ElsieD

This was course no. 4, a pasta course. The dish was Chanterelles, beans, and corn agnolotti. The corn was a very smooth purée and the top had shaved parmigiano reggiano.on top. This was our favourite dish of the night. Wine: Lightfoot & Wolfville , Pinot Rosé Grand Pré, Nova Scotia, 2014. We were told that this is a very small winery and they only produced 50 cases of this wine that year, and Raymonds bought 25 of them.

The third course was a diver scallop served with apple, radish and cucumber and pea foam. Wine: Pearl Morissette, Riesling, Niagara, Ontario 2013

The second course was an heirloom tomato salad served with goat milk ricotta and basil. You can't see them, but there were some tiny little whole tomatoes in there that were just bursting with flavour. The wine: Condes Del Albarei, Albarino, Rias Biaxas, Spain, 2008

And now, on to last night's dinner. I may not get it all done in one sitting so will post a separate entry for each of the seven course tasting menu. This was a meal like no other I have ever had. The service was very professional and friendly without being familiar. Just a top-notch place. The only thing we asked was that they not serve us anything raw. I have also included the wines that were served as I thought some might be interested in knowing what they were. The first course consisted of artichoke with lardo, gazpacho with snow crab and basil oil, radish with cultured butter, a tiny perfect carrot with a velvety smooth carrot purée and a pickled chrysanthemum. Beautifully plated and delicious. There were three substitutions made on our plate, and they replaced razor clam with cucumber and dill, oyster with raspberry and Albacore tuna. The wine was a champagne, La Valle, Franciacorta, Primum, Brut, Italy, NV

After lunch yesterday we stopped in at Cupid's Legacy Centre which is a museum dedicated to the founding of Cupids. I mentioned earlier that Cupids dates back to 1610 and the Centre contains artifacts dating back to that time. I found one display particularly interesting and that was of the Beothuk culture. The othe picture is of some older kitchen items although I recall my mother had what we called an egg beater that looks very similar to the one on display. After that we went to Cupids Cove Plantation, the archeological site of the 1610 settlement. One of the archeologists showed us around and this may be of interest: the first building was not completed until December of 1610. Until then, the settlers slept in a depression in the ground. Also, tax evasion was alive and well. They found a fragment of cloth that had a lead seal indicating that either taxes had been paid or the individual had tax exempt status. They sent this piece of cloth out for testing and discovered that the seal was fake.

We have just arrived back in the land of the Internet so I will post our lunch. This we had at Shark Cove in a place called Cupids Haven Bed and Breakfast Tea Room. I had the special of the day, which consisted of a fish cake, a touton (yes!!!) and baked beans. This was really good and I really enjoyed it. John had the mac and cheese and really liked his as well. This is one of those places that sits at the end of a road and whenever we have been lucky enough to find one of these, the food has always been great. While there, I thought to ask about the actual cooking of the toutons. I knew they were done in a frying pan but I didn't know how much fat to use or what temperature to cook them at. The answer was use as much fat as you wish, or as little as is required to fry an egg. As for heat, medium low was the answer as any higher than that they won't cook all the way through. Tonight we are going to what could be described as a fancy pants restaurant called Raymonds. It is one of the best restaurants in Canada and at least one year that I know of, was voted # 1. We haven't decided if we are sticking with the à la carte menu or the tasting menu but either way, I should have a memorable meal to share with you

Wayne got one part and Beebs got the other. A loaf of breads sits in the top part and that was where they sliced it and the curved bottom was used to roll pastry, cookie dough and the like.

Bingo! The bottom was used as a rolling pin. So what was the top flat part used for?

@PattyO a knife was used with that item, so your thinking is going in the right direction. @ElainaA Nope. Moving it is correct. See Smithy's cradle comment. One more hint - it is a dual purpose item.

@PattyO it has no sharp edges so would not be used for chopping anything.

@IowaDee um, no, sorry, not even close. @Smithy cradle is part of the answer. Sort of, in that it rocks. It is a kitchen item, has nothing to do with children.

