Category Archives: Eat & Drink

09

Jun. ’10

I Scream: I Am Not Lactose Intolerant!

It’s Day 8 of the yoga challenge, see previous post and the one before it as I am too lazy to link.  My sense of humour is taking a vacay but my appetite is alive and well and taking charge of the situation.  You know, I thought that over the winter I had become “lactose intolerant” in my Cougar Years because I had a reaction to hot chocolate in Yorkville.  By reaction I mean I had to sprint to Holt Renfrew while my friend was trying on shoes at BCBG a block away because HR has those specially enclosed soundproofed lady stalls that those with IBS and bulimia know about.  The hot chocolate was delish and worth the disruption though and I embraced the idea of being “lactose intolerant” because it made me seem like part of an elite group like the Masons or the Avon Ladies.  But a couple of days ago, I had a hankering for some ice cream and you know me, where the appetite goes, the body will follow.   What ever happened to ice cream?  Is it just me and my cronies, or has ice cream lost some mass popularity over the years?  As a youngster I used to eat it all the time.  Sealtest Heavenly Hash was my poison.  When there was only vanilla, I would take Fry’s cocoa and mix it in.  Then along came Ben and Jerry and I never looked back.  I even visited the factory in Vermont when I was pregnant, just call me Mrs. Chunky Monkey.  I could eat the whole tub.  But over the years I began to think, I best not.  Ice cream and wine don’t really mix, so I gave one up, guess which?  Duh.  In the summer, as a cool refreshing treat, why not have a popsicle instead of ice cream?  Ask my beloved Dr.Oz that question and guess what?  Popsicles have the high fructose sugar that is the evil that made America fat!  Ice cream (maybe not a tub) is the better choice.  So off I went to The Marble Slab at Queen and Lee, a 15 minute walk from home so if anything should happen lactose explodo-wise, there  are 2 Starbucks in my path (crappy coffee, awesome IBS friendly washrooms, decent ginger cookie).  Marble Slab is a chain where they scoop the ice cream up with Popeye’s bicep strength and put it into pint size ice cream containers while you wait.  Normally this would have sent me over the edge, but all that yoga breathing and such has put some patience in me.  You dig, girl, sssscccoooop it up, plop it in and scoop some more. What’s the rush anyway?  I ordered an ice cream cone (deep chocolate) and a couple of milkshakes for the chillen.  There is an option for extra stuff like cake crumbs and crushed up Skor bars.  I find this confusing and surreal.  It’s like putting lime in beer:  grow up, take it as it is.  Anyway, it took a long time but it was interesting.  She put my dark chocolate lump on a marble slab (hence the name) and weighed it.  At almost 5 bucks a cone, I should hope so.  And off I went, eating an ice cream cone like a lady.  Lick. lick, lickity loo.  All the way down the street and home.  No spills of any kind.  I am ready for more.

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31

May. ’10

Hello Dosa

 

Udupi Palace, Gerrard Street East, West of Coxwell

If there is one thing I know for sure:  All things can be folded into a pancake.  And what is inside should be kept a mystery just like a woman, and you will get my drift from the photos below.  Last week, the roti from Cool Runnings was my lady lunch, a folded over doughy thing with chicken and other stuffin’s, and what is in the gravy?  I have no idea, I don’t want to make it at home.  If you tell me what the sauce is, I may not want to eat it. And when I am making my own everyday sandwich out of whole wheat bread, Ziggy deli slices, and Hellman’s mayonnaise, I am thinking about you, Chicken Roti (or you Polish Mushroom Blintz, or you Greek Lamb Gyro, and even you, American Aunt Jemima with your fake maple syrup and faint taste of bacon grease).  The Dosa is the Indian version of this culinary staple.  It’s a pancake suffed with spicey goo.  Yes, goo.  Indian foode is my most favourite of all and therefore I truly do not want to know.  My purposeful ignorance is all about reverence and I want to remain in awe and wonder.  A couple of friends and I go to Udupi Palace in Little India when our hankerings are synchronized.  We order the paper masala dosa, check this out:

As you can see from the photo above, to get inside the paper dosa, you have to dig deep…you have to eat a lot of crunchy pancake material and dip it into the coconut sauce before you get to the slap chunk.  It’s work, man, no joke.  The thing is almost the size of the body of my Miele vacuum and yet, despite its volume, I could definitely eat more than one.  In fact, there is a dosa eating contest every year for Sick Kids Hospital, click here for the details.  I am thinking of entering it, I am woman, here me roar and watch me chew!

