City Market 2013: Week 3

It was a beautiful spring day at the City Market, the glorious sun highlighting just how much the trees have budded and bloomed over the last week.

Busy market day

Folks were snatching up the fresh produce left and right – given we’re already into June, it’s only a matter of time before the warm weather bounty is before us again!

Rhubarb from Riverbend Gardens

Pea tendrils from Sundog Organic

Bell peppers from Doef’s Greenhouses

Sprouts from Greens, Eggs and Ham

Bedding plants from Kuhlmann’s

Plants from Kuhlmann’s

For the second half of the market, I helped man the Downtown Edmonton Community League booth. We were selling league memberships and also promoting our annual toonie pancake breakfast, taking place on June 8, 2013 from 8:30-11am. Two bucks for a plate of pancakes and sausage at the intersection of 104 Street and 102 Avenue!

Ian at the DECL booth

The pancake breakfast will be kicking off a full day of activity downtown next Saturday: the market, Pride Parade, and the Centennial Street Celebration on 104 Street. The celebration marks the hundred year anniversary of several buildings on the Promenade, including the Phillips Lofts and Cobogo Lofts. 104 Street will remain closed after the market, and you can expect an outdoor barbecue, buskers, and salsa dancing!

I’m a little biased because I think downtown is the place to be, but this will indeed be true next week – enjoy the party!

Food Notes for May 27, 2013

Hurrah for rain! Hopefully we are in store for more moisture, but it’s still amazing how fantastically green everything seemed to become overnight. I relish my lunch hour walks when I get to drink it all in – hope you’re getting some fresh spring air as well! On to this week’s food notes:

A new market debuts this weekend. Check out Eden Market on 124 Street and 105 Avenue every Sunday starting June 2, 2013 from 10am-3pm. It sounds like they will have several food trucks on hand, including Battista’s Calzones, Eva Sweet and The Food Fighter.
I was too slow in posting a link to Elm Café’s first brunch that they are hosting in their brand new 118 Avenue space, but it sounds like they will be offering them on a regular basis in the future.
It looks like Urban Shabu (9700 105 Avenue) in Chinatown is now open. Anyone been?
Liv reviewed the freshly opened Belgravia Hub.
Another corporate food truck is rolling into town (remember the visit by Kraft last year?) – this time, Sabra, offering samples of hummus and salsa from June 6-9, 2013. Check their Twitter for location updates.
Top Chef Canada is recruiting for Season 4 (deadline June 11, 2013). What say we start drafting Edmonton chefs to represent?
After work on Saturday, I swung by the Alberta Hotel to check out CKUA’s new space on Jasper Avenue. The music room was too packed for much of a peek, but the bar space (tenant still TBD) was beautiful. Hopefully someone takes it over soon!

Alberta Hotel

On a rainy Friday, I grabbed some lunch at Bully Food Truck, parked in Churchill Square. The pizza burger (topped with pepperoni, mozzarella, caesar salad and bruschetta) was messy, but worth it!

Pizza burger

In spite of our workout on the weekend, Mack and I gave into our cravings and ended up at Route 99 for a plate of poutine. It was worth every fry.

Poutine!

City Market 2013: Welcome Back to the Promenade!

Now that the City Market is back outdoors on the 104 Street Promenade, it finally feels like spring! I ended up missing my window to post about opening day last Saturday, so I thought I’d just combine the first two weeks in one post.

Opening day

The weather was very cooperative last week, gloriously sunny skies providing the perfect welcome to vendors setting up shop on the street.

Last week

Today was quite the opposite: overcast, windy, and eventually, rain.

This week

Due to the the Fox Towers construction, the market has been required to make some adjustments to their layout. Change is not always well-received, so I was eager to see how its new “T-shaped” configuration along 102 Avenue would look.

102 Avenue

It turns out, the shift was better than I anticipated. The aisles were spacious and easier to navigate (the Avenue seemed wider than the Street), and the vendors we spoke with were happy with their new placements. Erdmann’s and Sunshine Organic anchor the 102 Avenue drag, which will hopefully encourage shoppers to tour both ends.

