The Food Trucks (and Carts) Are Here!!!!!!!! (pt. 1)

Hey kids, I'm back and super-excited about this post!


Ottawa has a poorly earned reputation for being the "town that fun forgot". I happen to know better, mainly because I hang out at the Dominion Tavern, as do some of the city's most creative people. But even though our arts, music and many other communities are small and somewhat overlooked, there is one area in which our town has a pretty strong following and community, and that's our food. Even though we might get overlooked in guides and "top 50 lists", Ottawa has a strong foodie culture (might have something to do with all those public servants and their disposable incomes). But up until recently, one thing had been missing to make Ottawa's food scene really exciting: a decent fleet of street food trucks and carts. 

For decades we were saddled with chip wagons and hot dog carts and almost nothing else (with some exceptions like Stone Soup Foodworks). Maybe this was a concerted effort by city authorities (who may, in fact, be the ones who want to keep the fun out of Ottawa) to prevent the city from developing a street food presence, or maybe the suburban mindset has taken over so deeply that Montana's is somehow considered the apex of good food... who knows? Luckily, city council eventually saw the light and as of May 2013, a whole slew of new and interesting food trucks and carts have come out of the woodwork. I'm doubly excited since one of my professional fantasies is to open my own food truck some day. At least the legal obstacles have shrunk!

I've managed to try out a few of the new spots, but there are many more to peruse. So, in this post, I'll cover the first three with more to come in the coming weeks. So, in order of when I tried them, we have Raon Kitchen, Ottawa Streat Gourmet and Angry Dragonz. Let's get at 'er!


Raon Kitchen

There’s something to be said for doing one thing and doing it really well. This is very much the case with one of the first entities in the great Ottawa Street Food Revival of 2013, Raon Kitchen. This simple little food cart located on Bank Street between Slater and Albert streets (conveniently around the corner from my office) serves the Korean dish Bibimbap, which is essentially a mix of rice, meat and veg. Kari and I got to give it a try on their second day and it was AMAZEBALLS!!! 

So much awesome from such a small contraption

The dish comes with seasoned rice (I think they use rice vinegar in it), mixed veggies, your choice of beef, chicken and tofu, egg and is served with a small container of homemade kimchee. It was a fantastic mix of salty, sour, sweet and spicy. The portion isn’t huge for 7 bucks compared to some of the cheaper, greasier selections available in downtown Ottawa (which is ridiculously packed with lunch places), but I think it’s a quality meal for the price. I was more than satisfied after devouring every last morsel.  

All kinds of goodness going on!

Ottawa Streat Gourmet

I have some aversion to the idea of clever puns in business names, but to each their own! Streat Gourmet (Str"eat", get it?) is a truck focused on fresh, tasty goodness. It's set up on the corner of O'Connor and Queen, so it's fairly busy during the week. On the day I went by (early June), the menu consisted of a Brie in Phyllo Pastry for 10 bucks and a Blackened Trout Sandwich with Slaw and Lemon Mayo for 12 bucks. Both came with a green salad on the side. Not one to resist either fish or blackening, I went with the trout sandwich. 

I dig the homage to Ottawa's old street sign design

My impressions were a bit mixed: In the sandwich's case, the fish was perfectly tender and flavourful (albeit the piece was a bit small), but it wasn't even close to blackened, more like bronzed. It wasn't spicy at all and there was no crust from searing spices onto the meat, which is what blackening is! The bun was fresh and tasty and slightly chewy, which was a bonus. The mayo was very low key and could have used a bit more zing and the slaw wasn't really all that interesting. As for the side salad, the green goddess dressing on it was superb, creamy and garlicky, but it was only greens. A few other veggies would have been nice. 

Mmmmm, trout...

Streat Gourmet is kind of the opposite of Raon Kitchen in that the menu is ever-changing, so I may have to give it another shot soon. 



Angry Dragonz

Angry Dragonz is a truck that, God help me, is about a 5 minute walk from my house. They serve what they call "Asian fusion", I call it damn good! 

That's a spiffy lookin' vehicle!

  
These cats are ambitious as heck, boasting a menu of over a dozen different items, with more in the works! I've been about five times now (proximity to home is a big incentive) and I'm amazed at how friendly, energetically and efficiently the staff works in such a small space, with three people milling about making egg rolls, tasty skewers, epic rice and noodle dishes, and crispy golden egg batter waffles. 

So many choices! 

So, here's a quick rundown of some of the dishes I've had:

- Egg Rolls: Egg rolls are one of those things that are best when you don't mess with them. After all, why change a classic. With that in mind, the Egg Rolls at Angry Dragonz are classic American-Chinese style done really, really well. I usually get them whenever I'm there. You can get a pair for 3 bucks or add one to your rice or noodle bowl for a buck. 

