November 8th, 2011 by Dawn Becker

While our server’s name wasn’t Lola, I would give odds that on any given night, you can find Tony or Rico in the CopaCabana, a Brazilian-styled steak house, located at 150 Eglinton Avenue East. That might sound racist but I know when you go to a Chinese restaurant you’re just like me. You want to see a good handful of Asian diners and a solidly all yellow cast of servers. Then you can say to yourself that this place can’t be too bad. Seriously, nothing irks me more than going to a Japanese restaurant, for example, and discovering that I’m being served by a poorly trained Chinese sushi chef. I’ll know it before they mouth a word by the size and quality of the California roll. Too much rice and there’s sure to be some Chinese influence, whether it’s the chef, the manager or the owner. And don’t get me wrong. I am fully aware that behind most kitchen doors in this city, there’s a lovely and talented crew of the best Sri Lankan chefs you can find anywhere. I’m all for that.

So when I say that CopaCabana has an expected Latin flavour in it’s clientele, servers, and entertainment, this is a good thing. I’m not generally a fan of in-your-face theme restaurants though I have been caught on camera dancing on tables in a Greek restaurant called Taverna Opa. The dancing was wholly due to the wildly authentic and sincerely delicious food, and oh yeah, a few shots of ouzo.

When you read the reviews about CopaCabana Toronto you’ll see a definitive line of lovers and haters. I happily divulge to you that I am one of the former. I will admit when my friend Brian chose this spot to celebrate his 30th birthday I was skeptical. Would this place be hokey? Would the steak come the way I like it (tender, rare and oh so juicy)? And what’s up with the salad bar? This is Canada, not America.

At first glance, CopaCabana is the kind of spot you think you’ll only go to when you’re looking for entertainment beyond the meal. With the extra loud beats, shiny shimmy shimmy of the Brazilian dancers dressed in barely clad carnival gear and the shirtless capoeira performers, it’s hard not to wonder if this is some kind of attempt to misdirect you from mediocre food? Turns out, it’s absolutely not.

As a diner with some miles on her fork, I entered CopaCabana with a few opinions and hopes that this show would taste as good as it looks. And to my surprise it did. Let’s start with the salad bar consisting largely of a good selection of grilled vegetables, piles of asparagus, mushrooms grilled or lightly marinated, eggplant and zucchini slices slightly charred and covered with a silky coating of olive oil, caprese salad with a very generous portion of baby bocconcini, seafood salad with sweet baby shrimp, two types of rice, pasta, deep fried yuca, and fruit platters settled amongst a few of the less appealing wilty green-type of salad options that I just skipped.

Then when you’re back at your seat, prepare for the real fun. Slow down and take it all in. It’s performance art. Around comes a server offering you the most delicious dough balls filled with cheese, poorly described by me, but absolutely addictive. Then comes a swash buckling assortment of meat on large skewers carried by servers wielding sharp butcher knives. It’s a wonder no one loses an eye but they are careful and even though demand is up-tempo the whole night, they manage to keep serving everyone through till past full.

We tried everything on the list except for the suckling pig and rib eye that I didn’t see come around even though we went on a Saturday – certain items are justifiably available on Fridays and Saturdays only – though it’s possible I blinked and missed it with all the other activity in the restaurant. At the top of the pleasure list, I enjoyed the ultra garlicky sirloin, well-marbled rib eye and strangely a little chicken drumstick they managed to cook to supreme juiciness on the skewer. To finish off, our party dined on roasted pineapple again sliced directly off the skewer at the table. Sadly, I couldn’t partake in the pineapple due to my growing fruit allergy (which, as an aside, I have seen mostly afflicting other Asians – perhaps we’re missing an enzyme like the one that prevents some of my brothers from processing alcohol).

Nowadays, diners seem to have elevated expectations of their restaurant experiences. I think this is partly due to more discussion in the media and online through reviews and blogs like this, and partly due to glamourizing chefs and restaurant experiences on television networks. I’m not saying that this is a bad thing but I think that diners should be aware of what places they are choosing so they know what’s in store. For me, CopaCabana in Toronto is a place you should definitely try at least once but absolutely not on a first date. If it’s a busy night have patience. Take in the whole evening for the spectacle that it is and appraise it accordingly. Oh, and an elastic waist band also helps.

