Tag: restaurants

Haisai Tasting menu

Michael Stadtländer’s Haisai restaurant does not have (nor is intended to have) the cachet of his Eigensinn Farm, but this summer they are offering one aspect of that establishment: the “you shall eat what you are given” tasting menu (not published in advance). Only here you can do so for a mere $75, with optional $50 for matching wines. We tried it out this past Friday.

If you haven’t been here or to the farm before, the atmosphere can be a surprise:

Interior of Haisai

But even at these more manageable prices, the food remains some of the best on offer in the country.

The countdown on the four-course meal did not include the amuse bouche, but it’s definitely worth mentioning. It was a single oyster on one side, a fish roll on the other, and both lacking only in I would have liked to have had more.

Amuse of oysters and fish roll

All wines served were from the Ravine winery. First up was a nice dry rosé, meant to last through the amuse and the two appetizers.

The first of these was speck-wrapped Georgian Bay white fish (speck is a smoked pork—bacon-y), with braised cucumbers, peas, beets, and broad beans. All veggies were from the Eigensinn Farm, which is also where the pork was smoked. All the flavors “popped”, yet played nice together.

Appetizer of fish and speck

Appetizer the second was osso bucco ravioli, topped with cranberries, with a side of apple and radish. This proved to be the highlight of the meal, as the only thing better than just plain osso bucco, it turns out, is stuffing osso bucco into a perfect ravioli. The cranberries were a great accent.

Osso bucco ravioli

The main course wine was a meritage, that was very smooth, not excessively fruity. The main course itself was beef, asparagus, thyme polenta, and Swiss chard. We remain lesser fans of getting beef at gourmet dinners, but one must say that this free-range, grass-fed meat was really delicious, and literally was so tender it was cut with a butter knife. Polenta is another thing I usually don’t care for, but this was the best one I’ve had. The asparagus was good, of course, but the actual highlight? The Swiss chard! Delish.

Main course at Haisai

That left dessert, which was served with a Gewurtz that was slightly off-dry. There we split, with Jean opting for the three cheeses (all Canadian, and all meeting his approval) while I had the sweet stuff: Lemon tart, meringue on custard, and strawberry ice cream. All lovely, though the meringue was my favorite.

Three desserts

All photos taken with Blackberry or Android phones, as we forgot to bring a camera

 

 

 

Québec City!

I don’t really have that much to say about our recent, quick visit to Québec City as all we did—apart from the concert—is what we always do there: amble about, do a little shopping, look at art, enjoy the romantic “old city” feel of the place, and eat at great restaurants. We were not bored, but it’ not much to write home about. But Jean took such great pictures there, I have to say something!

Quebec City street

Accommodations

It did strike me, this time, how we never, ever seem to stay at the same place twice when we visit. We were spotting our past hotels all over. This time out, of course, was a new one, Hotel le Grande Allée, just outside the gates of Old Quebec. Having achieved cost reductions by using travel points, it was by far the biggest room we have ever had in Québec City: It featured not only a sitting room, but two full bedrooms. Interesting, but rather more than a couple requires.

Gates to Old Quebec

Gates to Old Quebec, just down from our hotel

It was on a super-busy street, teaming with bars, cafes, and restaurants that were going strong Saturday night. So can affirm the hotel had pretty good sound proofing. Steep to park there, though.

Weather

The weekend weather could not have been better for our visit: Sunny both days, with a high around 21.

Hotel Frontenac and field

The weather, she be perfect

Food

For meals, we went to the reliable Crémaillère for dinner before the concert, and found it still had excellent service and very fine food. I shall have to contact Where to Eat in Canada to see why they don’t list it.

Sunday lunch was at a randomly selected place where I had a great platter of antipasto’s like duck pate, house-smoked salmon, roasted red peppers, prociutto, and olives. Jean had the cheese platter (no surprise).

Quebec terasse

We had lunch on a térasse something like this. (And yes, this is a photo of Jean’s)

Sunday dinner was the coolest, though, as we went to restaurant Toast!, which was entirely enjoyable. We were able to dine in their recently “open for the season” covered patio, which has a very neat atmosphere. Service was great but not stuffy, as evidenced by the staff uniform of a red plaid shirt over black pants. And their menu is just appetizers—no main courses. Which was perfect, because we weren’t starved, but everything sounded so good.

So we were able to share four: An amazing mushroom crostini; very nice asparagus and crab; le foie gras, specialty of the house; and a lamb and gnochi creation. Each with a matching glass of wine. The small serving sizes left plenty of room for dessert, which was (big surprise) chocolate for me, cheese for Jean.

Shopping

We did look at art, seriously considering one painting (which we’re still considering), but made only small-ticket purchases while there, of items such as chocolate truffles. And shoe laces. (Really.)