- Lamb Skewers: I can't rave enough about these. I bought them on my first visit after getting there a bit late and discovering all their rice had sold out. So, I figured I'd try the Lamb Skewers on a lark. Wow. Just wow. These things are meaty perfection. The lamb doesn't taste too "lamby" and it's marinated in a cumin-based marinade, then topped with honey, chili and some kind of saucy deliciousness. It is out of this world. Mind you, that's just my opinion because Kari wasn't as big a fan of the cumin-centric flavour (which is also how they season their beef skewers). They also offer chicken and tofu skewers, all of them being sold at 3 skewers for 5 bucks. 

Lunch victory!

- Chicken Panang: This dish was my first non-epic-win. It was a rice dish topped with, essentially, a Thai style red curry with chicken and coconut milk. Don't get me wrong, it was delicious, but it was also pretty damn spicy! Like, way more spicy than most red curries, including my own recipe. Maybe I'm a wimp, but the level of heat made it hard to scarf down. 

Yes I'm using a fork, sue me.

So, those are a few of the initial samplings from Angry Dragonz (I've had more since). Of the three trucks/carts mentioned in this post, they're by far my favourite, but that might be based on a geographic bias and variety. 

All in all, so far so good in the genesis of the Ottawa food truck scene, at least from my perspective. I'm looking forward to exploring all of them around the city. Any excuse for a bike ride, right?

Cheers!

Po' Man's Oyster Po'boy

Hey there,

It's an interesting and tragic development in the history of aquaculture that seaborne delights that were once so common as to be considered "peasant food" have become delicacies priced out of most budgets, more often than not. As an old story goes, lobster used to be so common in the Maritime provinces of Canada and the U.S.' New England that kids would trade in their "boring" lobster sandwiches for the luxury of peanut butter and jam.

Another story is how New York is a city founded and built up on oysters. Apparently these mollusks were so abundant that about 700 million were harvested from the Hudson River in 1880. Nowadays, there's not much chance anyone's eating anything out of the Hudson unless they're a fan of Hepatitis Rockefeller. Point being, oysters also have been one of the more common foodstuffs out there and been poor man's food. Which brings me to the "po' boy", a traditional Cajun sandwich served on a baguette, basically a kind of submarine. I had thought the name was some sort of reference to it being cheap food for the workin' man, but wikipedia is woefully unclear on the matter. Anyhoo, the Oyster Po' boy is one of the more common versions of this type of sandwich, even though most "poor boys" wouldn't be able to afford fresh oysters these days. There is a cheaper alternative though...

Smoked Oysters can be found tinned in any grocery store and supermarket and are often on special (usually they run about 3.50 Cdn a can, but they'll often be on sale for 2 bucks). Now, the smoked oysters you get in a can aren't the beautiful treats you get for 3-4 bucks a piece at oyster bars. Rather, they're a product of Chinese farming, but as it turns out, this is a sustainable form of production, so you can enjoy guilt-free! So, with that in mind, Kari suggested after sampling smoked oysters once, to try making an Oyster Po' boy using smoked oysters instead of fresh. After much delaying, I finally did just that for lunch one day!

Basically, I used a standard deep frying method to prepare the oysters, served it on hot dog buns, and topped it with a little twist on tartar sauce that used elements of tapenade, so I called it Taptar Sauce (clever, eh?).


Smoked Oyster Po' Boy

Serves 2

Ingredients

- 1 can smoked oysters (yields about 8-10 oysters)
- 1 egg, beaten
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup panko or other bread crumbs
- oil for frying (at least 1/2 inch deep)
- 2 hot dog buns
- 2 lemon wedges

Directions

- First, drain and rinse oysters. I find using a wire strainer is the easiest and cleanest way to do this.

- Next, using a spatula, gently flatten oysters. Don't force anything or you might ruin the oysters.
- Whisk egg and milk together.
- Coat oysters, first in flour, then in egg mixture, then in panko. Try only using one hand to actually coat the oysters so as to not get both hands super-messy.

Ready for frying

- In a large pan or pot, heat oil until ready for frying (allow a drop of water to fall into oil; if it sizzles, it's ready).
- Fry oysters until crispy and golden on both sides (about 1 minute each side).
- Drain oysters on paper towel and keep warm under foil.

A crispy thing of beauty

- Next, make the "Taptar" Sauce:

Taptar Sauce

- 2 tbsp mayonnaise
- 1 clove garlic, finely minced (or pressed)
- 1/2 tsp capers, finely minced
- 1/2 tsp kalamata olives, finely minced
- pinch smoked paprika
- juice of 1/4 lemon
- salt and pepper to taste

- Stir all ingredients together until smoothly blended

To Serve:

- Toast hot dog buns if you want (I just put them in the toaster).
- Spread Taptar Sauce on halves of buns.
- Split oysters between buns and serve with lemon wedge.

Not bad for canned seafood!

And that's the "Po' Man's Po' Boy". It was actually really tasty and fun, with a good balance of smoky, fishy and crispy, not to mention the extra zing and salt from the sauce. All in all, a pretty good way to try out something that might normally be cost prohibitive, albeit in a lesser form.

Enjoy!

RIBFEST!!!

