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.

~*~

Final Day of Training + Porter Lounge

Morning call was for 7am. My coworker, Glenn Coco aka GC, and I had no idea there was one set. I woke up so confused. I definitely got up and then crawled back into my pillow fort. We eventually got up and ready. We checked out of the hotel and then went back to headquarters for breakfast and our last day of training. You can read about the first day of training here.

There was a platter of pastries (cinnamon rolls, bear paws, and a variety of scones), bagels, muffins, yogurt, and fruits.

The chocolate croissants were a popular item the previous day, so I checked it out for myself. It was dense in the middle and wasn't light and messy -- which is what makes a great croissant.

Canada Day 2013

This post is dedicated to all my friends and family who spent Canada Day overseas.

Toronto Marathon Weekend 2013

My weekend was spent in Toronto for work. I helped cover the GoodLife Fitness Toronto Marathon as a sports photographer with the MarathonFoto company. You can read more about what it's like to work the event [link]. This post is about all the food.

*Updated* Covering a Marathon as an Official Photographer: My Experience

This upcoming Sunday is the GoodLife Fitness Toronto Marathon 2013. I'll be joining a wonderful team of MarathonFoto photographers to cover the event. It will be my fifth time helping out with the amazing event.



Grab a cup of coffee, or in this case -- a caffé macchiato -- and read how the upcoming weekend typically unfolds for me, an official marathon photographer for the day. There won't be any food porn. I'll write about the food later. Continue if you'd like.

Sugar bush during the March Break

It's safe to say that there are a ton of activities available for kids during March Break.  One that won't break the bank, and also gets kids outside, is visiting a nearby sugar bush to see how maple syrup is made, indulge in a pancake breakfast, and roll up some sticky maple taffy.  It's a quintessential Ottawa activity.  Last Saturday, I was able to round up some of our friends to check out the Proulx Maple and Berry Farm in Cumberland.

As you can see, we had gorgeous spring weather on Saturday.  The temperature was perfectly mild, with bright sunshine beaming down on us.

This is the shack where the maple sap (which was 90% water) was boiled all the way down to the sticky, sweet maple syrup we all know.  The young man tending to the wood fire was supremely knowledgeable and very comfortable in speaking to visitors.

There were a ton of young families around.  I should point out that our friends, like us, are in our late 20s and early 30s, and none of us have children, yet.  I felt a little odd at first.  In the end, the excitement to be visiting a sugar bush again after nearly 20 years erased my self-consciousness.

After waiting for approximately 40 minutes, we were finally seated for our pancake breakfast.  It was $22.75 per person (tax included) for the buffet.  The selection was smaller than expected, but it definitely hit the spot on a morning when I didn't partake in my daily coffee before making the drive.

This was my first plate: pancakes, baked beans (with pork), maple-glazed carrots, sausages, homefries, crispy pork (oreilles de crisse), scrambled eggs, and maple syrup.  The eggs were hard, as you can see, and the carrots weren't actually glazed.  They sat in a watery liquid and was mostly just overcooked.  Everything else was pretty delicious.  The pancakes were thin and dense, not your diner-style fluffy pancakes.

The winner of the day was the crispy pork, which we thought was regular bacon.  In French, these were called "des oreilles de crisse" -- roughly translated to Christ's ears.  Little did we know that the fried strips were crunchy, yet chewy.  These were a favourite around the table.

Jimmy's second plate was piled high with crispy pork.

After many refills at the buffet table and a more than a few cups of coffee, we headed outside to a little tented area for the maple taffy.  It was included as the dessert option for the buffet.  You're given a ticket to redeem for taffy or for raspberry or sugar pie.  We all picked the taffy obviously. 

This is basically a boiled down syrup that cools down to a sticky mess the instant the syrup hits the snow (or in this case, the ice chips). You're given wooden popsicle sticks to roll them up into a lollipop form.

As you can see, it's a little drippy at first, but after a while, it smooths out into something that looks like amber on a stick.

Most of our friends found it too sweet and threw out the rest.  I definitely ate the entire thing :)  Memories of childhood, and all that.

We took a walk around the sugar bush to work off our full stomachs.  Most of the trees had one tap and one bucket, but the larger ones had up to five!

There was also a blackened cauldron containing maple sap.  It was a display to show how maple syrup used to be boiled down.