Street art

This piece of street art was not for sale

Students

We had two near encounters with the student protestors: we heard their pots clanging away nearby while having lunch, then after visiting the Assemblée Nationale at night. We returned to our hotel room, turned on the TV, and saw a “live” shot of protestors at the Assemblée Nationale. Meaning they must have arrived five, ten minutes after we left.

Assemblee Nationale fountain

Assemblée Nationale shortly before being overrun by student protestors

I admire their tenacity, but jeez I wish they would put it toward something actually worth fighting for!

Entertainment

Our audiobook for the journey was Sacre Bleu: A Comedy d’Art by Christopher Moore. It was the first book of his either of us had read, and we both really liked it. Very interesting weaving of all these Impressionist painters with a fantastical element. It also allowed us to great enjoyment out of lines such as “Accident. Couldn’t be helped.” and “Not that Prussian shit!”, which no one understood but us. That’s always fun.

More photos in the gallery

Niagara wine-ing

We did an over-nighter in Niagara-on-the-Lake last weekend. We visited Flat Rock Cellars winery for the first time, and were left somewhat unimpressed. Our favorite of the four wines we tried was the 2010 white Twisted, which is very nice. (Might make a white wine convert of you.) But it’s widely available at LCBO. And you had to buy four bottles to dispense with the tasting fee. So, we just paid the tasting fee.

More successful was our second visit to Thirteenth Street Winery, though the first at its current location. Which is very nice, with an art gallery and a bakery also on site. And they were much more relaxed about the tastings, allowing us to try more than the prescribed five. And you only needed to get two bottles to dispense with the tasting fee.

In the end we bought five: one of their nice Cabernet Rosé, two of the character-ful 2009 Gamay Noir (an interesting contrast to the fruitier 2010), and two of the Below Zero Riesling, which is that ice wine and Riesling blend.

The weather wasn’t super-cooperative on Saturday, giving us a mostly rain when we arrived in Niagara-on-the-Lake proper. We did some walking around regardless. But it was only the next morning (early, so without me) that Jean got some photos.

Building in Niagara-on-the-Lake

We had dinner at Hillebrand Estates Winery. They offered a prix fixe menu of three, four, or five courses—same menu, you just picked how many parts of it you wanted. At first I picked three that, I was then informed, didn’t include the entree course. That wasn’t ideal, but neither of the two entree options: salmon (which I’d had plenty of at lunch) and beef. But it did mention a possible vegetarian entree, so that’s what I went with: a vegetable ravioli.

Our first course was a quite delicious pumpkin soup with lobster, served with a mix of Trius Brut and ice wine. Next we had a duck and ravioli appetizer, served with a red wine—though neither of us can quite remember which grape. It seemed to go well, though. And both the duck and ravioli were very good.

Duck course

With the mains (Jean had the beef), I believe we got the Trius Red, which was fine, but nothing outstanding. We did not take the wine pairings with dessert. I had the bittersweet chocolate pudding, while Jean went for the pear meringues.

All in all, a quality meal in a lovely room with a waiter who was kind of fun—commenting on Jean’s attempt to be surreptitious about taking photos, for example.

The next day, after a nice breakfast at our B&B, and a walk around a now not-rainy Niagara-on-the-Lake, we stopped in a Peller Estates, as we curious to try their 2010 reds. But we also tried their 2010 Sauvignon Blanc, which was interesting in being a little oaked, which is unusual for that type of grape. And their Private Reserve Rosé, which we really liked.

On to the reds. The Pinot Noir wasn’t bad, but was fairly light, and didn’t seem quite worth the price tag. The Merlot was really tannic. They then realized they needed to do some extra decanting on some of these reds. After that, the Cabernet Franc wasn’t overly tannic, but it didn’t seem super-interesting, either. But the Cabernet Sauvignon was really nice. So we bought a couple bottles of that, which we’ll probably let sit a bit, along with a couple roses and one Sauvignon.

On the way back, we stopped in for lunch at Borealis Grill and Bar, which we’ve been wanting to try. It’s nothing fancy—specials of the day were perogies and ribs, for example—but it focuses on local foods, well-prepared. And we were happy with what we had, which was a fish taco in my cases (with Lake Erie pickerel) and a vegetable fusili in Jean’s—featuring pickled asparagus, goat cheese, tomato, and double smoked bacon. It’s a little out of the way from where we live, but we would go there again.

Happy birthday to me

Birthday celebrations were pretty mellow this year, but I did take advantage of the opportunity to have dinner at Verses, for their “new” menu. Which turned out to be their old menu, soon to be replaced! How did that happen? We’ve vowed to attempt to get to each menu twice in the future.

Jean had the foie gras to start, as usual, and it was amazing. I had gone in thinking I would have the scallop and oyster, but I ended up unable to resist the “tuna six ways”: tartar, sashimi, tuna melt, tuna shooter, slider, and… one other. Delicious! And amusingly, listed as ttttttuna on the bill.