Living in downtown Ottawa can lead to a pretty awesome series of annual festival and event traditions. There's Jazzfest, Fringe, Canada Day, Bluesfest, and so on. But in the the past decade or so, one event has become a pretty integral part of creating a Summer worthy of remembrance in Ottawa. That event is the Ottawa Ribfest on Sparks Street. Basically, about a dozen competitive "ribbers" from Canada and the US line up the pedestrian-only street and fill Downtown with smoky meat awesome. 

In this post, I'll be giving you my account of the various porcine treats this year's event had to offer. I went a little more often than I usually do, like every day, but my girl was nearly 9 months pregnant! What was I supposed to do? So, let's go day by day.

Wednesday

The first night of the Ribfest was probably the least involved one for me. I had to work the night shift and had less than an hour to eat.

The first sampling came from the rib stand closest to home (go figure), the Blazin' Big Rig out of Chatham, Ontario. Kari got the standard "Vegetarian's Nightmare" plate of ribs, pulled pork and chicken with sides of beans and slaw. Me, I was intrigued by the Jumbo Turkey Drumstick. Luckily, the boys working the grill had an extra one that'd been left on the heat too long so I got two for the price of one! I also got the sides of beans and slaw.

Blazin' Big Rig

So, I thought it was a really tasty little bit of fowl and something unusual to kick off the Ribsfest. As I mentioned, I had two legs, one cooked "normally" and the other kind of "overcooked", but when you leave a sauce-slathered piece of meat on the heat, it creates a kind of crunchy coating of caramelized sauce that can't be beat. So, I ate the overcooked one and kept the other for later use. Verdict? Well, it was dry from being on the heat so long, but still really flavourful. The sauce was good, but not great. The beans were really tasty as well, but I would have better later on. The slaw, on the other hand, was exactly how I want slaw to be: creamy, tangy and crunchy; best of the festival by far.

Turkey Leg and sides from Blazin' Big Rig - also serves to club seals in a pinch

Thursday

If Wednesday was the tentative first step, Thursday was a full-on jump into the pool. Kari and I wandered around, unsure where to engage in our porcine goodness, but she managed to grab a twisty fried potato treat. We ran into to many of our friends, including my good friend Siobhan who, as a born-again carnivore, was enjoying her first foray into Ribfest and brought her three kids along to enjoy the ride. It was a lot of fun watching the kids' faces light up over ribs and corn on the cob and the frantic crowds. All in all, a good time was had all around.

Sticky Fingers

As for the ribs, we stopped at one of the less busy stands, Sticky Fingers. I only got a half rack, I wasn't in the mood for beans and slaw. The ribs were really well done, exactly the right texture between solid (which can sometimes mean 'tough') and fall of the bone (which too often means 'mush'). Unfortunately, there wasn't enough sauce on the ribs to get a really good idea of its flavour. I've noticed that some of the ribbers would have big bottles of sauce with a squeeze pump so you can load up your pork with as much sauce as you want. Unfortunately Sticky Fingers weren't one of them. Which is too bad, because from the little I could taste, it was a pretty decent, tomato-ey sauce. Oh well...

Half rack from Sticky Fingers

Friday

Friday was a quick trip through the festival for pulled pork as we were trying to get to Confederation Park in time to get a good spot to see Willie Nelson. Once again, we were looking for the shortest line, which we didn't really find, so we settled on Bone Daddy's for pulled pork sammiches.

Bone Daddy's

This is pulled pork the way it was meant to be: moist, greasy, smoky and loaded with sauce. It's hard to review food when it's nearly perfect since there's not much to say! I will give extra kudos on the sauce though, because all too often, the sauce used on pulled pork is "dumbed down" for public consumption and made less spicy and overly sweet. Luckily in this case, the sauce was the right mix of both. I was highly satisfied with this choice! And really, what says Summer more than an outdoor country show with BBQ on your face?

Mmmmmm, grease puddle...

Saturday

Sometimes, a weird serendipity comes along to make your whole Ribfest experience sing. In this case, the decision to meet friends at noon while it was pissing rain led to being able to access one of the rib stands that usually is impossible to get to without waiting for 2 hours in line. There are two stands that always seem to be in the most high traffic area of Ribfest between Bank and O'Connor Streets and are always packed with people: Camp 31 and Silver Bullet. I'd tried Camp 31 in the past (and it wasn't as revelatory as I'd been expecting, but that was mainly due a lack of sauce) and really wanted to give Silver Bullet a go.

Sparks St. in full porcine swing

It was the noon hour and I decided to basically skip breakfast so I could have lots of room to pig out. With that in mind, I got the ribs and pulled pork combo with sides from Silver Bullet. First, the bad news: the coleslaw was, unfortunately, prepared in the same style as that pale green slaw from KFC that I dreaded eating as a kid. Needless to say, I didn't eat all of it. Another downside was that the ribs were served with membrane still attached, a BBQ no-no if there ever was one. It's basically like eating paper.

