Jump to content
  • Welcome to the eG Forums, a service of the eGullet Society for Culinary Arts & Letters. The Society is a 501(c)3 not-for-profit organization dedicated to the advancement of the culinary arts. These advertising-free forums are provided free of charge through donations from Society members. Anyone may read the forums, but to post you must create a free account.

Gill Review of the Week


*Deborah*

Recommended Posts

I eat at Wink a couple of times a week. Lurking there, as is my nature.

It is what it is, a decent little hipster-neighbourhood vegetarian spot with the cutest girl ever (Sarah) working the counter. It's pretty simple. You go to the counter, you point at what you want to eat, you pay for it (Interac, fortunately for Ms. Gill, is within arm's reach), and Sarah brings it to you when it's ready.  She perhaps has more enthusiasm than culinary training, but what the hell. A chickpea salad, soup or grilled sandwich with a happy planet juice doesn't need a red seal or sommelier's ticket. They do their biggest sales on Sunday night when improv comedy takes over the stage/dining dais. The food is a bit hit and miss, but for six bucks, it's better than the wraps up the street and a good foil to budgie's colon blockers. Secret crushes on Sarah aside, I quite like the place.

This was just a stupid review. I don't know how she found Wink or what she thought the dining experience was going to be, but it's obvious she did little pre-visit research. It's like giving the family-run falafel place on Denman Street a bad review because your "snooty drunks club" buddy had to go to the counter to order mediocre wine. Are you kidding me?

Anyway, I hope this gets me Sarah's phone number...

I guess what irks me the most is that so many of my friends are vegetarian and they can afford to eat out, but find their options are limited. This article could have been an opportunity to search out fine dining options for vegans/vegetarians. Also, it could have been a great forum to discuss organic/vegan/vegatarian wine.

Mr Mighty, PM me for the eGullet dating service. Sarah's related to me.

Edited by Zucchini Mama (log)

"I used to be Snow White, but I drifted."

--Mae West

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I eat at Wink a couple of times a week. Lurking there, as is my nature.

It is what it is, a decent little hipster-neighbourhood vegetarian spot with the cutest girl ever (Sarah) working the counter. It's pretty simple. You go to the counter, you point at what you want to eat, you pay for it (Interac, fortunately for Ms. Gill, is within arm's reach), and Sarah brings it to you when it's ready. . . Anyway, I hope this gets me Sarah's phone number... [Edited for Area Code]

555-1212.

What a delightful post, Mr. Q. Next month, I'm going to shoot some ducks in a barrel, write them up faster than a Surrey cop -- and call them bad confit.

from the thinly veneered desk of:

Jamie Maw

Food Editor

Vancouver magazine

www.vancouvermagazine.com

Foodblog: In the Belly of the Feast - Eating BC

"Profumo profondo della mia carne"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I had lunch (portobello soup) at Wink today. It was my first visit. First, a little note about my perspective -- I don't mind reading critical reviews, as long as they're fair. But after having dined here, Ms. Gill's "review" feels even more mean-spirited and hardly close to fair. I mean, did she even take a look at the place before selecting it as a place to go for wine and dinner with a self-proclaimed food snob?

As someone said upthread, Wink is what it is -- and to judge it as something it's never claimed to be just seems ... unfair is the only word that comes to mind.

Food Lover -- nothing more, nothing less
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Okay - I am sure AGill is lurking here... somewhere...

In today's column she notes that in the food issue of Enroute (great article by Mr. Stearns btw) Chambar was given the dubious distinction of having the worst dish in a best new restaurant (the poutine a la Belge were slammed - along with the blue cheese cocktail) and she finishes with

"And you thought I was cruel."

Well - that's a succinct summary of this thread's assessment of Ms Gill's reviews so far.

Edited by canucklehead (log)
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Okay - I am sure AGill is lurking here... somewhere...

I thought so too, but up in Whistler this past weekend she and I were within eye-scratching distance (BTW, beautiful red dress, Ms. Gill) outside Araxi smoking and drinking to our liver and lungs' content. She didn't raise a paw or a glance my way (I was, however, camouflaged in an evening gown studded with the errant doings of my Bedazzler - three more easy payments and it's mine all mine).

I love the poutine at Chambar.

