Keith Talent
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Posts posted by Keith Talent
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Anyone ever seen a BC roll outside of BC? I don't think I've ever eaten sushi outside of Vancouver.
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I can't be tricked into eating the scraps of a poor salmon. I'm suprised they haven't tried to flog a "salmon bone roll" or "Dorsal fin maki" BC Roll is a scam.
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I've recently read in numerous sources accounts of Tojo creating the California Roll here in Vancouver. Can anyone verify if this is true, or merely an urban legend that has gained traction. And if so, California rolls would be the only truly global foodstuff originating in our city, our philly cheese steak, or montreal smoked meat if you will.
And if so, why does Tojo not get the props he deserves? We all know the story behind the creation of Carpacchio, napolean cakes, the Bellini of Venice, why not California Rolls.
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Peas for risotto (nice and crisp, but at $1.99/lb they are not as cheap as I've seen at small produce stores - in fact I just saw some on Fraser and 49th for $0.99/lb).
The peas at Trout Lake, organic. On Fraser, not.
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Went to night market for the first time this year last night. Ate two outstanding things, two horrible things and some other meh/whatever things.
At the Taste of Thai booth I got green papaya with beef jerky salad. This was one of the best things I've recently eaten. Perfect sweet/salty/spicy balance. fresh and simple and at two bucks the best thing for the dollar ratio I've ever had. Across the isle is the only food stall without any english that makes a hot and sour soup I'm addicted to. Cellophane noodles, and brooth, then they start loading in the add ons, half of which I don't even recognize as food stuffs. The things I do recognize are spinach, mushrooms, chilis and strangely toasted wheat berries. Crunchy nutty things in the bottom.
Stay away from most dim sum, and barring any insight into which particular boothes to steer clear of all. Mmm, grizzle flavour shu mai. Actually, steer clear of any booth manned by the club kids looking to put a quick buck into their jeans and stick with boothes that look like they're run by food service pros.
Sadly, the hardest working man in unleavened egg based griddle cooked dough products isn't there this year, and without him egg balls are just overcooked waffles.
No fake fives, but someone did screw me out of a quarter by subbing a Korean 100 whatever piece. Ha! jokes on them, I'd have paid a loony for it.
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[ Pluis everyone above keeps consistently saying "Vancouver is awesome, Vancouver is great, easily on par with any great food city." And I don't think that's fair.
No it's not. Almost any city in Europe is better than Vancouver. New York and Las Vegas are better. Los Angeles is probably better. San Francisco is still better. Montreal is definately still better. But, really all the praise heaped on Vancouver is really just subtext for one thing; We're finally better than Toronto. And honestly, that all we as Vancouverites give a shit about. Once you recognize that all the hyperbole is really just an elaborate way for saying we're better than TO, it'll all make sense.
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Shums? That's some kind of joke I'm not getting, right?
Anyway, I may be wrong, but I find that Canadian chinese restaurants do way better takeaway than Chinese chinese restaurants. Know what I mean? There's probably some algorithm to deduce the inverse relationship between the quality of takeout vs. dine in. Places that I'd never sit down in seem to do a decent takeout. I suspect it's because "real" chinese was never intended to be eaten a half hour after leaving the wok, but the places catering to caucasians have factored the drive/delivery time into the cooking.
Or maybe I'm totally wrong.
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At the risk of offending our new Aussie friend just above, I don't have a recommendation, but I do have a prediction; You'll not rush out to buy a second bottle of sparkling shiraz.
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A) Are we certain that San Peligrino is 18 bucks a bottle? Thta sounds waaaay too wild to be true. And if so, when Rob buys a beer at a Canucks game, does he say "pfft, nine bucks, why not give it away free." I'd imagine the staff at Lumiere consider movie theatre soda quite reasonably priced.
B) If so, who here would question it? I'm 99% certain that I would. And it doesn't even need to be a confrontational conversation. "Uhh, I think your computer has made an error, it charge me 18 bucks a bottle for water." then soto voce, "you can buy retail for 1.50." I almost guarantee that if the topic was broached in that fashionthey'd adjust/remove the bill. I wouldn't pay it. I'd also make it my mission in life to make said restaurantuers life miserable. I despise more than anything being "nickeled and dimed".
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Anyone have any insight into the business model behind all these crap private liquor stores popping up on every corner. The cold beer stores attached to pubs I got, cold beer, extended hours. Then they started selling hard stuff. Whatever, I've never been short a fifth of cheap rum on a Sunday afternoon, but who am I to judge. But now, everytime I turn around there's one sprouting up like the twenty-first century equivilent of Starbucks in the nineties. And they all have alot of wine, but alot of bad wine at high prices. I'm so releived to know I can get Little Penguin Shiraz for twenty bucks should the desire overcome me. Why? Why so much wine? Why so much high end spirits? My Laugavualin habit is bad enough without adding another twenty bucks convience surcharge. Why?
It's like they've all seen Liberty and Marquis and decided "hey, we can do that too." Uhh, no you can't.
Are they all going to go bankrupt? I can't imagine the market can support them all.
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I'd say spending three hundred bucks and not being totally blown away would leave a bad taste in my mouth too. The fact is Feenie is a genius, and one bad meal at his restaurant is unacceptable. For better or worse, he's responsible in large part for our cities resurgent dining preeminince, and is the most visable face or "spiritual leader" of the movement, and unmet expectations are worse when they happen there opposed to anywhere else.
That all said I've not met alot of other people that have anything other than unreserved praise and admiration, perhaps it was a case of differing expectations and tastes. In my own case, I've eaten at Lumiere as sum total of three times, and have never experienced anything other than total bliss. The BBQ duck/foie soup does sound slightly overambitious though.