October 19th, 2011 by Dawn Becker

I haven’t heard anyone use the old adage “a way to a man’s heart is through his stomach” in ages but it seems to me that this is also the way to his philanthropic soul. Food-related charity events are quite a trend for non-profits to raise funds and I couldn’t be happier about this.

Events such as Feast For The Fight, a program that my friend Crystal has been helping to promote, is a dining event where host restaurants will donate a portion of their sales from the day to the Canadian Cancer Society. Events like Feast For The Fight allow you to contribute to a good cause by doing nothing more than what you might do on any given Wednesday, having a bite to eat and a few beers somewhere local. Here’s a list of the restaurants participating in tonight’s Feast For The Fight fundraiser. You’ll find me at one of them.

This event goes right alongside the latest book I’ve been reading, Mission Street Food: Recipes and Ideas from an Improbable Restaurant by Anthony Myint and Karen Leibowitz. First off, one of the guiding principles of Mission Street Food, as set by Myint and Leibowitz, was to build a restaurant business model with a charitable component. On page 63 of their book, you’ll find them discussing the “Benevolent Business” and whether the benefits outweigh the costs. At the end of the day they seem to conclude that it doesn’t matter to them and continued to give money away with the opening of their next three restaurants. If all it takes to be charitable these days is to eat, then count me in. I do it (eat) at least three times a day so why shouldn’t someone benefit from my gluttony.

For a similar reason to why I loved David Chang’s magazine, Lucky Peach, Mission Street Food reads like an artful stream of consciousness, documenting their business wins and woes in a unique and intriguingly arranged cookbook of sorts that’s actually part memories, part cookbook, part kitchen confidential and lots of fun. I suppose, I could learn to be philanthropic, like the theme of tonight’s Feast For The Fight dining event, but this is one book that I will not share with others. Get your own copy.

September 11th, 2011 by Dawn Becker

September is always a busy time for me with the start of conference season and the boys back to school. While most other parents are ecstatic about the return of school, I find the regimen of the school hours, making lunches and homework duties a hard adjustment for all of us. Add to this that Cole’s birthday is on September 5th and the guilt I have in knowing I can never pull it together to organize a birthday party with his friends until October can be overwhelming. The cobbler’s kids have no shoes and the event planner’s kid has belated birthday parties.

Along with having a busy schedule, my writing outlet also suffers and I’ve been finding it harder and harder to take precious moments to post here. Having read a number of blogs, it seems that most non-professional bloggers have ebbs and flows in their writing as I’m experiencing and this is normal. I still enjoy writing even though my posts are more intermittent as this is a valuable outlet.

Trust me also that my food experiences have not been reduced. In fact, we just got back from a road trip to Cleveland, Ohio, where our sole purpose was to dine at Iron Chef Michael Symon’s restaurant, Lola Bistro. We did tack on a couple of fun days at Cedar Point Amusement Park in Sandusky, Ohio, which got me in the good books with the kids. And they were looking forward to our dinner at Lola Bistro as much as I was. The service at Lola Bistro was sincere and friendly. We all walked away feeling like we were kings. We ordered nearly every appetizer on the menu and split two entrees between the three of us. I would describe the food but I wonder if I can do it any justice to write about perfection. Let me just say that Cleveland is worth a visit, if only just to eat at Lola Bistro or anyone of Chef Symon’s other restaurants in the area. Plus it’s a 5 hour drive from Toronto, closer than Montreal.

Ah Montreal, another destination I enjoyed with Casey this summer. We booked last minute reservations at Chef Martin Picard’s restaurant, Au Pied de Cochon (or PDC as the insiders tell me) and got an 11PM seating. Their last of the night. Hopped into the car and drove like madness. It was a sumptuous meal and we left bloated and giddy. This is another place I would happily drive to for dinner. And I must mention that the special we had of veal bone marrow topped with sevruga caviar was mind blowing.

Today I did enjoy a few minutes of down time which I used to get into the articles in a new magazine, Lucky Peach, brain child of David Chang, chef of the famous Momofuku restaurants in New York, with two exciting new locations planned for Toronto in 2012.

