The Cooking Chronicles: Man-loaf

This guest post was written by Mack, an Edmonton-based geek who fancies himself a part-time foodie. You can find him online at his blog, and on Twitter.

It all began a fortnight ago when I was hungry for some Grade A Alberta beef.

I decided to consult the 8-ball which told me to check with Sharon. She said she wanted meatloaf. So off we went to the gleaming silver mecca known as “The Superstore”. I wanted to buy Coke but Sharon forced me to buy ground beef instead. We also purchased the other necessary ingredients.

When we got back home, Sharon decided to kill a tree by printing off the recipe. I learned how to chop and onion and was surprised to find out that it didn’t cause me any tears. Sharon did most of the work and I was given the most difficult job of all – mixing everything together in the big bowl with my bare hands (grr).

Next, we got an epic fail for not having a pan to cook the meatloaf in. So we plopped it awkwardly on a tin-foil covered cookie sheet. We spread ketchup on top of the loaf and put it in the oven.

One hour later…(ding!)

We took it out of the oven and it looked pretty bad but it tasted good so I was glad. Like every other meatloaf I’ve had in my entire life, all I could taste was beef. The vegetables inside seemed to disappear. I’m convinced you could cook meatloaf with plutonium and it would still taste like meatloaf.

I still owe Sharon a meal. Maybe I’ll make veal!

Meatloaf with mixed vegetables and mashed potatoes

Going Through the Motions: The Blue Pear

I had heard a lot of good things about The Blue Pear (10643 123 Street) – a small boutique restaurant, their creative menu changed on a monthly basis to reflect seasonal ingredients. Of course, given that they only served four-course pre-fixe menus at $85 per person, it wasn’t the type of place I would pick for a spontaneous dinner. With July’s Fork Fest, however, the $35 three-course meal was a great opportunity to give The Blue Pear a try without breaking the bank.

Mack and I had a reservation for 6pm on Thursday. The restaurant offers seatings every half hour, but because it was still relatively early, I was surprised that there were already a few parties in the dining room. The friendly hostess seated us in a dim corner, and left us with the wine list and the food menu, which included the Fork Fest specials at the top. I ordered a Sangria ($7) to start – a blend of red wine, fruit juices, and orange brandy – while Mack opted for a glass of Stella ($6), and we both asked for the Fork Fest meal.

Through the course of the evening, we were served by four different people. This could have made us feel taken care of, but the opposite actually occurred – the service as a whole was less personal and attentive because of the number of hands involved.

At any rate, our appetizer arrived promptly with the verbal promise of bread to come. The layered salad of marinated summer vegetables and fresh mozzarella was finished with a dressing of sundried tomatoes, herbs, and balsamic and mustard oil. The cheese overwhelmed the carrot, eggplant, roasted red pepper and zucchini, but I didn’t mind this as much as Mack did. Our bread didn’t arrive until after we requested it when our entrees were brought to us.

Marinated summer vegetables, mozzarella cheese, sun-dried tomato, herbs balsamic and mustard oil

Thankfully, the grilled Alberta pike fillet made us forget temporarily about the need for any carbs. Perfectly seared, the fish was flaky and tender on the inside. Served with a Bobby Flay-esque corn and black bean salsa and a deliciously rich herb butter sauce, the dish showcased well what the chef was capable of.

Grilled Alberta pike fillet with prawn, corn and black bean salsa, horseradish mashed potato and herb butter sauce

Dessert was a flourless chocolate cake topped with whipped cream, fennel and slivers of basil and accompanied by rosewater almond cream, milk chocolate rosemary sauce and basil oil. We both found the shredded basil an interesting garnish, one that Mack would have preferred left off his last course. The cake itself was lovely – sweet and dense as a flourless cake should be, with an intense chocolate flavour.

Flourless chocolate cake, confit of fennel, rosewater almond cream, milk chocolate rosemary sauce and basil oil

At dinner’s end, Mack said it felt like something was missing, as if the staff were just “going through the motions”. I couldn’t disagree – compared with our recent visit to Characters, Blue Pear just didn’t offer us the experience we were looking for. The food was great, but I’m not sure I’d return for an $85 meal.

The Blue Pear
10643 123 Street, 780.482.7178
Dinner only, Wednesday to Sunday from 5pm

The Cooking Chronicles: Coconut-Oatmeal Bars with Chocolate Chips

Dickson gave me a cookbook as a part of my birthday present this year. Titled Food 2.0: Secrets from the Chef Who Fed Google, Charlie Ayers shares his secrets of harnessing fresh ingredients for healthy, delicious “brain food”.