As my main, I went with duck two ways: a roast breast and seared leg. That was served with kale in butter and raisins, and squash gnochi. All really nice. Unusually, I couldn’t finish (needed to leave room for dessert), and it made for a great leftover lunch the next day as well.

Jean had the seafood assemblage that included shrimps, mussels, and scallops, in a lemongrass sauce, on rice. He wasn’t super-crazy about the veggie accompaniments, but enjoyed everything else about it.

As wine with that, we went with an Okanagan Pinot Noir, 2008. It was pretty easy drinking.

For dessert, we had the pavé, and the chocolate and peanut butter, switching halfway. Mine was served in a special way. The number associated with my birthday was Jean’s joke.

Visiting the Canyon lands

We’ve recently returned from a trip with the following itinerary:

  • 2 days in Zion, Utah
  • 2 days in Sedonah, Arizona
  • 2 days in Grand Canyon Village, Arizona
  • 2 days in Las Vegas Nevada

Map of area

(Not quite our itinerary, but gives you an idea)

Getting around: Why drive when you can walk?

We flew into Vegas, rented a car, and drove ourselves to the other locations. (And by that I mean, Jean did all the driving.) But it was still a pretty active vacation, because we managed to get some walking in on the driving days, and on the non-driving ones, we did a lot of hiking. And the thing about Canyon areas is, there a lot of uphills! So it wasn’t just ambling down paved lanes.

On Grand Canyon trail

Even in sprawling Vegas, since we abandoned the car as soon as we arrived, we got around mostly on foot.

We did use a bit of public transit, trying out the cool monorail in Vegas, and having to take the free park shuttle to get out of Springdale (the little town right outside Zion) into Zion park, and to get to the various trail heads. Grand Canyon Village also had a free shuttle, but it wasn’t as frequent or as late-running as the Zion. So we did some car-supplementing there, especially at night.

But still, pretty active. And I have to say, that does wonders for sleep. And gives you quite the appetite, too. (For food. What did you think I meant?)

We’ve discovered that quite a few people actually visit all these parks from a Las Vegas base, driving out and back in the same day. If you have limited mobility, such that hiking isn’t too feasible anyway, it’s probably a reasonable approach. The landscape is very interesting—sometimes, but not always, gorgeous—but so varied and different from here, it does make for good drives. And Las Vegas is cheaper to stay in than the other places.

Route 66 scene

Not our rental car! A view from Route 66, one of the interesting drives you can do around these parts

But our best days were definitely the hiking ones, not the car ones. So if healthy and wealthy enough to do so, I’d strongly recommend getting out of Vegas and spending non-driving time in the other places.

Trail in Zion

You can’t get here by car! (trail in Zion)

The weather outside is (not at all) frightful

The weather was perfect. It was sunny everyday. It was warm, but not too warm. Despite SP15, I even got a bit of a tan.

I’m not sure that was such great luck. It is desert area, after all; warm and sunny’s not so unusual. Still, we heard that the week before we were there, Grand Canyon had turned so frigid, they actually got some snow. And Vegas got a flash flood that left knee deep water in parts.

So maybe it wasn’t great luck, but at least some luck. (Hmm, maybe I should have tried the slots at Vegas. Oh well.)

And, we were even graced with a full moon, which apart from looking gorgeous, was helpful in those small towns which (unlike Vegas) are not very illuminated at night. Especially given that the sun set around 6:00.

Moon over Grand Canyon

Hotels: Living in the lap of luxury

This wasn’t an organized tour, so we booked all our hotels a little haphazardly, over a series of weeks. In Zion and Grand Canyon, it quickly became clear that things were selling out fast, so the main criteria became, which hotel has space? In Sedona and Las Vegas, we were able to deal-hunt more, and picked out places mostly based on value (most stars for the least money).

So we were repeatedly surprised at just how fancy the places we were staying at were. In Zion, we had a full suite with complete kitchen, a hot tub outside, and a beautiful view of the park. In Sedona, we got valet parking, porters, free yoga classes, another hot tub, and walk-in closet. It also had the most gorgeous dining area, with a view, and on the Monday night, a great guitar player performing. Really, super-romantic.

And Vegas—our cheapest accommodation—was the best room of all! Again a full suite with complete living room as well as bathroom, two flat-screen TVs, walk-in closet (of course! Too bad we were never bothering to unpack), enormous bathtub (Jean said you could get a full workout walking around in there while taking your morning shower), escort by golf cart… 9 pools (all heated)… Crazy.

The only “normal” room—a perfectly fine room of the type we normally stay in—was at Grand Canyon Village. That was the most expensive one of all.

