Eat! Eat!

Eat! Eat!
1325 9 Ave SE
Calgary, AB

Located in the trendy Inglewood neighbourhood in Calgary, Eat! Eat! is the perfect little place to go for breakfast and lunch. Our discovery of Eat! Eat! was serendipitous as our original plan was to meet our friends Tamir and Thomas a few doors down at another cafe, which ended up being closed that day.

Being a huge breakfast buff, I was pretty excited by their menu. However, after taking a look at both the breakfast and lunch sections, I had a hard time deciding on what to order. Tamir was in the same boat. We then amicably agreed to split a reuben and eggs benedict.

Reuben with chicken tortilla soup

The reuben ($12) was tasty, warm, and wonderful. It was served on buttery marble rye toast with the perfect portion of horseradish and sauerkraut. The corned beef was moist but a tad on the salty side, however. The choice of sides included yam chips, fries, house salad, or the soup of the day. I opted for soup, but I was presented with several choices which included Moroccan lentil, yam curry, chicken tortilla, and two others. I chose the chicken tortilla. Many of the tortilla soups I've had in the past were on the thick side, but this one was surprisingly different. It had a harmonious blend of veggies, chicken, and deep-fried strips of tortillas which added a nice crunch to the soup.

Tamir ordered one ham and one spinach and tomato benny ($13), so I was able to sample both. While the eggs were slightly overcooked, it didn't necessarily detract from the benny experience. I preferred the spinach and egg one over the ham one. The spinach used was fresh and wasn't overdone.

Andrew had a 3-egg omelette with bacon, sausage, red pepper and ham ($13). The hashbrowns on the side were homemade and well-seasoned.

Since I love breakfast foods, I give bonus points to any place that serves it into the afternoon. Eat! Eat! is open Tuesdays to Sundays from 7 AM - 3 PM on weekdays and 8 AM - 4 PM on weekends. Next time I'm in Calgary, I would definitely eat eat here again.

4.5/5

Suitcase Souvenirs: Bordeaux, France

As this is a travel and food blog, I'd like to use this post to step back into the past and relive some travel memories. During those vacations, I've kept only a paper journal that has never before been read by anyone else. I will be using this blog as an outlet for my future travel memories, but I will also be reminiscing in a series of posts entitled Suitcase Souvenirs, which perhaps you can also use as a guide to plan your own travels.

Bordeaux
May 2011

We spent 3 days in the Bordeaux area during our honeymoon. We chose a hotel that was east of the city centre, across the scenic Pont-de-Pierre bridge. I thought it was a fabulous location as the area was quiet, we were right next to a supermarket, and it was a only 20 min stroll or 5 min bike ride to central Bordeaux.

We used bikes to get around quite a bit in Bordeaux. The VCUB bike rental service is pretty awesome. There are tons of bike stations around town and you can pick a bike up at one station, ride to where you need to go, and chances are there is a bike station close to your destination for drop off. All you have to do is purchase a membership and get a PIN (rates depend on the length of the subscription but are super cheap). When you go to use a bike, any rentals under 30 min are free, or a mere 1 € for 24 hr. I highly recommend bike rentals whenever possible as it's an incredibly fast and efficient way to discover the city.

Andrew with our rental bikes in front of Place de la Bourse

L'Entrecote: We went to this steak restaurant based on the high ratings we saw from Google Places and guidebooks. They only serve one meal option here: a steak dinner that includes a walnut and green salad, and fries (16.50 €). While the salad and unlimited fries were acceptable, the steak was not. It was tasty, but drenched in a greasy sauce and was full of gristle. When I asked for medium steak, it arrived more rare to medium rare. It was hard to believe that patrons could be filling 4 floors of this restaurant. With all the other delicious options in Bordeaux, this is not a place I will return to.












One of my favorite things we did in Bordeaux was our wine tour. We didn't book anything before going on our trip as I found that in my searching, there were many pricey and multi-day options. Instead, we booked at the tourist information office, which gave us more choices within our budget. If there's a specific region you want to visit on a specific day, it might be better to book further in advance. Otherwise, if you're open to checking out any Bordeaux vineyard and are not too restricted by time, booking at the at the tourism office may be the better choice.

