Tales of the Cocktail on Tour Returns to Vancouver in time for Valentine’s

January 27, 2012

It’s just a couple of weeks until Tales of the Cocktail on Tour rolls into Vancouver, Feb 12-14, to no doubt repeat its highly successful inaugural show from last March. Not familiar with this pretty awesome salute to the wood? Read all about last year’s here. This year’s program is greatly expanded. From the 2012 release: Held once [...]

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The Haggis Match: What to Drink (as opposed to sip) on Burns Night

January 25, 2012

For just a moment—horrors!—the wine geek within had me pondering what to drink with Haggis. A crisp, clean Riesling perhaps? Or, how about a rustic red, maybe a budget Syrah, to pick up on all those gamey sheep bits? Thankfully, at this point, common sense (or my Scottish grandmother, from the Great Beyond) prevailed. “Sassenach!”, [...]

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Canned Budget Bites by the Book: Moving Well Beyond Sardines on Toast

January 24, 2012

A few weeks before Christmas we dropped into Barbara-Jo’s Books to Cooks to take a peek at what’s hot in the culinary book world. And, as usual, we wound up picking up a couple of things that would make fun gifts—but somehow we forgot to give them away. One was Len Deighton’s French Cooking for [...]

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Zagat Encore: Believe me. Le Crocodile and Bishop’s are “still a thing”

January 23, 2012

Last week it was fun to see people’s reactions to the latest Zagat Survey. As the Vancouver editor, I’m deeply involved in sorting through the immense amount of data that goes into compiling the reviews and, hence, the final scores. What might not be apparent to the casual observer is that no review gets past [...]

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When the Good News is All Garbage: Composter is a Game-changer

January 17, 2012

  Calling all restaurateurs! When it comes to how you dispose of your garbage, if you have even the slightest hint of a social conscience (and from my experience most do), this one’s a game-changer. What if you could forget about filling that dumpster with all kinds of garbage every day, reduce your organic waste [...]

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Dale MacKay’s Ensemble Tap Plays it Tasty, Casual and Cool

January 16, 2012

Let’s be right up front here. We can probably count the number of burgers we eat in a year on one hand or, at most, both. Even then, a few of those fingers would figure for some cooked on our trusty mini-Weber Q100 (the best-ever, veritable propane-sipper of a barbecque). When we dropped by for a [...]

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Zagat Releases 2012 Vancouver (plus Victoria, Whistler & Okanagan) Survey

January 12, 2012

As some folks may know, in our role as the local editor for Zagat, (backed by a great team in New York) we’ve been working for the last few months on the latest Zagat Survey, that encompasses key players in Vancouver, Victoria, Vancouver Island, Whistler and the Okanagan Valley. Well, here’s an exclusive look at the [...]

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Going Haywire (with a little BS thrown in) at Edible Canada at the Market

December 20, 2011

Yesterday we took time out from our pre-holidays deadline whirl, and Zagat Survey wrap-up (hence the lack of posts here), to catch lunch with the Okanagan Crushpad gang and consulting winemaker  Alberto Antonini. His best quote of the day was: “If I was a yeast, I wouldn’t want to spend my life in stainless steel!”, [...]

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Taking the LEED: Cactus Club Readies English Bay for March 2012 Launch

December 8, 2011

As a long time West Ender, I like to think I have a vested interest in what happens at English Bay. For me, it represents the very heart of the city. In a way, it’s the ‘essence’ in Vancouver’s quintessence. To put it mildly, there was quite the kerfuffle when Cactus Club landed the Park [...]

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Having a Ball at Bel: Hawksworth Mini-Bites at Rosewood Hotel Georgia

December 2, 2011

The buzz at the Rosewood Georgia Hotel is mainly all about Hawksworth, and rightly so. But now newly unveiled “little sister” Bel Café, named after chef David Hawksworth’s wife Annabel, and which wraps around the corner of Georgia and Howe, is also causing a stir. We found time for a bite the other day. Verdict: Pretty [...]

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