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25

May. ’10

Give Me Shelter

This weather is CRAZY!  I’m not complaining, don’t get me wrong, but there is something about perfect, sunny, warm days that make me disfunctional.  I lose my indentity, as though I’m meant to live in the land of the dark and dour.  When it`s cloudy, I don`t have to squint and when it rains, I don`t have to wash my car.  When it`s crap outside, I can be inside!  The other day, the weather was so bright and hot that I totally forgot to eat.  Me.  I forgot to eat.  It was 2:30 in the afternoon and I was getting ready to prospect that really nice upper beach neighbourhood south of Gerrard at Main when I started to feel light headed and delirious.  What is this feeling?  Thankfully Bret Michaels explained on Larry King what a brain hemorrhage felt like, and this couldn’t have been it. I figured it was hunger, in an advanced stage, normally I don’t let it get that far.   All that outdoorness made me forget about foode (I spell it that way on purpose).  Luckily right on Main, there was a restaurant calling my name.  Cool Runnings is a cute little Caribbean restaurant at 146 Main.  I would like to claim that I discovered this little gem  (they have another location at 2708 Danforth Ave) but as it turns out, everybody I know gets hankerings for roti and they go here or have it delivered.  But now that I have made my discovery, I’ll be going back for more.  Here it is half eaten:

Chicken roti, too good to wait to have its picture taken

The beautacious Eileen at Cool Runnings

And wash it down with a Red Stripe!  I felt like I was on vacation, the people were so nice!  I could have stayed there all afternoon, just to hide from the sun.

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19

May. ’10

The Summer of Honey

Farmer’s Market at the East York Civic Centre

Yay!  Starting today, every Tuesday, the Farmer’s Market comes comes to the East York Civic Centre (on Coxwell Ave at Cosburn).  The East York Civic Centre is one of those handy places to know about where you can get your driver’s license updated and a flu shot.  And now that it is mid-May, the market is there once a week as well.  It’s still kind of early, so if asparagus doesn’t rock your boat, all the vendors aren’t set up yet.  The marble rye/poppy seed loaf people are there (try the honey garlic sausages, yum!).  And speaking of honey, the honey people are there too.  I got a honey skin cream that is supposed to be good for any skin ailment from diaper rash to eczema.  It smells fantastic, I’m putting it on my baggy neck right now, maybe it will look normal again or at least some vampire will want to bite it.  They have loads of flavoured honey.  I got the ginger infused one which is soooo delish and I am having right now in my tea.  You know, Dr. Oz approves of honey, it’s his Number One Pantry Healer.  I’m going to make this sticky honey soy chicken wing recipe, click here to watch the lady make it on you tube.  What did we do before you tube?  So much easier than reading a recipe and getting the pages all stuck together.  The cute boys who run the south side of market are back and they had the super skinny asparagus which I am more partial to than the big fat ones, oddly enough.  Roasted asparagus is a reason to buy that super expensive sea salt that looks like shaved flakes.  I’m going to try drizzling some of that ginger honey on them, bet that will be a taste sensation.  Mmmm, honey….oh, and here’s a recipe for a honey martini that’s supposed to be an aphrodisiac: 1.5 oz of rum, 1 oz honey, lemon squeeze, splash soda water, and serve with a honey stick (the farmer’s market had them!). You know, I would add some mint and call it a honey mojito…in fact, I declare it to be the Summer of Honey!  I’ll be trying out all the flavours, see you next Tuesday!

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16

May. ’10

What Happens in the Car Wash…

Okay, birthday week is officially over now that all the Champagne is gone.  I can’t NOT say the word  “Champagne”  like Bubbles from Little Britain, “Champagne for everyone!”  Although I never really drink the real stuff, just bubbly wine, it could be from anywhere, I don’t care.  It puts me in the best (and craziest) mood and I will not tell you what I did in the car wash at Queen and Kingston Road.  If I wasn’t such a charming LOCA (lady of a certain age), I could have been arrested and no, I wasn’t driving.  Anyway, there is nothing a like a super fun Champagne buzz to bring on the most profoundly existential angst-ridden hangover the next day.  Will I ever learn?  No, but what I have learned is to embrace my inner wretchedness.  First start with Vitamin Water, it’s brilliant for replenishing depleted nutrients, the ones that went down the drain in the car wash.  It is my daughter’s mission to try every flavour so the one I got yesterday tasted like a pina colada….not my favourite, I must say.  After getting plumped back by the fluids, keep moving, go to the gym.  The sweat will pour out even on the lamest elliptical ride.  Then lay on a mat or roll on a  stability ball.  Think about what you’re going to eat next and YES!  it can be grease!!!  In fact, it must be grease, Doctor K’s orders:

