At the Edmonton International Film Festival’s 24/ONE screening last year, I voted for the film that made me laugh out loud the most. I ended up using the same measure this past Friday at this year’s 24/ONE. 6 Hours by Fourth Wall Productions got my vote (I couldn’t . It seemed others in the audience enjoyed it just as much, and they took home the coveted Best Picture prize, which is determined by the audience. It was a good time – check it out next year if you get the chance! On to this week’s food notes:
- Congrats to Transcend baristas Josh Hockin and Ben Put who took home both first and second place at the Canadian Barista Championships today!
- Liv wrote about Engrained, a new eatery on the U of A Campus in the Edmonton Clinic North building.
- Chris reviewed The Burger Joint on the south side.
- I wasn’t able to make it out to the Fall Sturgeon County Bounty at the Prairie Adventure Gardens this weekend, but Andrea was! Live vicariously through her delicious pictures here.
- Marilyn wrote about a lovely potluck dinner she had with fellow gardeners of the Edmonton Organic Growers Guild.
- The Journal staff were up to their elbows in pie judging which pie would take home the prize in The Great Pie Project. Congrats to Ruth Reay and her strawberry rhubarb pie! Find her recipe and nine others here.
- Looking for a unique Christmas gift? Valerie has updated her schedule of 2012 Taste Tripping classes.
- Love this: a photographic retrospective of food trucks! (Maria, the chuckwagons are for you!)
- I heart Gail Simmons! Here’s an interview she did recently with the Huffington Post. I’ll have to try her fish sauce/risotto trick some time.
- Will this be a trend that moves to Edmonton soon? Catch down in Calgary now has their wine menu on iPads!
- We had another one of our epic potlucks at work. It probably is a good thing we don’t have them too often, or else afternoon naps would become a standard, too!
Too much food!
- While Mack’s Mom was in town on Saturday, we had lunch together at Famoso. It was my first time having the pizzetta/soup combo, and I loved the fire-roasted tomato bisque! The sharpness from that sprinkle of cheese really helped bring out the flavour.
Sweet BBQ chicken pizzetta and tomato bisque
- We also attended a lovely wedding on Saturday – congrats to the newlyweds Mag and Joey!
The cupcake tower mirrored the colours of the wedding
- Mack and I also finally visited the Fort Edmonton Footbridge this weekend. A coworker commented to me that she doesn’t normally deem bridges to be a destination, but this one, tucked in the Wolf Willow neighbourhood, should be. The view from the top, with the sound of the creek bubbling away, reminded us more of Banff (minus the mountains) than of Edmonton.
Fort Edmonton Footbridge
Wolf Willow Ravine
View from the top
I hope you have a good week!
Only Here for the Food 
We walked to the bridge from Fort Edmonton Park this summer. It was stunning, and the view was amazing! The biggest surprise was that no one else was around! I’m glad you’ve posted some great shots of it.
Nice to see someone finally using a new generation tablet for wine lists. We dined at Aureole a few years ago, and they had the wine list on a old-school tablet. The concept was great, but the tablet was quite bulky and heavy (and hot!). When the iPad was released, my first thought was using it for wine lists. An electronic wine list is a living document. Wines can be added or removed from the list as the inventory changes. Stale wine lists are no fun.
I wish we weren’t so behind the times in Edmonton. When I was in Europe last year, they were already using iPads there for the wine list. Unfortunately, as Chris pointed out, the iPad was a bit bulky and heavy compared to a menu. It also didn’t make ordering any more accurate. We were given a glass of wine as ordered but was charged for a bottle mistakenly. It would be great if they could tie the iPad into the ordering system wirelessly in order to make the whole billing process more seamless and accurate too.
Linda – yeah, I don’t think it has been heavily promoted. A shame!
Chris – I haven’t yet tried it myself yet. Looking forward to doing so one day!
Eva – I could see tying in the ordering on the iPad for certain kinds of restaurants (e.g. New York’s 4Food), but I can’t imagine most getting rid of the personal service provided by servers. It’ll be interesting to see how the trend develops though.
Sharon – I didn’t mean to imply getting rid of servers. I meant that the servers could use those table side when taking orders to produce a more accurate bill. I know many servers have amazing memories, but I’ve often found that errors can still occur when they’re done serving a handful of tables and then go to input items into their system (eg. the bill shows an addition pop that wasn’t ordered or dessert, etc).