Andrew Morrison

Food Columnist | The Westender

Editor & Publisher | Scout Magazine

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Kudos to Ms. Gill.

For those who made mention of her fish bladder hiccup there was this correction:

"Mea culpa! In last week's column, I scoffed at the suggestion that wine might be filtered through fish bladders. Actually, many wines are fined with small drops of substances that contain animal products to clear up cloudiness and sediment."

Read her encapsulating Cornucopia column here here.

Edited by Andrew Morrison (log)

Andrew Morrison

Food Columnist | The Westender

Editor & Publisher | Scout Magazine

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think it was John De Lancie's character in Star Trek who said:

"If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you oughtta go back home and crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here. It's wondrous, with treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross; but it's not for the timid." -- (from the episode "Q Who?")

Today's review was great. Managed to weave in post-essentialist feminist themes, questions of sex and excess, give props to a small, less media-savvy restaurant, and wind up with a very gracious and well-informed mea culpa. All with that particular sexy-fiestyness that (with all due respect) I never want to read from Mr. Maw, Mr Morrison, or Mr. Pawsey...

My favourite, though, was the sidebar. A skilled dig couched in "reporting on the reporting". Very nice. If I see Ms Gill at the Lumiere tasting bar, I will definitely buy her a tasty (and surprisingly reasonably priced) cocktail.

BTW, Poutine sales are WAY up...

Quentin Kayne

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Kudos to Ms. Gill.

For those who made mention of her fish bladder hiccup there was this correction:

"Mea culpa! In last week's column, I scoffed at the suggestion that wine might be filtered through fish bladders. Actually, many wines are fined with small drops of substances that contain animal products to clear up cloudiness and sediment."

Read her encapsulating Cornucopia column here here.

Wow, she actually liked something..... :rolleyes:

I must agree with her about Melissa Craig at Bearfoot. We enjoyed a 5 course chef's tasting menu last winter that was sublime. I'm too lazy to dig up the link, but it's around here somewhere.....

And who is this "John from SFU" who "kindly pointed out" her error re fish products as filtering agents in wine? Does Ms. Gill not read eGullet? Props where props are due - I'm sure the Vancouver Forum denizens beat "John from SFU" with that information. :laugh:

And, to be fair, props to her for admitting her mistake.

Edited by Vancouver Lee (log)

Always remember that you are unique. Just like everyone else.

www.leecarney.com

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Gill's reference to the women servers made me think about Cornytopia a bit more. First, I'm wondering if the beverage servers were actually painted with the logo of the products they were serving. This made me think of Naomi Klein, of No Logo fame. It's probably been said before, but this event is all about "branding" Whistler as a lifestyle. It says "Look how rich and decadent we are, we can use women for sushi plates."

In terms of using the women as "serveuse sexy", I wish there had been room for Gill to actually interview the women who were serving. I would like to hear how they felt about the whole event. If any are lurkers here, please post your thoughts. I imagine most of them thought it was fun. However, I think it would have been more interesting and empowering if they were allowed to talk back to the customers. Did the woman-as-sushi table say, "If you like that, come up and see my sashimi sometime?" If they were mute servers as decorations, well, it's a living, and you take a few pictures of Hornytopia home for your scrapbook. Beats slinging burgers at McD's. You'd have to be pretty comfortable in your own skin to apply for the job anyway.

Was there a complete absence of nude men as servers? Would this have made the heterosexual guys too uncomfortable?

I love spectacle, parades, carnivale, and so this event does intrigue me. Food is very sensuous and so it lends itself to this kind of crazy party, but I don't think it's about food. I think it's about advertising a lifestyle. It seems like a hetero version of the pride parade to me. It does look like a lot of fun.

I'm impressed Gill sorted out the fish bladders!

Zuke

"I used to be Snow White, but I drifted."

--Mae West

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Was there a complete absence of nude men as servers?

Throughout, I spied just two buff boys meandering around in dental thongs, but the only thing I saw them carrying was embarrassment. Perhaps they were overzealous guests.

Andrew Morrison

Food Columnist | The Westender

Editor & Publisher | Scout Magazine

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I love spectacle, parades, carnivale, and so this event does intrigue me. Food is very sensuous and so it lends itself to this kind of crazy party, but I don't think it's about food.