Hell is other people: The crowds

Actually, it wasn’t that bad. But, we weren’t exactly the only people there. All accommodations in Zion/Springdale and Grand Canyon Village were fully booked. (In Utah, they post Sorry! instead of No Vacancies. Isn’t that cute?) But where Zion had some crowded buses and busy restaurants, it really wasn’t annoying. Like, we never made restaurant reservations, and that was never a problem.

But in Grand Canyon, there really were people everywhere, all the time. Really hard to get parking, most any of time of day. Really hard to get a seat at a restaurant, especially the better ones. (One we had to reserve weeks ahead, and still got only an 8:45 dining time; another we had to wait 45 minutes before being seated.) In Zion, on some trails, we hardly met anyone. Not so at Grand Canyon.

Crowd at sunset in Grand Canyon

Joining the crowd to watch the sunset at Grand Canyon

In Sedona, the trail we did was really quiet; hardly met anyone. I guess most people were visiting the little town, which was quite a bit busier. But manageable. And except for one very popular restaurant, no dining issues here, either.

Las Vegas is packed with people. Especially at night. On the streets, in the hotels, everywhere. But, great people watching, especially given the higher percentage of attractive people here (especially female, but some men as well). And of course, so many restaurants, they’re not all going to be booked.

But all in all, if this is sort of the low season, can’t imagine what it’s like in these places in the high season…

You didn’t come all this way for the food, did you?

Well, no, we didn’t. But, with the help of a few guide books, we mostly did pretty well in the dining department. It was not a big foodie focus (for once), but with about two exceptions (both in the Grand Canyon—who knew breakfast could be so dire?), all the meals ranged from decent to very good.

A real Mexican focus to the food options here, which unfortunately made us realize that we get tired of Mexican food faster than other types (despite it being better prepared there than anywhere around here). The El Tovar at Grand Canyon was touted as a five-star restaurant; I’d say that’s generous. It was good, but in local terms, I’d say it was Solé good rather than Verses good. But it was just a gorgeous place to be at; too bad it was too dark to see the view.

The beautiful restaurant at Sedona also had really good food, though with very disorganized service. Still, that benefited us one night, as they were so late bringing us the wine, we got it free! And pretty much every place we tried in Springdale was rather remarkably good.

In Las Vegas, we had supper in Paris, lunch in New York. (I just like saying that.) And back in Sedona, we did an Arizona wine tasting. I only learned on the flight over that they even made wine there. None of the restaurants seemed to serve it, but two of the whites and one of the reds were very enjoyable.

Dining in Vegas

Sorry; probably more of me than you want to see. But when in Vegas…

Leaving Las Vegas

And what did we think of Vegas, really? Worth visiting… for a day. Never seen anything like it before. But if you don’t gamble or drink your face off, it doesn’t take that long to get tired of the crowds, the noise, the smoky casinos (that all look and sound the same). And mainly what there is to do there (besides gambling and drinking your face off) is visiting big, lavish hotels and fancy designer stores. Which gets old.

But, they do have good shows. And we did get same-day discount tickets to one of those, the Cirque du Soleil Beatles Love. It was really excellent. It was compelling in itself, but I also felt it gave me new insight into the familiar Beatles music. Even at a discount, not cheap, but certainly my favorite part of Vegas.

Cirque Du Soleil at Mirage

For more photos, see http://jean-cathy.smugmug.com/Travel/Zion-Utah-Sedona-Arizona-Grand/19635036_qgqcMK#1539211510_N2cb2X3

(And Jean will be continuing to add and update that area in the coming days.)

And for a particularly detailed account of the trip: http://jean-cathy.com/cathy/photos/nevada-utah-arizona.htm

Canoe-ing together

We’re just back from vacation to Zion, Sedona, Grand Canyon, and Las Vegas. And you’ll be reading and seeing more about that from me soon. But first, I wanted to finish this post I started before leaving, about my trip to exotic Toronto. I’ve already talked about the Daltrey part of that, but not about the foodie part (the second time a Daltrey has included visits to fine restaurants. So I guess that’s a tradition now.)

First up: Canoe!

Canoe sign

We’ve been hearing about Canoe for years and years, and finally went. For lunch, because that’s cheaper.

It is a beautiful space up there on the 54th floor. Even though we had a somewhat cloudy day, it still offered an impressive view of Toronto.

We did feel slightly underdressed, as we were in our rock concert gear while most everyone else seemed to be on lunch break from their Financial District jobs, and therefore in business dress (the only nod to Friday being that many of the men didn’t have ties). Nevertheless, we received impeccable service. (And very prompt.)

For some reason this is now a two-star restaurant in Where to Eat in Canada, but to us, it was definitely three-star food. It’s not every day you swoon over squash soup, but theirs did taste divine, featuring a maple accent. Maybe even better than the wild mushroom soup Jean had, though no complaints about that one either. For mains, Jean had a beautiful goose cassoulet, and I had a salmon fillet that I’d hoped would be more smokey (it was described as “smoked”), but came with fairly amazing rice in broth. How often do you describe rice in broth as amazing?

