.

Then, on to NAO. It’s a cool space, and they gave us a nice corner on the banquette, the feel of the place was a hit. And the food? Outstanding. The Japanese influence lent a little something to the typical steak experience, but the steak itself was top-notch. I also really liked the wine selection…not the kind of 4-pound wine list that confounds or overwhelms, but well-organized and well-thought-out. We tried to get a bottle of Rustenberg from South Africa, but someone snagged the last bottle just before we did. Instead we got a Chilean Carmenere/Cab blend that wasn’t on the list, which worked out just fine indeed.

Our meal:

  • Blanc de Blanc // Pearl Morissette Chardonnay
  • Hamachi with jalapeño and yuzu // Oysters from BC and PEI
  • 22oz swinging rib Canadian prime (Norwich, ON)
  • Broccolini with soy, chili, and garlic

Consider it added to the favourites section of my list.

.:.

Cover photo from NAO’s site

The California experiment

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Pearl Morissette is one of my favourite Canadian wineries, but until a month or so ago I didn’t know they were also producing wine in California. I found out when I saw an announcement about a dinner at hot new Toronto restaurant Alo, featuring these California wines from PM. It was such a hot ticket (and Alo is such a small restaurant) that the event sold out in minutes, but they scheduled a second seating and Nellie, Kaylea, and I got tickets.

Winemaker Francois Morissette was there to speak about each of the California wines, and a few surprise Ontario wines as well. All the wines were predictably delicious, but we were just so impressed with how he’s found a balance in the Californian wines: using all the advantages of the hot (but not too hot, based on their vineyard locations) without the overbearing, overwrought, over-oaked tendencies too often found in California bottles. These are California wines made with the restraint of a Burgundian winemaker.

The menu, as best I can remember provided by P-M…thanks Milt!:

  1. Pan au lait with fleur de sel
  2. Matsutake mushrooms, turnip, celery, chicken skin
  3. Carolina gold rice, foie gras, bonito
  4. Yorkshire rack of pork, romano bean, artichoke, mustard
  5. Beef brisket, king oyster mushroom, parsley, garlic
  6. White chocolate cremeux, toasted oats, quince (Note: Cori Murphy is a bad-ass pastry chef)

The rice + foie gras dish sounds like it should have been terrible, but it was goddamn delicious. And I hate foie gras.

The wines:

  • Blackball Riesling
  • 2012 Heintz Vineyard Chardonnay
  • 2012 Baranoff Vineyard Pinot Noir
  • 2012 Caldwell Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon
  • Niagara Viognier
  • I know I’m missing another Ontario wine. I just can’t remember what it was, goddammit.

All in all, an outstanding meal. I really want to go back Alo now, and we’ve already ordered some of the California wine.

After dinner we still wanted more wine, so we decided to meet up with more friends at Archive. The girls started drinking sparkling; I stayed on the Pearl Morissette with the 2012 “Dix-Neuvième” Chardonnay. I lost track of what everyone got, but after we shared a bottle of Cab Franc from Saumur I was out of there. The rest of the group partied well into the night.

Cask Days 2015

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Last year our first Cask Days beer festival was a revelation. So many amazing beer, at such a well-run event, made us incredulous that we’d never been to one. For the past 11.5 months we’d looked forward to the 2015 installment.

We just got home from #caskdays2015, and the fact that I can type probably tells you that it was a little less epic than last year’s. Granted, there was no post-festival Wvrst bottle tour like last year’s, but still. It wasn’t quite as epic as last year’s maiden voyage.

I mean, sure, there was great beer and excellent food, and it was almost shockingly well-run. But here was my major disappointment: they were holding back so much beer that I couldn’t try half of what I really wanted. This is what I tried, and what I tried to try:

