Tiny Chickens!

After work on Saturday night, I immediately took my fresh, tiny, Thomas Reid-raised hens to task. I was up all night butchering a dozen birds and roasting their bones for stock... I put the caramelized carcasses under water with mirepoix just after 5am, and left the heat on low while I napped.
Up at the crack of noon, I immediately put on a cup of coffee, drained the stock, and spent the day cooking with Destiny.
We chopped potatoes and mushrooms for hash, celery and leeks for soup, and she julienned and caramelized a bag of organic onions. We made a light chicken stock with the remaining little bones, for use as a soup base. I crashed the large pot of dark stock down to a half litre of chicken demi, and made creme anglaise with free range eggs and Surrey honey, to be cooled and churned for dessert. As the clock wound down, I trayed the chicken quarters, seasoned and seared.
When Tristan and Kaitlin arrived, I put bread in the oven and Tristan harvested chives and arugula sprouts from the garden. Robin and Mia arrived with Rob and Alex just as I sliced bread, finished the soup and ladeled out creamy bowls. Vichyssoise!

(avec ciboulettes des jardin)

After soup, Robin rendered a tray of Dawson Creek double-smoked bacon, with Delta cherry tomatoes and thyme. We tossed pans of mushroom and pea hash in foaming butter while the chicken quarters finished in the oven. The chicken demi was added to reduced red wine and mounted with butter... Robin cut makeshift ring-molds for us to plate the pedestal for our
perfect poultry, crowned with caramelized onion and micro-arugula. Wines: Garnacha del Fuego (old vines Granache from Spain - plummy, peppery purple velvet, $17). La Buxynoise Reserve Bourgogne (classic French Pinot - light, brisk and woody, but driven by fresh red cherry), Cedar Creek Merlot/Cabernet 2006 (amazing $19 Kelowna bottle - so very currant, plum and chocolate, decadent and well balanced). The stage is set for: Local, Organic, Cornish Hen!

(I can't believe how horrible the best of my photos of this chicken turned out. I'm sorry, tiny chickens.)

Finally, with the help of Tristan's amazing white chocolate anise biscotti and clean, crisp Columbian from Moja Roasters, I was ready to finish this locally-driven meal with 100% locally produced honey ice cream (forgive me the organic Hawaiian ginger and Indian baking spices). As a delightful treat, Tristan produced a chilled bottle of Prospect Winery's "The Lost Bars" Vidal Icewine! Such a likely partner to fresh, homemade honey and spice ice cream! Echoes of wildflower honey and dried apricot sweetness, followed by pleasantly prominent acidity (a foil!), to balance and fill the palate. Bliss.

Such auspicious eating can only be followed by similarly momentous merrymaking, and more wine was drank as the clock's embrace widened. As those with other engagements made their way, I remembered tray of cornish chicken wings that I had earlier floured and par-baked!! And the sunflower oil I'd brought in specifically to fry them in!! I put 2L of oil on medium heat and tested it with small pieces of chicken until they bubbled just a little too fast, and then put in 2 dozen tiny chicken wings to crispy. Quick sauce: honey, Destiny's raspberry vinegar, salt, pepper, cayenne... and micro-arugula! Cornish munchies!