I tried my first recipe from the book today: Coconut-Oatmeal Bars with Chocolate Chips, meant by Ayers to be a breakfast option on the run. As usual, poor planning on my part meant I rushed the melting/cooling process of the butter to room temperature, and actually ended up warming and cooling the butter several times because I left it so long it solidified again. I’m sure this was the main reason why the mixture ended up with a foamy substance on top as it baked in the oven, but it didn’t seem to affect the final product too much.

I was a little too eager to slice into it, and should have waited longer, as the crumbly triangles attested. Taste-wise, the coconut and oatmeal were the strongest flavours, and though the bar itself appears to be healthy with the addition of the latter ingredient, I’d be more likely to snack on this than have it for breakfast. It’s definitely something I’ll make again though!

Coconut-Oatmeal Bars with Chocolate Chips

Chinatown: Bakery Favourites

Aside from supermarket treats, another stalwart Chinatown tradition from my youth were trips to Chinese bakeries. For just a few dollars, a box of sweet or savoury pastries could be mixed and matched to your heart’s content.

They have fruit cakes too!

While the giant T & T Supermarket (#2580, 8882 170 Street) in West Edmonton Mall makes it convenient by individually wrapping buns, I have to admit my favourite bakery in the city is Garden Bakery (10019 106 Avenue) because of their self-serve set-up. With a tray in one hand and a pair of small tongs in the other, there’s nothing like having to fight the urge to stack just one more filled pastry on top of your already bursting portion.

A few of my family’s picks:

Chopstick Doughnuts, deep fried until they’re crispy on the outside but still soft and chewy on the inside, are great served with congee.

Mini Pork Dumplings, also deep fried, are best eaten on the same day they’re purchased. Felicia’s favourite, they’re also a popular item served at dim sum.

Sesame Red Bean Balls are death, if not only because I can never seem to stop after eating one. The creamy, sweet red bean paste in the centre is complimented by the savoury crispness of the exterior.

Amanda’s favourite Swiss Rolls are individually packaged to preserve the fresh sponge cake separating layers of light cream. The cake is also sold in larger rolls.

Mini Cocktail Buns are my Dad’s favourite because of their smooth coconut filling.

Mini Cream Buns, filled with a rich, illustrious pastry cream then dusted with coconut, are always a showstopper.

Steamed BBQ Pork Buns, shown here in a cooler and ready to be heated, are a dim sum favourite of mine. But should you not have time to sit down for a meal, are available at the bakery to grab-and-go.

Last but certainly not least – Egg Tarts. The creamy custard is worth a trip to the bakery alone.

Given that my office is just a few minutes away from the bakery, it’ll be too tempting not to just pop in now and then for an immediately satisfying treat.

Take it to the Streets: Old Strathcona Fashion Extravaganza, Street Sale & Art Walk

I remember having intentions to visit last summer’s Whyte Avenue Street Sale, but never got around to it. So this year, I jumped at the chance to kill three birds with one stone – namely, the Old Strathcona Art Walk, Fashion Extravaganza, and of course, the opportunity to shop on pavement.

The weather was perfectly glorious for outdoor activities of any kind on Sunday, including the open-air catwalk that greeted us at 82nd and Gateway Boulevard. As my sister predicted, the fashion show turned out to be rather “lame” – the DJ had a preference for one-hit dance tunes from the 90s, some of the models left the stage before the announcer was finished with their outfit label rundown, and tags on some items were clearly visible from the crowd. On the bright side, much improvement can and will happen should the event be repeated in the future (here’s a video clip courtesy of Mack’s Flip if you’re interested).

Crowded runway

Model

We continued down the street, pausing on occasion to peruse discounted wares in addition to displays set up by local artists participating in the Art Walk. Perhaps it’s too cliché or tourist-oriented, but I was expecting to see more pieces devoted to Edmonton’s land or cityscape for sale.

Street sale

A kayak, anyone?

How about a turtle?

Art Walk

More art for sale

Mack can never avoid the beckoning call of mini doughnuts

We also wandered into a number of stores. Notable was Ten Thousand Villages (10432 82 Avenue), where Mack found a visor that was perfect for him, and Eden Lilly (10416 82 Avenue), which carries a line of locally-designed cards that were too cheeky not to photographically commemorate.

Coke visor!

Double take? (Cards by Brulak Design Studio, available in 11 locations in Edmonton)

On our way back north, we noticed that the High Level Bridge waterfall was on as it had been earlier in the day (yesterday was also the Sourdough River Festival – it amazes me how many events took place on one day). We scrambled to park the car so we could take pictures (and a video!).

