Sheryl Kirby

Bye Bye Beep

Okay, so it was never a healthy drink. On par with Tang, Sunny D or Kool-Aid, Beep was mostly sugar with some juice thrown in, but for many Nova Scotian kids, it was the beverage of choice.

I haven’t had the stuff since my early 20s. Even after I moved to Toronto, my folks would always buy a carton of Beep for me when I was back in Halifax for a visit. And then one time I forgot about it, or maybe my tastes and attitude had changed and I told them not to bother, I can’t remember.

But when news came down that Farmers Dairy was shutting down production of the lurid orange fruit drink, I think we all heaved a nostalgic sigh for childhood innocence. And started remembering the stuff with fondness.

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Sunday Brunch – Le Select Bistro

Le Select Bistro
432 Wellington Street West
416-596-6405
Brunch for two with all taxes, tip and coffee: $60

I haven’t been to Le Select since they moved to the Wellington Street West location some three years ago. Once a landmark on Queen West, the restaurant there was tiny and narrow. This new space is easily double the size indoors, plus there’s a gorgeous terrace out front (well, it’s probably gorgeous in the summer) and a large garden patio in the back. Slightly off the beaten path for those of us who travel on foot or by TTC, their website reiterates the close proximity to lots of parking, which isn’t actually endearing to me, but apparently is to everyone else who can’t live without their gas-guzzler, because on a recent Sunday morning, Le Select is packed and the parking lot across the street is nearly full, despite the ongoing rain.

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Lady Marmalade

The text across the shard of pottery says “Marmala”. The rest of the centuries-old stoneware jar is missing, presumably still buried somewhere here at Fort York where it has been sitting in the ground since the mid-1800s. We are told that children who visit the fort on school tours don’t know what marmalade is, which seems a terrible shame.

I am at the “Mad For Marmalade, Crazy For Citrus” event at Historic Fort York, the third annual event, produced by the fort and the Culinary Historians of Ontario, that celebrates all things marmalade.

This isn’t your typical Toronto food event – aside from myself and Sarah B. Hood of Toronto Tasting Notes, there are no bloggers, no writers, no “foodies” here for the free samples. Instead there are about 80 people, many part of the above-50 set, who are all here to learn – or share their knowledge – about that most delectable of preserves, marmalade.

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Old Punk Rockers Never Die

Okay, well, technically they do, eventually.

Last night, Greg and I attended a photo exhibit called Toronto Calling, of photos of concerts that took place in the early 80s in Toronto featuring bands like the Clash and the Ramones. We didn’t actually stick around to see the photos, though, as the gallery space was packed solid with old punk rockers, so much so that we couldn’t get in to see the photos.

The era in question took place before my time in Toronto, with most of the gigs featured taking place between 1979 -1981. I arrived in Toronto in late ’87, so this was not my scene per se, although I was listening to all of these bands back home in Halifax, a no-man’s land when it came to international tours. Hats off to Billy Idol for not forgetting about us in 1984.

But the remarkable thing was that here was a group of people in their late 40s – early 50s… and there was a still a solid punk vibe going on. Piercings, tattoos, oddly-coloured hair. These folks were still flying the freak flag.

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Sunday Brunch – Cowbell

Cowbell
1564 Queen Street West
416-849-1095
Brunch for two with all taxes, tip and coffee: $50

Since it opened in 2007, Cowbell has never been open on Sunday. Chef/owner Mark Cutrara set that day aside to spend with his family. The idea of Sunday being family day is a big one in the Parkdale neighbourhood where the restaurant is located, however, and brunch is possibly more popular here than anywhere else in the city, with Gen X and Y hipsters from the area looking for a way to get out of the house and have a reasonably priced meal with their kids without resorting to a fast food chain.

So Cutrara’s decision to open for Sunday brunch (with Saturday service also being considered) offered both locals (and not so locals) another brunch option; this one made with regional, sustainable ingredients; and also kid-friendly, although maybe not so much of the “frenzied daycare” vibe one might get from neighbouring brunch haunts where hipsters sit around and compare their latest tattoos while setting their kids free to terrorize staff and other customers. Cowbell is not the kind of place where you let the rugrats run free.

Instead, it’s a fun, quirky brunch spot with some seriously awesome food and just enough cuteness to not feel stuffy.

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Changing It Up

This past Thursday night, 250 lucky people trekked through the snow to attend Foodshare’s Recipe For Change fundraising event. I say lucky because the event sold out and many people found themselves on a waiting list, but also because some of Toronto’s top chefs were on hand with delicious treats for guests to enjoy.

The event raised funds for the Field to Table Schools program which brings food literacy back to students from Junior Kindergarten to Grade 12.