  1. Burdock Peach & Apricot Berliner Weisse
  2. Niagara Oast Dr. Lychee Gose Nuts Gose
  3. Niagara Oast Verjus Fruit Sour Ale
  4. Dunham Saison du Pinacle Farmhouse Ale w. Fireweed Flowers
  5. Indie Alehouse Maple Cinnamon Belgian Wit
  6. Stone City Ales Devil and the Deep American Sour
  7. Parallel 49 Bodhisattva Dry Hopped Sour Ale
  8. Community Beer Works Frank APA
  9. Dunham APA w. Habanero Pepper
  10. Macleod Ale Jackie Tar Brown Stout
  11. Dieu Du Ciel Tamarindo German Gose
  12. Left Field Bricks & Mortar Porter w. Pilot Roaster Coffee
  13. Great Lakes x Bar Hop Sweet Zombie Jesus Milk Stout w. Peanut Butter
  14. Sawdust City Damn!!!!!!! Spicy Peanut Butter Imperial Stout
  15. Wellington Buggin’ Out Cab Franc Barrel Aged Sour Ale
  16. Ladyface Companie Ballista Imperial Grisette Aged in Viognier Barrels
  17. Amsterdam El Jaguar Barrel Aged Imperial Stout w. Chocolate & Chilies
  18. Howe Sound “Smoked” Pumpkineater Imperial Pumpkin Ale w. Rum, Cacao & Vanilla
  19. House Ales Mezza Notte Espresso Milk Stout

So, yeah. Literally the first two beers I wanted were sold out. Or, rather, they were being “held back” for later sessions. I get that they’re trying to keep enough around for everyone, but I tried to get those two within seconds of entering the building, and I checked back a few times, so they were NEVER available for our session. That’s brutal.

Just before 5pm I went hunting for my 11th and final beer, and my last four choices were all off-limits. I gave up and ate some fried chicken instead.

So I ended up drinking a lot of sour beer on the day, which was fine, and one or two of them were tremendous (the Parallel 49 and Stone City especially), but GOD I wanted a heavy stout toward the end.

Frankly, the shot of espresso (from Boxcar Social) and fried chicken (from Brando’s fried chicken) were two of the best things I had all day, and the food program in general looked killer, so kudos to the festival for that. Also: military precision on the porta-potty line.

What I took from this, though, is that a) the Friday night session is the only good one, and everything else is a poor cousin; and b) you have to buy your way into one of the premium packages to get decent beer. I guess I’ll keep that in mind for next year, and see whether the price is justified.

Cover photo by Loaded Dog, used under Creative Commons

What a week-ish

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It’s been a busy 8 days, considering I haven’t been traveling or anything. The mother in law visited for about a week. We had a huge dinner at Jacobs & Co. I spent Saturday, including a Fieramosca dinner, involved in a work conference. Good Jays games and bad Jays games. Absolutely insane amounts of work.

I spent tonight eating dinner at Hawthorne with Nellie, planning my attack on Cask Days tomorrow, and watching the Jays’ season end in game 6 against the Royals, in a game they probably could (should) have won. But hey, at least the Habs are 8-0 to start the season. So there’s that.

.:.

Cover photo by Loaded Dog, used under Creative Commons

Elemental

Dan Dickinson2 Comments

I have an emotional hangover. I sportsed too hard last night.

Plenty of ink has already been spilled about the Blue Jays game 5 win over Texas to advance to the American League Championship series. (Cathal Kelly’s story in the Globe was the best, I thought.) All I can say is that it was definitely one of the highlights of my sports-fan life…to go from so low to so high, to sprout a profuse belief in the sporting gods, all in the space of a single epic inning of baseball, was mildly profound. I can’t imagine actually being at the Rogers Centre Skydome for the game, as some of my friends were.

We’d had tickets for the Toronto FC game last night, but given how long the Jays game ran over we really didn’t think we’d make it over to BMO Field. But after Jose’s bat flip we figured we’d make a break for it: we assumed the Jays would win, and if they relinquished the lead, I didn’t want to watch it. So in the middle of the 8th we jumped in a cab and beat it west before the mayhem began. As it turned out, the mayhem began at the corner of Queens Quay and Bathurst, when every car around us at the traffic light began honking wildly.

Despite it being freezing cold, we’re glad we made it to the TFC game. They clinched the first playoff berth in team history last night, on a highlight-reel goal from the incomparable Giovinco, who’d gotten off a plane from Italy just a few hours before. For at least this one night the sports gods were on Toronto’s side.

All in all, a pretty good evening. Oh, and as I type this, the Canadiens are about to win their fifth straight game to start the NHL season, the first (!) time in their storied history that’s happened.

Sports!