I found that the sugar bush at Proulx Farm was far simpler than I remembered sugar bushes to be.  There were activities at the other part of the farm, but they seemed more geared towards young children and families.  Overall, we found that it was an affordable, fun outing for friends -- especially for those who had never visited a sugar bush before.  Recommended to visit every few years.

More Photos from Asia 2010

I thought I'd share some photos that I've recently edited from my 2010 trip to Asia.


A photo of the Dream Mall. It's one of Asia's largest shopping malls. [link]




Sulfur springs and hiking in the Yangmingshan National Park. [link]








Busy streets of Danshui market and harbourfront. [link]




Mutianyu section of the Great Wall of China. [link]

Do you like?

Mont Tremblant, Montreal, and Blueberry Lake Resort

When Aunty and my cousin from Hong Kong visited us back in October, my other aunt had booked a few days at a cabin at the Blueberry Lake Resort. We had a plan to go up with the family, visit Mont Tremblant, have a steak dinner at the cabin, do a day trip to Montreal, and then rest up at the cabin. The weather could not have been any nicer. The leaves already began to change and the sunny warm weather was out during the weekend of our trip.







On our way to Mont Tremblant we dropped by McD’s for a quick bite. Bic Macs, McChickens, and Quarter Pounder meals were shared.





Pâté, brie, another kind of cheese, and crackers were brought out of the car for those who didn’t want to eat McD’s. The sun and heat melted the fat in the pork pâté. Sad.



We walked around the busy Mont Tremblant village. Someone was nice enough to give the guys a couple of free passes to the second gondola. I got this shot on the way down.

Later that night, the steak dinner was made to feed the large family. I’m missing the photos from that night.






The following day, we drove to Montreal and found lunch at the Kei Phat Restaurant (inside the Marché Kei Phat). I noticed that the menu was smaller than usual, and then I saw the words “Menu du Mardi” which translates to “Tuesday’s Menu.” We were told that the main chefs had Tuesdays off.



That didn’t bother me. I went with the Phnom Penh noodle soup.



MT’s usual dish, rice noodles with beef, was not on Tuesday’s menu. She lost her appetite. Someone ordered some shrimp spring rolls for her to snack on instead.





Fast forward to dinner. We went to a restaurant in Chinatown located somewhere at the end of the pedestrian street. The last time we ate at the restaurant, I remembered that the fish was really fresh, really moist and tender. The stir-fried rice noodles were great too. I lost their business card so I can’t tell you which place we visited. Woops. It’s past the AYCE place and it’s across the bakery (which is located at the corner of the pedestrian street).

Cousin E and Aunty chose the dishes that night. We started off with some fish maw soup. A plate of dried scallops with greens came soon afterwards.





Steamed oysters with black bean sauce. I really liked the sauce that went with the oysters. The steamed oysters, themselves, were alright.



Double cooked oysters (battered and deep fried, then stir-fried).



Stir-fried vermicelli.





Steamed fish with soy sauce. This fish was great! It was super fresh and cooked perfectly. The meat was tender and sweet with no hints of fishiness or muddiness. You should definitely order a steamed fish at this restaurant (whatever it’s called). I’d probably ask the server which fish is the freshest or in season.





Finally, a plate of rice noodles with beef and Chinese broccoli (aka my noodles) with extra sauce. This was really disappointing. Some of the noodles were undercooked and the sauce was flavourless. Grandpa assumed that it was the “second chef” who cooked the dish. Whatever the case may be, I was disappointed that the noodles weren’t even decent. We ended up packing up the dish.





After dinner, we visited the bakery across the street and picked up a few things before driving back to the cabin for the night.

We had a little snack of some coconut buns and tea before or after soaking in the hot tub and playing a few rounds of pool and ping pong. I can’t remember.






This was the view in the morning. The weather was looking great and the cabin smelled like a bakery.



Check out this spread for breakfast. Nice, huh? These were all warmed up in the oven. Croissant, hot dog buns, coconut spiral sticks, and cookie-topped custard buns were pretty damn tasty. The cabin was filled with the perfume of buttery pastries.



I picked up a few of these for Dad, but it turns out that everyone enjoyed these because the cookie-topped custard buns were made so well.



MT absolutely loved these. I asked her to show it off between bites.

We slowly packed things into the cars and headed back home. It was a very nice couple of days up at the cabin.