And lastly, I for one appreciate dissent on the board. This place is at its worst when we're all on the same page. Good for you Foodie girl for having the courage to defy conventional wisdom.
(edited to change dillybravo to foodie girl.)
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I worked at a restaurant where the dishwashers were called "goats" 'cuz they would eat anything !
That is the single most unattractive anecdote yet told on this forum. Bravo. It's no wonder you're so popular around here.
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We talking real Peking Duck? Multipart service and all that? Carved with a surgeons skill? And how much?
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This "let's rip off the tourists" mentality is of course not confined to Greece.
See most of Robson for further proof.
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modula1- Thanks alot for your thoughts on Szechuan Restaurant. I'm still eager to try it, sans kids of course, whiny little crybabies complain at a little japaleno, never mind numbing sichuan peppercorns. (For those without their hyberbole meter on, I'm kidding. Kids not liking spicy foods doesn't make them crybabies, it makes them normal. They are still whiny though.)
It looks like a set from Crouching Dargon Hiddden Tiger or whatever the hell that film was named. (Hero would make an excellent post-meal DVD selection, BTW.)
And take my comments re. Chinese desert with a grain of salt, especially that super delicious sichuan peppercorn flavoured salt that makes chicken taste so good.
Thanks for the reply.
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Anyone try the imaginatevly named new place on Saba Road "Szechwan Restaurant"? We've gone twice, once for dim sum and again tonight, but haven't actually eaten there yet. The dim sum line was too long. (It's hell to be a dim sum fan, yet also to refuse to stand in line. It pretty much ensures a lifetime of mediocre dim sum.) And tonight we didn't stay becuase the menu was too pricey for somewhere to take the kids. (The amount they eat is inversely proportional to the price. They could bankrupt me at Lumiere or Tojo's.)
The interior is gorgeous, all chinese antiques and private rooms. Prices are very expensive, ranging between 15 and 30 bucks, much higher for seafood (Xiandu Abalone & Turtle $688!)
I'm very interested in trying it, and would love to hear if anyone else has.
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Uhhh, it's not the names that are offputting with chinese deserts. As you know, I have nothing but respect and admiration for the chinese. Your culture is 6000 years old. You still haven't made a good desert. Maybe time to give up. Your culture has had untold triumphs, technological and artistic, sweets are not among them. They don't sound like science projects, they are science projects. No one with a clue about desert creation would think to themselves "yeah, this custard is pretty good. But it still needs something. Hmmm. I know! Beans! Yeah, if I throw some red beans in here, people will soon forget about the cakes of Vienna and the pastries of Paris, the Chinese will agian be triumphant!"
Two words. Bubble Tea. Stop it. Now.
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I think in a lot of ways, part of the problem may be endemic to all of North America, our appetite for more. More ingredients, more garnishes, more flavours, just more. The simple preparations would never fly here. The poor restauranteur would be broke in a week as the clueless braying masses would register their disappointment that the proscuitto bruschetta was a piece of ham on toast. Where's the roasted red peppers, the capers the fresh basil? What the hell kind of appetizer is ham on toast?
Plus you could never get bread good enough to pull off such a simple construct here. Maybe better to hide behind a thick smear of tapenade.
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Yeah, although I've never been to Greece I've been told that the food is totally different from Greek here. But the diference, here in Vancouver at least is our greek restuarants are uniformly crappy. We have lots and lots of italian-style resturants that are superb, with the unifying trait that the food is not really italian.
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I guess to answer my own question is that Italian food more than any other seems to be a cuisine of Place. You could probably piss a Frenchman off really bad by telling him that Italian food has more terroir than French.
Then again to contradict my own contradiction, Italian food in private homes here in Vancouver seems very Italian to me.
It's a weighty issue. Better minds than mine will need to adress it.
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I kinda like Nicks. Ducky said, "Of course the utter tackiness of the decor could be high-camp if intended ironically - but neither the surly staff nor the truckers, Hells Angels enforcers, and longshoreman that make up the clientele suggested to us that there was any irony at play here. Nor was any other humour in evidence" Uhh, that's what makes it good. If the irony was intended, it'd be just another group of irritating retro-hipsters. And we already have Main Street to satify that demographic. The fact that the clientele consider the food good, and the decor authentic makes it somewhat charming.
And I didn't want to post this, but discression isn't a strong suit. Does Vancouver really have a SINGLE good Italian spot? Yes we have restuarants that purport to serve Italian food that are quite good, but truthfully in all my time in Italy I've never seen anything resembling supposed Italian cuisine here in Vancouver, particularly in the casual low end. Yet the restaurantuers are Italian. Thet clearly know what they're doing.
In my opinion the biggest disconnect between a cuisine in it's homeland and the exported version is Italian. Chinese is like China, French is (almost) as it is in France, same with Japanese. Italian? Completely and totally different.
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Surely he's never spoken to real customers like he does on the show? I can beleive he's verbally abusive to staff, but the public? No way, he'd be in a fist fight once a week. Get a couple glasses of wine in some hothead, have Ramsay tell him to fuck off and it'd be on.
I can see him talking shit once the customer leaves, but to their face? No chance.
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Who here thinks they could differentiate Blue Raspberry from Black Raspberry in a blind tasting?
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No, there are plenty of cooling units that manage the variables, just like a wine cooler isn't a fridge in a furniture looking case. If you're not fortunate enough to have a basement where you can build a proper cellar, (damn Richmonds high water table, damn it to hell.) you can add a cooling/temperature control unit to a well insulated area creating a celler above ground.
California rolls
in Western Canada: Dining
Posted
He also invented the inside out technique that is so popular now? Not doubting the mans claims, but with historically signifacant research such as this collaboration with multiple sources is required.