Category: Food / drink

"Could you go a bit slower with the clicks there?"

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deliriumtremens

Here’s what we’ve done with our last 24 hours:

  • Went to work. Okay, well, this was mostly me. Just needed to catch up from last week and get a head start on the coming one.
  • Saw District 9 (imdb | rotten tomatoes) at the Varsity, which was excellent. Good film all around, but what blew me away was how not-fake everything looked. Tons of social, racial and economic commentary too. Highly recommended if you’re into that sort of thing.
  • Had dinner at Volo, quaffed a couple of beers (two of which you can see above, including my Delirium Tremens) and watched the parade of interesting up and down Yonge Street.
  • Dropped our TIFF picks in box #30. We switched our picks at the (almost) last minute, ditching the Peter Berg documentary and adding Valhalla Rising. Watch the trailer and you’ll see why. It looks like Braveheart, but more violent and less cheesy. And Danish.
  • Scooted out to Liberty Village and bought (well, ordered) a new couch at West Elm, then had lunch at The Brazen Head.

Now, happily, we’re done for the day and can relax with bad movies (Nellie’s watching Hallowe’en 6 as I type this) and France planning.

"Then that Cobain pussy had to come around & ruin it all."

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At the end of a long work week I didn’t have much left in me last night, so we met up with CBGB at The Auld Spot for some comfort food and beer. Disappointingly something seemed to be wrong with the Denison’s, but a Mill Street Tank House Ale did just fine. Really, I was just in it for the pulled pork sandwich. Which I love. I know this because typing the words “pulled pork sandwich” made my mouth water. Hey, there it goes again.

Upon returning home we could see Buskerfest happening just down the street from us, but it was a little chilly out and, as I said, energy levels were low. We also have a mission to clear off the PVR before leaving for France, and so we watched The Wrestler (imdb | rotten tomatoes). It was excellent, as I expected it to be by now. I think I’d put off seeing it for so long because I know how wracking Darren Aronofsky movies usually can be, but this one didn’t leave me feeling drained. Of course, all the things I’d heard about Mickey Rourke’s performance were true. He was on the screen virtually every second, and made Randy the Ram real when it would have been so very easy to make him a farce, or fantasy.

Actually, I’m rather glad I left it this long. I think if I’d watched it when it first came out the hype — the unrealistic expectations of the miraculous performance we all heard about — would have blurred what a wonderful performance it actually was.

How to enjoy a fickle summer

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I do enjoy a good summer weekend. Yesterday I left work a little early and met Nellie at the Rebel House, and two more friends joined us shortly after. I ate pheasant sausage and a bison burger and drank pints of Denison’s and Neustadt. Nellie ate mac ‘n cheese and drank KLB and Neustadt and Okanagan Springs and (!) Big Rock. It was a pretty Canadian evening.

Today has been an absolutely stellar day. We slept in, watched a movie (Traitor), visited the market and have spent the last little while enjoying a picture-perfect day on the balcony. In fact, I’m writing this on my balcony, using my new Dell netbook, listening to tunes on the outdoor speakers, watching boats sail around the lake. In a few hours we’ll grill the steaks we just picked up, crack a bottle of red, and pretend I don’t have to go to work tomorrow morning.

"Just because she likes the same bizzaro crap you do doesn't mean she's your soul mate."

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It’s been too nice to blog this weekend (as that would mean sitting inside), so here’s the point form version:

Friday night CBGB, Nellie and I went to Harlem, a place right around the corner from us that we’d just never made it to. We’re bad at that. Anyway, it was pretty fantastic. The starters (chicken lafayette, bourbon baby back ribs and seafood fondue) were all good, and while my main (jambalaya) and Nellie’s (barbecue chicken) were pretty good, everyone agreed that CBGB’s fried chicken was the winner. I ignored the giant cocktail list and drank Red Stripe all night. We book-ended dinner with drinks on the balcony. Awesome night.