View of the vineyard from a window in the chateau

We toured two Grand Cru vineyards in the Graves region just south of Bordeaux. The majority of the wines produced in Bordeaux are reds, but Graves is also amenable to white wines. We learned that all of the Bordeaux wines are blended, so the red wines can be a mixture of any of cabernet sauvignon, merlot, malbec, and cabernet franc. White wines are typically a mixture of sauvignon blanc and semillon.

The wine cellar of Chateau Carbonnieux

At the first vineyard, Chateau Haut-Bailly, we tasted two reds. They make 3 grades of wine here and we tasted the premier and secondary grades. Honestly, I didn't really like either of the wines and if I had to choose, I would have gone with the secondary grade. It was full of tannins, but we were told that the wine needed another year or so of aging before reaching its optimal taste. The other vineyard we visited was Chateau Carbonnieux, where we tasted a red and a white. I liked both and would have bought some if we didn't still have to travel by air to Madrid and Brussels. However, I was able to find 3 stores that carry this wine in Alberta.

Our hostess preparing our samples of wine

I think Bordeaux rises above Paris as my new favorite city in Europe. It has a much more relaxed pace, is less touristy, and still has magnificent architecture with lots to see and do. It's a short drive away from the beach and even Europe's largest sand dune, which I will write about in a future post!

Jardin Public

Apple-Cranberry Crisp

Shortly after Thanksgiving, Andrew found some cranberries on sale for 50 cents a bag. Even though we still had some at home, he bought 2 bags. So I've been looking for ways to use up the cranberries, in addition to making some cranberry sauce a few weeks back. A coworker of mine bought a cranberry apple caramel crumble pie to share today, and I thought it tasted amazing (it's from Save On Foods, by the way). I then started to look for similar recipes and came across the Apple-Cranberry Crisp.

After a quick trip to the grocery store for some Granny Smith apples, I was set to bake.

The ingredients - NOT to scale!

I modified the recipe a bit, adding more cranberries than called for. I usually find crumbles/crisps to be on the sweet side so I didn't proportionally change the amount of sugar. The result was a fruity and tart dessert that went well with vanilla ice cream.

 

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Apple-Cranberry Crisp
Adapted from allrecipes.com

INGREDIENTS:
4 Granny Smith apples; peeled, cored and thinly sliced
1/2 bag cranberries
1/3 cup white sugar
3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/3 cup quick-cooking oats
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1/4 cup butter, cut into pieces
1/2 cup chopped pecans

DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C.) Butter an 8 inch square baking dish.

2. In a large bowl, mix together apples, cranberries, white sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg. Spread onto the baking dish.

3. In the same bowl, combine oats, flour and brown sugar. With a fork, mix in butter until crumbly. Stir in pecans. Sprinkle over apples.

4. Bake in preheated oven for 40 to 50 minutes, or until topping is golden brown, and apples are tender. Serve warm.

Hot Pot

With the turn of the season and the temperature falling, one of the comforting meals I like to turn to is hot pot, or Chinese fondue. For those who have never experienced hot pot, a large pot of broth is kept simmering in the middle of the table. A variety of meats, seafood, vegetables, noodles, and dumplings are cooked in the pot and eaten with a dipping sauce.

For our first hot pot of the season, we used a tom yum soup base. We got some thinly sliced beef, dace fish balls and imitation lobster balls from T&T Supermarket. I also sliced up a pork tenderloin. Meat is usually thinly sliced so that it can cook quickly in the broth. It can come pre-sliced from many Asian supermarkets or you can cut it yourself. To facilitate easier DIY slicing, the meat can be put in the freezer until it is half frozen.

For veggies, we chose watercress, siu choy (Chinese cabbage) cut into bite-sized pieces, enoki mushrooms, and regular button mushrooms. We also pre-cooked a package of rice vermicelli beforehand, and defrosted a package of O'Tasty pork and vegetable dumplings. On a side note, I highly recommend these dumplings. They make for an easy work lunch. They're pre-cooked and frozen, so all you have to do is heat them up and eat. You can find them for $4 for a package of 20 when on sale (T&T sells them).

