Can't beat the EAT
During last week鈥檚 EAT 麻豆传媒映画Food and Cooking Festival, it was nearly impossible to go anywhere without bumping into the likes of Vikram Vij, Mark McEwan, J茅r茅mie Bastien, Anna Olson, or any number of this country鈥檚 top celebrity chefs.
Under new ownership, the revitalized festival鈥檚 efforts to reshape the populist event into a more sophisticated 10-day, nationally themed celebration seems to be paying off. Even if the three-day BC Place event still bore that inescapable sample-fest feel, there was no shortage of informative seminars and cutting edge cook-offs to suggest things have been bumped up a notch. Not to mention a 鈥淐raft Beer Alley,鈥� expanded tasting areas and onsite liquor store, where you could actually buy that bottle of Victoria Spirits Twisted & Bitter black pepper bitters to spice up your Saturday Caesar.
If there was one message to take away from the wealth of dinners, it was this: while 麻豆传媒映画has every right to proclaim its dining prowess, there鈥檚 also plenty elsewhere. One intriguing chefs鈥� collaboration, Vancouver鈥檚 Wildebeest and Toronto鈥檚 the Black Hoof focused their proteinous powers on tastes such as seal and fennel salami, rabbit rilettes, horse heart tartare, braised lamb shank, and pork blood cavatelli.
Kicking it all off, the Canadian Flavours Gala proved a showcase for much of that cross-Canada talent, with a wealth of inventive plates, ranging from smoked trout on betel leaf (chef Nick Liu of Toronto鈥檚 DaiLo) to Boreal rose petal macarons and birch syrup ice cream (chef Michele Genest of TIA Yukon). The showstopper? Hard to pick just one, but Westin Edmonton chef Ryan O鈥橣lynn dazzled with his Gold Medal Plates-winning terrine of pine smoked sturgeon, cured Quebec foie gras, N.W.T. morels and Okanagan apple.
All aboard Notch8
Speaking of things quintessentially Canadian, the wraps have come off the Fairmont Hotel Vancouver鈥檚 extensive ground-floor remodeling, which now includes the railway themed Notch8 Restaurant & Lounge (900 West Georgia St., 604-662-1900). A deliberate nod to the hotel鈥檚 storied CPR past, the name refers to the old throttles, where 鈥淣otch 8鈥� equated to 鈥渇ull steam ahead.鈥� Only permitted for use by fully certified engineers, it still pops up in modern day听 expressions such as 鈥渢op-notch.鈥�
The lobby lounge redo feels dark, masculine and vaguely industrial in a polished and warm kind of way. My first visit included a taste of the house signature beer bread (made with stout, compt茅 cheese and plentiful mustard seeds), succulent Argentinian wild prawns (the size of crayfish) with tarragon butter and addictive garlic pur茅ed potatoes and a healthy house salad of mixed greens with rhubarb and burnt honey vinaigrette. Other bites of note include a rotisserie prime rib sandwich of bunkerman proportions (served on a half baguette) with horseradish and oversized onion rings.
Also worth checking out are the very discreet booths and a tucked away, semi private 鈥渓ibrary鈥� room, complete with shelves of real books that could make for serious perusing.
Fezzy notion
Just a tad less formal, compact and pretty Fez Caf茅 Bistro (1331 Robson St, 604-559-4339) is a welcome addition to the lower Robson diaspora, with French-North African-Mediterranean fare. Drop by for excellent lunchtime baba ghanoush, hummus or omelettes, or for a traditional dinner of couscous 鈥渞oyale鈥� or Merguez, brochettes, lentil soup, lemon sole and more. Ingredients are GMO-free and locally sourced, while the decor of north African artifacts makes for a cozy setting, with live music Thursday to Saturday evenings. (No alcohol served.)
Belly鈥檚 Best
鈥� Beronia Rioja 2010 (Reserva). Forward spicy, blue fruit and earthy notes followed by a juicy plate with refreshing acidity, black cherry and anise; plush and structured with approachable tannins before a spicy, lingering end. 91 pts. ($21.79)
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