jamiemaw

Flashback of the movie Tampopo! The quest to make the perfect ramen... If you've seen the movie before, do you remember the fat bald white man slurping his pasta when a group of ladies are taking etiquette lessons in a restaurant? He was a famous French pastry chef in Tokyo called Andre Lecomte. He had several high end patisseries in Tokyo and a restaurant in Ginza. Tokyo's celebrity chef of the 80's doing a cameo... Can you picture Thomas Keller doing a cameo in an indie movie?! ← The Forest Fire ramen at Kintaro (served on weekends) comes pretty close and there is a certain Tampopo-like frisson in the room.

Coincidentally I had marrow the other day. It had been removed from the bone, mixed with fine bread crumbs and garlic and replaced. Delicious: With the addtion of parsley it would have been even better. Pretty easy sale here.

I'm afraid the price disparities in many US markets force consumers' hands like yours, Robyn--it's just too expensive (3X) for many to take a stand. Where is the farmed product from? Canada, Chile, Europe? Thanks, Jamie

So there's hope yet that the Swedish Touch might do smorgasbord? ← Oh I'm sure you can get smorgasbord at the Swedish Touch! ← Good, because I'm too old for the Happy Meal.

I'm not sure as our budgie recently died.

Thank you very much for the praise which is entirely undeserved as I like to say in my usually falsely-modest way, Mum. A lot of people think the life of a restaurant critic or food writer (two completely different enterprises by the way) is endlessly glamourous--filled with great meals, fabulous babes and exotic wines. Of course they're absolutely right. Although they got it completely backwards at the restaurant I was at last night--the babes were exotic and the wines were fabulous. Quite a refreshing change, actually. • This is absolutely true. Metaphor=good; Adjectives=mainly bad. In the culinary journalism class I help out with at UBC, we sometimes play a game called Spot the Amateur. I select a few columns and amateur writings and read out paragraphs at random. The bellwethers are mainly adjectives, not syntax, and I tell them I'll have to kill them if they ever use these words: succulent (OK as a noun though), scrumptious, yummy, fare, decadent, eatery, transcendent, swimming, falling off the bone (we pefer to call that move the Full Jenna), or sinful. A few more random thoughts from the perspective of the restaurant critic, which answers in part some of the questions asked elsewhere on this thread. • We don’t go out of our way to trash businesses. In fact some of the worst kind of restaurant journalism occurs in Great Britain where sensationalistic articles are frequently based on only one visit. For a feature review, as I’ve stated before around here, we revisit a restaurant on enough occasions to ensure that we have tasted dishes sufficient to get full measure of the quality of food and service. If we feel we’ve been noticed, we often send in other editors. That being said, we'll be tough when we feel it's justified. • Job Hazards: We’ve had threats (we had to send the police to visit one deranged Greek restaurateur on a couple of occasions); threatened lawsuits; stalkers in our garden and, in one memorable incident, a six page letter from an Italian restaurant owner of some reputation that was so full of spitting invective that I have hung it in a place of honour. • Soup is the food critic’s friend. One sip and you can often read how the rest of the night is going to play out and if the kitchen is paying attention. • Of the approximately 1,000 restaurants that we review annually, about 130 are Asian. While not quite true to the actual proportion of Asian restaurants relative to their provincial population (quality Asian restaurants tend to drop off precipitously the farther you travel from an urban core), it does reflect the demographic of our readership. • There are some food critics who know something about food (and may have worked in a restaurant); some who can write; and some who understand the business of restaurateuring. Rare are those who are proficient at all three. There is the ‘I Came, I Ate, I Left’ school who attempt to simply reflect a sort of weird culinary shopping trip. Then there are the professional victims like Joanne Kates, who is in a class of her own. I hope that the Globe finds a way to stretch its restaurant reviews nationally; it has occurred to me that there are restaurants in cities other than Toronto and Mississauga. • This week I've spent about $1,100 in restaurants, a fairly busy week, but we're updating the Eating + Drinking Guide. • My weaknesses: Asian noodle soups. It's a quest and I'm still looking for the perfect bowl. Ditto perfect Coq au vin, Siberian peach pie and top-drawer chicken pot pie remain elusive as well.

So there's hope yet that the Swedish Touch might do smorgasbord?