Saturday was a day to get stuff done. I returned two ill-advised purchases: one at MEC (which I traded in for a pair of shorts) and another at Harry Rosen: a dress shirt that I somehow exchanged for two Etro shirts, which were on sale but would normally each be more expensive than the shirt I was returning, and still had a $60 credit left over! I considered this quite a coup, but my guy at Harry pointed out the downside: that I could now be developing a taste for very expensive shirts. After all that we set to the painstaking task of sitting on the Bier Markt patio and drinking cold, cold beer. I enjoyed my Weihenstephan so much we popped by the LCBO on the way home and picked up some more.

Today was movie day. We saw Funny People, which was good-not-great, and  500 Days Of Summer, which was fantastic. We then came home and watched Burn After Reading, which was mildly amusing (mainly for Brad Pitt) but not that impressive for the Coen brothers.

No work tomorrow. Thanks, obscurely named civic holiday!

Wrapping up the trip

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The fruits (ha ha) of our labours
The fruits (ha ha) of our labours

In the twenty-four hours since my last blog post we:

  • Watched Taken (imdb | rotten tomatoes) which was both highly entertaining and patently absurd;
  • Had dinner at Seven Wine Bar with many Halifax friends, followed by drinks at Durty Nelly’s and yet another stop at Pizza Corner;
  • Awoke, arose and had breakfast with T-Bone and The Sof (who had an earlier flight) and were joined briefly by Marney and Amy;
  • Got to the airport early so we could catch a bite, where our friends were still waiting (their incoming flight was diverted) and who eventually took off after us, despite being on a flight meant to leave three hours earlier;
  • Arrived home to find some happy, happy cats.

By the way, here’re the wineries we visited Thursday. I couldn’t be bothered to find all the sites before:

None of the samples really blew us away, but we found enough interesting ones to buy nine bottles. I think the one we’re looking forward to the most is the Alchemy from L’Acadie, which we couldn’t sample but has drawn some fanfare.

The locals don't go there. Which, in this case, is a good sign.

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The coma continued yesterday. Mainly just sitting around and reading and napping. We did go for a bit of a drive up into the sugar woods and then around the farm a bit, but nothing serious. Last night we piled everybody up and went to the Bare Bones cafe in Parrsboro.

I’ve never been to a restaurant in Parrsboro with actual edible food, so this actually felt a little weird. My buffalo and warm rocket starter was quite tasty, my chicken wasn’t bad and my warm chocolate cake & white russian milk shake dessert was interesting. Certainly not going to knock Splendido or Canoe out of my mental top ten list or anything, but just miles ahead of anything else I’ve ever eaten in that town. The service was a little slow, perhaps because our table of eleven might’ve been throwing them off their game, and one of the servers seemed quite young and fairly new. One person’s appetizer arrived minutes after the rest, and then we all waited while another person’s entree showed up several minutes after the others.

I showed T-Bone and The Sof a little more of the town, including the site of my perpetual agony (the school) and the theatre and the pier to see the tides. We got home, chilled, beat my dad at crib (at least, I did) and were about 3/4 through The Princess Bride when the power went out. That’s pretty weird…I’ve only known that to happen in the winter. Anyway, we decided to just go to bed. So now we’re up, getting packed, finding some breakfast and getting ready to hit the road.

Next stop: the Annapolis Valley.

"I don't dance with naked soldiers."

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Though Thursday and Friday were supposed to be a short vacation, we actually used them as get-shit-done days. Here’s what we’ve managed so far, the major points anyway:

