Zucchini Mama

Dear Ann, Glad you like the posts. There seem to be a lot of us in these threads with children the same age. I would be fun to have a mom's night out together sometime. The Main actually does a decent weekend brunch. I really like their crab and avocado eggs Benny. It has a child-friendly Greek-Canadian pub atmosphere at that time, and earlier on in the evenings. (We often just go really early to places in the evening and find that better for dining out with kids, as you probably know.) The Sawasdee Thai place near us at 4250 Main Street is totally child-friendly. The service is great and the food is a good value. P. and I like the deep fried ocean perch with all kinds of yummy sauce on it. One of my absolute favorite places on Main is Chutney Villa, with lots of child-friendly snacks on the menu, but it's a bit pricier, so I like to save it for a romantic night out. I also like to take the bus up to the Punjabi Market, but do you know where the best place to eat up there is? I'm try to widen my curry reperatoire in the kitchen, so have been heading up there for ingredients. All India Sweets is child-friendly, but I'm a bit bored with it. I'm always on the lookout for places to have lunch with my boy around town, so I would love to hear postings on that subject-in my neighborhood and others. Stay tune for more detailed postings of our neighborhood joints. Zuke Oh, and once in a while we get take-away wings from WING NUTS. They have a simply spiced version and my son loves them! I like the honey Dijon.

Dear B.C., You can mix and match the cheeses and yes, they have port style wines. Actually, it's all on their fabulous web site <www.aurorabistro.ca/dessert.htm>. I e-mailed a question to them last week and the chef e-mailed me back himself! Great service, eh? You must go. It's so great! Zuke

Romance at Aurora When you have had a hard week, you ask your boyfriend to take you to Aurora Bistro. P's next door at Pulp Fiction books while I preview the new wine list. Now I'm excited. This wine menu is all B.C. and I like the way they've hi-lighted some of their favorite choices. There is a good selection by the glass so you can try a few different ones and then pop down to Dunbar and 41st to buy a bottle or two. I can tell by the new menu they have developed a strong identity and made a stronger commitment to local wine and food. There is even a list of B.C. cheese, with their own little sides which bring out the unique flavors of each one. I'm over the moon! I ordered the Salad of hazelmere Organic Beets and Blood Oranges with arugula and chive blossom vinaigrette. It amuses me so much that pickled beets are given such rarified treatment here. They are cut into thick strips and stacked up log-cabin style with an accompaniment of three tiny pieces of blood orange). My mom's pickled beets were really too beautiful to keep in the root cellar. When we ate them, they weren't given there own course, just plopped on the side of the plate where they seeped into the edges of the potato salad, tingeing it bright purple. For this reason, and for the earthy sweet and tart bite they deserve this blood-orange duet on their own plate. I bet that's blood orange peel in the butter and bloody good bread, too. I start with the Cipes "Aurora" Brut: floral, dry, light and summery. That's because its Summerhill Pyramid winery- can you feel the vibrations? We share Fanny Bay Oysters breaded with lentil flour and served with curried aioli and plum chutney. Yes! I could have stopped right there and ordered two more plates. P's warm goat cheese and pear slice were classic. He had that sexy cherry red sports car blush. I'm not even going to tell you what it is, because (even thought I can't afford it) I want it all!!!! This is why I could never be a food critic. Je suis méchant. For my main course, I had a glass of the Hainle Zweigelt, which is fantastic. I find there's a bit of a longstanding wine storage issue here at Aurora. Their reds are almost always served a touch warmer than they should be. Anyway, the Hainle is a big surprise. It's got tons of big Bing Cherry on the nose and more weight than usual in this varietal. Full of bon ami. My vegetarian strudel was decadent. Flaky pastry criss-crossed over sweet potato and onion mixture that weren't baked to a mush the way it is when I try to do it. The morel sauce kept it savory-balanced it out and gave it elegance. P. loved his halibut. For dessert I had the Vanilla Bean Pannacotta with pistachio cream, chocolate salad, and pistachio brittle. I love the idea of a chocolate salad!!! The contrast in textures were what makes it a stellar dessert-creamy, wobbly, crunchy. So much cheese to choose from, so little time. My partner in fromage had Meadow Mountain sheep cheese with a golden fig compote. The descriptions of the types of cheese were very helpful. I'm so glad Aurora is in our neighborhood. It's casual enough for the guy at the next table to wear a baseball cap, but fancy enough to feel like a real treat. The decor is witty and unpretentious in its glitzed up plywood kind of way. We gotta go here more often! It's good for our relationship! Zucchini Mama says eat yer chocolate greens.

