20150712 Toronto Trip: Messini & Chatime

We had brunch earlier at Pho Dau Bo. Andrew and I had a free day, so we called our cousin, JT, and met her at Vaughan Mills. We browsed through a few stores and then made our way to Chatime.


There are so many choices! I went with the usual grass jelly roasted milk tea. Andrew wanted to try something new. Hilarity ensues.

Jack Astor's Lansdowne: Zomato Meetup

Have you been to the redeveloped Lansdowne Park recently? Do you remember what it used to look like? My memories are a bit foggy. I vaguely remember going down for the SuperEx and going to 67's games. Gone are the empty lots. Now there are places like Whole Foods, Lindt Chocolate Shop, Winners, and Cineplex Cinemas. Among the new shiny establishments, Jack Astor's can be found by the Aberdeen Pavilion. Earlier this week, I had the privilege to be invited to the third Zomato Meetup in Ottawa.



Once we were all introduced to one another, we went on a brief tour around the restaurant. We learned that Jack Astor's has added more of a local feel at both their Lansdowne and Hunt Club location. At this specific location, they have coasters that feature local personalities, arena lights that used to light the old Civic Centre, pictures and memorabilia of Ottawa's sports history. Don't be shy to ask the staff if you're curious about the decor.

The Usual at Kim's Restaurant + Aladdin

Earlier last week, I found myself around Carling Avenue when running some errands. There are two restaurants that I like around there, Rice Pea and Kim's Restaurant.




On this adventure, I was craving the smoky stir-fried rice noodles with chicken (FN-04) at Kim's Restaurant. When I asked for the bean sprouts to be substituted with chinese greens (gai lan or choy sum), the owner told me that the dish didn't have bean sprouts. It was great news to me.

These were just as smoky as I remembered. The chef, who looks like the character on the menu, seasoned it perfectly. It was a solid dish which reminded me of House of Gourmet.


The order of deep-fried shrimp balls (A-11) came with only 3 shrimp balls instead of the usual 4. I've tried some of their other appetizers and some of their dim sum, but I always come back to these.


I was super full after lunch, but I couldn't help grabbing a few meat pies for the family. Aladdin Convenience & Bakery is located across the street of Kim's Restaurant. A quick run across the street and BOOM -- a bag of spicy meat pies.

~*~

Addresses:

Kid's Night: Central Bierhaus

Thinking back, I don't think we've ever had just a kid's night out. One of us was usually in another city or even in another country, so it made it tough to organize one. Now that we're all in Ottawa, we found time and got together for dinner and the Sens game.

Since the Canadian Tire Centre is in Kanata, we were trying to decide where to go for some good food. Richard suggested Central Bierhaus that's located in Kanata Centrum, right by the Landmark Theatre. It was coincidence that Chris Neil, a current Sens player, actually owns the establishment.


When we arrived for dinner, we were promptly seated and took a look at both the beer and food menu. The Central Bierhaus has an impressive selection of beers from around the world (Belgium, German, Ireland, and Japan to name a few).


To quench our thirst, we went with the Pilsner Urquell (Czech) for Richard, Erdinger dunkel (German) for Andrew, and Kronenburg Blanc 1664 (France) for Lucy and myself.


To fill our stomachs, we started with the traditional sausage flight (platter) which was served with bacon saurkraut and three mustards from McGarrigles. Then we got the giant soft pretzel, confit maple pork belly, and lobster poutine.






It was too much food. The confit maple pork belly was curiously dry. The lobster poutine was alright. The stars were definitely the sausage flight and the pretzel. When I had a piece of the pretzel, it was like an epiphany. "Ah, so this is what pretzels are supposed to taste like." I'm definitely coming back for more pretzels. No question about it. When I asked Richard how authentic they were, he surprisingly remarked that he never had any pretzels in Germany. When it came to snacks, he preferred the currywurst over pretzels.


As for the sausage flight, we got one each of a German bratwurst, Oktoberfest, German frankfurter, smoked italian, hot italian, and honey garlic sausage. It seemed like they ran out of the weisswurst. I didn't like the two italian sausages or the bratwurst. The latter seemed to be overcooked and became dry. The bacon saurkraut did its job of being the palate cleanser between each bite. I know others would disagree with me, but I enjoyed how subtle the bacon was.


Once dinner was over, we headed over to watch the Lightning against the Sens game. This pic was from the first intermission when the Sens were still up 1-0. The team couldn't keep up with the Lightnings and lost by a final score of 4-2. Despite the loss, it was still a great night with all the siblings!