Beautiful

By late afternoon, we had built up quite the appetite. Thankfully, we had tickets to Edmonton’s Countryside Taste of Summer event.

Food Notes

The second of my FoodTV posts went live on the website today. I wrote it way back in May, just after Sobeys Urban Fresh opened. After I had some more time to think about the store, I drafted this post, which more accurately captures my feeling about the “urban fresh” concept.
Original Fare’s ForkFest started this week! To my surprise, the website has already uploaded most of the participants’ set menus. Though there will always be people wanting to eat out in restaurants, I do wonder why they decided to run their feature event so close (and next week, overlapping) with Taste of Edmonton and Capital Ex.
I don’t go to breakfast buffets often, just because I find I can’t eat that much first thing in the morning, but if you can, perhaps the Sunday Brunch at the River Cree Resort, as reviewed by Richard Helm, is worth checking out.
“Splash plugs”, which I mentioned back in April, have arrived at Starbucks locations in Edmonton (or at least, the 109th Street/Jasper Ave location). What a waste.
Congratulations to Bob Blumer of Food Network’s Glutton for Punishment who broke the Guinness World Record for most pancakes made in an hour in Calgary last Thursday. He made 559 pancakes in total, all of equal diameter and thickness without any burnt edges. The episode capturing his victory will air some time next spring.
I can’t wait to try this so-called “perfect” chocolate chip cookie recipe, cobbled together from the wisdom of many experts in the field.
Also from the New York Times, a story about an innovative program for juvenile delinquents to gain employable skills by refurbishing old diners. The community liaison likens the program to be the “Home Depot of the correctional system.” Hee.
Lastly, an update on our President’s Choice chip-off: the Buffalo Wings and Blue Cheese flavour taste like exactly that – spicy, with a blue cheese kick. My favourite (and Mack’s) ended up being General Tao Chicken.

The Cooking Chronicles: Cinnamon Sticky Biscuits

I originally saw Julie van Rosendaal’s recipe for Cinnamon Sticky Biscuits in a print magazine, but lucky enough, it was also available on her blog, Dinner with Julie (it was profiled in the Journal a few months ago). I felt like a sweet dessert on Friday, and it seemed like a good recipe to try on a cool summer evening.

Except for lining the pan with parchment, and attempting (and failing) to roll out the dough with a rolling pin instead of patting it into a rectangle, I followed all of the directions as listed. Twenty minutes later, the oven yielded a bubbling pan of golden cinnamon buns.

I was expecting a biscuit-like consistency from the buns, but it actually tasted more like a cross between a biscuit and a regular bread-dough cinnamon bun, meaning that it took some getting used to. I wasn’t a huge fan of the sticky brown sugar, honey, and butter topping – it hardened quite quickly into a crunchy, chewy candy-like confection that didn’t go well with the softer texture of the biscuits.

This would be a great go-to recipe to pull out for an afternoon tea, rainy-day activity with the kids (they can help mix the dough or help top the rolled-out dough), or when you’re looking for a quick after-dinner treat.

Cinnamon Sticky Biscuits

Value Meal, Italian-Style: Italian Bakery

Wanting something other than what was waiting for me in the communal fridge, I headed to the Italian Bakery (10646 97 Street), hoping it would live up to the fantastic review in Vue Weekly two months ago.

Italian Bakery & Delicatessen

A modest line greeted me at the deli counter. A number slip indicated I was just three away from a custom sandwich built the way I wanted – and cheaper than the average supermarket pre-packed variety. A small (with 1 meat and 1 cheese) is just $2.50, a medium (with up to 2 meats and 1 cheese) is priced at $3, while a large (with 2 meats and 1 cheese) is $5, all garnished with either mayo, mustard, or vegetable spread and banana peppers if so desired. Saran wrapped for no hassle travel, it would be the perfect sandwich to take on a picnic, or in my case, provide a reprieve from a lunch of weekday leftovers.

Deli counter

The time in line was actually a blessing in disguise, as it gave me some breathing room to decide which meat and cheese combination I wanted to try. After some deliberation, I chose chicken breast and German butter cheese to be paired with vegetable spread. One of the three behind-the-counter deli ladies (each with their own individual slicing machines) efficiently took my order and assembled my sandwich. I marvelled at how all of the employees were so cheery and friendly despite the growing crowd of hungry customers.

Also prompted by the review, I asked for a single slice of tiramisu ($2.50). With my meal ready, I snagged one of the three tables situated against the window (great for people watching) and dug in.