This inaugural issues focuses on ramen, one of my favourite food subjects, and sadly it just rubs it in how little physical research one can do in Toronto with the severe lack of ramen restaurants that truly honour this dish. I won’t even go into how mediocre the ramen places are here having broken my ramen cherry in Tokyo so many years ago. It’s like your first taste of meat was kobe steak and then only being able to get top sirloin after that. No comparison.

Back to the topic at hand, Lucky Peach. I recommend this magazine as a must read for anyone who loves to delve into a topic. Not simple visual porn, this is more like erotica for foodies. Lucky Peach feels like an art house magazine that will surely be a keeper. Make room on your shelf because you’ll want to save this one to read again and again, or just to say you have if you’re more about collecting trophies than actually digesting the articles.

July 20th, 2011 by Dawn Becker

All you have to do is walk by Khao San Road on any given night and try to get a seat – without reservations – and you’ll know this restaurant is doing more than okay. The line-ups are testament to the popularity of this downtown Thai spot located in the entertainment district at 326 Adelaide Street West. I used to think that dubbing yourself the “Best Thai Food in Toronto” was just rhetoric but Khao San Road has created a good case for using the title.

While the decor has a bit of a student cafeteria feel and there is a severe need for some sound baffling – the low ceiling creates strange acoustics and it can become very hard to talk to anyone across the table when it gets packed as it usually does – they have made me a Thai food convert. Sort of. (Pad Thai Sam Roas shown below.)

I have to come clean and say that I am not a fan of Thai food. Many of my friends have been singing the praises of Khao San Road and making what looked like dubious status updates about how awesome the food is. Meh, I thought. How good can Thai be in Toronto?

Usually it’s a set up for cloyingly sweet sauces, gloppy over-cooked stir-fried noodles, sticky tables and bad service. Too harsh? Well, after all the accolades and at the behest of my cousin, Casey, we met there for dinner. I brought my high expectations. He brought his empty wallet.

My first trip to Khao San Road was not the triumph I was hoping for but of course I came back for another try as every restaurant deserves if you’re actually going to write about them. True, the service is hit or miss and there can be a wait for a table and then your food, but that’s because they’re ridiculously busy. Did you notice the line-up at the door? Everyone wants to eat here and people are obviously willing to wait for it. And as it is for any business, it can be hard to keep up with hyper growth. Give them time to catch up to their own success and you’ll probably be pleased you did.

I sampled the Gra Bong, fried battered squash fritters. Here they could use a little consistency. Above you’ll see two shots from separate visits and you can easily see that, while the left one was shot with an iPhone, the fritters are denser and more heavily battered. Not so good. The Gra Bong pictured on the right were outstanding. I could easily eat these all night long, with what looks like a Szechaun-style chili pepper oil, that you can get by request. They were light, delicate and crisp and a serious crowd-pleaser.

My favourite appetizer has to be the Tao Hoo Taud Samoon Prai otherwise known as Garlic Tofu described on the menu as nuggets of fried tofu breaded in a crispy garlic and kaffir lime coating. These were so delightful it was like eating hot little morsels of pillowy tofu. Drool-worthy.

A lot of fuss was made over the Khao Soi, our version being egg noodles with braised beef in a coconut milk enriched curry (chicken is also available). My friends raved that this was bar none the best dish on the menu. On my first try the sauce was luscious and velvety and very worthy but the braised beef was dry and tough. When I asked about it, one of the owners, Monte, explained that they were so busy that they ran out of the braised beef and had to make some more on the fly. The term “braise” means to sear the meat and then simmer slowly in some liquid, emphasis on slooowwwlly. I sincerely appreciated the honesty and when I came back I tried the Khao Soi with braised beef again and very happily found the meat meltingly tender as so many had described. This is why the high praise and I’m happy I gave it a second chance.

I tried the various curry dishes (green and red curry shown below) which are available with chicken, beef and for some with tofu or shrimp as indicated on the menu. I found all of the curry options to be soul satisfying and spot on. These curries all have a coconut base which generally tend to feel very rich. I can’t each too much of any Thai curry but I do find the Khao San Road curries tempt me to have one more scoop on my rice.

Three simple options for noodles. My favourite being the Pad Kee Mao mostly because I’m not a fan of things sweet, like my noodles. There is just enough basil stir-fried into this dish that makes these noodles sing. Sadly my photo below doesn’t do it justice. Disregard photo and consider this a must-order item.

