Food Notes for January 24, 2011

There’s some good news coming– watch for an announcement about the venue for the year-round City Market in two weeks. I can’t wait until it’s official!

• NAIT’s next Chef in Residence will be Susur Lee – it’ll be interesting to see what else he has to say about Shang.
• Thanks to this tip, I found out that the Edmonton area will be getting its first Five Guys Burgers and Fries – in Sherwood Park.
• Look for GAMA (10418 82 Avenue), a new store that will serve up Taiwanese drinks and cookies. They had their soft opening over the weekend.
• Axis Cafe is closing its doors. They are hosting a closing party on January 27, 2011 at 7pm.
• If you love Blue Plate Diner’s vegetarian burgers, you’ll be happy to know you can now take them home to make! Pick them up at the restaurant ($12 for 4 patties), or order them through the Good Food Box.
• Curious about how the revamp of The Next Act Pub came to be? Vue Weekly published an interview with one of the men behind its “second act”.
• Valerie sent me a link about Food Network’s reality show-style search for The Next Great Chocolatier.
• The Journal had a great write-up of the Breaducation event at Luzzara two weeks ago, including a recipe for no-knead bread. Local blogger Andrea already tried it out, with fantastic results!
• Isabelle wrote a very thoughtful post about the realities of tight purse strings unfortunately preventing her from supporting local producers.
• This is pretty cool – a musician staged a flash mob at New York’s Eataly, to the tune of “Smooth Criminal”.
• The NYT had an article about the rise of restaurants using social media sites like Scvngr and Foursquare to engage customers.
• I’m not sure what I was expecting from the facade reno of Chinatown’s Taipan Cafe, but it wasn’t this. Even though it’s a bit far out, I kind of like how bold it is.

Taipan Cafe

• Mack was nice enough to stop by Bistro Praha to check on its status – turns out, it will actually be opening this coming Friday, January 28. The interior, even though it is in a new building, actually reminds me very much of the old space.

Bistro Praha interior

• There’s a new Mucho Burrito downtown, in the HSBC Building (10250 101 Street).

Mucho Burrito

• Before Ice on Whyte, I had a bite to eat at the newest location of Nhon Hoa (10154 82 Avenue). My usual order at the Chinatown location is a sub with shredded pork, but they didn’t even have it on the menu here (I ended up with a sausage and shredded pork sub). The bread was too toasted for my liking, but it hit the spot.

Sausage and shredded pork sub

• Mack and I ended up at our neighbourhood Blue Plate Diner on Sunday night for a pre-show dinner. I ordered the $45 Fork Fest special, which included an appetizer, entree, and glass of wine. The tomato & parmesan tart was delicious – the pesto beurre blanc that made the dish. I was expecting a little more from the braised plum lamb shank though – the meat was nearly fall-off-the-bone tender, but more than anything, I was left wanting an accompanying jus or sauce of some kind. Also of note – it was the third time, in trying to have points added to our Original Fare VIP card, that the machine did not work – the program has been in place for a few years now, so we wondered why glitches haven’t yet been remedied.

Tomato & parmesan tart

Braised plum lamb shank

• To help celebrate Annie’s birthday, her parents cooked us a grand meal, and finished with fondue made from a Kerstin’s Chocolates kit. Happy birthday, Annie!

Chocolate fondue