Wide aisles

My only suggestion has to do with seating. Although it wasn’t an issue today because of the blustery conditions, it was quite obvious last week that the market could do with more tables and chairs. With musical buskers attracting crowds, and multiple prepared food vendors surrounding the market “plaza”, places to rest and linger were in short supply. I recognize this isn’t an easy problem to solve, with the challenge of on-site storage, but hopefully it is something that can be looked into.

Plaza

In terms of vendors, it was great to see all of our favourites again, including Sundog Organic, Riverbend Gardens and Edgar Farms. But it was nice to see some new faces at the City Market as well, such as Heritage Baked Goods and their unique doughnuts. Without question, we ended up filling our shopping basket much too full – call it the spring reflex, where anything remotely green results in an impulse buy.

Asparagus from Edgar Farms

Rhubarb from Sundog Organic

Spinach from Sundog Organic

Onions from Sundog Organic

Spring onions from Sundog Organic

Microgreens from Sundog Organic

Tomatoes from Gull Valley Greenhouses

Cabbage from Riverbend Gardens

Herbs from Riverbend Gardens

Flowers from South Cooking Lake Greenhouses

It’s wonderful to have the market back on our doorstep. See you there next week!

Recap: Ginger Beef Throwdown

Last Friday, we kicked off our 2013 What the Truck?! season with a Ginger Beef Throwdown. Partnering with the Royal Alberta Museum , the event was organized in conjunction with the current Chop Suey on the Prairies exhibit, which examines the history of Chinese restaurants in our province in the twentieth century.

Although we knew the event would draw a crowd, we never anticipated the sheer number of early birds that staked out a place in line well before the start time. The glorious weather definitely helped, as did the scheduling just before the long weekend, but most of all, I think it speaks to the fact that Edmontonians love food trucks!

The line

I have already written about the rationale for our food ticketing system and the “intentional bottleneck” that we created, and in spite of fielding many complaints, I don’t think we could have done it any other way. Given the constraints of the museum space, as well as a desire to streamline food access to enable sampling of multiple dishes, we were happy with how things worked out overall. That said, we could have done a better job in communicating the reasoning behind the system – hopefully those that left hungry and frustrated will give future What the Truck?! events another chance.

Controlled chaos

It also bears saying that the trucks just rocked it that night. They pumped out servings like nobody’s business, and continued to push the limits of their capacity. Thanks to The Act , Bully, The Lingnan Express and Smokehouse BBQ for a memorable start to the season!

The trucks

As for the food, while we didn’t vote ourselves (The Lingnan took home the crown), we were able to sample Bully’s BLT and The Lingnan’s traditional ginger beef. After the craziness, they really hit the spot! For a more comprehensive look at the dishes that night, check out Teresa and Diane’s posts.

Bully’s BLT and The Lingnan’s ginger beef

Partnerships have been vital to What the Truck?! from the beginning, so we appreciated the opportunity to work with the Royal Alberta Museum for the first time. With over 400 people who checked out the exhibit that night, it was counted as a definite success for the RAM!

Without question, this was our most labour-intensive event to date, as we not only had to facilitate the food tickets, but also drink sales. Because of these responsibilities, we could not have run the event on our own, and were indebted to the generosity of our volunteers. Thanks to my Mum, Dad, Felicia, Caleng, Linda, Phil and Robyn for all of your help!

Lastly, thanks to everyone who came – we hope you had fun! We are already in the throes of planning for the next What the Truck?!, which will take place south of the river in June. Stay tuned for more details next week!

124 Street Grand Market 2013 Kick-Off

While the City Market is my go-to destination for seasonal produce and other groceries, the 124 Street Grand Market is a great mid-week destination for a fun evening out. In its first year, it did a great job highlighting the fact that a market isn’t just a shopping hub, but also a place for people to meet, eat, and linger. Their “food truck alley” encouraged patrons to expect great dinner options, and an expanse of tables to enjoy supper al fresco. The musical buskers were a bonus, and created a lovely atmosphere in which to drink in long summer nights.