Pad Thai Sam Roas (shown at the top of this post) and Pad Thai Street Style, shown below were both exemplary. Perfectly dressed, noodles still bouyant, with a light hand on the tamarind-based sauce so as not to be too sweet. Yum and yum.

Khao San Road doesn’t need me to vouch for them but I am doing it here. This time the line-up is no mistake. This place is worth the wait. But do yourself and your date a favour and call to reserve ahead.

April 26th, 2011 by Dawn Becker

I’m one of those sushi-loving fiends that has well-established standards and when I’m about to eat something raw, I want to know that it was made with care. I wouldn’t call myself a purist but I certainly can’t handle eating at the bleach-scented fast-food style student-priced sushi joints that keep popping up around town. It’s not about the price point. I’m happy to pay less as long as the quality is there. In my experience though, you get what you pay for.

Other than my perennial favourite that’s priced for all pocket books, Tokyo Kitchen, I’m always on the hunt for a consistently awesome sushi restaurant and preferably one that opens Sunday which is harder to find than you might think.

I ventured into Yuzu on Adelaide a few times and it’s definitely made my sushi worthy list, which includes Tokyo Kitchen and Ichiriki plus a handful of my favourite places I have yet to blog about. Yuzu offers a premium quality sushi menu with delicious specials and hot plates. On one occasion I had the Buta No Kakuni pictured below off the daily specials menu. It was four tender morsels of pork belly and truly the most delicate I’ve had in flavour and texture, literally melting on my tongue. If I recall the menu correctly the pork belly was slow braised for 18 hours. I hope you’re as lucky as I was to find it on their daily specials when you visit.

While I can appreciate that the prices are definitely on the high end, the taste and presentation of their dishes answers any question you might have about why. Below is an oyster shooter, ikura (salmon roe) sushi – my apologies that some of these shots aren’t as clean as I would have liked as I try to shoot with no flash to prevent from annoying neighbouring dinner patrons – two sushi close-ups that show off the delicate toppings of crispy fried shallots and fried daikon with seaweed salad, both of which offset the fish perfectly, and finally my lunch portion of sashimi.

Yuzu is a wonderful addition to my favourite sushi places. The atmosphere is upscale and perfect for a romantic dinner for two. While I really don’t recommend take-out sushi, Yuzu does offer a take-out menu if you really have to have their sushi at home.

January 22nd, 2011 by Dawn Becker

Years ago I used to commute to work in Markham. At the time it was mostly an industrial wasteland with pockets of subdivisions faking community. Things have changed now and Markham including Richmond Hill has become a fantastic destination for Asian shopping and dining, among other things. Back then there weren’t a lot of choices for lunch that went beyond the local sandwich shop and the odd all-you-can-eat buffet. Neither of them satisfied me. But around the corner from my work, I discovered George’s Tastee at 600 Denison Street.

Some passersby might have thought of them as just an ordinary bakery but where they succeeded was in the selection of West Indian-style comfort food that you could eat in or take home including frozen pre-baked boxes of patties. Frozen vegetable patties above cost $7.45 for the box of 12.

Our family favourite is the veggie pattie. It’s milder than the beef or chicken options but that works well for daintier palates and I just dip them in plenty of hot sauce (my preference is The Real Jerk Hot Pepper Sauce which I purchase at the Toronto location).

George’s Tastee was my saving grace for the bland and repetitive lunch-time blues in the burbs. You could order Jerk Chicken, Jerk Pork, Curry Chicken, Curry Mutton and Oxtail. But the best thing about walking into George’s Tastee was the service. George’s Tastee is family run and many of the servers were West Indian Asians. They looked like me but talked with a warm and friendly island accent. This was the first time I had ever met Jamaican Chinese people (JC as one referred to himself as). Since then, I’ve had many delicious adventures exploring the variety of migrant cuisine including Indian Chinese food and learning more about other cultures.

Last week George’s Tastee opened a new Richmond Hill location at 9021 Leslie Street, Unit 14. The dining area is large and you can of course get the same takeout patties/meals and catering.