Vertical

Our dinner restaurant was a no-star listing in Where to Eat, and was indeed not as impressive as Canoe. Still, Vertical is not a bad place to go. It has fun, lively-looking bar area, and a quieter dining one. We were there quite early in a bid not to miss any of the concert, and our waiter was quite accommodating in not rushing us through the order selection process.

The meal was fine but not outstanding, except for one item: the haddock ravioli with truffle and chanterelle. Which sounds totally weird. But it was just delicious, with pasta of perfect texture, and a fantastic blend of flavors.

Le Petit Déjeuner

I don’t usually go on about breakfast, but I feel a need to mention Le Petit Déjeuner, on King Street East, because it had the most amazing scrambled eggs. Really—scrambled eggs. I’d never had such amazingly light, fluffy ones before. (The waffles were also quite delightful.) We got to wondering how they achieved this texture. Jean’s been studying the matter with the help of an egg cookbook written by a French chef. He’s getting closer…

Tawse Winery

The next part of this weekend getaway actually took place in Niagara-on-the-Lake, as part of a work thing of Jean’s. Included was a group tour of Tawse Winery (sometimes Jean’s job is really tough). Jean and I had visited before, but that one was the typical step up to the bar and try out a few tastes of wine type. This one featured four different wine stations, each with a food item that suited the wine being tasted, followed by a visit to the wine cellar where we could try any other wines they made. And, we were led on the tour by the vintner himself.

All the little appetizer items were very nice on their own, and did suit wine being highlighted. And those were all good, except that the Pinot Noir just wasn’t quite there yet. (The vintner agreed; we were tasting it before it was ready to be bottled and sold.) We got a full explanation of their wine-making process, and how it’s different from most other wineries, so I did come to understand why Tawse wines cost more than many. Despite that understanding, though, we still bought only one bottle each of their two cheapest wines, the Riesling and the rosé.

Vineland Estates

Our one winery stop on the way home was at Vineland Estates, in Vineland (would you believe). I wanted to go after having enjoyed their wines at the Solé dinner, but in the end, we didn’t even do a wine tasting here—they seemed a bit busy, and we didn’t want to wait. But, we did have a fine lunch. They have a very beautiful room with a view, enjoyable even on this day, which was gray and rainy. And all the food was very nice. We went totally seafood, sharing mussels to start, then Jean had the bouillabaisse while I had the smoked trout (which was as smokey as I’d hoped). Nice job on all the fish for being so far from the sea.

 

Worth the gamble

At our last dinner at Verses, several of us agreed that while Sole restaurant had many fine qualities, consistently good-quality food wasn’t one of them. You could get a pretty good meal there. Or you get a pretty mediocre. It was a bit of a crap shoot.

But, anytime I’ve been there for a special wine-food pairing dinner, they’ve always done an excellent job. So I was willing to try their September local food special, which is as follows:

“Sledgers” Organic Micro Greens
… hemp seed and lemon vinaigrette, fresh peaches, “Pingue” natural prosciutto

2009 Semi Dry Riesling 3 oz

Jumbo Scallop
… beet marinated, sweet pea and mint puree, pancetta cup

2010 Unoaked Chardonnay 3 oz

Tomato Mille Feuille
… roasted “Elmira’s Own” cherry tomatoes, “Woolwich” goat cheese, puff pastry, dill pesto

2010 Pinot Meunier 3 oz

Ontario Duck
… Roasted “Brome Lake” duck breast, zucchini fritter, heirloom carrots, red currant compote, cassis jus

2009 Elevation Cabernet 3oz

“Rosenburg” Blue Cheese
… green apple sorbet, pear chips

2008 Cabernet Ice Wine 1 oz

Five Course Preset Dinner $ 50 per person, Wine Pairing $ 30 per person

I have to say, everything was just delicious. The scallop was perfectly cooked. The mille feuille had a great texture and nice balance of flavors. The cassis jus nicely accompanied the medium-rare duck. The green apple sorbet was a highlight of the dessert.

The wines were lovely, too. I wasn’t that familiar with Vineland Estates, but now I’m interested in checking them out. The off-dry Riesling and the Pinot Meunier (wonderful nose on that one) were highlights, but they all worked well. And I’d never had Cabernet Sauvignon ice wine before.

The service was very prompt and very friendly. We are a little spoiled, though, as we were somewhat expecting a full explanation of each dish, but they don’t really do that at Solé. So we just kept asking questions:

  • What’s the sauce?
  • What are these things on the scallop?
  • Which type of wine is this?
  • What year is the wine?

And so on. Occasionally our waitress could answer, but very often she had to go running back to get the information. She always did, though.

The only other minor complaint was that the serving sizes could have been a tad smaller, for five courses. But it wasn’t crazy sized, and in the end, the only dish that I couldn’t manage all of was the duck.

