Eating the Northwest

[stovetop]

Tofino; I live in Port, everyday I see something more about Port and the Alberni Valley, so many years I just drove through town on my way to tofino or uke, just bypassing port. This past year of living in port I have gotten to know another side of the town, this town is in a valley with the biggest inlet on Vancouver island cutting a crag across the island and hitting smack dab in the middle of that valley, so just this characteristic gives the town a very special thing, you are at the end of a inlet that leads to some of the most beautiful areas that BC has to offer, at the moment it is very cheap to live.

I see it on its way up, they say that even a bum lying in a gutter still sees blue sky, well that is what I see for the valley of Alberni, like its namesake it is a tough place full of wacky characters and beautiful scenery, but it has a bit of a identity crises, caught between being an industrial town and a place that people want to live travel and play. It reminds me of what Squamish was like about ten years ago, so I am hopeful that it will pass the same cross roads that squamish did and choose better paths economically and pick better industrial directions, clear some of the water front and make it more accessible, better restaurants and better promotion of what tourism inventory they do have, if this town could catch half of the traffic that would be a huge economic boost for a town that needs all the help it can get.

Edited July 16, 2004 by stovetop (log)

[stovetop]

jcsaucey; yes the other side of port that I knew nothing about is the Agriculture sector, it is a big part of the Valley, they go about things rather quietly and without fanfare, every sat all year there is a farmers market, it has some good stuff.

The valley has two local chicken processors, one big pork processor and BC hot house green house, with a very good product, better then some of the hothouse stuff, there is many mix and sustainable agriculture practices all over the valley, some of the area is well over a hundred years, and it has history!!

Now all we need is a good restaurant and retail store

Edited July 16, 2004 by stovetop (log)

[paul mitchell]

We get lots of stuff from Port. We get this incredible raspberry honey and our pork. Dynamite chops.

[paul mitchell]

$130 for a 13 course at Lumiere? That's an awesome deal. I did a 6 course last night with wine pairing and we charge $200.

[jcsaucey]

I believe 13 for $130 is food only.

[Johnathon]

Still a bargain on a global scale for that quality in food, service and environment.

[chuchelo]

I can only comment on my own experience but this is what I found when visiting Vancouver Island.

I had one of the best meals I've had in AGES at Cafe Brio. The food, wine, service, and atmosphere were excellent! The choices were subtle and sophisticated. Much of the food is organic, all fresh. The wine list was very good and I asked for local recommendations, which were terrific! I had Watercress Vichyssoise with shaved radish, crème fraiche followed by Asparagus frittata with carmelized onion. For dessert, I had Dark Chocolate and Pistachio Cake with fresh mint ice cream. Everything was clearly made there, including the ice cream which was bursting with fresh mint flavour.

As it happens, the restaurant was recently recommended in the New York Times as part of an article on visiting Victoria. I'm not surprised. It is definitely worth the trip!

In contrast, our meal at Sooke Harbour House, which had been described to us as a world class restaurant, was a HUGE disappointment.

The menu is based on local ingredients, many of them grown or harvested at Sooke Harbour House and that's a plus. Unfortunately each dish reads (and the descriptions of each dish runs for 4-5 lines on the menu) only like a list of exotic incredients. Unfortunately, it suffered greatly by comparison with Cafe Brio. Instead of being a subtle composition of light and joy, it seemed like it was a contest to see how many different tastes/items could be crammed into each course. As a result, the taste was not compelling but rather competitive and lacking.

The wine list is stunning. But when I asked for a local recommendation based on what we had ordered and our waiter seemed to struggle with the request. In the end though, two of the three of us thought the wine was lovely. I was one of the two and I thought it was delicious.

The view of Sooke Harbour was very nice, though misty and disappeared from sight shortly after we were seated.

It was service where Sooke Harbour House really fell down. It was disjointed and our principal waiter seemed a bit confused much of the time. Also, when clearing our places, they SCRAPED AND STACKED THE DISHES as they carried them away. YUCK. I don't like to see that in a diner, let alone a "world class restaurant." Perhaps it was an off night, still, I was beginning to appreciate why it was that we were able to make a relatively last minute reservation on a Saturday night!

When I brought this to the attention of Sooke Harbour House's management's via a later email he defended the actions of the busboy re: stacking the dishes but said he committed a professional error by doing it withour sight/sound. To demonstrate his point, he cited p. 109 of Professional Table Service, published by John Wiley and Sons. I mean, he looked up the page number? Or has he heard this complaint often enough to know the page by heart?!?

He surprised me by saying that our waiter, who seemed to struggle to come up with an appropriate wine. and not particularly pleased to have been asked, was in fact a fully-trained sommelier. In the end though, he offered us a free meal on our next visit. Given that I'm on the opposite coast and vacation with these friends (who live quite far away as well) only once a year I think it's unlikely we'll take him up on this generous offer.

To be honest, right now the thought of paying for a meal at Cafe Brio is more appealing than a free meal at Sooke Harbour House. That's how good Cafe Brio was!!!