This jogged my memory about when I first learned how to make Jamaican-style curry chicken. My friend Tim, co-owner of Shop Dine Tour Toronto, is Canadian Jamaican. His mom, Jennifer, was visiting about seven or so years ago and I happened to steal 20 minutes with her alone. She had a pot stewing on the stovetop and I couldn’t resist asking her about it. The scent wafting from the pot was mouth-watering.

She explained how easy it was to make a basic curry chicken showing me how she rubbed seasoning salt and Mr. Gouda’s curry powder into the chicken pieces. She gave me a handful of odd black pearls that looked like large peppercorns telling me this was the secret to making sure the stew had an authentic Jamaican taste: Allspice. I’d never seen these before and its scent was unique, a combination of clove, nutmeg and cinnamon.Ever since then I’ve been recreating, changing and expanding on her basic method. The version she showed me didn’t include vegetables but I always try to add as many nutrients as I can when cooking so mine starts with a hearty mirepoix (carrot, celery, onion, and garlic sautee) then add potatoes and chickpeas. I also use ground allspice because I don’t like having to fish out the whole allspice later.  

Jamaican-style Curry Chicken

6 boneless chicken thighs, sliced into 1” strips

3 Tbsp Jamaican-style curry powder (Note: Chinese or Indian curry powder will not give you the right flavour so look for Mr. Gouda’s, Grace or another West Indian brand)

2 tsp seasoning salt (I prefer an all natural seasoning salt to the commercial versions that have added preservatives and colouring)

1 tsp ground allspice

3 Tbsp olive oil

1 large onion, diced

4 cloves of garlic, sliced thin

2 large carrots, cubed

3 stalks celery, diced

2 tsp dried ground thyme

4 cups of chicken stock

1 – 398 mL can of chickpeas, drained and rinsed

1 large potato, medium dice (Note: I prefer Yukon Golds as russets tend to thicken the gravy too much and new potatoes don’t thicken it enough. If you prefer larger chunks of potatoes, adjust cooking time below.)

Mix together the curry powder, seasoning salt and ground allspice and rub it into the chicken thigh strips. Leave it to marinate at least 30 minutes or as long as overnight in the fridge.

Heat oil in a dutch oven or large pot with a tight fitting lid, on high heat. Add onion and sauté until translucent about 3 minutes. Stir in garlic, carrots, celery, and thyme to the pot and sauté to soften about 4 to 5 minutes. Push the vegetables to the side of the pot and add the chicken strips to cook on all sides, about 5 minutes. Mix the chicken in with the vegetables and add chicken stock and chickpeas and bring the pot to a boil. Then cover, turn down the heat and simmer for 15 minutes. Add potatoes and cook another 15 or 20 minutes until the potatoes soften. Serve with rice and peas or plain steamed rice accompanied by hot pepper sauce for those who like some heat.

August 29th, 2010 by Dawn Becker

When you hear someone say menudo do you think of hot, young Latin men in a famous singing group that launched Ricky Martin’s career? Or are you like me, and immediately start drooling, not because of Ricky Martin but instead, envisioning a large steaming bowl of a traditional Mexican soup made with tripe, laced with chile peppers, hominy (a large dried corn kernel but not as sweet as the peaches and cream corn we’re used to) and topped with cilantro and a fresh squeeze of lime juice.   Above a closer look at a piece of soft tripe after it’s been simmered till tender on the stove top. Not at all as frightening as one would suspect when thinking about having a piece of stewed beef stomach. Sometimes the broth is clear and other times it’s red from the type of chile used in the soup, making a version known as menudo rojo.

Anecdotally thought to be a hangover cure, menudo is delicious anytime, even for breakfast. It can be served with warmed tortillas used to scoop the tender tripe and then topped with pico de gallo made of chopped fresh tomato, onion and jalapeno (or whatever chile is preferred) marinated in salt and lime juice. While it’s hard to find menudo on restaurant menus in Toronto – it’s a home-style dish more commonly reserved for family meals – you can find the Salvadoran version of menudo, called pancita, regularly at Tacos El Asador.

But why not make it at home, the way millions of Mexican families do, simmering a pot of menudo slowly on the stove. It is surprisingly simple to make. I would start with a trip to T&T Supermarket where they have a fairly large selection of offal including tripe. Just look for “Assorted Guts”. Only in a Chinese market can you see signage for assorted guts posted indiscriminately and without the slightest bit of humour intended. Tripe can also be found in many other Asian grocery stores and sometimes in European (read Italian or Portuguese) butcher shops.