The lack of information on foie gras de canard production (for much goes on behind closed doors) prodded me to see for myself in the summer of 2003. Encore un Foie? I’m certainly no expert on the production of foie gras, and, as much as I love the stuff have become an infrequent eater of it, especially after it became so very ubiquitous, even in inexpert hands (it deserved much better), a decade or more ago. I regret that it lost its purity, became a plaything -- even a cynical hamburger fixing. Whereas in France foie gras is a natural wintertime celebratory food (much is consumed between Christmas and New Year's), in North America it has become commodified, an item for Robb Report readers to add to their iconic lists like a vertical of Petrus, the lists that speak to excess cash flow seeking social validation. But not to sound a snot, for even if this class is bereft of good taste, let's assume that more than one of them knows what tastes good. Although some might say that these type of people only had kids so they could get pre-boarding, I have no opinion on the subject. But not to confuse the issue: Most people, especially those with more than a passing interest in food, eat foie gras because it is delicious and because its unctuous texture is like no other. Foie gras may soon join Chilean sea bass, swordfish, bluefin tuna and Caspian caviar amongst the verbotten for the Prius set, not for reason of endangerment, but rather for perceived cruelty. But what had struck me as I read the little available literature on the subject was the lack of firsthand information. Most people rendering their opinion, on either side of the issue, had not, it appeared, set foot anywhere near a foie gras production facility. It's safe to say that the foie reared in Quebec is exemplary; indeed many Canadian and American chefs who have worked with the three main products (Sonoma, Hudson Valley and Quebéçois) believe it the best foie product on the continent. I had the opportunity to inspect two foie gras de canard farms in Quebec last summer and was even allowed entré into the inner sanctum--the gavage sheds--which, for reasons of disease control and increasing political sensitivity, are usually off limits. The first farm, south of Montreal, was a fairly large scale commercial operation that is licensed to export product extra-provincially and into the US (and in fact supplies many eastern seaboard US restaurants). It was an unfettered production line with all stages of the process carried out in a carefully controlled environment. Diet, heat, humidity and light were fastidiously calibrated and constantly monitored by computer. It was also a scrupulously clean operation; the main fear being, because of the close quarters, a systemic outbreak of disease. As the ducklings matured toward gavage, their pre-migratory instinct to gorge was seemingly tricked into action (no matter the time of year--I was there the day before St. Jean-Baptiste Day in late June) via the steady diminishment of light and heat (imitating shorter autumn days), and diet deprivation followed by a spate of abundant feed; deprivation; feed. The gavage stage (heavily air-conditioned and humidified) was clinical but expertly managed (the speed of the technique is not learned overnight) from a mechanically-forced machine that follows the operator, although the ducks were held in restrictive individual pens within a shed the size of a small warehouse. The actual gavage took just a few seconds. The shed was cold and wet, and the ducks were certainly not running to be fed -- they couldn't budge. The pens were suspended above frequently flushed concrete floors; the shed smelled much as you might expect. Although the ducks did not appear to protest the gavage, which, again, was both swift and expert, there is simply no way—short of inviting Dr. Doolittle to the party—to know. (A little like being at the dentist with wadding and a rubber dam in your mouth when he asks you the quality check question). But neither did we see any evidence of animals squealing or otherwise behaving in an obviously distressed manner. Although I asked on more than one occasion, the precise (mainly corn) composition of diet for the ducks is closely guarded; it would be unfair to speculate what, if any, medications might or might not be added to their feed. But it was obvious even to an outsider that bacterial or viral disease could be commercially lethal to this type of closed facility. What struck me most about this operation though, was the very large size of the finished liver. At over 600 grams, the liver distends below the animal’s ribcage and has an exterior appearance, prior to their trip to the abbatoir, not unlike a human hernia poking through skin. This is the portion of the liver most likely to be damaged or bruised, et voila--pate. All of the parts of the duck carcass were packaged and sold, in large part to restaurants: the foie, trimmed breasts, legs en confit, pate, and the carcass for stock. The second farm, located near Quebec City, was a somewhat different story. This smaller producer, which used smaller, old (and picturesque) wooden sheds and barns, also revealed a slightly different methodology. The ducklings (hatched off-site) were allowed free range in outdoor pens before being moved indoors to the manipulated environment. But even that seemed a little friendlier: at this stage the ducklings were still allowed to roam in quite large rooms. The gavage was similar to the prior operation, but with an important difference: the feed was stopped when the livers were estimated to be at the 400 to 450 gram stage of growth for slaughter, and before any obvious distension had taken place. For regulatory reasons (and much like many of the province’s wonderful cheeses), their product is not available outside of Quebec, the only Canadian province where it is legal to produce foie gras de canard. The chef with whom I was traveling, Jean-Luc Boulay, who operates a restaurant in Quebec City called Le Saint’Amour, visited this operation regularly, as much, I came to feel, for his interest in the welfare of the animals as for the quality of the finished (smaller) product that they gave up. He seemed convinced that the smaller livers were superior—less likely to be granular—and that the ducks knew no suffering. Boulay regularly serves several variations—typical might be a homemade terrine with Sauternes jelly and fig pulp; squab stuffed with fresh foie gras; or foie gras seared with fleur de sel, its pan deglazed with cranberries and mango chutney. One can also order a foie gras plat combining several of these. Without for a minute wishing to prejudice anyone, having seen these two producers, I wouldn't eat from a foie over half a kilo. And because in a restaurant setting that’s nigh on impossible to verify, I choose to eat it no more. But that’s an entirely personal choice, albeit one I regretfully add to a growing list of other much-missed foods, especially that other luxe one, Caspian caviar. In fact, the last foie gras I ate was in Quebec City, early last summer, from the hand of the master Boulay. It was generous and seared quickly in a hot iron pan, with a top knot of good salt and a fresh, barely warmed compote of rhubarb that put sweaters on my teeth. Those perfect combinant flavours, plush under their crust and tinctured with the rhubarb, melted away slowly, and then forever.