~

Cinnamon Scones

After an early routine ultrasound at the Civic Hospital, I needed breakfast or at least a snack. I wandered over to the cafeteria and was immediately drawn to the cookies, muffins, and scones. Unsure of what to get, I grabbed a cup of coffee first and then returned. Staring at all the options for a bit, I picked the cinnamon scone because it stood out. Remembering the scones I had in Toronto, I excitedly paid for my breakfast and tried to find a clean table that was well lit -- for the photos, of course.


I took a bite and began to chew. Not too dry, not too sweet. Woah! I bit into something sweet and slightly crunchy. Cinnamon bark? No, it's soft and sweet. And that's when I realized that there were cinnamon sugar pearls in it. I thought I had picked up a cinnamon raisin scone. This was so much better than that!


On my way home, I tried to remember if I ever made a tasty scone. There was this one time when I attempted to make buttery biscuits. They ended up turning into scones because of over mixing. Other than that, I couldn't recall making scones.


Then one rainy day, I woke up with the urge to eat cinnamon scones again. With a few quick searches, I realized that I actually had to buy the cinnamon sugar pearls. I'm sure I could've made something like it, but it would probably take too long. Instead, I thought about using Skor toffee pieces to make *drumroll* cinnamon toffee scones. Doooone!




I found a recipe, added more cinnamon into the dough, replaced the cinnamon sugar pearls with toffee bits. I made both regular-sized scones and mini-scones. When these were in the oven, the house was filled with the perfume of cinnamon and sugar.



Boom. They turned out d-e-ricious! I'll definitely be making more scones from now on.

Street Food Ottawa Adventures: Streat Gourmet and Bap by Raon Kitchen

Ottawa's food truck/stand scene is still young and blossoming. There were 17 food trucks and cart permits that were given out by the city last year. Unfortunately, I've personally only tried a few of them. I've checked out the Street Food App before and seen the options out there, I just need to start planning some outings. I'm hoping to give more of them a try and thought that it would be great if I create a new label for the series. We'll call it the Street Food Adventures in Ottawa (or SFAOtt for short). There will also be a new "street food" label too. I invite you all to use the SFAOtt hashtag on Instagram and Twitter.


Where do I begin? Andrew, our youngest brother, and I planned to go downtown to meet up with Lucy for lunch. Richard was invited by declined to complete our sibling quartet. We arrived early to ensure that we'd have a choice of everything available at the food trucks and stands. We got their a little too early and got hungry, so we tucked into the Olly Fresco's Market inside L'Esplanade for a little appetizer.

Holy! It took every ounce of self discipline not to splurge and buy and eat everything in sight. There were pierogies with sautéed onions and bacon in their buffet pans, a few kinds of soups, lots of sandwiches, and sweets. Everything looked so good. I walked around and took it all in -- the sights I mean. I'll be returning for lunch in the future. Walking around that beautiful place while hungry was a bad mistake. In the end, Andrew and I shared a pastrami sandwich on a toasted sesame seed bagel.




There were a few spots that were burned, but other than that, it was a great snack. It made us feel less antsy. I picked up a few desserts for later too. There's a date square, a red berries square (I say it's raspberry, someone else said it was strawberry rhubarb, so we'll just generalize and call it red berries), and a piece of carrot cake.


After our snack, I went to get some cash on Sparks Street, while Andrew went to pick up some dolla drinks at McD. I had planned to grab some lobster mac and cheese from the Ad Mare food truck, but by the time I returned from the bank, they were sold out. My fault. Andrew and I met back up at the Streat Gourmet food truck on O'Connor and Albert.

Based on what I've read and seen first hand, Streat Gourmet's menu changes daily. The chef, Ben Baird, is constantly tweaking and experimenting to cater to more people. I admire him for that. It takes guts but he clearly knows what he's doing. Despite not having a regular dish on the menu, he's always keeping it interesting. Some of the main offerings in the past have included things like peameal bacon sandwiches, tacos, tandoori salmon burgers, grilled cheese sandwiches and soups. Dessert options he's offered has been things like butterscotch pudding with bananas, graham crumbs, Streat cinnamon buns, cookies, donuts, and rhubarb upside down cake with whipped cream. Lots of variety.


When we arrived, they had the roast beef with potato roesti, horseradish gravy, with a salad of spinach and carrot ribbons. Andrew wanted to grab something else, so we continued to walk.


We met up with Lucy at the Bap by Raon Kitchen stand on Bank Street (between Albert and Slater). As their name suggests, they serve a Korean mixed rice (could be a mix with other grains too) dish called bibimbap.