Welcome!

The 2013 season for the 124 Street Grand Market kicked off this evening. The skies threatened rain, but this didn’t deter the modest crowds from celebrating the market’s return.

124 Street Grand Market

The Misery Mountain Boys

Four trucks offered plenty of options, and included Drift, Nomad, Little Village and Sailin’ On. My sister and I took this opportunity to give Sailin On’s vegan dishes a spin, and ordered the BLT ($8), containing coconut bacon, lettuce, tomato, carrot, and a homemade garlic vegan mayo.

Sailin’ On

We weren’t sure what to expect from the coconut bacon, but after trying it, were shocked at how the texture and taste so closely mimicked meat bacon. We learned that the coconut bacon was comprised of roasted coconut flavoured with spices, but besides a hint of coconut, it was a pretty impressive stand-in!

Felicia was almost fooled!

We also indulged in an ice cream sandwich from Cookie Love. Over the weekend, they picked up their bicycle-powered cart from Portland, and though it isn’t quite finished (awaiting decals and an umbrella), it was ready for its first trial run at the market.

Mike from Cookie Love

I bought an ice cream sandwich ($5), made up of a double chocolate chip cookie, regular chocolate chip cookie and vanilla ice cream. The cookies were thin enough to make it easy to eat, and were as soft as they could be having come out of a freezer. It was a nice treat on a warm night.

Ice cream sandwich

It was great to see some new vendors out as well, including Duchess. Giselle explained that although the shop was quite busy on market nights, it made sense to have an actual presence at the market. To sweeten the deal for shoppers, Duchess developed specific products that are exclusive to the market, such as marshmallow macarons and a line of bottled drinks. As you can expect from Duchess, everything was beautifully-packaged and gift ready!

Duchess iced teas and lemonades

This market is also a great place to find funky treasures and gifts. Tonight, we stumbled upon Kristine MacDonald’s “yeglaces”, silver/copper charms in the shape of our fair city, with a river etched through it.

Yeglaces

Although I don’t (yet) own a bike, it was such a novel idea to have a bike repair specialist on-site. Instead of park and ride, how about a tune-up and dinner?

Dusty Pedals

Congrats to Krista and her team on a great first day!

124 Street Grand Market
108 Avenue & 124 Street
Every Thursday evening from 4-8pm until October 3, 2013

Giveaway: Red Shoe Crawl Tickets!

Since the Red Shoe Crawl started two years ago, it’s been great to watch the event grow and establish itself in Edmonton. A fundraiser for the Ronald McDonald House of Northern Alberta, the Red Shoe Crawl is a fun way to visit a neighbourhood by sampling your way through businesses within walking distance of one another.

I attended the very first Red Shoe Crawl that took place in Old Strathcona in August 2011, and was blown away by how well organized it was, and loved how it promoted exploring a particular area on foot. The ticket price provided incredible value (we were far from able make our way through the food provided), and it was even better that the entire ticket cost was directed to the charity.

Fish and chips from Elephant & Castle

In 2012, the Red Shoe Crawl took place twice that year, and expanded to include the burgeoning 124 Street neighbourhood as well. Though there perhaps wasn’t as much food when compared with the Whyte Avenue event, without question they made up for it with a more diverse range of participating shops, including several that I had never stepped foot in before.

Gelato from Cococo

If you still haven’t had a chance to attend a Red Shoe Crawl, now is your chance! The 2013 Taste of Whyte takes place on June 9, 2013, from noon-5pm. Tickets are just $40, and is inclusive of all food and beverage samples. Expect a great line-up of businesses, with more to be confirmed. So far, the list includes:

The organizers were nice enough to allow me to give two tickets to the event away! To enter, all you have to do is leave a comment with a valid e-mail address that answers the following question:

Which Old Strathcona business are you most looking forward to trying or revisiting at the Red Shoe Crawl?

A winner will be chosen randomly from all responses collected before the deadline. The contest closes on May 27, 2013 at 11:59pm. Good luck!

EDIT: Congrats to Susan Z. for winning the two tickets!