Another thing we like to have with hot pot are konnyaku noodle bundles, also known as shirataki noodles. These are incredibly healthy as they are virtually calorie-free, but also have no fat, carbs, nor protein. But they are very high in fibre. It's touted as the diet food in Japan. It's tasteless, but it easily absorbs the flavor of whatever you cook it with, or any dipping sauce you use.

The two dipping sauces we used were sa cha sauce and something similar to satay sauce (a mixture of peanut butter, hoisin sauce, and sesame paste).

Because of the variety of food we like to cook in hot pot, we always have tons of food so we always invite others over. Let me know if you want to join us for our next hot pot!

Queen of Tarts - Pop Up Dinner

Queen of Tarts (update Mar 2012: now known as Dauphine Bakery and Bistro)
10129 104 St
780-421-4410

Queen of Tarts is a relatively new bakery/cafe downtown that focuses on using local and organic ingredients. The sit-down portion of the restaurant only seats a dozen or so people, but they have many take away items available. I've tried some of their baked goods in recent months and they've kept me wanting more. They've recently started hosting Pop-Up Dinners and we went to their second ever dinner this past weekend. For $45, we dined on a 3-course meal.

A Gulf prawn amuse-bouche preceded our meal. It was served with a roasted red pepper rouille topped with alfalfa sprouts. This was a delightful prelude to dinner and it got me excited for what would come next. The prawn was carefully cooked without being overdone and the rouille was quite tasty with a strong presence of roasted pepper flavor. I mopped up the remnant sauce with a morsel of buckwheat bread.

We got a plate full of 3 varieties of bread: slices of buckwheat bread, buttery brioche, and gougere. The brioche was oh so flaky and it was filled with a small dollop of mushroom pate. I thought this was yummy but the gougere was even better. The dough had cheese baked into it and they were bites of savoury goodness. Apparently they sell these in their bakery on weekends, but I'd like to try to make some of these myself. The buckwheat bread was unremarkable in comparison.

Left to right: cheesy gougere, buckwheat slices, and buttery brioche

The next course was a fennel and orange soup. Before tasting the soup, the name didn't seem to appeal to me very much. The actual taste wasn't much better. It was overall kind of bland but orangey with a subtle hint of fennel. It was also too thin for my liking. It would have been better if it had some chunks in it or if it was thickened by some kind of starch.

The main course was a roasted organic chicken served on top of wilted greens with crunchy hazelnuts, currants, and pieces of pain de campagne (similar to sourdough bread). A large piece of cooked lemon wedge also accompanied the plate. The menu description didn't mention any lemon so this was a bit of a surprise, especially for Andrew as he's not a fan of the fruit. The vegetables were overly seasoned with lemon juice (it was even too much for a lemon lover like me) and I found that they could have been further cooked. The chicken was seasoned but nothing more. We both thought that the roasted chicken from a supermarket deli was much tastier. My piece of chicken had bright pink near the bone on one end, but on the other end, it was overcooked and dry.

Unexpectedly lemony

For dessert, we had a chocolate tart. More specifically, it was the Longboat Porter tart au chocolat. The chocolate filling was rich and velvety smooth. Andrew found it to be too chocolatey and ate only the crust. I am not normally a fan of crusts but the ones from Queen of Tarts I have always loved. The tart was topped with creme fraiche and a slice of apricot-resembling persimmon. I thought that regular whipped cream would have worked better with the dark chocolate.

I wonder what the Longboat porter tastes like on its own

They had a choice of two white wines and two red wines on their menu tonight, and the 2010 Petit Le Vieux from the Okanagan piqued my curiosity. It was a refreshing and fruity wine that suited tonight's meal.

I thought that this meal was a big disappointment compared to the baked goods I've had from Queen of Tarts in the past. These pop-up dinners bring in guest chefs for the evening but I'm not sure where tonight's chef came from. The items that were notably from the bakery were excellent, however. But overall I would have to give this meal 2/5.