I’ve made menudo using whatever tripe is on hand whether it’s rumen (pictured below), reticulum (which has the larger honeycomb shape), or omasum which is often seen in dim sum dishes or Vietnamese pho. Rumen has the best texture for menudo but as long as you simmer the version of tripe you have long enough so that it is meltingly tender then it’s really no matter in the end.  The most important part of making menudo is ensuring the tripe is clean. Tripe is typically sold in packages pre-cleaned where it will appear imcomprehensibly white. The problem with this is that it’s been cleaned with a portion of bleach that will leave an odour in your soup if you don’t get rid of it by first boiling it in a pot of water with a tablespoon of Kosher salt for 5 or 10 minutes.

Alternatively you can soak it in clean water for an hour. Discard any water used in the bleach removal process. The best test to ensure that you’ve soaked or boiled your tripe long enough so the ungainly chlorine scent won’t taint your final product is simple: Smell it. If there’s even a lingering hint of a swimming pool you need to boil it longer or if soaking, drain the water and re-soak in clean water.

You will also need a calf’s foot which you should also be able to get from the same Asian market. Ask the butcher at the counter to cut the calf’s foot in half for you. And finally, the last major ingredient is a can of hominy which you can get where they sell Latin American products.

If you’re in Kensington Market, stop by Perola Supermarket or Emporium Latino to choose from a variety of canned hominy. You can pick up your chile peppers, cilantro and limes near by too.

Mexican Menudo (Tripe Soup)

1 package of tripe (about 1 1/2 lb) preferably rumen (honeycomb tripe is also fine)

6 cups of water (more, if bleach removal process is required)

1 Tbsp canola oil

2 medium onions, chopped

2 garlic cloves, minced

2 tsp. Kosher salt (plus 1 Tbsp, if bleach removal process is required)

1/4 tsp. dried oregano

1 calf’s foot, cut in half

1 15 oz (425 g) can of hominy

1 bunch cilantro, chopped

2 limes, cut into wedges

1 jalapeno, sliced thin (or your choice of hot chile pepper)

6 soft tortilla shells

Wash tripe. If there is a strong bleach odour, boil in water with 1 Tbsp of salt until no odour remains about 5 or 10 minutes. Remove tripe, cut into 1” x 2” pieces and set aside. Discard boiled water.

In a clean pot, heat oil on medium high heat. Add onions and sautee until nearly translucent about 3 minutes. Add garlic, salt and oregano. Return the tripe pieces to the pot. Add the calf’s foot and cover with water. Simmer, covered for about 3 hours or until the tripe and calf’s foot is very tender. Add the undrained can of hominy. Cover and simmer another 15 to 20 minutes. Serve with chopped cilantro, lime wedges, jalapeno slices and warmed tortilla shells. Serves 6.

Options: If you prefer to have your menudo spicy right out of the pot, you can add the jalapeno slices when you add the hominy. You can also squeeze the juice of half a lime directly into the pot at the end and serve with extra lime wedges as a garnish, if you prefer to cut the tripe soup with more acidity. I also enjoy stirring in 1/2 of the chopped cilantro leaves into the pot at the end when you take the soup off the heat. Doing this creates a beautifully fresh burst of green cilantro aroma in the air. Be sure to serve extra cilantro on the side.

August 10th, 2010 by Dawn Becker

When I went to Tokyo I became addicted to onigiri the very first time I tried it. Onigiri is a ball or triangle-shape of Japanese rice wrapped in nori (roasted seaweed sheets) stuffed with fillings like spicy tuna, umeboshi (pickled plum), and other savouries. You could find these tasty gems almost anywhere including convenience stores like 7-Eleven. It was at Ueno Station that I had my first onigiri and it was filled with fresh ikura or salmon roe. Biting through the crunchy seaweed and discovering that the divinely tender rice housed a healthy spoonful of salty bulging salmon eggs was sheer delight and my first delicious food memory of Japan.