Food Notes for May 20, 2013

I had great intentions to catch up on writing and some other things this weekend…but then I found myself just enjoying the long weekend. I hope you were able to take in the sunshine as well! On to this week’s food notes:

A reminder about Slow Food Edmonton’s Berkshire & Beer event at the Yellowhead Brewery on May 26, 2013. The menu is now up as well.
Dishcrawl will be hosting their next neighbourhood crawl around Southgate Mall on June 12, 2013.
Liv professed her love of the sandwiches at Pure Kitchen.
Vue profiled Sailin’ On, the newest food truck to hit the streets in Edmonton.
Sad news: the Arbour Room at the Rutherford House is now closed due to staffing and financial challenges.
I missed this article last week – ever wanted to peek into RGE RD Chef Blair Lebsack’s kitchen? Now you can.
I also missed linking to Omar Mouallem’s fantastic piece about the history (and his history) with Burger Baron.
Mack sent me this amazingly nutty clip from a recent episode of Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares. The owners are so stubborn and blind to their toxic behaviour that it’s hard to believe the confrontations aren’t staged.
Valerie posted a recap about Eat Alberta 2013. Her pictures are gorgeous, and bring me right back to the day.
Mack and I trekked across the High Level bridge over the weekend for dinner and dessert. The latter was made up of visits to Transcend and Menchies. Transcend was advertising their new cold brew coffee (something we’ve made at home, but are generally too lazy to do on a regular basis). Mack loved it, commenting that it actually tasted like coffee, though given it is filtered several times, we were surprised to see so many unidentified flecks in the mixture.

Transcend’s cold brew coffee

Menchie’s, the newest frozen yogurt chain to land in Edmonton, is set up in the same way as other self-serve froyo establishments, with a wall of yogurt options and an adjacent topping station. I did appreciate the easy access to sample cups, though was hoping for more fresh fruit options. Overall, I enjoyed the strawberry sorbet, but probably wouldn’t be able to pick it out of a froyo line-up.

Menchie’s

Felicia and I hit up Hundred for an Alley Burger last night. I don’t know what it is, but the burger always tastes better when consumed outside on a warm summer night.

Alley burger!

Food Notes for May 13, 2013

I hope you’re ready for the Ginger Beef Throwdown on Friday! Join us at the Royal Alberta Museum on May 17, 2013 from 5-8pm as four of Edmonton’s food trucks vie for ginger beef supremacy! Check out the menus here. On to this week’s food notes:

Tickets for the first Red Shoe Crawl of the year are now on sale! Taking place on June 9, 2013, the event will showcase some of Old Strathcona’s best restaurants and businesses. Tickets are $40, with proceeds supporting the Ronald McDonald House of Northern Alberta. We had a blast at the 124 Street crawl last October.
The Edmonton Community Foundation’s upcoming Annual General Meeting on June 13, 2013 will feature Jeremy Isles, Chief Executive of the Federation of City Farms & Community Gardens, UK.
Beer Revolution (11736 104 Avenue) opened today.
Look for Belgravia Hub (7609 115 Street) to open this week!
La Poutine’s truck is now on the streets! Looking forward to our first mobile poutine.
It also looks like Sailin’ On, Edmonton’s first vegan truck, will be on the streets on May 14, 2013!
Marlow Moo wrote about a pop-up over the weekend with forthcoming food truck Switch.
The rise of Italian in Edmonton continues with the opening of Enzo’s on 76.
Liv also wrote about Amato Gelato in Lewis Estates, the first of a Vancouver-based gelato chain to open up in the city.
The Makk was positively reviewed in the Journal last week.
Vue’s annual Golden Fork Awards were announced last week! I found it interesting how many of the winners were concentrated in the Old Strathcona area – will we soon see a shift to more Downtown and Oliver-area restaurants?
The same issue featured a Vue writer taking on the burger challenge at Soda Jerks – could you finish three monster burgers in thirty minutes?
Valerie is looking to hone in on our “Canadian voice”, and is inviting writers to help her identify uniquely Canadian experiences and foods. Find out more about The Canadian Food Experience Project here.
A call for Edmonton Food Council members is now open. Interested parties have until May 20, 2013 to submit applications.
It looks like Remedy is expanding again, this time into the space vacated by Booster Juice in the Palomar Building on 82 Avenue and 104 Street.