You should read Andrew's write up in the West Ender - less than impressed apparently (I can't seem to link the article). So much of the time - these events aim for 'Caligula' but you actually get 'Eyes Wide Shut'.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Very sorry that my party did not please you Andrew, but I am puzzeled that you would compare my party to Jacks dinner. My party is nothing but a party & you were worned before coming that it is x rated. Why do I have this Party every year, because most of my guests love it. We did have 2500 people from all over the world & we could have sold 1000 more tickets. Most of the guests at the rave only came for the party. I have generated over $500,000.00 of indirect revenues for Whistler that weekend, that why this party has been supported for the last seven years. So it works! After all it is for charity. I raised $5000.00 for the arts & $3000.00 for the gymnastics club. That is more then all the other participants put together. Don't get me wrong, I love your criticism. but why trash a party that most poeple loved? I bet that if I have another one, you will be there!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Very sorry that my party did not please you Andrew, but I am puzzeled that you would compare my party to Jacks dinner. My party is nothing but a party & you were worned before coming that it is x rated. Why do I have this Party every year, because most of my guests love it. We did have 2500 people from all over the world & we could have sold 1000 more tickets. Most of the guests at the rave only came for the party. I have generated over $500,000.00 of indirect revenues for Whistler that weekend, that why this party has been supported for the last seven years. So it works! After all it is for charity. I raised $5000.00 for the arts & $3000.00 for the gymnastics club. That is more then all the other participants put together. Don't get me wrong, I love your criticism. but why trash a party that most poeple loved? I bet that if I have another one, you will be there!
It amazes me about critics who do not have objective overviews of any venue or medium- I mean any art form or form of communication; the whole bear foot event has been around and is what it is. I find when critics bring personnel opinion into the mix of the peice they are writing how objective are they being. You critics all have this problem. It is like a movie reviewer going to see a cowboy movie and they hate westerns and trying to critic the movie- then panning it.

First of all bear foot has always been about smoke and mirrors and you have to put the place into context

We did have 2500 people from all over the world & we could have sold 1000 more tickets
the bear foot is a international venue and it has its audience (customer) - Mr Saint-Jacques knows who his customer is and they keep coming back. He is not there to please everyone- that is not his job, his job is to please that certain international customer who goes to whistler with money and wants to spend it. That is what the whole venue is about. If you can not get your self around that you do not have to go, but to put down something because you do not like it.

Many people love what you do Mr. Saint-Jacques so we have to keep everything into prospective.

Steve

Cook To Live; Live To Cook
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Very sorry that my party did not please you Andrew, but I am puzzeled that you would compare my party to Jacks dinner. My party is nothing but a party & you were worned before coming that it is x rated. Why do I have this Party every year, because most of my guests love it. We did have 2500 people from all over the world & we could have sold 1000 more tickets. Most of the guests at the rave only came for the party. I have generated over $500,000.00 of indirect revenues for Whistler that weekend, that why this party has been supported for the last seven years. So it works! After all it is for charity. I raised $5000.00 for the arts & $3000.00 for the gymnastics club. That is more then all the other participants put together. Don't get me wrong, I love your criticism. but why trash a party that most poeple loved? I bet that if I have another one, you will be there!

First, welcome to eGullet, Andre! I'm sorry your first foray here isn't a sunnier one, but under the circumstances, I don't blame you. :wink:

Second, my mention of Araxi wasn't a comparison, but a clearly stated contrast (as I wrote).

Third, I think anyone who knows me would attest to my love affair with all things remotely Saturnalian.

I like a good party, and yours was without doubt a most extraordinary affair. You're work for charity speaks for itself, and you do British Columbia and Canada as a whole a great service by aiming for the moon with Bearfoot. It was my first time up, so I hope if you forgive me for anything it will be for the fact my impressions were those of a tourist. Cornucopia was a wonderful food and wine festival, but everything was peripheral to your Masquerave, where food and wine took second (or sixth) place to carnal excess. The totality of what I didn't like about it was distilled into just one or two graphs for my story, but I could have gone on. Kudos to you for a throwing a big party, but it wasn't my scene (though it was clearly others) and it's my job to tell it how I see it.