  • Got my driver’s license and health card renewed in what must surely be the most efficient government-related service experience ever. Ten minutes after entering the Service Ontario office at Bay & College I’d completed both renewals and was on my way home. I was actually a little shocked, and left wondering if I’d done something wrong.
  • Watched all four Wimbledon semi-final matches, or at least parts of them.
  • Went to the distillery district with Nellie (who left work at noon) in search of a hopside down glass (since I broke one) but to no avail. We had a bite to eat and a couple of cold ones at the Mill Street brew pub, and managed to get home without being rained on.
  • Went for a run. Good one too.
  • Watched Passchendaele (imdb | rotten tomatoes), which I had really hoped would be good, but it wasn’t. At all. It could have been, but when a movie called Passchendaele spends the majority of its time in Calgary it wastes whatever potential it has.
  • Walked along the waterfront, checked out the new wave deck at the foot of Simcoe, despaired at the putrid wasteland that Queens Quay becomes east of Yonge.
  • Visited the LCBO to pick up some wine for tonight (simple, tasty Cab Sauv from J. Lohr) and a few bottles of the Innis & Gunn Canadian Cask, as recommended on the always-helpful Great Canadian Pubs & Beer blog.
  • Bought a new camera bag for the SX10 at Henry’s.
  • Finished off (more or less) some rearranging we started last weekend. Lots more room now, junk recycled, shelves put up. Time to finally hang that diploma I got last fall.
  • Picked up the new bench for our balcony at Andrew Richard Designs.

Now we’re getting ready to grill some Rowe Farms steaks, maybe watch a movie. It actually feels more like Sunday than Friday…I have to keep reminding myself that we have two more days off!

Since there're three of them, they can probably spare one while he learns some new recipes

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Nothing much to do on this shitty wet morning other than tell everyone about the latest beer/food adventure: The 3 Brewers. A French brewpub chain (which is actually named Les 3 Brasseurs…I guess they registered under a new name in Ontario) which also has a presence in Montreal, they just opened a new location at Yonge & Dundas earlier this week. Since Y&D is almost entirely devoid of worthy places to eat we thought we’d give it a try. We were both a little wiped from the week so we were looking for low-key anyway.

The beer was quite good. It tastes fresh, as it’s brewed in-house and unpasteurized. We had the wheat to start, and both enjoyed it. I got a sampler next, and Nellie settled on the red. I thought the red was decent (I normally have no time for reds/ambers), the blond was good and the brown seemed ok…a little on the heavy side, but it might’ve just felt that way because I was full. Full of what, you ask? A crap pulled pork sandwich, that’s what. It’s advertised as coming with onions, but in fact the onions were mixed in with the meat and it turned out to be more onion than pork. Disappointing. The fries were wooden, but I don’t really eat fries anyway. Nellie got the poutine, even though she wasn’t that hungry; not really sure what the verdict was there.

I liked the decor at first — very clean, wooden beams, exposed brick, huge kettles in the middle of the space, stretched across three floors — but it does feel a little too scrubbed. Clean I have no problem with, mind you; it just seemed…I dunno, mass-produced. Nellie described it as Milestones made to look like a pub, which felt about right. Oh, and the music was both bad (“Scrubs” by TLC? Really?) and really loud, so a definite downside. I think that, if we’re to return, it’ll be for drinks on the main floor: big open windows facing the sidewalk, sane music level and fresh beer.

The Great Canadian Pubs blog has a more thorough review and video of the inside. They also had a peek inside a new pub which opened just around the corner a few days later, The Queen And Beaver Public House. Toronto Life took a look as well. It sounds like the complete opposite of The 3 Brewers. Looking forward to it.

Look at it.

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What a brootiful day in the neighbourhood. First I slept in (a little, anyway), then my brother sent me one of the funniest pictures I’ve ever seen and I laughed myself stupid. Then Nellie and I went out (I wore my new shirt) to procure meat, veggies and cheese from St. Lawrence Market for tonight.

Then off to Andrew Richard Designs where we bought a small bench for the balcony before discovering an awesome new place in which to get full & silly: Betty’s. I’m not sure how we’ve missed it in the two years we’ve been living down here: it has a pretty good beer list (e.g., Hacker-Pschorr, Blanche de Chambly, Mill Street Tank House), decent food and a nice big back patio. We’ll be going back. We might actually go back tomorrow.

OK, guests have arrived, I’m off.