Remedy – coming soon!

The Burg announced their presence in a big way on the 4th Street Promenade – probably hoping to capitalize on all of the foot traffic the street garners when the outdoor City Market begins on May 18.

The Burg

Kabsa is now open at 10332 82 Avenue – anyone know if it is the same folks behind the space that was taken over by Corso 32 downtown?

Kabsa

We stumbled upon a new bubble tea shop just off the main Whyte drag, called Teapsy Café (9959 82 Aveue). They offer the variety of cold drinks found at similar shops, but enhance their menu with Peking dogs (think a Chinese-style Japadog). The peach slush we tried was very refreshing.

Teapsy Cafe

After a meeting with the folks at The Next Act on Thursday, we stayed on for dinner. It was a good call – the omnivore grilled cheese hit the spot!

Omnivore grilled cheese

We were happy to join other “Drift-ers” at Red Star today for a group viewing of their Eat St. episode! It was great, and showcased their food well.

Of course, Kara and Nevin made sure the audience was well fed!

Recap: Eat Alberta 2013

On April 20, 2013, we held our third annual Eat Alberta food conference at NAIT. It was our biggest event ever, with 120 registered attendees.

Perogy making with Chef David Omar of Zinc

We know changes are never embraced by everyone, but for the most part we think the implementation of a set track registration system (as opposed to attendees being able to select from all available workshops) was a success! It guaranteed every attendee at least two hands-on classes, and we hope the tracks facilitated some deeper connections with fellow root-ers as well.

Maki makes ricotta!

I have to say I didn’t end up stepping foot in many of the classrooms this year, so while I don’t have personal account of the sessions, the feedback has been overwhelmingly positive!

Artisan sausage making with Allan Suddaby

We tried to achieve a balance between new and returning presenters, knowing that our attendees would be made up of those both familiar and unfamiliar with Eat Alberta. For new presenters, we were thrilled to have many members of the food community answer our call, including Nevin Fenske of Drift, who taught the finer points of butchering a whole chicken, and Chad Moss of Shovel and Fork, who inspired many on the merits of homemade bacon.

Nevin teaches The Whole Chicken

Bacon making!

To end the day, we were certain a concept like “lightning talks” would be the perfect way to connect attendees with resources beyond our annual event. But we never knew how effective it could be until the presenters blew the doors off the place! The nine speakers were engaging, funny and informative, though it was hard for anyone to top Mark Stumpf-Allen (aka “The Worm Guy” of the Master Composter Program), who threw packages of worms out into the audience during his address.

The Worm Guy!

One of the highlights of the day for me was the unveiling of the tastes, to accompany the wine down after the lightning talks. Allan Suddaby, a chef and one of the organizers, crafted a brilliant board of seasonal, local bites. The icing on the cake was listening to Allan describe each of them! We also poured exclusively Albertan fruit wines, a first for us. Given our provincial mandate, we expanded the selection and brought in Field Stone Fruit Wines, based out of Strathmore, but currently unavailable for purchase in Edmonton. After hearing the comments around the room, however, I think we should lobby for their sale locally!

Tasting board

As a whole, it really helped that we were at the same venue for the second year running – we were able to tighten up some things, partly because we were more familiar with the building, but partly because we worked with staff rock stars, led by Toby and Josh, who made meeting any last minute needs seamless.

We also managed to fill the void of a host this year, one person who could tie the day together and provide some cohesion. Global’s Jennifer Crosby filled those shoes with grace and humour to spare.

It takes a village to put on an event like this. Thank you to the presenters who stepped up to share their knowledge and enthusiasm, to the volunteers who generously donated their time and to the sponsors who believed in what we are trying to achieve. To my fellow organizers – it has been a pleasure and a privilege to work alongside you.