Ooooh, thanks for this. I have made it myself but it is so nice to know that I can get it at home.

Tonight's dinner was a disappointment. We were back at Dustabella's where we ate last night. I had ordered the pork chop special which was stuffed with a pesto filling with feta and almonds. The plate came, I had ordered garlic mashed potatoes as a side and it also came with vegetables of the day. The veg were cold and the one fork of mashed I ate was overpowered by raw garlic. Back it went. Since I didn't want the mashed spuds anymore, they replaced it with salad. Out came the revised plate. The chop must have been sitting under a heat lamp or something because it was HOT, completely overcooked and dry. The veg had zero seasoning or anything else on them and were lukewarm. The salad was okay. John was satisfied with his fish and chips but his veg were cold too but he didn't care because he wasn't eating them anyway. I'm glad we have that apple tart to look forward to a bit later.

Any guesses as to what this might have been used for?

A similar fireplace was used in the room directly in front of the sleeping quarters. All meals were cooked on it and the smoke escaped through a hole in the roof. If there were more people than beds they slept on the floor. The dishes you see were made out of wood, birch to be exact. Only the rich could afford china. The other picture is of cod drying on a flake. After cleaning the cod, they were layered in salt and a few weeks later were dried on the flake.

Today we did a tour of Cape Random where the mini-series Random Passage was filmed in 2000. We had watched the series at the time and really enjoyed it so decided to buy the DVD and watch it again before we came out here. To have seen the series recently made it that much more interesting to see this set. The series took a year to shoot and was shot at this location except for 1 week in St. John's and three weeks in Ireland. The village, or community as it would have been called was built using materials and methods available in the early 1800's. This meant, for example, that no nails were used in it's construction. The series told of how Random Passage came to be populated and the back stories of the individuals who lived there. They even have a little graveyard showing the "graves" of the people who died in the show. (They are not real graves.) It was fascinating and you really get a sense between the show and actually visiting the site of how hard life was back then

Today we had lunch at the Random Passage Tea House near Old Bonaventure. It was earlyish for lunch so we weren't all that hungry. Turkey soup with vegetables seems to be very popular in Newfoundland so we both had a bowl of that. It was a very big bowl, and more like a stew as it was chock full of vegetables and turkey. John had 2 hot dogs o go with his, I had a very tiny pizza. Thus fueled, we toured the Random Passage site which I will tell you about in my next post. Right now we are in the town of Bonavista having stopped long enough for me to post this. It is the first time today that I have had an Internet connection since we left the hotel this morning. No picture of the hot dogs.

I meant to show you one more picture, and that is of a street in St. Pierre. Cars are driven on the left hand side of the planters and pedestrians walk on the other side. All the streets that we walked on are narrow like this. It reminds me of the old part of Quebec City or even the old city of Montreal. Very quaint if you come from a modern urban centre. Edited to add: they drive the same way they do in North America, on the right. Once students graduate from high school, they go to university in France. Pretty much everything is paid for by the government - tuition, transportation to and from St. Pierre to France and they get a living allowance. Of particular interest to those of us who live in cold weather climates, after a snow storm, they have special equipment that totally clears the snow right down to the pavement within 24 hours of a storm. Also, all hydro and telephone wires are buried, not just in the city but also in the rural areas. Nary a pole to be seen. Specialists are flown in from France as required to perform surgeries.