Wine Tasting - U of A Faculty Club

 The U of A Faculty Club has been hosting wine tastings for many years now and this is the first time I've attended. Every November and January, they have a formal event hosted by sommelier William Bincoletto of Vines Wine Merchants. This past Friday, eight different wines from the Dominio del Plata vineyard in Argentina were featured.

Stacey and Emily ready to sample wine

I was quite excited for the tasting, as I wanted to try different grape varieties from Argentina other than the typical malbecs you find everywhere. We sampled almost all of the wines from the Crios label: torrontes, rose, malbec, syrah-bonarda, and cabernet sauvignon. Malbecs from the Zohar, Ben Marco, and Susana Balbo lines were also on the list. We started off with the light wines: torrontes and rose (2010). I actually didn't enjoy either of them. The torrontes was citrusy and dry, but I didn't like the acidic finish. The rose was also too full bodied for my liking.

Wine pairings

Next we moved onto the reds, starting with the 2010 Zohar Malbec. It smelled strong, but had a very light taste that I quite enjoyed. This wine was aged in stainless steel rather than oak barrels which contributed to the overall light body.

The 2009 Crios Malbec was something 6/7 people at our table didn't enjoy. We might have been the only table out of 25 who put our hands up when William asked if anyone didn't like this wine, which made him come over to our table to give us drinking instructions. He stared at Leeann and directed her to take a big bite of strong cheese, and while the cheese was still in her mouth, to take a sip of the wine. He asked her if the wine tasted better with the cheese, to which she nodded agreeingly so that the attention would no longer be on our table. With or without food, we still didn't like this wine.

Leeann avidly taking notes - you'd think she was cramming for an exam!

We made our way to the more full-bodied wines: the 2008 Syrah-Bonarda and Cabernet Sauvignon. Both were okay - oaky, but nothing spectacular. The 2008 Ben Marco Malbec, however was wonderful. I've had this wine before as it is one of the malbecs on the Faculty Club wine list. It's a very smooth and velvety wine that goes well with a wide range of foods.

Lastly, we finished off with the 2008 Susana Balbo Late Harvest Malbec. This wine was a pleasant surprise. I have never heard of nor tried a red dessert wine up until now. This red is meant to be served slightly chilled and pairs well with chocolate (not that we had any to eat with the wine). I'm not normally a fan of dessert wines, but I liked my small portion of this wine because of the novelty.

My top two picks: 2008 Ben Marco Malbec ($28.99) and 2010 Zohar Malbec ($21.99)

The Faculty Club wine tasting is a popular event attended by approximately 200 people. A variety of cheeses, fruits, crackers, and breads are served to pair with the wines and there are abundant wine-related door prizes.

Garson's prize: Koonunga Hill Chardonnay and a Crios corkscrew

Andrew's winning

I would be happy return to a future tasting night if anyone else wants to go. The next one will be featuring cabernet sauvignons and will be on January 13. Tickets go for $22.50 each and sell out quickly, so if you're interested, let me know as soon as you can!

Remnants of wine

The end of the night

Syphay

Syphay Restaurant
6010 104 St
780-438-8338

Located in a sketchy looking building on Calgary Trail, Syphay is a cozy restaurant with food to die for. We decided to go on a Friday night at about 5:30. Having been there before and knowing how busy it can get, I called ahead to see if they would have room for us, and they did! The person on the phone also ended up being our server and she was very friendly, attentive and efficient.

Andrew gave me full control over ordering our meal this evening. I chose the Yum Vermicelli salad with chicken ($13.95), Phanang Curry with beef ($15.95), Pad Thai with chicken ($15.95), along with an order of coconut rice ($3.50).

My platter of food - sorry for the poor quality iPhone pics!

The Yum Vermicelli was yum. This salad was served warm and consisted of vermicelli mixed with pieces of chicken, finely shredded cucumber, carrot, red onion and mint. It was topped with cilantro and peanuts and dressed with a sweet and spicy peanut sauce. I thought the dish was very delightful, and I would describe it as warm, sweet, and spicy. The cucumbers in the salad were quite refreshing and made for a nice, light dish. I found that there was excess sauce in the dish but that was not a problem as I ate it with coconut rice after.

