An RO in both places

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I spent last weekend in Nova Scotia, at the family farm, to celebrate my mom’s 75th birthday. Brother #1 & progeny drove down for the day as well. We had a big Chinese feast and chocolate cake and then we surprised mom with her birthday present (to come in a few months).

Saturday I re-lived my youth and went to a pancake breakfast down the road at the local fire hall / community centre. That day, and Sunday, I was able to help a tiny bit with the very end of maple season. [UPDATE: I have been informed that the season in fact continued all week. I’d swear it was wrapping up last Sunday, but what do I know? I’m a city boy now.]

I worked in Moncton Monday and Tuesday, dosing my co-workers with maple sugar, then flew home early Wednesday morning. It was a few days of all-out sprint for us both, but we had enough in the tank to eat a delicious meal last night at Ricky + Olivia:

  • Cocktails
    • White Negroni (Dillon’s gin, Elora elderflower liqueur, gentian)
    • Mr. Christie’s Old Fashioned (Brown butter washed rye, Dillon’s chocolate liqueur, sea salt, vanilla, orange bitters, chocolate chip cookie)
  • Food
    • Grilled kofta of chicken + duck w/ rhubarb, yoghurt sauce, goat feta, endive, fingerling chips
    • Turnip cakes w/ purple daikon, chilli crisp, marinated tofu, mushrooms, black radish
    • Perth pork shank w/ daikon “pineapple” rings, Niagara cherry, maple + mustard
    • Special: spicy carrots, bacon, and burrata
    • Bottle of Big Head RAW Malbec
  • Dessert
    • Chicken liver mousse w/ Parallel Brothers’ beet tahini, Rosewood Estates wildflower honey, VQA red wine gummies, sour cream bundt cake doughnuts (seriously)
    • Glasses of Paradise Grapevine fortified Gewurztraminer and Southbrook The Anniversary

It was all fantastic, but the pork shank and chickenduck were the showstoppers for me. How lucky are we to have that place in our neighbourhood?

Adolescence

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Well, Adolescence (imdb | rotten tomatoes) wasn’t an easy watch, but it was so good. I decided to put on episode 1 while Lindsay was out with a friend, not knowing if I’d even like it. Four hours later I’d killed the entire thing.

Stephen Graham was as great as usual, but my goodness, Owen Cooper. He may have been older than his character’s age, but still…what a performance. And the fact that every episode was a single shot, with the 1st, 2nd, and 4th being kinetic feats and the 3rd a pressure cooker — outstanding stuff. A feat, to be sure.

And now I never want to watch it again. 😐

Yorkies

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Thursday evening I met up with old friends BC and CBJ at The York Club, where BC is a member. I’d never been — obviously, given my utter lack of poshness — but I’d had a look at their wine list and was intrigued.

It was great to catch up over a drink at the bar, dinner (short ribs all around, plus a 2007 Hidden Bench Terroir Caché), dessert (I eschewed the beignets and had a glass of beerenauslese instead), and a Highland Park by the fireplace.

No pictures of the wine bottle, for fear I’d get scolded by the staff. No phones in the dining room, you see…a rule which, I admit, I do not hate at all.

Cold Harbor

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I/we’ve been burning through a lot of TV so far this year (season 2 of Patriot, Tsunami: Race Against Time, Say Nothing, season 4 of Slow Horses, The Penguin, Zero Day, Vietnam: The War That Changed America, and season 1 of The Night Agent) but lately we’ve really found ourselves at the nexus of a bunch of big shows, specifically new seasons of Abbott Elementary, Mythic Quest, Yellowjackets, White Lotus, and Severance. Season 2 of Severance (imdb) wrapped up a couple nights ago, and has been the subject of much discussion in our home.

I have a little more patience for the show’s tendency to leave more loose threads than it ties up, but my patience is wearing thin. Hopefully it doesn’t take another three years to see what season 3 reveals.

Also: fuck yeah, Brienne of Tarth.

Yellowjackets and White Lotus should be wrapping up in the coming weeks, just in time for The Studio and the second season of The Last Of Us, so the blitz continues.

Kirstrisma

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It’d been a while since we hung out with Kirsten, so we met for dinner last night at Carisma. I’d gotten up early (3:45 EDT) to catch a flight home, and Lindsay wasn’t feeling well, so we thought it would be an early night. We ended up closing the joint, though.

