chrisstearns

"High kitsch" is understating it a bit. My favourite part: Federico's father promenading through the dining room playing his electric mandolin (wireless!). That, and the inexplicable giant sneeze-guard which surrounds the drum kit.

Kurtis and Jeff, thanks for hosting. Great to meet all the eG-ers face to face. One drink! I'm just happy I didn't break anything. As for the meads, I was surprised at how dry and light they were--even the sweeter wines had good acidity and weren't cloying. I wonder if the cyser or cranberry mead might be fun with turkey dinner this Christmas? I agree with the lavender and gin cocktail; good stuff. I think it would be great with Hendrick's gin, which has rose and cucumber notes. The salal/Oregon grape/blackberry might be a good match too, since it's so floral.

Andrew, when did Elmore Leonard open a restaurant? (Or was it Tarantino?) BCinBC, as for not being in to Lumiere Tasting Bar forever... drop by sometime and introduce yourself. Sunday nights are very civilized.

I sort of mentioned pricing in my post above, but to clarify: I think price points need to be understood within the context of the cost-of-living of each city. Montreal, which is working its way out of a lengthy recession, has to be gauged differently than Toronto or Vancouver. I suppose one could rebut that ingredients cost what they cost, and fine-dining is a world of razor-thin margins... It's a tough business even when you're selling to a willing public. Maybe this explains why so few 'nouvelle' restaurants have cropped up in Montreal in the past few years. As for the affections of French girls... again, discretion.

I'm no authority on the Montreal dining scene. But as a Vancouverite who was consulting on a restaurant opening there, I did notice huge differences between the dining cultures of the two cities. (Or solitudes, if you like.) I found Montreal more insular than Vancouver or Toronto. Montrealers seem less interested in recent North American trends in cuisine. This can be a good thing (the tendency for celebrity chef worship seems to have little traction in Montreal) and a bad thing (mid-century French is getting a bit stale, no?). How much of this you ascribe to economy, chauvinism, or just a kind of culinary inertia is up to you. Certainly the city can seem stuck in a time-warp sometimes. But it is starting to change, with several forward-looking restaurants opening in the last five years (helmed by chefs who look outside the province's borders for inspiration). Another challenge facing fine-dining rooms in Montreal is getting people to pony up for great food in a city where great food doesn't cost a lot. Forty dollars goes so far in Montreal that a hundred has to go much, much further than it does in Vancouver. The justification for the pricing--the story about fresh products, regional ingredients--doesn't seem to have gained as much attention with everyday diners as in the rest of the country. It's a big hurdle for new restaurants to jump. As for "all-evening opportunities," ...discretion is the better part.

I would too. The ISG program is geared toward training professional wine waiters, and focuses on a lot of service-related information you might not be interested in. From what you've said, it sounds like the introductory level of the WSET would be a good fit. The names for the different levels can be confusing; take a look at the list of programs on the WSET site. Just to make it more confusing, I've heard that those levels are going to be re-worked soon... Of course, the absolute best way to learn about wine is to taste it, constantly. In addition to taking some organized classes, do lots of informal study on your own. Check out some tastings at wine stores Marquis Wine Cellars on Davie has some great ones, which are reasonably priced. Have some friends over for wine tasting nights. Everyone brings a bottle, do a different region or theme each week like 'sauvignon blanc,' or 'Rhone varietals'. Read up just a little bit beforehand in something like Auntie Jancis. That way, wine becomes not just a component of your learning, but a part of your life. Edit: Lancelot beat me to the Marquis tasting comment--he's right, it can be hard to take notes. Bring a date and write on their back! I still think their tastings are a great way to learn.

...and they aren't all Starbucks? Strange indeed...

I won't comment too much, since I write for the magazine, except to say that the full "Canada's Best New Restaurants of 2005" article can be found in the November issue of enRoute, which is available gratis on all Air Canada flights. If you don't happen to find yourself on a plane next month, you'll be able to read the article online at enRoute's website, once the November content is posted. (While you're there, you'll also be able to read my November feature on "culinary cocktails," but enough plugging...) If you're interested to know who has won in the past, follow these links: 2004 2003 2002 Montreal kind of stole the show this year, didn't it?

Has anyone had brunch at Abigail's Party yet? (For those who hadn't heard, Abigail's purchased the brunch menu from Tangerine, whose breakfasts I always found to be good--certainly the best along the Yew St. corridor.)

Curious: is "Shiraziste" your first name, or your family name?