El Susheria

I finally found a free night to get out and see Avatar!!! My friends couldn't make the 7:10 showing so I was forced to kill time downtown until the 10:30 screening... what to do??? I first thought I'd check out Guu, as I haven't been there for oh so long, but I should have known better than to expect to walk into that place unannounced at 8 o'clock. I definitely wasn't going to go to Le Crocodile by myself, so the nearest thing that tickled my fancy was Tsunami Sushi on Robson. I'd actually never been there before so I figured a solo mission was the best way to test the waters, in the event that I ever had to take a lady somewhere in the area. Naturally, I had a seat at the sushi bar, watching the ships roll in like the Otis Redding of Japanese cuisine. For those of you neophytes who haven't experienced this yet, here is the drill: you sit at the bar where little wooden boats pass in front of you, each one with a different plate of sushi and maybe some wasabi or ginger. There are four different plates, and each plate represents a different price point for that particular item. This is a very entertaining experience, and I imagine during a busy time when the boats are all full it would be so much more so. There are many nigiri sushi I haven't tried, and as I watched unidentified pieces of fish swim past me I pieced together which each one was. Without this system, I'd have to risk up to $4 a shot to even see what hamachi or unagi look like. If you don't want what's on the boats, there are waitresses patrolling the floor ready to take an order back to the kitchen.
I started off with a 650mL Kirin lager ($9) miso soup and an order of goma-ae. The presentation of the goma-ae showed a great attention to detail. Rather than being tossed in tahini and served in a roughshod ball, I was presented with lovingly stacked and pressed spinach doused in sweet sesame dressing. The goma-ae of Sakura Sushi at Lonsdale Quay is better, as you can see the hand-ground toasted sesame seeds in the sauce, but I did enjoy the caramelized sugar flavor in this one. It reminded me of the sesame snaps I used to have packed in my lunches as a child... I'm a fan of any dish that inspires nostalgia. After having savoured my goma-ae and speculated at great length about the floating delicacies at hand, I reached for a plate of inari (fried tofu pockets marinated in sweet sake lees and stuffed with sushi rice). I love this stuff. You can pick it up at TNT market, which is probably the same stuff Tsunami uses, and make these things yourself super easily. At $2.05, I'm happier than a pig in a turnip patch that they were so convenient to snatch. My bill is now pushing $20, so I've got to be judicious with my next choices. Halibut sushi with minced kimchi and green onion... why not? I've never had it this way. Unfortunately, its delicate flavor played second fiddle to the rockstar duo of wasabi-loaded soy and the colourful garnish. Not that I'm criticizing the dish construction or quality – I can't expect halibut to be at its best out of season and thawed from last year's catch. Let me note here, though, that I saw the same suspects in rotation on the sushiboat fleet for the entire 45 minutes I sat. I wasn't surprised that the rice stuck to the plates a little bit and that the fish had lost its “freshly cut” slickness, let alone the rainbow effect that can be observed on very freshly sliced tuna. But I'm sure if I had asked to be brought a more freshly made piece, they would have obliged me. But I'm foodie, not fussy.
And then – a prawn sushi. There were two different looking prawn sushis, on two different plates, indicating different prices ($3.05 and $4.25). Cross-reference the menu: ebi is cooked tiger prawn (WARNING! Farmed in India/Southeast Asia), and the more pricey ama-ebi is RAW BC SPOT PRAWN!! JACKPOT. These succulent prawns should be eaten raw, at their best, and thank god for Tsunami for carrying this product as part of its regular menu and for serving it in its most natural state, so very lovingly and minimally manicured. I will FOR SURE pay the extra 60 cents per prawn (there are 2 nigiri sushi in each order) to support local fishing, reject destructive and exploitative agroindustrial colonialism and redundant globalism... and, most importantly, enjoy top shelf produce.
This is a great example of why I love this town so much. You can sit down to any halfway decent sushi restaurant, and you will have wild local salmon, halibut, and maybe even prawns, as part of the regular rotation. Not as part of a trend or even socio-ethical imperative; it is simply because these local fruits der mer are the best on the planet, and Japanese food is such a minimalist affair that any decent susheria does not have room in its coolers for shitty produce. So here's a note to people who complain that BC spot prawns are too expensive, or you don't get enough of them, or their texture is different: steak tartare is smaller, more expensive, and mushier than a Big Mac. Exploitative wages, chemical enhancement, and unsustainable practices propel the Indean Ocean's aquacultured and super-pumped antibiotic pseudo-prawns to reach our tables at $8/lb. Perhaps it is in our best interest to get to know the smaller, more expensive, and “finer things” in life.
check this out... http://eatprawns.com/local-food/ama-ebi-spot-prawns-sushi-delicacy/
...only $2 each!!!!!!!!!

Flavor First!

Serving tables can be a very satisfying line of work. It all depends on one's attitude and knowledge. Every time I go into work dreading dealing with chronically unsatisfied people, or those who waste my precious dinner rush minutes giving me their “feedback” on how they would design the room better, I inevitably dwell on these unpleasantries and it can really ruin the job for me. But the more I consider myself a gastronomic ambassador, the more I'm likely to spend time with those who are interested in being educated about what is on their plate and in their glass, and to simply dismiss the ignorant blowhard with a smile and a wave as the door hits them on the way out. I had a four-top last night, people who were young professionals, there to have a good time but clearly appreciated good food and wine. This is the bread and butter of the new gastronome: people who put pleasure first, have the resources to pay for it, but are still socially conscious and also aware of the dining market.