Here’s what we had:

  • Appetizers
    • Burratina w/ shaved truffle
    • Carpaccio di Manzo
      • A Negroni; glasses of Gavi Di Gavi & Falanghina
  • Mains
    • Pasta del giorno: agnolotti stuffed w/ ricotta
    • Pappardelle w/ wild board ragu
      • Bottles of 2018 Antinori Pian Delle Vigne and Tolaini Valdisanti Toscana
  • Dessert
    • Affogato
    • Classic Italian cheesecake w/ strawberry compote
    • Warm molten chocolate w/ house-made chocolate gelato
      • Glasses of Vinsanto & Reccioto

Elbow mists

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I’m in Moncton this week. A&D drove over for dinner this evening, which was the perfect excuse to finally try Les Brumes du Coude. It’s a lovely casual vibe inside, and the food was wonderful. We shared everything (except that glass of Pineau).

  • round one
    • house ciabatta
    • fromage: Alfred le Fermier
  • round two
    • steak tartare, all dressed w/ rosemary crackers
    • fancy stuffed pie of mushy peas, house bacon, lettuce chiffonade, and Fundy scallops
    • seared salt cod fish cake, boiled market vegetables in salt pork broth
      • bottle of Pouilly-Fumé
  • dessert
    • Carmélita
      • Pineau des Charentes

“Game’s the same, just got more fierce.”

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Four years ago Lindsay wanted to start watching The Wire (imdb). We only made it an episode or two before she bailed. The time wasn’t right.

More recently I re-watched seasons one and two, but when Lindsay said she wanted to give it another go, I went back to the starting line with her. This time it stuck — we plowed through seasons one (cops), two (blue collar workers), and three (dealers); we’re most of the way through season four (schools).

This might be the first time I’ve watched season three and four since the first time in the mid/late-2000s. It’s as good as I remember. Better, even.

Of note: Clay Davis doesn’t say “Sheeeeeeeit” nearly as often as I remembered.

Clay Davis

51st and 49th

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It’s been fewer than six weeks since Trump was inaugurated and I haven’t written about it. I wouldn’t even know where to start. By the time I formulate a thought on something awful — not even the constant stream of embarrassing or enraging “flood the zone with shit” stuff, but truly destructive policy or comments — another awful thing has happened. It’s not that I have any particular insight, but back in the Dubya days (now a quaint period by comparison) the horror was at least infrequent enough to articulate my outrage. Now? No chance.

Being Canadian has meant we can mostly just gawp at this from afar and fight the occasional tarriff war. And until a week or so ago I would have said all the rhetoric about Canada becoming the 51st state was just posturing and bluster ahead of trade negotiations. But what he’s doing with to Ukraine makes me worried. I think his recent assertion that Ukraine simply needs to cede the land Russia occupied by force to end the war, thereby rewarding Russia’s aggression, is a pretext for his own ambitions. He sees countries which have something he wants — Canada, Greenland, Panama — and may well decide to invade and just take part of it; if there’s international pushback that he actually cares about, he’ll simply point to the scenario he’s about to force with Russia/Ukraine and say, “See? It’s fine. I’m only doing that.”

It’s been two centuries since the war of 1812, and 150 years since any sizeable Canada-US conflict at all. The world’s longest undefended border has had a good run, but that run might be coming to an end.

Carismaro

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I’ve eaten well the past week. Maybe a tiny bit too well.

First, for v-day, we made a return to Carisma. It was, as usual, superb. Wonderful food, and Adriano picked us out a winning bottle as usual.

  • Burratina Salad
    • glasses of Falanghina, Negroni
  • Penne w/ Pancetta & Fresh Summer Peas
  • some agnolotti special I don’t quite remember at this point
  • 32oz Grilled Bistecca Fiorentina Per Due
  • Sauteed Mushrooms
    • bottle of Brunello
  • Warm Molten Tortino Al Cioccolato w/ House-Made Chocolate Gelato
    • glasses of Vin Santo / Recioto

Then, just this past Wednesday, I met a work colleague at Ricky + Olivia. Yes, I selfishly wanted to go there for both the food and the proximity. We shared:

  • big mac steak tartare
  • r+o burger (actually my first time having it, and wow was it good)
  • turnip cakes
  • french fries
  • garlicky steak special
    • both reds on their BTG list and the two Pearl Morissette red specials

Fantastic, as always. Well worth hurdling a bunch of snowbanks.

The east-za end

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One thing I take for granted is how much incredible pizza exists close to where I live, in the east end of Toronto.

Danforth Pizza House may be in Greektown, but it is in my opinion (and many others) the best in the city. It’s classic, delicious, and I never feel gross after eating it.

Of all the Detroit style Pizza I’ve tried, Descendant is by a country mile the best — and most interesting. The flavours, the consistency…all top-notch. The fact that Slowhand, an excellent nearby shop in its own right, sits #2 in my mind, says a lot about Descendant.

I’m alone on this in my household, but I think Blondies kicks ass.

There’s even a Maker, which I find too greasy, but which scratches the itch sometimes. Especially when it’s one of the few places in Toronto that even makes an attempt at garlic fingers.

What a time to be alive.