Now the good news: The ribs, other than the annoyance of the membrane, were PERFECT! They were cooked exactly right and the sauce was one of the best I've had: sweet, peppery, smoky and rich. The pulled pork was also really tasty, but it was overcooked and stringy in parts. The beans were really good as well, nice and rich but not chalky the way beans can sometimes be. They also were chock-full of BBQ sauce flavour, which isn't always the way. Not sure why...

A Porkpocalypse from Silver Bullet

Sunday

By now, I have to admit that my arteries, and even my taste buds, were getting a bit overpowered by smoke and meat, so my review of the next feast might be a bit skewed. It was the last day and sweltering hot and we needed food for our D&D game, so I went out looking to get my pork fix fast. The only place that I hadn't tried that didn't have a ridiculous line-up was Texas Outlaws. I was impressed to see such a wide variety of foodstuffs being offered: pulled chicken, wings, brisket and many more. I decided on ribs and brisket since I have a soft spot for brisket. I wish the girl at the cash had been a bit less of a grumpy jerk, but I guess by Sunday, most of the ribbing staff must have been fed up with the masses of gluttony.

Texas Outlaws - definitely the most variety offered at one stand during Ribfest

So I got my mess of ribs, brisket, beans and slaw home and proceeded to mow down. My impressions were pretty straight forward: the ribs were good, but not great (the sauce had some mustard elements that I wasn't completely sold on), the sides were decent (slaw was kind of ho-hum, but in the way I wanted) and the beans were just a bit too ordinary (and I generally don't like beans most of the time). The brisket was really the saving grace, it was absolutely perfect; not too fatty, well smoked and very flavourful. But, because of the heat, I wasn't able to eat very much. Kind of an anti-climactic end to 5 days of pigging out on pig.

Brisket and Ribs from Texas Outlaws

And there you go; just one glutton's tales of a festival of gastronomic excess.

Enjoy!

Grilling Tip - Chicken + Lemon = Besties!

Hey there fire-o-philes!

I might be telling you something you already know, but there are some flavours that naturally compliment each other and one of the simplest of these pairings is lemon and chicken. Pretty much every cuisine out there has this pairing in some form or another. So, one surefire North American (by way of the Mediterranean) way to zip up your chicken on the BBQ is to marinate in a lemon-based marinade. Not sure how to make one?

Well, here you go!

Lemon Marinade for Chicken

- juice and zest of one half lemon
- 2-3 cloves garlic, crushed
- 1/2 cup dry white wine
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
- 2 tsp green olive brine (this adds an extra tang and salt element)
- 1 tsp dried basil (or 2 tsp fresh chopped basil)
- 1/2 tsp dried oregano (or 1 tsp fresh chopped oregano)
- salt and pepper to taste

- Whisk all ingredients together and transfer to a zipper bag
- Add about 1 pound of chicken (breast is quite good for this recipe as it allows the marinade flavours to be at the forefront).
- Marinate for at least 2 hours in the fridge.
- Grill chicken at 350 degrees for about 10-15 minutes until chicken is cooked through but not dried out.

A mess o' chikon

Of course, lemon also naturally pairs with fish, so I imagine this marinade would also work on a firm-fleshed mild fish like tilapia.

And there you go! Enjoy!

Bread, GOOOOOOOOD!

Hey there!

There are a lot of bread naysayers out there these days. Wheat Belly, a book by Dr. William Davis that has been all over the news, demonizes gluten and wheat in our modern diets, and I can't really disagree, considering that wheat is one of the most genetically modified crops in the world and gluten intolerance is on an astronomic rise.

But holy magilla, bread is sooooooo good when done well and it's one of the best canvases to make a meal of tasty goodness. Sure, there are gluten-free breads out there, but most of us are familiar with the tried and true bread made from good ol' fashioned wheat flour in all its mad-sciencey GMO goodness (well, badness, I guess).

So, with that in mind, here are a couple of bread-oriented meals that Kari and I whipped up recently.

The first was a "Stuffed Italian Bread" that Kari found on the internet. This one was pretty much a carb and cheese bonanza that was so apparently lacking in vitamins that we also had put together some veggies in the form of what I call an "Alternative" Green Salad. "Alternative" in that there was no lettuce in it, with the green coming from edamame beans, green peas and asparagus.

Alternative Green Salad

Serves 2

Salad

- 1/2 cup shelled edamame beans
- 1/2 cup shelled green peas
- 5-6 stalks asparagus, tender parts only, cut in to 1 inch long pieces
- 50 grams sopressata salami, sliced in to strips
- handful of toasted sunflower seeds

- Add water to a small pot to about 1 centimetre depth. Bring to a boil. Add edamame, peas and asparagus. Steam for 2-3 minutes. Chill in ice water for about 2 minutes. Drain and set aside.

Dressing

- 1 tsp olive oil
- 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
- 1 tsp dijon mustard
- 1 tsp honey
- salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
- juice and zest of half a lemon
- 1/2 tsp dried basil or 2 tbsp fresh basil, finely chopped

- Whisk all ingredients together.

To serve, toss veggies in dressing and serve in large salad bowls and top with salami and sunflower seeds.