Great Burger Kitchen 1056 Gerrard St. East

I went here, Great Burger Kitchen, because I saw a Harvey’s commercial at the gym.  They use locally sourced, naturally raised, free range meat and!  AND! They serve poutine.  I ordered a Greek burger, ie. man repellent (feta, tzatsiki, and ripe raw red onion…kiss me!)  I also ordered the poutine and I’m wondering if you have to be born in Quebec to get this but I guess not because I have been noticing all these “gourmet” poutine places opening up all over Toronto.  I embrace this, although I am a purist and have yet to taste any as great as the poutine at Patateville on Laurier Blvd in Beloeil, Quebec.  I don’t even want to know if it’s not there anymore.  But the poutine at Great Burger Kitchen sure hit the spot and so did that burger.  The next burger I order, which maybe as soon as the day after The Sex and the City 2 premiere next week, will be the “voodoo” burger….salsa, spicy mayo, guacamole, balsamic onion…definitely will chase all the bad spirits away!

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29

Apr. ’10

That Seventies Style

Bette Davis and Joan Crawford in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?

They say that the biggest makeup sin that women commit is that they wear the same makeup from their heyday and that they should move with the times. I don’t know about that, I still feel pretty in my Bonne Bell lipsmacker and however women like to put their slap on is alright by me. The same must be true about decorating style. Last week, Diana at Flohaus asked me to write a piece for her blog about my decorating style. She actually came over to de-clutter so we could figure out what it was. Once she cleared away all the boxes of tea and Italian Wedding Soup (don’t ask), we figured I was a seventies child through and through. 5 years ago, when I decorated, I ordered wallcovering from Germany, googling up “seventies wallpaper” and got to choose from some really groovy prints. I chose a geometric print in sickly green colour. That’s the thing about the seventies, everything seems so purposefully hideous, the colours are either too vibrant (orange, yellow) and they are offset by a colour range that only the human body could produce: puke green and lots of brown. The wood is veneer, the leather is “Corinthian”, and the fabrics are Dacron, it’s hard to go antiquing and actually justify buying this stuff when you know that the local Legion is decorated in this inflammable style. But I love it! I don’t think I went overboard in my love of the seventies (by the way, see my blog header, designed by Indigo Dawn: she actually used Partridge Family font!), I used the wallpaper as an accent. Also a splash of orange on the kitchen counter. And a shag rug carpet inlay, that I regret, and that Betty (aka. The Urinator) thinks is grass. I am dazzled by the decor at Lady Marmalade on Queen Street, west of Logan:

It’s complete seventies in all mismatched tables and chairs. The bathroom is great too. They’ve got some retro wallpaper and some really cute woodland animal art. The best part is the food, which is breakfast and lunch cuisine with a bit of Mexican flavour. I always order a clubhouse, it’s my thing, and theirs has avocado, along with the bacon and chicken. Avocado and bacon make one of the best food combos in my opinion. Never let your bacon go grey in the fridge or your avocados to rot on the counter, mix them together and spread on toast! The quirky part of Lady Marmalade is they only accept cash but maybe that’s part seventies concept when only business men had Diner’s Club cards. Those were the days, my friend. They also don’t have a liquor license which is okay too. A lemonade at lunch is very retro.

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27

Apr. ’10

Tea for Troubles

I have a crush.  No, it’s not that guy at the gym who doesn’t know I’m alive in spite of my volcano of pheromones that erupt when he’s near by.  I’m over him (not really).  No, this is just a celebrity which is the best kind because you can be as impractical as you want in your fantasies, I have a special little one about Robert Pattinson where I am 20 years younger and he is my tennis instructor.  It’s a convoluted little reverie that’s more exhausting than it’s worth so I leave RPattz for my daughter to dream about.  My current crush is Ray Lamontagne and my  favourite song to play over and over again is “Trouble”.  I even liked it when the mullet boy, Alex Lambert, sang it on American Idol, and I was boiling mad when he got voted off.  I saw Ray Lamontagne on Elvis Costello Spectacle (love this show!) a couple of weeks ago and he has that Jesus Hermit look that I’m drawn to.  And that song pretty much sums up my state of mind these days.  Worries, worries, worries!  What to do about worries?  Last week when I was at The Brow House, I checked out the store next door called Steeped And Infused, 1258 Queen Street East.