For the protein choices, they offer tofu, beef bulgogi, spicy pork or spicy chicken. You choose to have all the toppings like egg, veggies and kimchi, or you can adjust it to your taste by telling them to leave stuff out.


Once they finish making your bibimbap, you can personalize your bowl furthermore by adding some toasted sesame seeds, sesame oil, soy sauce, and gochujang (aka Korean red pepper paste or Korean spicy sauce, as it says on the label). I'm not sure if other people like having to dress their meals themselves, but we love it because then we can adjust it to our taste.

If you aren't familiar with seasoning your bibimbap, I recommend using only a few drops of sesame oil, a few swirls of the gochujang, and a few shakes of sesame seeds. Soy sauce isn't necessary, in my opinion.


There was a bit of a line but it was moving steadily. Lucy went with the tofu bibimbap, while Andrew took the beef bulgogi route. We took our lunches and retreated indoors to a nearby food court to enjoy.

My lunch from the Streat Gourmet food truck was still warm when we began to eat. The tender slices of roast beef sat on top of the potato roesti, which was a potato pancake, was quite enjoyable. As a gravy snob who loves gravy made with pan drippings and fond (the sticky caramelized stuff left on a tray after baking), I was disappointed with the gravy. I couldn't taste the horseradish at all. The gravy, which was packed in a small cup, also had a slight sweetness. I kept going back to it throughout the lunch because I tried to like it. In the end, I left the rest of the gravy alone. The final element of the lunch was the spinach and carrot ribbon salad. The salad was crunchy and the simple vinaigrette cut through the heavy flavours really well. Despite the gravy letdown, lunch was great. Other than the gravy, I finished everything -- before Lucy and Andrew even finished eating -- which is unheard of! (I'm the slowest eater of the family.)

Andrew dressed his bibimbap with all the toppings. Once he mixed everything and tucked into his lunch, he mentioned that he would've loved to add less soy sauce and more gochujang if he could redo it. Lucy used everything but the soy sauce and happily devoured her bowl of bibimbap, with the help of the Streat salad.

It's only the second season for a lot of the food trucks/stands, so they're still working out the kinks. Even if there are bumps along the way, I'll try to support them. You should too. Go Ottawa!

~*~

Addresses:

Olly Fresco's (Located inside L'Esplanade Laurier Building)
181 Bank Street
613-596-3860

Edamame Bruschetta

While going back through my Instagram wall, I noticed that I had forgotten to write about this beauty. Back before Christmas, Vanna found a recipe for edamame bruschetta that she wanted to try out for her Xmas party. The recipe that we skimmed through was Honest Vanilla's rendition. Since we didn't closely follow the recipe, I recommend that you head over there to see the accurate measurements.

Here's the gist of the ingredients we used: frozen shelled edamame (that happened to be on sale -- bonus!), a whole whack of mint leaves, some garlic cloves, olive oil, chili flakes, salt, and black pepper. To make it fancy, we added so me oven-roasted cherry tomatoes and some charred green onions.


We started off by getting the edamame boiled. While that was doing it's thing, chopped mint was added to some chili flakes, olive oil, and minced garlic.


We also popped in some cherry tomatoes that were tossed in olive oil, and a bit of salt and black pepper. I also threw in a few cloves of garlic to make things interesting. Once the edamame was soft enough, we blended it until it had some texture and then seasoned it lightly with S&P. The final touch was charring some green onions in a bit of olive oil.

I'll be the first admit: me and vegetables don't get along very well. Despite our relationship, I loved these bruschetta! First off, you get the charred green onion character and then the sweetness of the tomatoes jumps in. Then the not-entirely-smooth edamame mix joins the party with the mint, followed by a hint of garlic and then the french bread. It was harmonious. This edamame bruschetta will definitely be making more appearances in the future. And whether you blend the edamame into a smoother mix or leave it with a bit of texture, I'm sure you'll enjoy this appetizer for lunch or even dinner. Hell, you could even turn this into a breakfast sandwich with some eggs!

Sunday Picnic Lunch at Trinity Bellwoods Park

Today was a much-needed sunny and warm day. Although I was in Toronto for the past week, I had to get out and do something earlier today. I needed to keep busy.

Lunch was found at Clafouti Patisserie et Café. We: DG, VN, and myself, picked up some things at Clafouti and crossed the street to the busy Trinity Bellwoods Park. I really enjoyed the atmosphere there. The sakura trees still had some flowers, birds were singing away, dogs were having a blast, and people were just relaxing at the park -- it was a great atmosphere.