If you are interested in being a part of Eat Alberta, let us know! We’re looking to expand the organizing committee, so just send me an email!

Thanks Valerie for letting me use your photos!

Date Night: The Cavern and the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra

This is a bit of a composite “Date Night” post, as I had planned for a pre-symphony visit to The Cavern before an outing to the Winspear Centre last Friday. But an intense craving for wine and cheese hit me on Thursday, and I gave in.

The Cavern is the newest storefront to open up on the 4th Street Promenade, and in spite of being first and foremost a cheese shop, owner Tricia Bell has designed a dine-in concept that easily transitions from day to night. Early birds can head to The Cavern for an espresso and a bite of breakfast in the morning, while downtown office workers might be more interested in her daily grilled cheese lunch options. For the after work crowd, The Cavern offers wine and spirits alongside meat and cheese boards, great for some nibbles leading up to dinner, or as the main attraction before a night out on the town.

Mack and I walked in to a near full house that Thursday, and snagged the last two seats at the bar. During our previous visits, Tricia and the rest of her staff have always been warm and welcoming, and tonight was no different. It was clear they were all very busy trying to manage the room and handling new walk-ins, but we never felt rushed or not taken care of.

The Enomatic system makes it ideal for The Cavern to serve small 3 ounce pours of wine in addition to 6 or 9 ounce glasses, but Mack and I were fine with a regular glass each. For those interested in pairings, the cheese menu lists both wine and beer selections.

Malbec and Cava

We had to choose between a cheese board for two featuring three cheeses ($19) or a cheese and meat board with two of each ($24). We opted for the latter, and selected two meats from a list of five, and two cheese from a list of twenty. Tricia was a great help in answering our questions and guided us to a Quebec washed-rind cheese, Le Douanier, with a unique vegetable ash centre. It was soft and mild, with a lovely creamy texture. Our other cheese choice was Sylvan Star’s award winning Grizzly Gouda.

Meat and cheese board, with all beef salami and prosciutto di parma

The board was beautifully presented, with some fruit, fresh bread, and dollops of cherry jam and jalapeno jelly. I also loved the ability to imprint on the board itself with chalk, a seamless way to identify multiple items.

Cheers!

The Cavern was a wonderful place to spend the evening, and one that we will be returning to again.

The following evening, Mack and I walked over to the Winspear Centre for Radio from the Head, a show in the “Late Night with Bill Eddins” series. It has been a while since we last took in one of these concerts, but we knew we were in for an entertaining night, mostly due to the conductor’s personality and ease on stage.

The beautiful Winspear Centre

I was particularly drawn to this show because of the promise of a song to be paired with chocolate. Symphonic Chocolates by Maxime Goulet is composed of four movements, where the audience was invited to eat a different chocolate during the corresponding movement. The ESO partnered with local chocolatier Carol’s Quality Sweets, who produced the custom boxes of chocolates which were sold prior to the performance for $5 each.

It was an innovative multi-sensory experience that reminded me of Karen Brooks’ presentation at Feast in Portland which involved a communal tasting component, and the trend of food deliberately being paired with music. While we weren’t floored by all of the pairings, Mack and I enjoyed the dark chocolate which accompanied a theme cloaked in mystery, and a mint chocolate coupled with a movement reminiscent of a spring breeze.

Chocolates!

The show’s special guest was Christopher O’Riley, known for his piano interpretations of Radiohead. Mack, more familiar with Radiohead than I, was drawn to O’Riley’s performances of the three Radiohead songs. And though we can appreciate the difficulty of the four-hands Stravinsky piece, its 33 minute length was a rather bulky way to end the late-night concert.

“Late Night with Bill Eddins” will be back in the 2013-14 Edmonton Symphony Orchestra calendar. No mention of chocolates, though.

The Cavern
2, 10169 104 Street
(780) 455-1336
Monday-Thursday 7am-8pm, Friday and Saturday 7am-11pm, Sunday 10am-5pm

Edmonton Symphony Orchestra
Winspear Centre, 4 Sir Winston Churchill Square

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