The tea selection at Steeped and Infused

Jennifer Best, the owner, was there to help me sort through all the teas as it turns out there is more than one way to swing a cat when it comes to brewing tea.  They sell tea accoutrements as well.  Jennifer guided me to a tea called Honeybush Maritime Cranberry (eases worries) and I got a teapot with an infuser on the lid so I can brew loose teas and maybe even mix them myself.  I like to have sun tea in the summer:  put the tea in cold water in the sun, steep, and then refrigerate.  There’s so much to choose from here and Jennifer is a great guide.  She’s as passionate about tea as I am about Ray!

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13

Apr. ’10

Kristin’s Big Box

The French Fry Truck at Canadian Tire, Leslie & Lakeshore Blvd East

Okay, I know how the good citizens of Leslieville are in a kerfuffle over big box stores. The idea of a big, fugly Walmart killing all the cute shoppes along Queen Street doesn’t thrill me either. Besides I actually enjoy my drive to the suburbs to hunt for sold-out game systems in the land of Best Buy and Future Shite. But I hate when people say something bad about my Canadian Tire, the one in Leslieville. Please do not refer to it as “Crappy Tire”-it was funny in 1991, (like when people call Target, Tar-jay, ho ho ho). I don’t care what anyone says, I get my car serviced there…I do not have an “in” with one of those little mechanics on Kingston Road and I never know what you’re talking about when you say he’s east of Main on the North side behind the flower shop, I will not go there. Canadian Tire has all my info in their computer, your mechanic doesn’t even have opposable thumbs much less a proper address. And I love the Pit Stop. The name conjures up something romantic in my imagination. The last time I was there, the young, ginger buck at the desk had lips so chapped they were bleeding. I went to the Shopper Drug Mart while I waited for my wipers to be replaced and I bought him a CHERRY CHAPSTICK! How grateful was he….sigh! Also I love the smell of Canadian Tire….intense rubber. It`s the same exact smell as the Canadian Tire in Beloeil, Quebec that my Dad used to take me to when I was a child. I would wander the aisles, intoxicated by the smell and pretend the hoses were snakes and I’d run and try and find him. He`d always buy me ball at the checkout…that kind you put in pantyhose and then knock against the wall, remember that game? Why don’t kids play that anymore? Oh yeah, because they are all inside playing video games FROM BIG BOX STORES! To me Canadian Tire isn’t a big box store as much as a tradition…hoses and balls and rubber…okay it’s also a bit of fetish. And another thing as a child, we used to hit the french fry stand called Patateville for the world’s greatest fries. These are the fries that set the standard for the rest of my life, by the way. In all my years in Ontario, all (except the ones at Prohibition…future post) have paled in comparison until today. As though the gods of nostalgia were smiling upon me when a saviour, known for now as the fry man, opened up a french fry truck a couple of months ago that is permanently parked in the parking lot of The Canadian Tire on Lakeshore. I’m telling you, these fries are little golden slivers of heaven…LOOK AT THEM:

and yes, that’s a little tub of gravy…so what? Sometimes a lady needs gravy now and again.

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12

Apr. ’10

Saturday Night’s Alright for Freddy

The Burger Shoppe, 688 Queen Street East, west of Broadview

By the way, I’m still on that Eating Better kick, just so you know. But I have to say, on weekends I do love my takeout. There’s me, my daughter Evangeline 16, and my son, Freddy,14, whose hankerings are often in competition. “Why is Friday always pizza night?” my daughter always complains, Because Freddy says so. You do not want to mess with tradition. Last Friday though, we sent him to the movies and ordered Indian behind his back. Evangeline has expanded her palette greatly over the last 2 years but! since her biology class dissected a pig a month ago, pork products have become verboten. The pickled piglet in question resembled our barrel bodied, stumpy legged dog, Betty. Pigs are now too cute to eat. I don’t care about pork chops but I love bacon in all its forms so when I’m out, you can be sure I order it. Il Fornello makes the best fig pizza with proscuitto, by the way. And how can you eat a perogi without a bacon bits? Don’t get me started….anyway, last Friday we ordered a bunch of lentils and chick peas from Makkah (1020 Danforth Ave 416-406-2500) and it was yum! The next night, Freddy, aka Jughead Jones, demanded burgers. Now I will eat almost anything happily but I usually feel kind of meh about burgers and of course, Evangeline is slowly becoming more righteously vegetarian but no one felt like arguing so off we went to The Burger Shoppe. http://www.burgershoppe.com/newsite1/splash.html