edm Posted Mar 24 2005, 03:57 PM " i think we should go all there and tell them that its crap. BOYCOT the goddamn BG, Cobs, starbucks, safeway,etc that abuse our vigilance by playing on the convenience factor. Support our local businesses that support our local farmers and growers!!!" I agree! Solly's makes great pumpkin chocolate chip muffins that are out of this world when the chips are still soft from the oven. Maybe we need to give out some eGullet awards-the picks and the pans! Zuke

Hey folks, my favorite recent dessert is the Double Beet Chocolate Cake (warmed slightly) with copious amounts of whipped cream at Aphrodite Café, 3598 W4th Ave (at Dunbar). It's farm-girl delicious! Their carrot ginger soup is also soul-warming. Some of you mentioned Sweet Revenge on Main. I haven't been impressed by their desserts, but they have a good selection of teas and I like the cosy atmosphere. I go there to write sometimes, and I like their pear bread pudding with creme anglaise. Zuke My son wants to end it on a happy note as I write this with him sitting on my knee!

Why is my 'spidey sense' tingling? -------------------- Signed - Lee Now, CIAO DOWN!!!! 'Cause that's the effect my She Hulk powers have on humans! Zuke

"Lee, are you suggesting that Zuchini Mama is anything less than a sincere off-the-street poster who was probably sucked into eGullet by Jamie Maw's article in VanMag?" BCinBC Dear BC, Thanks for all of your kind comments. I haven't read the Jamie Maw article since the mag isn't distributed to us plebs on the east side. Which issue is it in? I found out about this forum from an article in the Straight a couple of week ago. I have been lurking and laughing and crying. I promise to do my best to do my duty, to god, e-gullet, and my country... Zuke

Hanging at the Reef Arrived home late afternoon from Alberta. Bad news in the post, so I opened the bottle of wine on the table. I needed a drink. Nothing like a glass of Nederburg Cab Sauv. (2002) to calm the nerves. The wine is a dark, tart, inky plum. I'd like a dress like this -silky, velvety, with a bit of an edge. No food in the fridge so we head to The Reef on Main because my four-year old loves the plantain fries, and I can get some spice. We get the last table at 5:30. The place feels warm and vibrates like a funky beehive. The reggae is good medicine for the travel-weary soul. The waiter recognizes me and I am relieved. He is lovely- cool, efficient, and gives us a basket of fry bread while we wait for our orders to come up. "It's like eating doughnuts!" the woman at the next table exclaims. "Yeah doughnuts you slather with butter," I'm thinking. Diet starts tomorrow. We share a ginger beer. I love its bite, though I don't know how authentic it really is because on time I saw a waitress top it up with seven up. Oh well, this summer I vow to make my own. It will be peppery gingery- blow your stack. It surprises me my boy loves the ginger beer since he tells me he HATES GINGER, (and any other food that is not entirely bland, sweet, or chocolate.) Anyway, I order the pork tenderloin jerk and watch the Green Goblin join defenses with Emperor Zurg against Spiderman in a lurid battle by candlelight. I am beginning to uncrease. The music makes me feel loved in spite of it all, and before you know it my boy's munchin' his chips, bobbing unselfconsciously to the rhythm of the music. We've been taking him here since he was in the womb and he's always loved the music. I have one bad memory of the place that kept me away for some time. My son was three at the time, and I brought him in for lunch. The place was almost empty-we were well-behaved diners, but the attitude I got from the waitress (very hip, very young) chilled me to the bone. In the end, I paid the bill, walked out the door and then realized (in my mother-muddle brain) she'd short-changed me, thinking of course, it had been a mistake. I left her a fifteen percent tip, but she had purposefully kept part of my change back for herself before the tip and was very annoyed when I asked for it back. I was gobsmacked! I haven't seen her since, (very hip, very short-term). Most of the time I've had great service. It's the food that seems to change with the winds-maybe a succession of cooks? Sometimes the jerk is spicy and delivered with a heat alert, and sometimes not. I like it when it burns. Tonight it is over-salted, but the medallions are very tender and there is a nice slow burn. The rice and peas are salty too. I'm thinking canned broth? Oddly, the coleslaw is lacking in vinegar and under-salted. However, I'm unwinding, and forgiving. My boy loves the clown fish in the tropical tank. It's a little piece of paradise. I wish they could project it onto a wall somehow. Taking our leftovers to Cinephile we pick out our post dinner culture (Scooby Doo again) and head back past the recumbent digger that will raise their dino heads and chew up, the streets again on Monday. (Drivers beware.) A night in the life of Zucchini Mama