I don't think I've contradicted myself at all. I alluded to my concern about Gill possibly only making one visit in my very first post (#27). Actually, I put a question mark then because I don't know for a fact that she made only one visit. The review reads that way, though, and it seems others have made the same assumption. A consumerist perspective isn't synonymous with "one visit." You can write from the viewpoint of a consumer (approach the restaurant like an everyday diner, with all their attendant concerns) while practicing responsible journalism, making multiple visits, and checking facts. Gill did it in her Watermark review (not to dredge that up again, but it's a germane example). I think the danger of visiting on an atypically bad night--and reaching wrong conclusions--is too great to risk only going once. Opinionated? Fantastic. But it's important to be thorough, and accurate. I hope my point is clear.

True, many consumers form their opinion of a restaurant based on just one visit (I know I have). That's the diner's right, and it is a restaurant's job to win over each and every table or risk losing their future business. But a restaurant reviewer must work from a larger sample size. A reviewer is in a position of some responsibility (there's that word again). Not because a negative review can result in a significant loss of business for a restaurant. I think a reviewer has the same responsibility of any journalist: to get their facts straight. This means sampling many dishes, over repeat visits, to fairly and accurately gauge the sum quality of the restaurant. And if it's bad, fine, they will receive a deservedly bad review.

For some reason, I didn't see Mooshmouse's post #53 until after I posted my reply (#54). Just to be clear, I was using "amateur" to connote non-professional or non-paid, not as "hack." There was no "deeming" involved. As I already said I happily consider myself an amateur as well--that is to say, a non-paid enthusiast. To eat out because you love food is the best of all possible reasons! When you say that "we are not vitriolic; on the contrary, I find us to be reasonable, intelligent adults who are rather measured and honest with our remarks." I agree. Did I imply otherwise? (I didn't intend to.) That "the professionals write the reviews, but the amateurs' money pays the bills" is true. This is why I like the idea of a consumerist slant to restaurant reviews--I think it serves as a good companion (and sometime counterpoint) to the "foodie" style (for lack of a better term) of review. A different viewpoint is expressed--one that I think is closer to the eGullet viewpoint. Now tone, on the other hand...

For those who didn't bother to check, those articles are both from '98, and so is the bio, when Gill was billed as an "Entertainment Gossip" reporter. Funny, sure, but out of date. Gill started writing food reviews for the Globe in the summer of '02, if memory serves, filling in for Joanne Kates during a vacation.

Not only have I noticed, but I greatly enjoy their posts. But I think you'd agree with me that the vast majority of eGulleters are enthusiastic amateurs, or industry types, just like you and me. My point was not to denigrate "amateur" opinion (which I find relevant and valuable), but rather to point out that criticizing Gill for certain traits while praising eGulleters for the same seemed contradictory. What's the difference? Is it as Kurtis says, influence? With influence comes responsibility. Is part of that responsibility to be polite? It seems that most posters here who were upset by the review take exception to the tone of the piece more than the content. See my comments above about "stirring the pot."

Pros? Excuse me? You had me right up to your last sentence. I find it curious that you excoriate Gill for the things you do (a review based on one visit, lack of long food pedigree), then go on to say that you appreciate just the same qualities of writers on eGullet, home of the amateur one-vist review. You can't have it both ways. Some obvious truths about Gill's Friday Globe and Mail reviews: 1. She reviews from a consumer, not a foodie, perspective. Her reactions as a consumer are as relevant as yours or mine would be if we were dining in the restaurant. 2. She likes to gossip and stir the pot (her reviews run alongside an industry gossip section, after all). 3. She is not big on sacred cows, and is not consumed with concern for bruised feelings. She knows that honesty makes for a good review. She also knows (perhaps better) that brutal honesty makes for good copy. Does she step over the line in an effort to make her reviews more "punchy?" Maybe. The Diva review reads a bit like a car wreck made into a train wreck.

Sorry, but I have to call bullshit on this. "Shoulder season," "Friday before Thanksgiving" (someone else's comment), "upcoming competition" or whatever other excuses just don't hold water. The doors are open. You're taking people's money. Fair game. It's that simple. I'm not commenting on the fairness or thoroughness of the review (one visit?). But Gill had every right to write it.

Valid question. Mead will never be more than a bit player in your beer & wine line-up, it's true. What's more, the LDB doesn't list any mead at all -- this means a spec order, and more hassle to go through to provide your customers with something original. (But we're used to that, right?) It's an interesting product, certainly, but as you pointed out earlier it won't sell itself. Hence my suggestions were aimed at a couple things to do to ensure that some of it moves almost every night. Just one of the tricks of managing a bar product line: make sure there's no dead wood. What about infusing some mead with a bit of lavender and mixing it with French vermouth, tall, on the rocks? Mead and Irish whiskey would be good as a digestif, mixed like a Rusty Nail. Or how about plugging it into the spot occupied by Cointreau in many classic cocktails--like the Sidecar? (Name would have to change, of course, and the recipe would have to be balanced for sweetness.) I bet your pastry chef could have some fun with it too.