So, I’d say this one is a good bet (and a good deal) at Solé. You have five more days to try it out.

A Taste of Canada in Ottawa

For the Ottawa portion of our trip, we booked a package called Taste of Canada that included hotel accommodations, entry to the War Museum and National Gallery, and $100 off dinner at Signatures Bistro. These were the highlights.

Being car-free

The reason we were car-free despite this being a road trip is that we experienced a broken wheel bearing on the car while in Timmins. And in Timmins, you can’t get Audi parts. So, we booked an appointment for the car in Ottawa and dropped the car off there on arrival, after a rather noisy (and lengthy) trip.

The circumstances weren’t ideal, but you don’t really need a car when being a tourist in Ottawa. Particularly as we were staying at the well-located Lord Elgin Hotel. And though we could have taken advantage of their pretty good bus system, instead, boy did we walk. To the War Museum and back. Along the canal. To Parliament Hill at night, where they were projecting images onto the House of Commons. (Very cool.) And of course, to and around the market.

House of Commons

Supreme Court of Canada

Dining mostly per Where to Eat in Canada

It’s good we were that active, because there may have been eating involved as well.

The first day’s walk was in the rain, so we went to Murray Street. Last time here we’d arrived drenched; this time we were merely damp. Murray Street is very casual, with very friendly service, and has excellent food. We skipped the appetizers, though, and I had the deer fricasse while Jean had the quail. He declared his perfect, but my meat was a little dry. No complaints about the sauce and veggies, though. Or the petit syrah (CA) we drank. I also enjoyed the nanaimo dessert.

For lunch the next day, we tried Play, which was new to us. It specializes in small plates, with glasses of wine suggested with each. I had the gnocchi with peas, endamame, and Parmesan, which was delicious. And the recommended Appleby Pinot. Jean had the mussels with smoked tomato and chorizo, which he also liked, though not as much as my dish. And a Sauvignon Blanc with an unusual taste. For dessert, I had lavendar creme brulee with peach conserve and maple, and a French Muscat, which was very neat tasting—not overly sweet. Jean had a cheese plate with port.

For dinner that day, we tried another new one, Navarra. It specializes in the unusual. It was also remarkably small, with its 20 table packed in tight.

I decided to be daring and order the bone marrow appetizer. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but it was indeed a couple large cow leg bones, from which you had to extract the marrow with a little fork. There were also olives, bread, and roasted red peppers. Everything tasted good—even the marrow, which had a mild beef taste. But frankly, it kind of freaked me out.

Jean meanwhile, had ordered the lamb prosciutto. only to find it very heavy on the salad greens, which aren’t really his thing. So, we traded. I founded his Parmesan-laced salad delicious (the lamb was just so-so; I would have preferred it more crispy); and he found the marrow the best part of the whole meal.

On to mains. I had sea scallops, which tasted good, but boy did they seem overcooked. Affected the texture. And Jean had the gnocchi, which he liked, though he found it pretty spicy. So this was an uneven one. (We had a couple glasses of the house wines, which were fine, but not exciting.)

But desserts, we had no complaints about. And the service was very good.

Navarra dessert

Other Navarra dessert

The final meal of note was at Signatures Bistro. It was our first time since it had been transformed into bistro style, and lost a star in Where to Eat in Canada. But the room still looked very grand, with white linens and all. And the food? Pretty damn amazing.

I started with the asparagus soup with gnocchi, which was as a surprise, as I had been expecting more gnocchi, less soup. But the soup was the best part. Just so fresh and delicious. And my main was a duck magret with beet foam, rhubarb, and cherry compote. Oh my, God. Amazing,

Jean seemed pretty happy with his escargot appetizer and pork main, as well. And certainly his cheese plate dessert. Me, I went with chocolate ganache with ice cream.

Though we didn’t have as many people tending our table as before, the service was still excellent. Except at the very end, when our waiter just… disappeared. Very strange, and unlikely to have happened in the old days. (Maybe he was out looking for their missing star rating.)

And the museums?

We did use our two museum entries. The National Gallery was featuring a Caravaggio exhibit that showed his influence on other painters of his time. It was interesting, seeing how different artists inspired each to take on similar themes and styles. In some cases it was difficult to tell one from the other. But on a pure art level, we weren’t totally blown away.

The War Museum had a special exhibit on medicine in wartime. You kind of got a tour through the different types of injuries soldiers suffered, and how these were treated through history. (Much better now!) The whole thing was a bit gruesome, but it was the infections featured near the end that I had the most trouble with. Eew. And the very last part was on psychological injuries, like post-traumatic stress. Oy.

And then we had the rest of the museum to see. We joked that we hoped it was cheerier, like “the lighter side of war”. But by comparison, it actually was. Like to explain the War of 1812, they had a film of French and English Canadian sitting together commenting on a documentary about it. Then partway through their Native friends pipes up. “Jim, when you did get here?” “Me? I’ve always been here!” I thought that was funny.