We found a spot in the park and ate lunch. I went with the Lana Del Rey panini. It was really exciting. There were so many flavours that complimented one another with every bite; the creaminess of the garlic lemon aioli, the burst of fried onion flavour, thinly sliced pork, and sweet bun. It was so good that I wanted another one after I devoured it. VN had a nice pulled pork panini (sans the cheese). DG had a surprisingly tasty grilled veg croissantwhich. The only complaint was that we didn't want the sandwiches to finish.


We also picked up a butter croissant and almond croissant from Clafouti. We liked that the croissants were sturdier and flakier than Le Moulin de Provence's rendition.


DG said that we had to get macarons from Nadège Patisserie since we were in the area. That was perfectly fine with me.

Side notes: We heard so many comments like, "these macaroons look amazing,"and "they have the best macaroons here!" Please. They're called macarons. Macaroons are the coconut things.

Also, why is it that everyone seems to know how to make macarons? The trend bugs me. Partially cause I can't make them.

These are my trio: mint chocolate chip (in the red), pistachio, and matcha macaron. I enjoyed the latter two. DG and VN both went with the salted caramel. Wise choices. I'll be getting the salted caramel next time. We happily soaked in the warm sun before I had to catch the train back home. Thanks for the lunch date ladies! It really meant a lot to me.

~*~

Sfiha: Another Spin on Meat Pie

These were the finished product of my version of the Lebanese meat pies. We didn't have all of the ingredients in some of the recipes I found -- shocking, I know -- and so I just relied on the smell and the taste of the meat topping. This was the first time I made it, so I was a little worried about the final product.




Before I mixed the meat, I whipped up a double-batch of a yeast dough recipe I found. It almost had a 1:1 ratio of water to oil. The dough was wrapped up and allowed to rise. Then I focused my attention to the meat.

These were some of the ingredients in there: ground beef, ketchup, salt, ground nutmeg, ground cinnamon, ground cumin, cayenne pepper, and diced tomatoes. Legit, I know.


Once the dough was allowed to rise after a few hours, the dough was divided into portions, rolled out, and topped with the meat mixture. We don't have a pizza stone or anything, so I turned one of our oven pans upside down and used that as a cook top in the oven. We didn't have a pizza peel either, so I looked around the house and just used a long piece of cardboard from our Mama Instant Noodles. The cardboard was then wrapped with tin foil. Although it looked funny, it worked.




They didn't take longer than 10 minutes each. Once out of the oven, they were allowed to cool before being devoured. We probably ate half of what we made. The sfiha actually tasted similar to the real stuff at the Aladdin Bakery. The dough turned out like a crispy crumb crust, which reminded me of Joe's Pizza's aromatic crumbly dough. They were so addictive!

Visiting the 3 Brewers

Full disclosure:
I don't enjoy alcohol. I rarely drink for that reason. Watered down juice is my beverage of choice. That or water. I can't tell if beer tastes good or if wine tastes good. I just don't drink enough and I'm perfectly fine with that.

When JL suggested that we should either go to 3 Brewers or Mill Street I wanted to try both actually, but I wanted to try the 3 Brewers more. Mainly because they had liege waffles on their menu. Okay, that was the only reason.


We met at the Kanata location right after I finished work. It was a long week and a long day. I didn't have a big appetite. We agreed to order and share some things, like the 2lbs of honey BBQ wings. They were great wings! The sauce wasn't overly sweet, the wings were still crisp and juicy inside. We were all really fans of them.




We also shared the star platter which had potato skins, mozzarella sticks, and spicy onion scoops. The spicy onion scoops were the star. Think of spicy onion rings. That's essentially what they tasted like.

We chased all of the salt and grease down with some cold beer. IPA for myself, blonde for JL, and the white beer for CA.


After all of the savoury things were polished off, we looked at the dessert section of the menu and discussed. We got the coffee and dessert combo which included a slice of cheesecake (CA opted for the strawberry drizzle), cup of coffee, and chocolate mouse (underneath that whipped cream).


And I couldn't have left without having their liege waffles. It was a sweet end to a fun night. I'd definitely return to the 3 Brewers. Have you been there yet?

2013 Xmas Holiday Baking

Let's start this by saying that I'm not much of a baker. I'd rather cook something instead. Don't you find that you're also baking a lot during the Christmas holidays?

For our Christmas dinner, which we held at Aunt IS's house, I knew I wanted to make at least two kinds of cookies. I was thinking of trying to make the DoubleTree chocolate walnut cookies again, and maybe some Biscoff cookies, or some chocolate chip cookies.