I'm not saying you were playing disco while I was trying to become one with Mozart, not at all. But when you turn the volume up so damn loud (tigers, naked women, sex shows, spotlights, circus people, etc...), it tends to drown out the larger symphony. You have a beautiful restaurant Andre, and I'd love the opportunity to go again, but I'll opt for the table service and relative tranquility of a February evening rather than having to weave through an army of bouncers and middle-aged drunks with boners in perpetuity going ga-ga for go-go puffs. Next year I hear rumours of a Mardi Gras theme for Masquerave and an expenditure of over 1.5 million dollars. I can only imagination what kind of Caligulaic fun that will be, and thus primed with my first experience, I will be better armed to handle the second. If I offended you, my apologies, and If I don't get an invite back...I knew what I was getting into when I wrote:

Masquerave came across like a bad, disorganised play financed by reckless adolescents armed with nuclear-powered penis pumps

I am tasked with being frank. I write not just about what I eat and drink, but what I feel and think.

And stovetop, I like to get down. I like to shimmy and groove and get silly with booze. At times, I like to fall flat on my face and writhe like a gecko caught in a maginfying glass. If Bearfoot's Masquerave was a Western, then I am John freakin' Wayne. I just thought it was poorly juxtaposed against a wine and food festival, and that's what I wrote. :wink:

Edited by Andrew Morrison (log)

Andrew Morrison

Food Columnist | The Westender

Editor & Publisher | Scout Magazine

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If you promise not to put a bounty on my head for the next 12 months, you have a deal. :biggrin:

Again, welcome to eGullet, Andre. It's wonderful to have you posting and I'm sure everyone in the Vancouver forum is pleased you've become a member!

Have a wonderful winter up there.

Edited by Andrew Morrison (log)

Andrew Morrison

Food Columnist | The Westender

Editor & Publisher | Scout Magazine

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Again, welcome to eGullet, Andre. It's wonderful to have you posting and I'm sure everyone in the Vancouver forum is pleased you've become a member!

We most certainly are! Provided of course that:

a) Andre provides us with sushi-plate women for any eGullet gathering :wink: , and

b) Participates on eGullet to help promote the food scene in Whistler in general, not just Bearfoot alone.

I for one am very pleased to have another voice from that end of the Sea-to-Sky. Welcome to the madhouse Andre!

Now, back to that Gill person .....

A.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Alexanra Gill reviews Senova -- quite positively -- here.

There are a couple of minor errors in the copy though. Did anyone else notice them?

from the thinly veneered desk of:

Jamie Maw

Food Editor

Vancouver magazine

www.vancouvermagazine.com

Foodblog: In the Belly of the Feast - Eating BC

"Profumo profondo della mia carne"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 5 months later...

SHE'S BACK!

Gill's take on the Van Mag Restaurant Awards.

There's nothing else like it in Canada. And most of those who attend, me included, truly enjoy this rare opportunity for everyone to get together and let loose.

So why then have the awards themselves become such a joke?

Well, for starters there are just way too many -- 32 this year -- for any one to carry much weight. Jamie Maw, Vancouver Magazine's food editor, has often insisted that the number of categories reflects the huge diversity of dining options in the city. He also argues that if Tojo's has been winning the same award for 10 consecutive years, it's important to recognize that "consistency" of excellence.

Is anyone else finding her tiresome and predictable?

A.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think her cranky food critic persona is just a character she assumes to write her weekly column.

How unfortunate she did not see Tojo at the pre-awards nosh, because he was there but constantly surrounded by people a whole lot taller than himself. Too bad she also missed what else the general manager for Tojo said when he accepted the award, it was hilarious.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Is anyone else finding her tiresome and predictable?

^ predictable yes. Maybe it's just me but don't we all need at least one really bitter cynic in every crowd? Helps balance out the industry? I'm sure this is how she feels about her role as a food writer.

As for the restaurant that sent me the $100 offer? It was a runner up. Did the gift certificates make a difference? You be the judge.

Again I think this is pushing the envelope of responsible journalism. Slander should be left for the politicians.

"There are two things every chef needs in the kitchen: fish sauce and duck fat" - Tony Minichiello

Link to comment
Share on other sites

But then again, I was not one of the judges on this year's panel and never have been -- by choice.

Yeah, that's same reason I don't play in the NHL. I choose not to.

I know a man who gave up smoking, drinking, sex, and rich food. He was healthy right up to the day he killed himself. - Johnny Carson
Link to comment
Share on other sites

×
×
  • Create New...