A little different, a lot delicious

The "Stuffed Italian Bread" was a fantastic recipe, easy and delicious. But me being me, I decided I need to add olives for a bit of extra flavour. Also, the "Italian loaf" aspect is purely optional, use whatever bread you want. 

Stuffed Italian Bread

1 Italian loaf, about 12 inches long 

1 stick butter, melted
1/8 cup olive oil
3 tsp minced onion
2-3 cloves garlic, grated
1 tbsp Dijon mustard
3 tsp chopped parsley (add more if you wish)
12 oz grated cheese

2 tsp green olives, minced (optional)

- Preheat the oven to 350 F.　
- Mix the melted butter, olive oil, onion, garlic, Dijon mustard, poppy seeds and parsley in a bowl.　
- Cut the bread into cubes with X-shaped slices without cutting all the way through the bottom crust.　
- Pour the butter-onion garlic mixture carefully into those X-shaped cracks using a small spoon and over the top of the bread. Fill those delicious cracks with the grated cheese (and olives if using).　
- Wrap the entire loaf with foil, sealing the sides properly and bake for 15-20 minutes. Remove from the oven and unwrap. Bake for another 10 minutes until the cheese is melted and gooey.

Stuffing the loaf - not a euphemism

Baked an' gooeh!

Next up is a little recipe that shows just how good a blank canvas bread makes for a tasty and filling meal. We all know about bruschetta and crostini and other ways in which bread is used as a delivery system for some kind of delicious topping. Well, it's also a good way to take an idea that doesn't really translate into a meal per se and make it one. In this case, it all started with figs. Figs are really super delicious when they're ripe, but pretty much useless when unripe. That is, unless you caramelize them:

- Caramelized Figs

- 1 tsp brown sugar
- 2 figs, underripe, sliced
- 2 tbsp butter
- splash Irish whiskey

- Melt butter in small skillet. Stir in sugar and figs. 
- Cook until figs begin to dissolve into tasty fruit goo. Add whiskey and cook off alcohol. Add butter as needed to keep from drying out. Keep mixture warm. 

All fancy n' tasty-like

Now, what to do with this gooey mess o' goodness? Well, slather it on bread and top it with proscuitto and blue cheese then bake it in the oven, of course (at about 400 for no more than 10 minutes)! Trust me, this is one of the best ways to use bread I've ever had. I believe we used a multigrain fennel loaf from Art-Is-In Bakery. And OH MAH GAHD! Pretty much the perfect carb-salt-meat combo on a lazy night where nutrition isn't quite on the top of your agenda. 

Ready for the oven

Crunchy salty good! 

And there you go, just a few ways bread goes a long way to making a meal.

Enjoy!

A Jamaican Holiday in the Kitchen

Hello there!

It was a fairly miserable Spring this year, cold and damp and gross. So, how is one to brighten up their season of rebirth when it's a holding pattern? Well, if you don't have the option of taking a trip to the tropics, you can always bring the tropics home to you! Granted, if you're a locavore, you might want to stop reading now.

Caribbean (specifically Jamaican) cooking is a fairly overlooked cuisine outside of its homelands and emigre communities, except the somewhat famous "jerk" sauce/flavouring/whatever you want to call it. And yet, almost everything about it is delicious! Jamaican food is spicy, flavourful and somewhat easy to make.

A few years back I picked up a cookbook on Caribbean cooking (it was 5 bucks) and made a few items in it that were tasty, but it was one night at Grace food market that I had a revelation: they sell goat meat. I'd heard stories of Curried Goat (apparently one of the national dish of Jamaica) but never had the guts to try it until that day.

It was super-tasty and I'd been itching to try it again, but this time with a full compliment of Jamaican favourites. Specifically, Red Beans and Rice and Fried Plantain.

Now, this is one of those meals that requires a bit of make-ahead, generally the night before. Goat meat is pretty darned tough, so it needs to marinate. Also, if you're using dried beans, and I recommend you do, they too need an overnight or more to soak.

A note on goat meat: I’ve made Curried Goat a couple of times, and the way it’s sold is either pre-cubed, or in large slices from the leg. The problem with using the cubed stuff is that it has the bone still on, meaning a lot of it will be chunks of bone with a little bit of meat on it. So, it’s maybe a better idea to get a couple of pounds of the bone-on slices of leg meat and cube it yourself.

So here we go!

Curried Goat

Meat and Marinade

- 1 1/2 - 2 lbs goat meat, cubed

- 1-2 onions, chopped

- 2 tbsp minced ginger

- 5-6 cloves garlic

- 3 bay leaves

- 3-4 lime leaves

- 3-4 sprigs thyme

- 1 tsp ground allspice

- juice of 1 lime

- 4 tbsp Jamaican curry

- 2 tbsp olive oil

- 2 tsp rum

- salt and pepper to taste

- 4 tbsp butter

- 2 cups stock (or water)

- 1 can coconut milk (about 2 cups)

Directions

-Mix together all ingredients, except coconut milk, stock and butter, in a mixing bowl.