Wine-ing around Prince Edward County

The finale of our not-very-exotic summer vacation was a visit to Prince Edward County. While we did walk some trails and visit some galleries, mostly, we were there for the wine.

Best wine tasting experience: Karlo Estates

Wines with characterWhich is interesting, because right before going there, we were warned by other visitors that the person doing their wine tasting wasn’t very knowledgeable and, for example, didn’t particularly like red wines.

But we got a very well-informed dude leading through a series of five of their wines, all accompanied by suitable matching food! (Like olives, Cheddar, almonds.) It was challenge for him, as it was busy and he had to manage various groups all at different points in the tasting, but he was up to the task.

So, maybe the advice is to visit the winery in the afternoon rather than the morning.

Another neat thing is that they offer kinds of wines not available elsewhere in Ontario. Their rose, for example, is made with the Frontenac Gris grape, that is not even recognized by the VQA. But it was very good, and as rosé’s often are, quite reasonably priced at $16. Though relatively sweet (sugar level 2), it didn’t seem cloying. “Exuding flavours such as strawberry, citrus with a spicy finish and a hint of cinnamon.” the tasting notes say. That could be about right.

They also work with the Bordeau-style grapes: Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Malbec, and Petit Verdot. (Did you know you could get Malbec in Ontario? I didn’t.) The blend of these is available as a wine they call Quintus ($35). When one of the individual grapes is having a good year, they will bottle and sell that on its own. Currently, the petit verdot is approaching that status. Though not quite ready for bottling, we were able to taste it as well.

And… They make port! And it’s really quite good, very smooth going down. $29 for a 500 ml bottle.

Runner-up: Rosehall Run

It was just a straighforward wine tasting, not a whole guided experience with snacks, but they were very knowledgeable and accommodating here. (Like, printing out a copy of the tasting notes for me.) Our favorite of the wines we tried here was the off-dry Riesling ($17.75), but we also enjoyed the 2008 Pinot Noir ($19.75) and the 2009 Sullyzwic Rosé ($14.75).  The Globe and Mail said “Rosehall makes some of the best-value wines in the County.”

Also worth noting for more unusual wine offerings is The Grange of Prince Edward Vineyards. We restricted our tastings here to three premiums offerings, and ended up purchasing two of them: The nice Champagne-style Brut 2008, a sparkling wine mix of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, $29, and the late harvest Sauvignon Blanc, a pleasantly sweet dessert wine that was made almost accidentally by forgetting some grapes on the vine. It’s $24.75. (I also enjoyed a glass of sparkling rosé—actually, Pinot Noir—from this winery at one of the restaurants. That one may not be available for general purchase.)

Best winery dining: Wapoos Estates

Wapoos logoWe say this despite not being huge fans of the wines, which all struck us as ultra-dry and quite different from the ones made at the other end of the county. But, they were quite food-friendly, and the food was just delicious. We stopped in here for lunch on the way in the way in, so we didn’t have anything too fancy, but everything was super-fresh (like the tomatoes in the gazpacho), made in-house (like the tortilla in the smoked pork sandwich), and with nicely balanced flavors.

Plus, it was just a beautiful day, maybe the best of our vacation, and they have lovely grounds there. So it was nice to be sitting out looking at water and views while sipping some wine and eating good food.

Despite not being too bowled by the vino, we did get one bottle of Baco Noir here.

Runner-up: Norman Hardie

Pretty easy win for Norman, as it’s the only other winery we dined at. All they offer here is wood-burning oven pizzas. I had the special of the day, which was a lemon-scented one. Which seems weird, but was quite nice. However, Jean’s Margherita, which is part of the general menu, was better, thanks to the delicious tomatoes.

It’s quite a casual dining experience on a patio, with communal tables. Fortunately, we had another nice day, so that was perfectly enjoyable.

Norman Hardie makes somewhat expensive wines, so I had thought this was a way to have some without a tasting and feeling the temptation of buying up bottles. That worked out. I had a glass of the Chardonnay, which didn’t taste at all how I expected. Not oaky at all, I guess. I finally concluded that I quite liked it. Jean had a 2009 Pinot Noir. It was also quite enjoyable, but again, that’s not the best of Pinot Noir years, so there it is.

Also worth noting is the East and Main Bistro in Wellington. That’s a restaurant, not a winery, but it’s a very good one, and the wine list is mostly Prince Edward County wines, many available by the glass. We complicated our lives by ordering items that were impossible to find a matching wine for (pickerel for me and osso bucco for Jean), but managing by me starting with a glass of that afore-mentioned sparkling rosé, then switching to join in on the bottle of 2010 Sandbanks Baco Noir, because it was just delicious, whether it really matched fish or not.