They use naturally raised beef (a happy cow is a delicious cow) and have all kinds of cool condiments…I amost ordered bacon for mine but I thought that would be kind of overkill so to speak. Instead I had carmelized onions, chipotle aoli, and blue cheese and it was fantastic. We all agreed, best burgers around! This Burger Shoppe is a small place but really cute and they have other locations in the west end. Here we had a choice of exotic sodas like spruce beer. The burgers themselves are just the right size, not like those massive ones a few doors east at Dangerous Dan’s who gets his inspiration from the Double D’s across the street at Jilly’s. They make them how you want them, rare, medium, well done. Ours were medium (ever so slightly pink in the middle) which were perfect. It’s a bit pricier than your average burger anywhere else but definitely worth it. And Freddy forgot about pizza. Another tradition is born.

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08

Apr. ’10

Kristin’s Mojo Rising

my hula hoops: the answer to core conditioning or potential dust collectors?  We shall see!

This story starts with a hula hoop and ends with pot stickers, just follow along.  You know how people always say “everything happens for a reason” as though there is some all knowing force with a hidden agenda maneuvering us along like some kid at a Nintendo console playing Pokemon Stadium?  It’s a frustrating concept, believe me I know, as though losing your job or getting dumped feels good knowing you’re going to have to come up with a resume or make up a profile on Plenty of Fish when all you want to do is take to the bed.  For me, I feel the gods of fate just seem just make their abitrary moves at commercial breaks so I don’t really take them all that seriously.  I do, however, notice signs.  You know how when you learn a new word and then you hear it all the time….it`s not like that word didn`t exist, it`s just that you weren`t paying attention. I learned the word `kiosk` in university and even though I had been going to the Orange Julep stand (aka. kiosk) all my life, I didn`t know what it was called. What a revelation!    Well the other day, I was at my gym, doing my usual meandering, fantasizing, sighing combo, when I noticed a hula hoop resting against the wall.  I love to hula hoop!  At least I used to, and I even won a hula contest in the Bahamas years ago on a stage, in the wind, in a bikini.  But I was too afraid to try it…I was in the gym afterall, where people go through great painstaking measures to ignore you, yet they are watching all side eyed so you better act normal.  But the next day, I was skimming through the Star and there was Marisa Tomei (she`s a LOCA, too…lady of a certain age) talking about how she looked so good naked in The Wrestler thanks to….the Hula Hoop!!  Well who doesn’t want to look good naked, if even just for the neighbours across the street?  So back at the gym, I picked up that hoop…and guess what?  Fish to water!  I shimmied for 15 minutes straight.  I knew I needed one for home because things at the gym come and go and there was only one of its kind there.  This one is rubberized and weighted, not light and plastic. The trainer who brought it in said he got it at T&T which is an Asian grocery store.  Wow, weird…but convenient. 

T&T Supermarket at 222 Cherry, just south of Commissioners

So Amy (another trainer) and I hightailed to T&T and sure enough, there were 2 hula hoops left.  Don’t get excited, we took the last ones and I also got another one that can be dismantled with with “massage balls” on the inside.  I have a ring of bruises around my midriff thanks to the massage balls but it is a heavy hoop (the heavier the better) and if I wear a sweatshirt, it might be okay.  But hoops aside, T&T is fantastic.  First of all, I love grocery stores and I go to my usual one  pretty much every day.  Even on vacation, I love to grocery shop.  As a kid when we went to Florida, we didn’t go to Disney World, we went to the Piggly Wiggly.  I love grocery stores the way Tiger loves the ladies…I might be married to Loblaws at Leslie and Eastern but I like to dip into others.  T&T has all things Asian: a whole display of Hello Kitty and Astro Boy and two aisles dedicated to the Ramen noodle alone.  And mulitiple flavoured Pockys, who knew there was caramel?  The best part was the ready made section where they have hot dumplings and pot stickers. How I love pot stickers especially when someone  makes them…I’ve been back twice since.

Anyway, the hula hoop:  I will keep you posted as to how my progress is going.  It seems to be doing something (other than bruising).  According to Marisa Tomei, it’s the tiny muscles that make all the difference, the little ones hold the guts in.  It’s definitely more fun than Pilates and I can feel a little pull in my pelvic region.  Maybe my mojo will wake up and roar again. Until then, I have pot stickers and a Hello Kitty tattoo.

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