We did some roaming around St. Pierre after lunch and found a patisserie where we bought the goodies pictured below. During what felt like the never-ending drive to tonight's hotel, the eclair managed to roll over and the chocolate ganache fell off, so I had to sort of piece it together as best I could for the picture. We are having the eclair and the pear tart tonight and will have the apple tart tomorrow. We have a fridge in our room so keeping it cold won't be a problem. To keep from eating it before then might be. We were pretty tired by the time we got to Clarenville and we weren't particularly hungry so decided to go to a place called Dustabella's for quick bite. It is a restaurant attached to a hotel and it actually has pretty good food. We ate there several times last year and were more than satisfied with it. I had the appetizer sized portion of seafood chowder with some garlic bread. This was a good chowder, containing salmon, scallops, cod, shrimp and one mussel. The garlic bread was fresh but not very garlicy and not very well toasted which I didn't mind too much because I'm not big on bread with chowder anyway. John had a turkey soup which he said was very good but could have been a bit hotter temperature wise. He had a grilled cheese and bacon sandwich to go with it that he said could have been better grilled. Overall, not bad. Tiring day, though. The going through customs and getting to the ferry early along with the crossing took 4 hours, we spent 5 hours in St. Pierre and driving time added another for 3 hours and 45 minutes to the day. Tomorrow promises to be much more relaxed. I should have some interesting pictures for you tomorrow.

And did you see le chat on the book shelf?

Lunch today was very good. They had a cod special and the menu listed one of my favourite things and something you see rarely to never on restaurant menus in Canada and that is flammekuchen. I was vacillating between the two then noticed the flammekuchen served two. I ordered the cod and was very happy with it. Beautifully cooked, nice big flakes of moist fish served with a red pepper sauce. It came with rice and a condiment topping of sorts which, when I asked, was told it was a shallots, tomato, white wine and cumin sauce. It was really good and livened up the rice which was a plain white one. John had the pizza and the toppings were hot and sweet peppers, ham, hot chorizo, shitaki mushrooms, and mozzarella cheese, They had cruet of spicy oil on the table which he also put on the pizza. It had a very thin crust and was baked in a gas fired pizza oven. We did not have dessert but visited a patisserie where we bought a couple of delicious looking things for later. The ferry is about to take off which is when I loose my Internet so will post the pictures and try to send before we leave. The connection is not particularly strong. Once again I had poked into my fish and rice before remembering to take a picture. The menu is a list today's specials.

It has been a great day. We had to show our passports to buy the ferry tickets and then to go through customs on the Newfoundland side. We just boarded the ferry for the return trip and they checked our passports again. I'm not sure what happens at the other end. I'll let you know.

Today we are in St. Pierre et Miquelon, which is a French colony off the coast of Newfoundland. We got up with the birds to get to the ferry, which made the crossing in 1 hour, 10 minutes. We took a tour of the island which was very interesting. The fellow doing the driving reminded me of Jaques Pepin with his, "you know?" and it wasn't just the expression, he was a dead ringer with the accent. A couple of pictures for you. One is just of the sign with the town name, the other are a couple of the town itself. The houses are painted different colours, much like St. John's. At the moment we are seated in Le Chat de Luthier, where we are waiting for our lunch. More on that later!

Tonight we were back at The Heritage Cafe for dinner. John wanted toutons so he had 2 toutons less a bite and mac and cheese which he enjoyed. I had pan fried cod with scruncheons, mashed potatoes, mixed carrots and peas a double helping of mustard pickles aND a bit of touton. It was all good. The fish was so fresh, moist and flaky. We did take a bite or two before I remembered to take a picture. For dessert we brought home a lemon square to bring home for later tonight. I spied a date square being delivered to someone's table so I got one to take with me and we will have it in the morning on the way to catch the ferry. I forgot to mention that the apple crumble cheesecake made up for the bad apple pie the day before. This is something I'm going to try to duplicate. I tried to worm the recipe out of them but no dice. The picture of the view is what you see from our table at The Heritage Cafe. Not too shabby. The other is of the food mentioned in this post, with a tea bag on the plate with the date square to give you an idea of the size.

Thank you. She did say to do this but I neglected to put that in my post. I have since corrected it. Yes, they sure are good. We are about to go there for dinner again (outside of the fact the food is good, it's the only decent place here) and I'm trying to think of an excuse for having another one. We leave Burin early in the morning to go to our next spot so won't have another chance. I had one last year that was very heavy and I did not care for it very much. Glad I took a chance and tried them again.