In Toronto, we are fortunate to be able to get our hands on onigiri at a few places. My favourite by far are the ones you can find at Sanko, the Japanese food and gift shop located at Claremont and Queen Street West. Pictured above is a small sample of the variety that are available. My favourite isn’t shown – the organic eggplant – because that version never makes it all the way home. More than likely I’ll be trying to drive and shift gears while I undo the cello wrapper with my teeth all without breaking the nori sheet. As soon as the cello is off, I have to eat the onigiri right away while the seaweed is still crunchy.

Here is a close up view of the instructions for removing the cello. Done this way, the nori sheet stays intact, folding around the rice so your hands don’t get messy. Essentially, Step 1 is to peel back the tab at the top and pull it completely around the onigiri and off. Step 2, while holding the onigiri with your left hand pull the right side of the cello off. And finally, Step 3, remove the remaining cello wrapper completely and then take a bite. Think about doing that while driving with one hand and using your teeth. It’s doable.

You can also find the Korean version of onigiri, called gimbap or kimbap, at P.A.T. Central in the Bloor Street Koreatown. Next to Sanko, these onigiri are a pretty good runner up. Julian is fond of the kimchi beef and Cole likes the spicy chicken. Korean gimbap is usually made with laver which are roasted seaweed sheets that have been seasoned.

If you’re at P.A.T. Central and they’re sold out of gimbap, you might want to pick up what you need to make your own at home. All you need is some short grain Japanese rice (or even easier, buy some pre-cooked takeaway rice from a nearby restaurant), a plastic holder that you can use to pat the rice into a triangle shape available in the kitchen utensils aisle, pre-packaged seaweed in cello sheets, shown below, and whatever filling you like. I would then probably make a second stop at the St. Lawrence Market to pick up a jar of salmon roe or sushi-grade fish for the filling.

Manpuku and their new restaurant, Harapeko, located at 160 Baldwin Street, both have onigiri on the menu. The version at Manpuku is usually served while the rice is still warm and they only seem to offer what tastes like a mild tuna salad. Still it hits the spot and the rice is always perfectly tender. There were a couple more choices at Harapeko, such as mentaiko or salted cod roe shown below, but primarily Harapeko is all about the Japanese sandwich pocket so their onigiri suffers a little in quality.

Tokyo Kitchen also has onigiri on it’s menu but they make a version that only uses a thin strip of nori wrapped around the rice as an accent. To me, I need the crunch of the full sheet of fresh nori so I’d skip that and choose one of the other mouth-watering choices on the menu if I was there.

At T&T Supermarket, they offer a two-pack of onigiri for a steal at $2.99 per pack pictured above. I am usually a big fan of T&T but here you really get what you pay for. The T&T onigiri is one item YOU CAN AND SHOULD SKIP. I took one bite of the spicy salmon onigiri and immediately spit it out. The spicy salmon mixture was sour but worst of all the rice was hard. It definitely seems to be an attempt to use up old salmon and stale rice and it doesn’t work.

If you’ve had the misfortune of trying onigiri at T&T Supermarket I hope you will give onigiri another try at a different place. They can be amazing and if people start eating them regularly and asking for interesting fillings, we are sure to see more and better options offered elsewhere in Toronto.

July 19th, 2010 by Dawn Becker

In my last post, I wrote about fulfilling my oyster cravings. And as the universe would have it, I suppose I will be eating more oysters soon. Specifically Malpeques from PEI. This past weekend, Patrick McMurray, owner of Starfish located at 100 Adelaide Street East by Jarvis Street, and also owner of one of my local hangouts, Ceili Cottage, is now selling Malpeque oysters at Evergreen Brick Works Farmers Market. You can get them unshucked for $1 each and shucked with condiments for $1.25 each. Unbelievable. The Brick Works Farmers Market is open every Saturday from 8AM to 1PM and features a great selection of local produce, cheese, fish and meat – everything you need to make a fantastic weekend meal. I’ll be going this Saturday to check it out myself and effortlessly toss back a few freshly shucked oysters on the spot. See you there.

June 12th, 2010 by Dawn Becker

Before I went on my trip to Orlando, my only references to Florida were few. In one of my past jobs I used to be the Sales Promotions Manager at Tupperware Canada. Seems like a strange place to work but for a foodie and an avid home cook, it was pretty decent. It was also my first foray into the corporate side of marketing versus the agency where I came from. And the first time I was exposed to a real show stopping style of sales conference with on-stage skits for new product demos, screaming award winners running up to the stage under a follow spot and cameras shedding tears on the big screen, and herds of sales people doing line dances and sing-a-longs. Tupperware is a strange world but it works for them.