Right off the bat, they ordered a bottle of Excelsior Cab-Sauv – my current pet bottle. Rather than be the server that reads you the tasting notes straight off the wine list, I like to have something unique and intelligent to say about what we're serving, so I make a point of trying a bottle of anything I can find on our list, and make it my pet for the weekend. And I really liked this wine: at $15 retail, it's a lush glass of plum and vanilla, with mocha finish and some very smooth tannins. And what's more, I looked into the owners of the winery, South Africa's deWet family (who have been cultivating their vines on the cape since the late 17^th century), and it turns out that they are one of the more socially progressive landowners in a region that remains tainted with injustice. Their estate employs over 100 families, and provides them with access to education and healthcare – they've actually built a school for their workers' children on their property. So when my friends ordered this bottle, I told them not only about their good choice from the perspective of the wine's great drinkability (flavor first!), but made a point to let them know that their decision is in support of some of the more conscious operators in the industry. Unsurprisingly, they were very pleased to have gained this knowledge from me. This is the kind of knowledge that makes your dining experience a deep-down pleasurable one. This knowledge takes your glass of wine beyond its superficial charms – this awareness buttresses the delight of flavor with the sound structure of good and fair production. This is now food for the soul.

A waiter can be so much more than an order-taker and bottle-opener. A waiter with good knowledge can not only encourage people to make more sustainable choices by championing programs such as Ocean-Wise (but never through guilt!!! the dining experience must always be a fulfilling one, and we must always be aware that our ethics are relative), but can actually add an priceless value to the diner's experience by providing knowledge about not only how his product tastes, but how it is cooked, how and from where it is produced, and who produces it. This awareness doesn't mean that we all have to become holier-than-thou vegans and foresake our right to pleasure, making every meal a mission to save the world. It just means that if our waiters can be gastronomic ambassadors, helping us feel good about making better choices and helping to educate us about the choices we have, we can become more conscious human beings with every bite we eat. Eating is about so much more than what goes into your mouth. It is about what goes into your soul.

My Grandpa's Garlic

Saturday January 9, 2010

This is a story about garlic. But not just any garlic. This garlic, like many of my friends, has been cultivated into something exceptional, though it is of humble origin. This garlic, also like many of my friends, is first generation Chinese-Canadian. His father, and his father before him, grew up in the sun-baked fields of southern China, just another bulb buried under the strain of years of agro-industrial colonialism. Then, when he was one day finally ready to leave the fields in search of a better life, he was crammed into a shipping container and spent weeks suffocating with his myriad countrymen, praying that he would make the arduous journey to Canada alive. Finally having arrived, all heads were counted, the dead ones discarded and written off, and our indentured traveler found not the freedom he was promised. Rather, doomed to spend the rest of his shelf-life imprisoned in a mesh bag, he finds only the tyrannical oversight of the supermarket. If he were any other Joe Clove, he would have grown too old to be deemed useful and sentenced to compost, or been garishly minced and likely burnt in some yuppie housewife's miserable recreation of an Emeril Lagasse recipe.

Enter: Robert Lacasse, Sr. This man is my grandfather. Retired rural logger turned worldwide web blogger, it has somehow become this man's impassioned mission to research and develop the most efficient and productive methods of boutique garlic cultivation. This is no garden-variety green thumb; I will tell you with familial certainty that this man produces the most perfect purple garlic north of Nanaimo. And our aforementioned protagonist has the great fortune to find himself at the bottom of my grandpa's shopping bag. If garlic could smile, this bulb's beam would clear the clouds from all the coast. To his great surprise, he was not cruelly hacked apart by a dull ten dollar kitchen knife, or crushed by the most unforgiving of unnecessary kitchen contraptions, the garlic press. He was instead lovingly laid to rest beneath the moist, loamy topsoil of suburban Campbell River. Peacefully, and with the loving care that only such a salt-of-the-earth old man can provide, he blossomed forth with a new progeny... a small field of plump cloves in the backyard of my grandparents' mobile home.

And so it came to be that, as the most effortless but most bountiful gift from an effortlessly bountiful man (who raised a brood of 7 young'uns), I received a 5lb mandarin orange box stuffed with clumps of dirt hiding the sweet, white jewels of the earth. I knew immediately that I would be roasting a lot of this garlic, with it's ridiculous sugar content and smooth, robust aroma. And so it came to be that I acquired 3L of nectar from the most valiant of olives, those chosen to be pressed for their essence and sent across the world to us not fortunate enough to dwell in the shadows of their branches. These likely bedfellows are now under my care... and I will ensure their union. After a generation of struggle, these all-too-different personalities from either end of my earth will discover for the first time how famously they get on. I am playing matchmaker with two souls I know so very well.