With respect, I have collanders that hold more water than your argument and think perhaps that you're putting us on. To test its validity, one must only exaggerate it slightly: Extinct species do not adapt, they disappear. Don't believe me? Ask a dodo. Simply put, Man is the only species that has the power to eliminate all of the other species and in the process himself. We have already been successful in doing that one species at a time. This does not, however, make other species inferior, just different. The reason is that when are no other species, there will be no Man. It's misleading to think in terms of a 'food chain'--it's not. The ecology that supports our nervous little band of brothers and sisters looks much more like a web. Begin removing components of that web and . . . But Man is also the only species that can save himself from himself. That's called responsibilty, and it's a useful antidote to greed.

Here’s how it looks for us right now. I buy most of my fish from Dave Moorehead at Longliner Seafoods on Granville Island. The shop is about 40 metres from the ocean and half a kilometre from the Fishermens Wharf. At this time of the year though, that might be a little misleading. Most of the wild Spring (King) salmon is coming via reefer from Oregon. Moorehead estimates about a 48-hour turnaround. Sockeye in April is local-FAS (frozen at sea). There is no shame in FAS, as long as you admire the ‘quick-freeze, slow-thaw principle’; it’s barely indistinguishable from fresh product if properly handled. Pricing: Wild Spring at CDN $11 per pound (US $8.99) FAS Sockeye $7.50 per pound (US $6.14) In the summer, these prices will drop as local salmon comes to market. According to Moorehead, that fish will usually be less than 24 hours old by the time it hits the ice at Longliner and may even still be in rigor mortis. Some of the northern river-run salmon is brought live to market. Like a growing number of responsible fishmongers, Moorhead stopped selling farmed product some time ago. But it is currently selling in the range of $6 to $7 per pound (US $5.72). So the decision is a relatively easy one: With a little foresight, budget salmon-lovers can order FAS product for pennies more per serving than farmed and thaw it slowly in the refrigerator. The marketing challenge for the fishery is to convince consumers that FAS product is superior to farmed 'fresh'. At the restaurant level, of course, the challenge is the same, but must also address the inconsistent size of fish as well--the farmed product is a dimension-cut commodity like lumber and ideally suited to three-ring binder concept kitchens.

The current (April, 2005) issue of BC Business has an article by Mark Laba (the Province's restaurant reveiwer) entitled "In Flagrante Delicto". The cover banner reads--"An insider's take on the incestuous world of restaurant reviews". It purports to be a tell-all dish on the conflicts arising out of restaurant reviewing. Unfortunately, it's fairly evident that the piece has been "lawyered" half to death--it names few names, quotes anonymous sources as "two reliable sources" or "industry insiders" or uses obsolete illustrative examples from the years 2000 and 2004. One source it does quote, Don Genova, in a sidebar regarding called "Why I Don't Review Anymore" concerns the freebies he seemingly used to accept, but fails to disclose the real reason he literally moved on: Vancouver Island became his principal residence two years ago, so he did the honourable thing and excused himself. Like a weak restaurant, the article promises more than it delivers, but may still be a worthwhile read for those unfamiliar with some of the potential conflicts of interest available to restaurant reviewers; of course the same may be said about automotive, movie and, especially, travel writers. FYI, here's how we covered the same ground in December, 2003 I read a number of periodicals each week to stay abreast of what’s going on in the culinary world. They’re a combination of criticism and feature writing, because as several of you have said, oft-times multiple sources can triangulate a sensible conclusion. Wednesday Food sections of New York Times SF Chronicle Los Angeles Times Thursday Mia Stainsby Tim Pawsey Friday Angela Murrills Anthony Gismondi Saturday Wall Street Journal The Financial Times—Weekend FT—especially for Jancis Robinson Sunday AA Gill in the Sunday Times—for entertainment mainly I don’t as a rule read Jamie Maw because I agree with his fiancée that he is a lapsed sit-com writer (with a propensity for weak puns) whose turbid prose only occasionally intersects with what he ate for dinner. In fact, I trust the Victoria’s Secret catalogue much more than any opinions voiced by that lamentable shill Maw and you can quote me on that.