- Cube goat meat if it isn’t already, making sure you keep the bones (as a general rule: marrow adds a whack of flavor to anything).
-Coat the meat with the marinade and allow it to marinate overnight.
-To make the stew, heat stock pot on medium, melt butter and add marinated meat. Cook for about 5 minutes.
-Stir in stock and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low.
-Simmer for about 30-40 minutes. Stir in coconut milk and cook for another 10 minutes.
-Serve on Red Beans and Rice

GOAT!

GOAT! marinatin'

Red Beans and Rice

 
- 1 cup dried red beans (or red kidney beans)
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 onion, diced
- 4-5 garlic, minced
- 1 inch piece of ginger, minced
- 1-2 tomatoes, diced
- 1 red pepper, diced
- 1 whole dried ancho chili
- 3-4 sprigs thyme
- 2-3 bay leaves
- salt and pepper to taste
- 1 can coconut milk (about 2 cups)
- 4 cups water
- 2 cups uncooked rice

Directions

 
- Place beans in bowl covered with cold water and leave overnight.
- To prepare beans once soaked, bring 2-3 cups water to a boil and add beans. Boil for about 20-30 minutes until beans are tender. Drain and cool beans.
- In a saucepan, heat olive oil on medium-high heat and sauté onion, garlic and ginger.
- Stir in rest of ingredients except rice and bring to a boil.
- Stir in rice and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and cover. Simmer for 25-30 minutes until rice is tender and liquid has evaporated. Remove chili from rice and discard (or mince and use for some other evil purpose).

Red Beans and Rice, right before getting covered to cook

And voila!

Fried Plantain

-2 semi-ripe plantains

-vegetable oil for frying

Directions

-Peel and slice plantain into ½ centimetre thick slices. This thickness leads to a nice crispy outside/chewy inside texture. If you want you plantain to be more like potato chips, slice about a millimeter thick using a mandolin or samurai-level blade handling skills.
-Heat oil to medium high heat. Once hot enough for frying (drop a drop of water in the oil – if it sizzles, it’s ready), carefully place the plantain in the oil using a slotted spoon.
-Fry plantain until crispy on the outside. It’ll be a little darker than the standard “golden brown”, but it’s totally worth “overcooking” the plantain to ensure they’re crispy.
-Remove plantain from oil with tongs or slotted spoon and place on paper-towel lined plate to absorb excess oil. Serve with Mango Dip.

Mango Dip for Fried Plantain

-½ cup mayonnaise
-juice of 1 lime
-½ tsp Sriracha
-2 tbsp mango juice
-Salt and pepper to taste

-Stir all ingredients together until well blended (consistency will be thinner than commercial dips)

Plantain - sliced and ready to fry!

 

Plantain - fried and ready for dipping!

This was a meal that would warm the cockles of anyone during any season. Of course now that I’m finally done writing about it, it’s nearly 30 degrees and sunny. It does beg the question: How does someplace that’s already so hot come up with such warming comfort food? Who knows… All I know is that I’m glad I’ve learned about this cuisine because man it’s a whole lotta tasty!

The finished product!

 

Enjoy!

Edible Events - A Taste of Winterlude - Canadian Game and Wild Foods Dinner at the Courtyard Restaurant

Me again,

Every so often, the missus/babymama/gf/love o' my life and I splurge for some sort of epicurean fiesta, as my three posts on Mill Street's Brewmaster's Dinners will attest. Ottawa has no shortage of festivals and events the year 'round, but one of its top draws is Winterlude, which is essentially a celebration of all things zero Celsius and colder. And what's a good Winter festival without a bunch of culinary events to surround it?

Annually a number of "foodie" events take place, ranging from giant gala-style events featuring a celebrity chef (not something I've yet to engage in considering the 200-hundred-plus dollar price tag) to foodie tours, to smaller-scale multiple course meals at many of the cities finer restaurants. This will be the third year running we engage in one of the multiple "Taste of Winterlude" events. I'll admit I spaced on blogging about the 2011 event at the Arc Lounge, but that's probably for the best because all I really remember is delicious Foie Gras served on a mini-Beavertail and drinking a metric ton of wine. As for last year's, it was a bit unimpressive and I prefer not to blog about that which does not impress me in foodie-land. But this year's event at The Courtyard Restaurant was definitely worthy of putting fingers to keyboard.

It was a "Wild Food and Game" themed meal, so vegetarians need not apply! The idea was to serve as many "wild" foods that can be found in our proud nation and pair them (mostly) with Canadian wines (and beer). Amongst the key ingredients around which the meal was built were Quebec duck, Atlantic sturgeon, wild mushrooms, wild boar, Steelhead trout and caribou.

The menu.

Dish 1 - Amuse Bouche

This is the opening shot across the bough that's supposed to wake up the palette and make you say "Goddamn, this is going to be tasty!" In this case, the one-bite-wonder consisted of Confit Duck Terrine, Foie Gras, Pine Nut Purée, Hibiscus (leaves and gelée), Black Onion Seeds and an Anise-Porridge Crisp.