Held in Foodshare’s warehouse at their Croatia Street offices (the same space where the weekly Good Food Boxes get packed), the room was simply but elegantly decorated, with plenty of seats (no, really, there’s usually never enough seats or tables at these things – I always threaten to come wearing a toolbelt to hold my camera, notebook, wineglass and cutlery) and plenty of good stuff to eat. Our only minor complaint was the lighting, which, while it made the room look fantastic, was not so photo-friendly. As such, I don’t have photos of everything that was offered (the full menu is available on the Foodshare website), but hopefully these will inspire readers to support both Foodshare and the great work they do as well as the many chefs and restaurants who donated their time and product to this event.

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Crazy Pineapple Lady

Last night, Greg and I went for dinner at a local Indian dosa place in the far reaches of our ‘hood.

I used to go to this restaurant about once a month or so when my friend Melissa lived nearby. She was home during the day, so I’d walk up to her place and we’d go for dosa then do some shopping at the mall. When she moved to New York state, I had little reason to be in that part of the ‘hood, and hadn’t been back to this restaurant in a couple of years.

One of the things I always ordered was a pineapple uppatham. Similar to a dosa in that it was like a huge airy crepe, this was made by mixing chunks of pineapple into the batter before it was cooked. But it seems that I was the only one who ever ordered it and the owner took it off the menu during the time we were regulars there. There were plenty of other great things on the menu so it wasn’t a huge deal, but it’s always been my favourite.

Last night when we were there, the owner came over to take our order and recognized me. “You used to order the pineapple uppatham,” she said, “I have pineapple today, you want me to make one for you?”

Awesome!

I was delighted, of course – not just that I was getting my favourite dish that was no longer on the menu, but that she had even remembered me.

I relished every bite, dipping the airy crepe and chunks of pineapple through the spicy coconut chutney that accompanied the uppatham.

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Getting Grubby

Grow Great Grub: Organic Food from Small Spaces
Gayla Trail
Clarkson Potter, paperback, copyright 2010, 207 pages, $19.95

It’s a romantic notion to think that we could all move to the country and start a farm. The fact is, the majority of people live in cities out of necessity, and few of us have space for a huge garden. But Gayla Trail thinks that fact shouldn’t stop us, and that most people have a little bit of space, whether it’s a yard, a balcony or a fire escape, in which to grow great grub.

Trail’s book is an excellent primer for anyone looking to get started on their own organic garden. Concepts and directions are presented in a straight-forward, down to earth manner that is welcoming to even the most alternative of personalities – and which will speak more to hipster than horticultural society matron. In fact there are a few passages that were even a bit shocking to me, such as the chapter where Trail discusses companion planting and uses the analogy of sticking “Jesus-loving uncle Bill next to your abortion doctor sister-in-law” at a wedding. Funny stuff, but it might offend anyone picking this up without being familiar with Trail’s style of writing.

Grow Great Grub touches on all the basics of gardening in small spaces, from how to build boxes or plant potatoes in garbage bins to creating great compost. A small section on community gardens and guerrilla gardens offers more alternatives to those with no space of their own, and Torontonians will recognize photos of some of the garden spaces included in the book from various spots around the city, particularly Queen West and Parkdale.

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Egg Head

I don’t recall eating store-bought eggs growing up. Surely there must have been times when we did, but I never really remember anyone buying them. What I mostly remember is my father coming home late from work every few weeks with a couple dozen eggs procured from a farm just outside the Halifax city limits. There wasn’t a lot of debate about why we went directly to a farm for eggs, and if there had been, I’m not sure it would have been of the “support local farmers” ilk. I suspect it was more that the eggs were cheaper than supermarket eggs, although, in retrospect, the gasoline used to go and get the things probably negated any savings.

And as a kid, I would have been hard-pressed to be able to tell the difference between farm and factory eggs, although the farm eggs (that never went to a grading station) occasionally turned out messy half-fertilized chicks that grossed out my brother and I.

As a grown-up, I buy supermarket eggs because they’re more convenient and because all three of the stores within walking distance of me carry some version of organic, free-run eggs. These are obviously not ideal in that the chickens are not free-range (aka. let outside to eat bugs and run in the sunshine) but are definitely superior in both flavour and ethics to the battery-caged industrial eggs that are more readily available.

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A Toast to the Roast

A few years ago, Toronto was all over the communal dining trend. Restaurants installed big harvest tables and hoped that customers would not just bump elbows but start up a conversation with one another. But because Torontonians are mostly of the “keep to yourself, mind your own business” variety, the communal table wasn’t a huge success when it came to the average customer.

So what to do with those big old harvest tables that customers avoid like the plague? Unless a restaurant can book a large group to take over the thing, it’s kind of like a no man’s land.

Thank heavens for the resurgence of comfort food and lots of talk in the press about the importance of family dining. The idea of Sunday dinner is often romanticized by chefs like Gordon Ramsay who once created a campaign in conjunction with his F-Word series to get Britons to go back to the tradition of Sunday dinner.

It’s not a bad idea, really – most people enjoy eating a big ol’ roast – it’s all the prep and cooking that sucks the fun out of it. So a number of restaurants are now serving up family-style meals, often on Sunday, and usually, but not always, communal. Here’s a few that we found…

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