“Spring breeze—
the pine on the ridge
whispers it”
– Kobayashi Issa (translated by David G. Lanoue) Read More
Category: Reflections
Herring : Silver of the Sea
Since man first cast nets into the frigid oceans for food, his survival depended on knowing when fish would be most plentiful and accessible. The changing seasons brought great frothing multitudes of fish into the nearby shoals to feed, spawn and die. Coastal communities likewise lived and died by the season’s harvest, and each new arrival would be met with celebration. To these early fishermen (and their ancestors to come) the most prized of all the migratory fish were the herring. Read More
Year Of The Snake
Gong Xi Fa Cai ! May the year of the snake be happy and prosperous for you and your family!
Time to get everyone around the table to laugh, drink and feast their faces off… And later on, bottle rockets! Take that evil spirits!
Remember to show some love (and a generous kickback) to the Kitchen God, Yu Huang.
Industrial Rustic
Back in October (A year ago, incredible! I’m still writing “2012”) Macleans magazine released their 50 Best Restaurants in Canada guide. My Chef, Hiro and I flipped through it one night after clean-up and immediately nerded all over the “Westcoast” chapter.
Vancouver’s own Hawksworth Restaurant got number one in all of Canada! Nice! Bao Bei and Whistler’s Araxi also represented. And, just a couple pages later we were treated to a beautiful two-page layout of Gastown’s gastronomic bleeding heart: L’Abattoir. My eyes were immediately drawn not to the perfectly prepared, meticulously arranged plates of food, but to the restaurant’s gorgeous interior. The sun-dappled dining section with the driftwood/antler chandelier and exposed brick walls really got my art school dropout soul singing. Read More
Cookbooks For Christmas!
Christmas is only a couple of weeks away and if you have someone in your life that is in the industry, or a home cook (or, like me, both!) you can count on them loving and appreciating a good cookbook in their stocking. But which cookbook should you invest in? Everyone’s writing cookbooks now! Bloggers, restaurateurs, stay-at-home moms with million-dollar cameras, they’ve all got their little slice of domestic life out there on the bookshelves. So what makes one better than the other? Read More