Yum Vermicelli

Next came the rest of our meal. The Phanang Curry and Pad Thai were also both warm, sweet and spicy. In addition, the coconut milk in the curry added much creaminess to the sauce. This dish tasted wonderful with coconut rice. The veggies included in this curry were bell peppers, broccoli and snow peas. The only bad thing I found was that there was too much broccoli in the curry and they were cut into large chunks. Since the place settings did not include knives, it was hard to eat. The coconut milk in the curry, as in many curry dishes, added a lot of richness and so it felt quite heavy as I was eating seconds of the curry.

Phanang Curry

Pad Thai is always one of my favorite Thai dishes. Syphay does there's exceptionally well and had perfect proportions of spicy and sweet in the sauce. The other add-ins (bean sprouts, eggs, carrots, chives, peanuts, and cilantro) were all well-balanced.

Pad Thai

We had a ton of food leftover, but that wasn't a problem as it still tasted delicious the next day! When our server took away our food to pack up, she also asked us if we wanted an order of coconut rice to take home. That's the sign of either efficient upselling or having a good understanding of what customers want. Thai food is something we both enjoy, but we don't seem to eat it often enough. We had a very positive experience at Syphay and we will not hesitate to return.

5/5

IHOP - All You Can Eat!

IHOP
3921 Calgary Trail

I signed up for the IHOP Pancake Revolution where upon joining, you get a free meal. You also get another free meal on you birthday, and another one on the one year anniversary of signing up! As a result of joining, I get some promotional e-mails from IHOP as well. For example, this month I got an e-mail informing me that it was "All-you-can-eat pancakes for the entire month of October!".

I went with one of my buffet-worshipping friends, Garson. The AYCE menu involved various combinations that consisted of either bacon, sausage, or ham with eggs and hashbrowns. I chose the Sausage & Eggs Combo for $11.99 and Garson had the Ultimate Bacon & Sausage Combo ($12.79).

Sausage & Eggs Combo (4 sausages, hashbrowns, and 2 eggs - mine were poached)

 

Bacon and Sausage Combo

With the AYCE deal, 2 buttermilk pancakes initially come with the meal. The refills come on a plate of 3 each until your face is stuffed. I loved my combo - the hashbrowns were made of shredded potatoes formed into a patty and fried until the outside is crispy. The sausages are also one of a kind, and I asked for my eggs poached as I rarely have poached eggs at home. You also get a choice of Tabasco sauce, ketchup and HP sauce as condiments for the meal, along with 4 types of syrups: old fashioned, butter pecan, strawberry, and blueberry. My go-to toppings for my hashbrowns are Tabasco and ketchup, with blueberry syrup on the pancakes.

Buttermilk pancakes doused with blueberry-flavored syrup

Garson also tried one of the IHOP splashers in splashberry. At the bottom of the glass was a layer of deep red strawberries topped with sprite and orange juice. It was fruity, yet refreshing, with a hint of carbonation.

Fruity Splashberry drink

My usual order at IHOP is one of the flavored pancake combos (the cinn-a-stack is amazing!), but I felt the need to try the AYCE. It was good, but nothing can beat the Pick-A-Pancake combo! By the way, I ate a measly 3 pancakes compared to Garson's 7.

I was very impressed by the service this evening, though I find that each time I go there, the servers have been top-notch. I always feel welcomed there and the waitstaff is always on their A-game. Way to go!

4/5

La Poutine - Review

La Poutine
8720 109 St

I love poutine, therefore La Poutine was a place I wanted to try. Kristen and I went upon recommendations by her coworkers. She said that they had mentioned that the cheese curds squeaked as they bit down on them, meaning that they were fresh and authentic.

I decided to stick with the traditional poutine (gravy and curds) with the traditional gravy. The traditional gravy is what they normally use in Montreal. It's spiced with herbs and is vegan. My first few bites were good, but the more I ate of the poutine, the more I noticed that the fries were very dry on the inside, even though they were generously coated with gravy. The curds were squeaky against my teeth, which I thought was kinda cool, and they had a nice flavor to them.The traditional gravy was also a bit tangy and reminded me of the dipping sauce at Swiss Chalet (something I'm not particularly fond of). I then tried some of Kristen's poutine with the beef gravy and I found that to be much better tasting.