I used more chopped walnuts, less chocolate chunks, and less oatmeal flour for this batch of DoubleTree cookies. After I got started with the DoubleTree cookies, Richard into the kitchen and was also in a baking mood. He wanted to make Mom's chocolate chip cakey cookies. I suggested the Serious Eats' Food Lab recipe for "The Best Chocolate Chip Cookies." We made the cookies on Christmas Eve and then put them in the fridge to bake on Christmas afternoon.

Both bags of cookie dough were taken out to warm up a bit. After popping them into the oven, the remaining cookie dough was put in the freezer. Once the cookies were done and had cooled enough, we dug in. The results of the DoubleTree cookies were great! The ratio of walnuts to chocolate was perfect for me and they were slightly crisp on the edges while being chewy in the middle.

As for the cookies Richard made, they were disappointing. When he browned the butter the night before, the house smelled like caramel. It was so promising. The baked products were not only short on that depth of flavour, but they needed more flour (human error) too.

~

For the Xmas party with some friends, VN and I were thinking about attempting to make macarons again. Our last experience didn't turn out the greatest -- visually, that is. We thought we had everything, but we realized that I had forgot the icing sugar. Oops. We postponed it until Boxing Day.

After having lunch at the Authentic Vietnamese Pho House, we picked up some things to make macarons. We went to Bulk Barn and then went back to the kitchen. I had forgotten the icing sugar again. So fail. There was luckily a small bag of icing sugar left in the cupboards. Phew! The almond meal wasn't fine at all. We tried using a blender. Fail. We tried a coffee grinder. More fail. And then finally we resorted to a mortar and pestle to try and crush them finer. That didn't work too well either. We went on though.

Everything was gently mixed together and we were almost ready to pipe the macarons before VN brought something up. We had forgotten the icing sugar! Wow. I tried folding in the icing sugar in 20, 000 times as delicately as I could. But it didn't work. We had enough ingredients to make only one final batch.

It looked great. All the ingredients were added.

After a quick exchange, we agreed that it wouldn't be a big deal if we piped the macarons directly onto the pan. It was non-stick after all. It would be okay? Right? Riiiight?

We nervously popped the two trays of piped macarons and put it into the 280F to bake. That's what the recipe we used said. The macarons didn't like the high oven temperature. The macarons not only cracked but they weren't fully cooked through. When I took out the tray, this was what I saw. It was like tunnel vision.

Upon further inspection, there was one that looked perfect! Enhance!

Enhance! What a beauty. It was smooth on top and had feet! Unfortunately, all of the macarons -- including the pretty-looking one -- was under baked.

After the 4+ hours that it took VN and I to make macarons, I still tried to make it work. We were going to eat these macarons with some chocolate mint icing! So I grabbed the tub of chocolate icing and as I slid my fingers around the lid to open it, a piece of tinfoil that poked out sliced my fingers.


Yup. I sliced my fingers by trying to open a container of icing. You'd think that after all of those bad omens, VN and I would've stopped. But no. Clearly, me and macarons don't go well together. Just like me and Scrabble.

Despite two failed attempts at making macarons, I'm determined to make at least one good batch. This is not the end.

~


Yesterday (December 30th), I went over to SM's place to hang out. We also did some baking. I brought along some cookie dough from the Christmas Eve batches. I baked the cookies before the World Junior game began, that way we could enjoy them warm when the game began. We were watching Canada play against Slovakia. By the time I brought the cookies downstairs, they were already announcing the starting goalies. Once I got back to my seat and took a bite out of a warm chocolate chunk cookie, Drouin took a major penalty for hitting the head of a Slovenian player. Lame. But the game got better and Canada managed to earn a win with the help of a great hardworking shift by the Lazar-Patan-Reinhart line in the second period.


Once the game had finished, we went upstairs and began to make sugar cookies with a recipe given from SM's co-worker. We had a lot of fun using the cookie cutters to make feet, stars, snowmen, and hearts. There weren't any angels. No angels! SM also had some leftover icing so she topped off some of the cooled sugar cookies. When we were mixing the dough, it looked like the cookie dough needed more liquids. I wasn't sure what to do about it, so we didn't do anything about it. We put it in the fridge to let it set for an hour and hoped that it would turn out. And it did!

The end of December involved lots of baking. There were some successful batches and some that didn't work out. It's all good though. It's not always about the journey, it's about the results. Wait. Uh... whatever. Never mind. Scratch that. Rewind.

Wurch-ch-chi-chi-chi-chit!

The end of December involved lots of baking. It was fun to bake and cook for my friends and family, and even cook and bake with my friends and family. I hope the new year will continue to be full of new adventures, even if they don't turn out the way I want them to. To good health and lots of fun times ahead! Happy new years everyone! Cheers! *raises a glass of watered down juice* *clink*