Wow. What a tremendous vindication for the Canadian fishery. The aptly-named Slavin also deals in Chilean sea bass, bluefin and a number of other endangered species. Perhaps even more frightening though, is how a spokesman for a major supplier of portioned fish product could be so formidably ignorant. It's exactly this kind of ignorance that has perpetuated the notion--at the consumer level--that if it smells like fish and swims like a fish it must be a fish. As anyone who has been anywhere remotely near a fish farm will tell you though, farmed salmon is decidedly not. Here it's reserved exclusively for tourists and drunks. Unfortunately, not only is the evidence increasingly conclusive that farms damage wild stock, especially through sea lice, it also has the effect of depressing prices for wild product, which has had an insidious effect on fishery incomes. If Mercedes dealerships were to begin selling Kias but with three stars on the bonnet, regulatory authorities would likely investigate. Now that your Eliot Spitzer has finished off the predatory thugs in other industries, perhaps the opportunity is at hand to clean up this sorry mess, and call it what it is--a fraud.

All awards programs--they that seek to judge--must themselves be judged both by their methodology and their inclusiveness. Former chairman of the restaurants' section of the Beard Awards John Mariani has some strongly held opinions and shares them here warts and all.

I recently had the pleasure of hosting James Chatto to half a week of eating in Vancouver. He was here to promote his new book The Greek for Love—A Memoir of Corfu. He has also authored The Man Who Ate Toronto, a chronicle about how New York-But-Managed-By-The-Swiss slipped the shackles of its meat-and-three-veg past. He is Canada’s most literate and graceful food writer and it was another pleasure to see that his and Lucy Waverman’s A Matter of Taste was nominated for a Beard Award. I hope they win—these awards and about $6 may be redeemed for a cleansing ale at many leading drinking establishments.

Sarah, the answer to your question is: Intermittently. A buzzer did go off in the ladies room and the statue pee'd too. Here's a regifting from 'My First Restaurant Job' . . . I began in the business as a busboy at The Attic in West Vancouver. It was shortly after the Crimean War, I believe. I was paid $1.25 per hour plus a share of tips from two waitresses--anywhere from $2 to $5 per night each, depending on many variables and their time of the month. My favourites were Teresa, who would eventually marry Jean-Claude Ramond, and Katie, who looked particularly endearing in her Klondike dress. I wore black pants and a green and gold lamé vest that reacted kindly to stains. For those of you who never visited The Attic, it pretty much looked like its name. It was decorated in a rather eclectic manner, to be polite, with fake Tiffany lamps, unmatched furniture and a male statue in the lady’s room that, when a fig leaf masking the male organ was touched, would pee a jet of cold water onto the curious babe. I got to mop it up. The managers, Charles (downstairs in the events and weekend brunch room called The Capilano Gardens) and Ian, were harsh invigilators, but Frank Baker was as cool with us as he was chatting up the ladies or blowing his trumpet. The night before he had his remaining teeth removed (the new ones would be installed a month later), he gave a last baleful toot. His sound would never be the same. But he was always the same, with a lot of kind words and a big drink in his hand, often entertaining celebs like Mitzi Gaynor after a show at The Cave. He wore white tie and tails every night for the floor show, with white shoes. But it was a cut above the regular Full Nanaimo. Hy Aisenstat, Jack Wasserman, Jack Webster and Denny Boyd were regulars, because the drinks were strong, severely discounted for pals and because it was just a short toboggan ride up Taylor Way to their homes. Downstairs, at the entrance, the silver James Bond Aston Martin sat polished under plexiglass. Quite a draw. But nothing like Lance Harrison and his Dixieland Band, who drank vodka with a splash of OJ on the back stoop between sets. To this day, I go out of my way to avoid banjo music. In time I was allowed access to the inner sanctum where Mr. Baker would entertain those pals and fabulous babes, bouffants like cotton candy, clasping whiskey sours over vertiginous bosoms. This was, I suppose, how I came to enjoy spectating the human condition. And at The Attic, the conditions were pretty good. The food was, well, interesting, the way you'd tell your Mum that the girl you took to the dance was “interesting”, I suppose. Soup, iceberg salads, steaks, ribs, chicken—pretty much proforma. The rubber tire tour bus crowd would roll in first on their way to the ferry—around 5 o’clock. They were served the “Staff Meal” which was invariably soup, griddled ham steak with a ring of Dole pineapple, and rice pilaf, which we didn’t exactly pronounce that way. One smart aleck caught me with my thumb in his soup when I not so carefully placed it down. “I hope you didn’t burn your thumb,” he said. “Well, no sir, it’s actually lukewarm.” And while I wasn’t actually fired for that remark, I did have to pearl dive for a couple of nights before going back on the floor. But hell, people weren’t there for the food. They were there for a night out, for some stiff drinks, a few jokes and some music, and maybe even a chance to spot a star. Eventually I cooked steaks, a great many steaks, in the little glass grill-room that protruded into the dining rooms. I loved it. We stuck little plastic cows of various colours—red, pink, beige and brown—into the steaks to indicate doneness. I’m sure the customers found it reassuring. I think my record was around 200 steaks in one evening. It must have been a payday Friday. West Vancouver was a dining desert then, with Peppi’s and a Chinese restaurant with an occidental name (Hennessy's) and just a few other places augmenting The White Spot. The real action was downtown at Hy’s at the Sands, The William Tell, The Cavalier Grill and The Roof. Frank Baker eventually lost The Attic, probably for a bunch of reasons, but mainly because he never changed the concept. The Aston Martin was famously auctioned off by the receiver. I guess people had moved on—to The Keg and elsewhere. His big time days over, Frank Baker made a comeback on Cambie Street, but it always seemed a bit half-hearted. His horn went finally quiet in 1989, his white suits packed away. The word flamboyant always seemed a bit small for him. In the summers Mr. Baker took us out for a staff party on his houseboat, the not-so-curiously named El Citta. The food was plentiful if familiar. We would push up Indian Arm at trolling speed, eating and drinking, into the summer shadows, and then suddenly, they were gone too.