Small traditional poutine with traditional gravy ($5.95)

The poutines range in price from $5.95 (small traditional) to $11.50 (large meat lovers). The small is the same size as a small square styrofoam takeout container. Large comes in a rectangular sized container.  Instead of using styrofoam containers, however, they serve their poutines in containers made from compostable sugar cane fiber, bagasse.

There was seating for no more than 12 and it was in a tight configuration. We got there at about quarter to twelve on a Monday thinking that it would get quite busy closer to noon. However, it didn't. While there were over a dozen different types of poutine to choose from, there was a rather limited section of canned and bottle drinks (water, orange juice, Pepsi/Diet Pepsi, 7-up, and Nestea).

The only part of the poutine I truly enjoyed were the cheese curds. While I appreciate the flavor of the fresh hand-cut fries, I found them to be very dry and almost unpalatable the more I ate. I'm glad I gave the place a try, but I will likely not return. I would much rather have poutine from Costco for a fraction of the price.

2/5

Other notes: only cash and debit are accepted.

Chocolate Caramel Pecan Pie – Recipe

Anyone who knows Andrew will know that he’s crazy about pecan pie. I’ve experimented with a few pecan pie recipes over the years and this one is the best one yet. It’s also the easiest recipe I’ve tried. Plus it works well with a store-bought pie crust. Yes, gone are my days of making my own crust since I don’t even like pie crust to begin with!

I found a recipe for caramel pecan pie from from allrecipes.com. Based on the reader reviews, I modified it a bit before making it for the first time. After that first time, I made some more changes and experimented with adding some chocolate thinking that in theory, chocolate caramel pecan pie should be delicious. I grabbed the first kind of chocolate I saw in our cupboard (Lindt Sea Salt Dark Chocolate) and melted half of the bar with the caramels. The experiment was successful! Andrew also agrees that this is his favorite version of homemade pecan pie.

Ooey Gooey Caramelly Goodness!

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Chocolate Caramel Pecan Pie
Adapted from allrecipes.com

INGREDIENTS:
1 (9 inch) unbaked pie crust
40 caramels, unwrapped
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup milk
50 g chocolate (I used 5 squares of Lindt sea salt dark chocolate but I reckon semi-sweet chocolate chips or baking squares will also work)
1/2 cup brown sugar
3 eggs
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon salt
1.5 cups pecan halves


DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C.) In a saucepan over low heat, combine caramels, chocolate, butter and milk. Cook, stirring frequently, until smooth. Remove from heat and set aside.

2. In a large bowl, combine sugar, eggs, vanilla and salt. Gradually mix in the melted caramel mixture. Stir in pecans. Pour filling into unbaked pie crust.

3. Bake in the preheated oven for 45 to 50 minutes, or until pastry is golden brown. Allow to cool until filling is firm.

Option: When the pie is out of the oven, microwave 3-4 caramels with a splash of milk and a tiny dollop of butter. Drizzle on top of the pie for a decorative effect.
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Welcome!

Hello all! Whether you are new my blog or if you have been reading my ramblings in my previous blog life, I welcome you here.

I started my first blog back in 2005 when my friend Tai registered his domain name perambulation.ca (no longer in use). He used the site to write updates his worldly adventures and also allowed friends and family to create blogs on the site. I used my blog to babble. Most of the time. I then started to use it to share my strange and interesting adventures on my first-ever overseas trip to China. Then it continued with Chicago, and then Europe, with more rants in between. Finally everyone gradually stopped using the site and then the domain name never got renewed.

In late 2007 I visited a charming new restaurant and I wanted to share my experience with others. That started my restaurant review-writing days. They continued until summer of 2008 when I needed to take a hiatus to accommodate for thesis-writing. Since then, I've only written a few reviews.

I have continued writing about my travel experiences but only in the form of a hand-written journal. I would like to share my travel adventures with others once again, in addition to my fooding fun and follies.