The amuse-bouche is conceptually awesome, but I find that sometimes it tries too hard to be too much. In this case, all the various elements were delicious and fascinating, but it was hard to distinguish them all in one bite. What I mostly could taste was the luxurious combo of the duck terrine and foie gras, which was awesomely tasty good (Foie gras and duck? Hard to go wrong!) with an added bit of sweetness from the hibiscus gelée, but the pine nut purée and onion seeds kind of got lost in the whole bite. I wisely broke off and saved the anise-porridge crisp until after, mainly because I wanted to taste it on its own. I'm glad I did because it was a one-of-a-kind flavour and texture experience that I really dug.

The pairing was a Californian sparkling wine which was a fun little compliment that helped open up the palette, but in the end the terrine/foie combo was still front and centre.





Amuse bouche of confit duck terrine and other goodies

While we were enjoying this first bite, the sommelier and executive chef came out to tell us all about how they put together tonight's menu and walk us through the dishes. There was a bit of a bittersweet aspect when I discovered that the chef was no longer Michael Hay (which goes to show you how out of the loop I am since he'd been gone since June of last year). Instead the new chef was Murray Wilson, an export from the UK. I needn't have worried, he had already shown his skill with the amuse-bouche, and I could tell just from the menu that he was creative with the plates. 

Chef Murray Wilson

Dish 2 - Appetizer

Next up was something really unique and special, a neat-o appetizer consisting of a Smoked Sturgeon Rillettes with Caviar, Pickled Cucumber and Red Onion, and Capers. The presentation was great, served up in a little mason jar with a whole bunch of Pumpernickel Toast on the side.

I loved this dish; bright, refreshing and delicious. The sturgeon was light and delicately smoked, the cucumber and onion rounded out the flavours and the caviar gave a nice salty pop to the whole thing.

There was one drawback, though, in that the Pumpernickel Toasts were by far too pumpernickel-y for the Rillettes and overpowered the delicate flavour of the fish. On their own they were fantastic, almost a fusion of traditional pumpernickel and a sweet spice cake.

The wine pairing was PondView Estate Riesling out of Niagara. I have to admit that a couple of months later and not being a huge Riesling fan, I don't really remember the wine being remarkably good or bad. I do remember it going quite well with the pumpernickel.

Smoked Sturgeon Rillettes

Dish 3 - Soup

Next up was the soup course and what a soup course it was! Let me fill you on a little secret (in my opinion at least): I think soup might be the best way for a chef to display some of their best stuff. From the lobster bisque at Mill Street's first Brewmaster's dinner to my own creations, soup is one of those "blank canvases" that allows a lot of creativity. Certainly this dish was another example that makes the point. I've had many mushroom soups in my day, but this one was a completely new iteration of an old classic.

To wit, this dish was made up of a base Wild Mushroom and Beau's "Bog Water" Beer Soup, with Sourdough Croutons, slices of Smoked Wild Boar, dollops of Goat Cheese, Mushroom Chips, and a Wild Mustard Gel.

Holy moly, that's a complicated soup!

It was also really super-tasty! All mushroom soups have a rich earthy flavour, naturally, and this was no exception. But there was an added element of depth from the beer. Beau's is one of those breweries that I think employs mad scientists (or mad brewmasters, I guess) because they put together some pretty crazy ideas for beer. The Bog Water is one of these, wherein they use wild harvested bog myrtle instead of hops to flavour the beer (I had to look it up here). Turns out that this is a method that used to be quite popular in Europe, but it's still pretty crazy to me! The flavour of the beer (which was naturally the pairing to the soup) was interesting, almost a sweet earthiness, if that makes any sense, which in turn added a sweetness to the soup that was a bonus.

Throughout the bowl were all the other elements that interacted in each their own way with the soup. First, the goat cheese was ladled in four little dollops at cardinal points on the edge of the bowl. So, you naturally want to scoop and mix the cheese with the soup, producing an almost silky texture and bringing an airy touch of flavour to the soup. The Mushroom Chips were, I suspect, some sort of dried treatment, possibly using morels. The flavour was quite complimentary to the soup, with just a bit of happy little peppery notes. The Croutons were also a nice flavour enhancement to the soup. I pretty much tried each "side element" on its own with the soup, just to make sure none of the ingredients overpowered the other. This turned out to be a very good idea, because the Wild Boar was by far the standout flavour in this dish, if not the whole meal! So good! Smokey and rich and beautiful, it was like super-bacon. Obviously, it sort of overpowered the soup itself, but who the heck cares?! SUPER-BACON!!!!! And that's about that!

Wild Mushroom and "Bog Water" Beer Soup

Dish 4 - Fish

Next up was the fish course (the pre-main?). This was a lovely and light dish (and light fish), but still substantial enough for a Winter feast. The dish consisted of Pan Roasted Wild Steelhead Trout, Lentils du puy, Yellow Foot Mushrooms, Roasted Almond Purée, Confit Cherry Tomato, Onion and Thyme Velouté.