Appreciator, I think that 'the plan' begins with education--our education. There can be little argument that, by first allowing ourselves to learn more about the inexact science of sustainability, then we can, in turn, elect how to communicate or act. All ot the actions that you mention lie within the power of any collaborative. But first, I would hope, a little learning. Our luncheon in June is being designed to initiate precisely that. Thanks for bringing forward these important questions. Jamie

O.K. I'll admit the journalistic standards aren't much but I still think The Province qualifies as a Sunday paper. ← Tough semantics, to be sure. Let's agree: It is published on Sunday, and it is made of paper. The other bits are trickier. The test in our family is whether you would wrap a fish in it. Out of respect, I would not wrap a fish in The Province.

Eat my grits. ← I should have thought that was the responsibility of the Gomery Inquiry.

I should have thought that exposing 90% of the plot would have required all of one sharply drawn sentence and a shallow breath. But I would like to retract a criticism that I levelled at the visionaries of Godiva's in its earlier thread. In it I likened their show to Married With Children at its zenith. I feel very badly about this and would like to offer my unconditional apologies to Ed O'Neill, Katey Sagal, Christina Applegate, David Faustino and the rest of the cast.

We will have some news next week about a special luncheon in late June to tackle the issue of sustainability, drink sustaining wine and take some sustenance. Watch this space.

Perhaps my memory's playing tricks, Deborah, wasn't it the chefs and service folks whom she interviewed that slagged Godiva's after they had viewed the promo tapes?

Forum Hosts please note: I had considered placing this in the Media Forum, however the information is so Vancouver-centric as to only be germane to this forum. The Globe launched its new 7 Entertainment Insert to its Vancouver circulation today. Featuring prominently was Alexandra Gill's column called Dish, which this week features chef Nico Scheurmans and the success of Chambar--complete with early growing pains. A profile of David Hawksworth accompanies, and there is a calendar sidebar. My own thoughts: I applaud this new direction--I thought it vigorously written and I welcome any style that supplements proforma restaurant reviewing (i.e. dining as shopping--I came, I ate, I left). There's some humour too, not a little mildly salicious content, and it takes the reader behind the swinging doors. I'd be interested in hearing your opinions. Jamie

One could only ask: Which lens?

For those of you interested, George Sui and Park Heffelfinger of Memphis Blues will be appearing on the Vicki Gabereau Show on Thursday afternoon. I believe that I am included in the money shot--the consumption of several spareribs while sounding like Meg Ryan in a restaurant. This is Vicki Gabereau's last week on CTV. In addition to co-hosting the Restaurant Awards for the last several years, she has been an outstanding supporter of chefs, winemakers, and cookbook authors, offering them one of few national platforms to show their chops. On behalf of many, our sincere thanks to Vicki. Jamie