Ahoy ye, Gulleteers! May I come aboard? I've been fantasizing about creating a utopian culinary emporium for some time. Maybe you can help me out... It's Vietnamese-French Fusion. The name is Faux. There are three main parts: Faux Boulangèrie, Faux Bistro, and Trop Faux (or Haute Faux) Fine Dining. The Location: That lovely scrappy patch of land across from Van Dusen Gardens, chock full of blackberry brambles. Someone's going to develop it eventually, so why not us? The desserts have to be over the top: Intense layers of lemon, (lemon peel, lemon grass, candied citron), or studies in ginger, or chocolate, or lime, or coconut. Vietnamese coffee creme brulée, intense home made crème glacées, and fair trade chocolates flavored with teas and the flavors mentioned above. The blackberry truffles are our specialty. They're served with Cherrypoint Vineyards blackberry port. The architecture is hard to describe-I'd need to sketch it out. The concept is a spiral. As you enter the spiral, there is the bakery (with lovely Vietnamese French subs, the desserts, soups and salads). The bakery is full of light with a few minimal art deco stained glass elements in deep jewel tones. The staff wear funky t-shirts silk-screened with faux-puns and rhymes. There is tons of seating out of doors with gardens winding artfully in and out of bramble-covered pergolas, (full time gardener required). There is a full time curator who organizes outdoor art exhibitions on the property. The coffee-Faux Joe...I'll leave it up to you to hit me with a barrage of puns. As you go up the spiral, you enter the bistro, which is decorated in 20's-50's Chinoiserie kitsch. The colors are deep red, grassy green, pink, and orange, reflected in the staff's funky clothes designed and silk-screened by Smoking Lily. The food is affordable. The vibe is fun, gentle and casual. The music is original local, unobtrusive, ambient. Local organic products where possible. Lobster and morel Spring rolls-but what's in the dipping sauce? Gorgeous Gewürtz's and Grüner Vetliners, B.C. wines, as well as a great selection of Alsatian and Austrian wines. (Oh, by the way, the wine cellar is in the basement, occupying the space beside the Faux Spa, which is run by the Silk Road Tea Spa in Victoria. The staff are given free treatments as needed.) Back to the Bistro: Huge selection of vegetarian dishes, updated Alsatian tarts... more ideas, please! Oh, and those puckery peppery buttery lemony garlicky chicken wings I've only had at the Saigon (sadly now defunct) in Saskatoon-my holy grail of chicken wings. Does anyone know what I mean? Trop Faux: Totally over the top haute cuisine-footstools for chihuahuas who have their own show on Bravo called Faux Paws. Shantung Silk banquettes and drapes in Blackberry and the jewel tones again. Staff costumes by Gaultier. Huge artisan lighting fixtures inspired by Sea Urchins (the outsides of the creatures, not the insides). Morels, lobsters, fresh coconuts, gold leaf, crème fraiche, blackberries, truffles, moules frîtes,...elements of dada and surrealism...yada yada yada. The next part of the spiral is another gallery for local artists with its own curator. The next part is a crêche (where we can drop off our kids while we dine) run by a league of British super-nannies who play instructional videos on table manners and fine dining. The übernannies also train the young' uns to translate foreign menus, so you can leave those heavy guide books at home. At the back of the spiral, going down to the earth once again is Barbara Joe's Books to Cooks, which we've had to pluck from Yaletown, (sorry folks). At the very top of the spiral is a secret pinnacle room/observatory/world headquarters accessible only by a secret code pad hidden behind a faux crocodile purse. Here, an elite group of eGulleters et al discuss the pastpresentfuture of food and pore over the out-of print tomes and encyclopedic reference books that are too expensive for me to afford at Barbara Joe's. The staff: I've always dreamed of winning the lottery so I could give the staff at Au Petit Café a palace to work in because they deserve it. They collaborate with some Haute French-trained chefs willing to lighten up. Financing provided by the Valton family who have closed all their Canadian Val-Mart stores and donated the money to begin to atone for their vicked vicked vays. Transportation: Oh yeah, ahem, that would involve moving the RAV line to Oak street. Also, valet parking for cyclists only. (To satisfy the eco-feminista in me.) I think we should come up with the recipes, and whip something up in Photoshop-create a virtual version of the place in a Faux Cookbook. Whaddya Think? Zuke