Let's start with the fish. First of all, it's really freaking hard to go wrong with Trout. It's environmentally sustainable, light-tasting and really difficult to screw up! This was a really nicely done piece of fish. Personally I would have cooked it less, but I like my fish underdone, and really, cooking fish has to be done in a way that appeals to the "masses", which in this case it did. Let me put it this way: my piscaphobe girlfriend ate half of it and loved it (but only halfway because it still got too "fishy" for her, but she's crazy). I do have one little complaint: they cooked it and presented it skin-side up, but the skin wasn't crispy, which makes it a little unpleasant texture-wise. Maybe take a blowtorch to the skin? I'm really not sure.

Now, the other elements did a very good job of complimenting the fish, especially when the trout, Lentils and Almond Purée were eaten together in one bite. It was kind of a neat "earth meets water" flavour. The Yellow Foot Mushrooms, I believe, had been lightly marinated (I could be mis-remembering) and had a nice zing.  The Velouté was, essentially, the sauce on the plate. It was tasty, if a little basic, but didn't really stand out compared to some of the more "punchy" flavours on the dish. As for the Confit Tomato... it was a tomato? I didn't really notice what the "confit" effect was, but the acidity was a nice foil for the density of the lentils.

The wine was Norman Hardie County Chardonnay (2010 - Prince Edward County, Ontario). It went really well with the fish, imparting a buttery flavour and mouth feel, as a good Chardonnay is want to do. I must admit, I'm also a bit biased towards wines from Prince Edward County rather than the Niagara region, probably has something to do with a camping trip a couple of years back where we visited a few wineries in the region and it was epic goodness.

Steelhead Trout with Lentils and other goodies...

Dish 5 - MEAT!

And now we come to the main event: a slab of bloody meat surrounded by side orders of deliciousness!

The dish was: Herb Roasted Leg of Caribou, Gruyère and Truffle Pavé, Carrots Glazed in Bourbon Maple Syrup, Squash Purée, Brussel Sprouts, and Wild Lingonberry Gastrique. I believe the meat was originally supposed to be elk, but the chef told me he couldn't find any and had to go with farmed caribou instead. To be honest, I don't think I would have noticed the difference. The meat was delicious, cooked nice and rare, and not terribly gamey; in fact I found it hard to tell the difference between the flavour profile here and that of really high end prime rib roast. That being said, the caribou was way leaner than any beef I've ever had!

What brought this plate to "above and beyond" levels were the sides (which is often the case: there's only so much flavour you can coax out of a hunk of red meat). The Squash Purée was nice and rich, without being overloaded with cream or butter, which is all too often the fate of any kind of mashed substitute on a "meat n' ________" plate. The Brussel Sprouts were also surprisingly subdued, steamed simply with a bit of butter and lemon juice (I think), which I appreciated. Too many preparations try to mask the unique flavour of Brussel Sprouts, which is understandable, but not what I'd do. The Lingonberry Gastrique (the jelly-looking stuff that goes across the plate) added a nice sweet and sour undertone to the rest of the plate. The Carrots were kinda super-awesomely awesome. They might have been just a smidge underdone (maybe slight crunch to cooked carrots is a new thing in haute-cuisine because this isn't the first time), but really, they were mainly a sauce carrier. And hoo-boy, Bourbon Maple Syrup! How can you wrong? Especially when you slather everything with it? But THE grand champion side for this plate was the Gruyère and Truffle Pavé. It was so good I'll give it a whole paragraph!

OK, so as far as I thought, a "pavé" is a rectangular potato dish. Turns out the term is applied to anything cut into a rectangular shape. Most times I've encountered it, it's been a potato-based dish. It's essentially made from very thinly sliced potatoes cut into a rectangle and stacked on top of each other with goodness between the layers. In this case the goodness was truffle and gruyère. NOM! Also, especially deliciously awesome when saturated with caribou blood! SO GOOD!

The wine pairing was Painted Rock Syrah 2007 (from BC's Okanagan Valley). This was one hell of a wine (and the sommelier made a point of noting it was a 140 dollar bottle of wine from the restaurant and hard to find (lord knows it isn't at the LCBO!).

Dripping tasty CARIBOU MEAT!

As an added spiffy bonus, they put the pairings on display:

Wine/Beer pairings on display

Dish 6 - Dessert

And finally, even though we had bellies full of food, we had to finish off the experience with a Warm Chocolate Cake, Black Raspberry Curd, Agassiz Hazelnut Ice Cream. There were, I believe, actually two kinds of cake: one was a "regular" chocolate cake, the other flourless. Also not mentioned on the menu was a kind of dehydrated chocolate crunchie bit.

I don't remember a whole lot about this dish, mostly because I was very full of meat. It was quite tasty and the mix of chocolate, raspberry and hazelnut, from both ice cream and Frangelico liqueur (the pairing) were very nice; rich but not heavy.



Chocolate Cake goodness!

 

 

 

And that's that! The first of many (I hope) Edible Events!

 

Cheers!