Favorite overall winery: Sandbanks

At least if you go by the number of bottles purchased! They are also quite reasonably priced, which doesn’t hurt. The wine tasting experience there is nothing very special, but you get good service. We especially enjoyed the Riesling and the Baco Noir, of which we bought the 2009 Reserve as well as that 2010. (That will be an awesome year in Ontario reds, by the way.) But we also liked the Cabernet-Merlot and the Shoreline, which is a blend of Chardonnay, Rieseling, and Gewurtz.

Yes, we are very well stocked in wine right now. We might have to have a dinner party or something.

You ate out again?

Yes, it’s true; a mere 5 days after our big Chef’s Table dinner at Verses, we found ourselves at Nick and Nat’s Uptown 21 for five-course wine dinner. This one had actually been booked before, and though I noted that it made the proposed timing of the Verses dinner less than ideal, I was overruled. I suppose there are worse fates than having two multi-course gourmet meals close together.

Of course, we weren’t the special guests this time; just three among many at the sold-out dinner featuring wines from Rosewood Estates. As always, the restaurant was too loud, but we were seated nearer to the back, with no table beside us, making that fact less annoying.

The first wine on tap was the 2009 Sémillon, which would prove the favorite for Jean and me. Though I expected a fresh dry style, it actually had a sugar level of 1, and was very pleasant. Our first course was described as:

Raw scallop with sea-buckthorn berries and a green onion tempura and honeycomb vinaigrette

We were presented with a single large spoon of what looked like mixed veggies. Not sure where the scallop was in all that, we concluded it must be mixed in there.

But we were being dumb. That was just the amuse. The first course actually looked like this:

Raw scallop with sea-buckthorn berries

The raw scallops, though it seems as though that should be gross, are quite delicious. The sea-buckthorn berries, a first for all of us, were quite tart, with an interesting texture. The green onion tempura was just delicious; possibly the highlight of the dish. And it included a piece of Rosewood winery honeycomb (they also have bees and honey at that winery), that was soft and blended nicely with the tart berries.

The next wine was the 2009 Natalie’s Sussreserve Riesling. The winemaker was there, and explained the process of making it, which is an unusual one. To quote the website:

Some juice is kept separate and stays unfermented. The rest of the Riesling juice is fermented and made into a finished wine. Just before bottling the unfermented Riesling juice called “süssreserve” is added back to the wine to add complexity, character, structure, natural acidity and of course sweetness.

We’ve really enjoyed other vintages of this one, but we found the 2009 vintage to be merely good, not outstanding. It was served with a composed salad with two warm Quebec cheese, house mustard vinaigrette, and bread crumbs.

Composed salad with cheese

The veggies included radishes, which aren’t normally my favorite, but are improved by proper cooking. It also included asparagus and beans, both which I love. The two cheeses (I don’t think we found out what they were) were very good.

Then on with the duck course, which of course means Pinot Noir—this time, the 2009 vintage. Rosewood’s 2007 Pinot was amazing, and their 2010 should have potential. But 2009 was a cooler summer, which means the much lighter style of Pinot. I like that too, but it doesn’t have the same wow factor.

The food was duck bacon (Ontario duck, who apparently eat sea-buckthorn berries) with pinot and honey-stewed rhubar, braised navy beans, and a barley grass jus.

Duck with rhubarb and navy beans

This wasn’t what I was expecting when I read “duck bacon”; it seemed more like smoked duck. Not that there’s anything wrong that. The navy beans proved a nice accompaniment, and dipping the duck into the sweetened rhubarb worked well.

They had really been building up the next wine, the 2009 Johnny Bower Merlot. Only a small batch is available, very little in restaurants, so it was special that we were all getting some. And there was a whole story behind its making, related to hockey player Johnny Bower (which didn’t mean anything to me, but may to you). The taste? Quite nice, really. Our second favorite. Nice and rich, but not overly so. Pretty smooth.

It was served with a beef ragu with cavatelli dumplings, sweet peas, fried shallots, and pickled green onions.

Beef ragu

I’m not sure what texture cavatelli dumplings are supposed to have, but I really liked the texture of these, with some firmness to them. The Ontario peas were amazing. The meat was extremely tender and in a very nice, slightly sweetened, possibly tomato-based sauce. But, we were still of some opinion that beef is not really the best choice of meats for a foodie dinner. (Neither is chicken, just for the record.)

And on to dessert! The wine was the honey-based mead royale, which is a cool choice. The dish included strawberries (fresh and stewed), honey-goat milk ice cream, and a rosemary sugar-dusted doughnut.

Kristi with dessert

Nick generally makes good doughnuts, and this one was no exception. There’s also no complaining to be done about Ontario strawberries and homemade ice cream.

So all in all, it was a good night out. The meal (including wine) was $85 plus tax and tip.