Well, a good waiter can always introduce a customer to a new product that they're excited about (how many of us have turned guests onto Moscato D'Asti?). But to help with the practical question of an open bottle of mead just sitting there, I can think of a couple ways to help keep it moving. You could incorporate it into a wine flight which accompanies a tasting menu (provided your restaurant offers something like this), probably to accompany the dessert/cheese course. You could use mead as an ingredient in a cocktail (one that lets the character of the mead show, without covering it up, of course). I have a couple recipes in mind. Both ways, you are moving enough mead that it won't spoil, and people could order a glass on it's own anytime they wanted. But I think the best way to sell mead in restaurants is to talk about Beowulf. "Gathered together, the Geatish men in the banquet-hall on bench assigned, sturdy-spirited, sat them down, hardy-hearted. A henchman attended, carried the carven cup in hand, served the clear mead. Oft minstrels sang blithe in Heorot.” Henchmen? Minstrels? Who can resist that?

Perhaps this is because Vancouver has a larger Taiwanese community than Seattle. Bubble tea was invented in Taichung, Taiwan, about 1987, in one of the thousands of tea shops that dot the city (think Starbucks in Vancouver, but quadrupled). It was originally a cold milk tea (made from powdered milk) with sweet syrup and various fruits and tapioca balls (and apparently candied yams too. What the ???). It's interesting that the drink didn't become popular until it appeared on a Japanese TV show. After that it took off back home in Taiwan and became a major fad. Taiwan, in my experience, is strongly influenced by Japanese trends--in fashion, music, food, etc. I lived in Taichung last winter and noticed many instances of this. Although you still see it around Taiwan, bubble tea not drunk as much today as it was in the 90s.

I arrived yesterday morning actually... If we drop the word "martini," which we both agree is a misnomer for cocktails with fruit flavours, we can see a very clear division between good and bad fruity drinks. Fruity cocktails don't have to be bad. If I served you a "Daiquiri" from a Slurpee machine, made from frozen concentrated limon mix and the cheapest rum you can find at the LDB, I have a feeling you wouldn't like it. But what if I mixed you a Daiquiri with quality Cuban rum, juice squeezed fresh from a hand-rolled lime, and a dash of dry maraschino liqueur, according to an authentic recipe from the 1930s? Maybe I could change your mind?

And also much, much less.

You're quite right. The genericization of "Martini" is a trend that serious bartenders lament. A Martini is gin and vermouth. (I might grant you vodka and vermouth. But that's it.) There are many bars where you can drink childish, over-sweet, artificially flavoured cocktails (called "martinis" by clueless menu-writers) and develop a hate for cocktails in general. This is a shame, and it sounds like what you've experienced. Most of the bars discussed in this thread so far (George, Nu, Lumiere) are not those places, but rather are home to informed bartenders who care, use fresh ingredients and classic recipes. (And--to be didactic--when they use sugar in cocktails it is most likely to be the disaccharide sucrose, not the monosaccharide fructose, unless the bartender has intentionally boiled an invert sugar syrup. This has a substantial impact on the flavour of the drink. Good bartenders know this stuff. Bad ones just tip up the bottle of blue liqueur.)

With all respect to Mr. Abu Ganim (and others that use the term), we're bartenders. This label used to be a source of pride, and denote all the things you've alluded to: craft, care in mixing, knowledge of history. The fact that the term has been eroded over the past 75 years is our problem to rectify. We need to demonstrate that there is more to bartending than what they've seen. Hiding behind other terms to dodge the negative connotations of what a bartender has become is the easy way out. (And frankly, I think it draws an unnecessary division across a profession that needs to grow as a group right now. Let's not be parochial.) Instead of telling our customers we're not bartenders, let's show them what it means to be a great one. We own the label for better or worse--it's ours to rehabilitate.

It depends what is in the drink. Is it made with rail booze, powdered juice mix and artificilly flavoured liqueur--thrown together by a disinterested, poorly trained bartender? Then yes. Is it carefully crafted with top-shelf spirits, hand-squeezed citrus juices, homemade syrups, and good quality liqueurs? Then no. Re-frame your question in food terms and think about it: is $50 steep for a steak? Why? Any bar can be serious about their drinks, whether it's in a posh lounge, tony hotel bar or a casual Mexican joint. The only prerequisites are passion and hard work on the part of the bartenders. In fact, it's more of the casual places we need to start taking mixing seriously. (I'm speaking generally here, not about Lolita specifically, as I haven't been there yet. But your question seemed to deal with bartending in general.) True. It's a shame that too many bars (the 'tony' places are some of the guiltiest) charge a lot for too little.