Coming from a fairly traditional Chinese family of non-touchers, it was a new experience being in this world of “huggers”, back then mostly decked out in sequins and polyester pant suits and perfectly French manicured white-tipped nails or glossy cherry red talons. I will admit I am now a fully converted hugger. It just feels good. But you can forget about the nails. These are working girl hands, made for chopping, dicing, slicing and typing.

The worldwide head office of Tupperware happens to be in Orlando, where my friend Daniel is from. It was on my wish list to do a drive-by viewing of the Tupperware fountain but it wasn’t in the cards on this trip what with the emergency hospital visit, tour of Disney World Resort, driving through half the state up to the border of Georgia and getting lost in a $100 USD taxi in Jacksonville. Scariest moment of my life which I’ll save to write about another time.

My other reference to Florida is from my former sister-in-law, Dana, who resided there. She was an extravagant person, lively, loud and what I thought was classically American. She also happened to be very funny though I think without knowing so. She used to travel the world with my ex brother-in-law as he was a huge car enthusiast, visiting the Porsche Zuffenhausen plant in Germany and one time to France, possibly to see Le Mans but I’m not sure of that. Upon returning from a whirl wind trip through Europe, the first thing she said about their vacation wasn’t how wonderful the scenery was, nor how interesting the people were, nor how fascinating the history was, nor how delicious the food tasted. Her first statement was this. “You know, you just can’t find a decent hamburger in France.” I still laugh when I think about how serious she was when she said that.

In that moment that statement established firmly in my mind what people from Florida were like. Although I don’t think that much differently now that I’ve actually been through half of the state, I do know that it’s hard to find a decent meal in Florida. Even the multi-starred Azurea Restaurant in the tourist trap called One Ocean Resort (entrance pictured above) in Jacksonville, failed to impress me. The service was mediocre, the food was over-sauced and the desserts were cloying. Below, a badly lit shot of the lobster and mushroom risotto I shared with Daniel. You can see two weird strips of melted cheese and the claw that looks like it was dumped on the top of the gummy risotto like an after thought. But of course, the company saved the day and it was there that we had laughs amongst friends that I will never forget. 

In Daytona, we went to a quaint place called Our Deck Down Under. It’s one of those places that you feel is a find because it’s tucked away under the Port Orange Bridge. The atmosphere is slightly rowdy and it has a shack-by-the-sea look to it. Unfortunately, the food didn’t live up to the ambience. The raw oysters on the half-shell were sickly – bad Florida oyster experience number two (you think I would learn) – the crab legs on the steamed platter tasted bland and now that I think of it were probably previously frozen (go figure “snow” crab prefer cold waters like those off Newfoundland so I’d be more likely to get tastier crab legs here in the T-dot). The spice on the shrimp, while pleasantly zingy, wasn’t marinated long enough to impart any flavours to the shrimp meat. The servers did remove the charge for the raw oysters since we only ate one. They were a really wacky bunch, gracious and perfect for this watering hole.

We also went to another kitschy spot called Joe’s Crab Shack. Yes, it seemed a touristy kind of place where they make the servers dance and sing in a line. What’s up with everyone dancing in a line in the south? The food had a lot of potential and from what I remember it was a worthy spot. Sadly, it was also a night of debauchery where our adult friends (Larry and Nicole) left the three child-like friends (that would include Daniel, Ronald and myself) alone with a six-pack of Corona’s and a full bottle of tequila. ‘Nuff said.  It looks like we ordered the Bean Town Bake on the menu which is a steam pot with 2 whole lobsters, 1 pound of clams, 6 shrimp, sausage, corn and potatoes. I’m very sad now looking back at the menu online to see that they also served crawfish which was high up on my must eat in Florida list. Very sad. Needless to say I didn’t get to eat any crawfish, also known as crayfish, mud bugs or craw dads.

And despite my memory of throwing a Krystal’s burger at Daniel at the end of the night, my regrets are few. I suppose it’s all about the story at the end. And here is not the place to tell it all. But stay tuned. There’s more to come on my trip to Florida.