Small sandwich and tiramisu

The freshness of the bread was apparent, and with the accoutrements, it made me wonder why I had ever made a fuss over Pret a Manger‘s looks-better-than-it-tastes paper and plastic-encased sandwiches. As for the cake, the bottom half of the tiramisu was exactly what I was expecting – a coffee-soaked layer of homemade ladyfingers accented with a rich marscapone cream. My only wish was for the top half to have had an equal amount of spongy coffee goodness, instead of a dry cookie layer as it was.

While I can’t definitively say the Italian Bakery has the best meal deal in the area, it would at the very least find a place on the podium of values.

Food Notes

Eating local is all the rage now, so much so that it seems events galore – from cooking classes, tours, and sampling fairs – are a weekly affair. Edmonton’s Countryside TASTE! of Summer is such an event, taking place July 13 at the St. Albert Grain Elevator Park. There will be live entertainment, a small market, and Taste of Edmonton-esque food booths. Tickets on sale at Ticketmaster and at the gate.
Another Edmonton trend that continues is “upscale” packaged dinners. Following in the footsteps of Wild Tangerine and Culina‘s Frozen Dinners, Bacon is now offering take-away dinners Tuesday through Saturday – $14 for a frozen entree, salad and dessert, packed in a biodegradable container.
I’m quite excited to check out Sip! The Wine and Food Experience at CapitalEx, July 17-26. Over 150 alcoholic beverages will be on hand to sample, but of course, I am mostly looking forward to the food pairings. The menu is here, while the schedule for special guest appearances is here.
My appointment television for the summer: The Next Food Network Star, showing on Wednesdays at 8pm MT. While I wished our episodes ran on par with the American channel, I can’t complain about the content of the show. In its last incarnation, I think the draw for me was the celebrity judges (Bobby Flay, Giada de Laurentiis, Rachael Ray), but this year, I’m actually more interested in seeing how the contestants fare in the challenges. It’s still too early to pick a favourite though.
Mack and I have been slowly working our way through the irresistible silver-packaged President’s Choice-branded chips. The first flavour we tried – General Tao Chicken – has actually been our favourite thus far; Szechwan was too mild and Smokin’ Stampede much too spicy. Waiting to be sampled on the kitchen table: Buffalo Wings and Blue Cheese.
Just before joining the lineup to await the grand opening of the Apple Store on Saturday, Mack and I tried the new Homestyle Hash Brown from Tim Hortons. It’s just about the only thing from a fast food outlet that remotely resembles the pictures I’ve seen in advertisements. Unfortunately, it didn’t taste as good as they described – the seasoning actually made it taste worse than the more plain McDonald’s version.
Shaken, not stirred: Before the fondue party, Annie and I chowed down on the new Maple Leaf Pasta Shakers. “Fresh” pre-cooked pasta, a light dressing, a package of sundried tomatoes, and vacuum sealed chicken are vigorously shaken together (that was the fun part) for an easy meal. The pasta was a bit scary-looking, as one would expect processed, preserved pasta to be, but appearance aside, it wasn’t bad, both portion and taste-wise.

Mediterranean Chicken Pasta Shaker

The Cooking Chronicles: Chocolate Fondue Night

Annie graciously hosted a chocolate fondue party on Sunday night, something she has been wanting to do for some time.

While Janice and Annie cut up fruit we had purchased that afternoon, I got to work on preparing the chocolate base in a double boiler. Using Rachael Ray’s recipe as a guide, I melted together milk chocolate melting wafers, squares of dark chocolate, some whipping cream, and a dash of Baileys. Having never tried chocolate fondue before, I wasn’t sure what consistency to aim for, but as we could add chocolate and/or cream to the mixture anytime, I wasn’t too concerned. I transferred the concoction to the ceramic fondue pot, and surrounded by bowls of fresh fruit, cookies and sweets, the dessert looked positively inviting.

Count me surprised that the tiny tealight was able to keep the mixture bubbling, even to the point where we were able to easily melt in more chocolate to top off what we had. Between the strawberries, cantaloupe, bananas, peaches, and apple slices, I liked the latter fruit the best – the crunchy texture suited the dipping exercise nicely. Chocolate-dipped Teddy Grahams weren’t bad as well, though the chocolate-chunk coated cookies were a bit too sweet, even for me. The fondue experience was not only fun, but I ended up feeling more full than I expected – it turns out one can eat quite a bit when everything is coated in chocolate.

Thanks Annie for hosting the party!