Boo!

I'm again in Toronto. Again, and loving it.

I arrived in time for the Holloween Parade. Though not in the same grand scale as New York's, it was nevertheless wild and not to be missed. Church Street, in Toronto's gay district, was cordoned off. Who cared if it was 4ºC, and it's not even winter! Aside from the usual suspects (mummies and trannies), an interesting cast of characters came and partied: the Joker, Dorothy of Oz, Bert and Ernie, Andy Warhol, Anna Wintour! A friend of Poch's, dressed over-the-top as Lady Gaga, landed on the pages of Toronto newspapers and blogs the following morning. Poch and I, on the other hand, managed to score a mask from Value Village. So even if I only had an afternoon to shop for costumes, I thought I managed to spook people as the living dead. Meanwhile, Poch pulled out a costume from her treasure chest and came as a wench from Pirates of the Carribean.

Pictures? Our cameras suddenly went wonky on us. Spooky!

(Photos taken at Saiseki Sakura on Church Street (more about its food in another post): me sans mask; Poch as pirate wench. Click here for more holloween pics, Toronto style.)

From Kitchen to Gourmet Food Empire

All we probably know of Toronto-based chef, Mark McEwan, is that he has a show that airs (now mostly re-runs) on The Asian Food Channel.

Heat is some kind of reality tv on the drama and complexities of running a high-end catering business. It ushers us behind kitchen doors where McEwan and his team roll out 4-5 course dinners for 200 people or so in an atmosphere guaranteed to bust arteries and unleash inner beasts. But McEwan is no Gordon Ramsay. No four-letter words fly across the kitchen counter. No apprentices burst into tears. The heat here is nowhere near Gordon's Hell's Kitchen - and Heat nowhere near HK in tv ratings.

But this is where McEwan leaves Ramsay eating his dust: McEwan has just put up one of Toronto's biggest gourmet shopping destinations. Sure, McEwan may not have his signature etched on some high-end pots and pans, but his name is emblazoned on the facade of what people say rivals Toronto's Whole Foods in size and offerings.

McEwan is one of the first to open in the Shops at Don Mills near Lawrence and Don Mills. Here you'll find fresh produce, prime cuts of meats, a wide choice of seafoods, specialty food and, of course, his own brand of gourmet spice mixes, dips, stock and oil. Including his own recipes of hot meals-to-go, like truffle mac'n cheese, glazed pork belly and vegetable curry with biryani rice which my sister, I and Poch had. Who says food eaten off styro boxes, with plastic spoons and forks, have to be blah?

Gordon Ramsay - and other high-profile chefs - must be scratching their head, "why didn't I think of that?"


(McEwan's photo, topmost, from the National Post)

I Love, Love New York!

Just when I thought a city like New York couldn't surprise me anymore, she turns around and shows me what once was an urban blight - the bones of an old, abandoned railway 30 feet or so above street level - transformed into a 3-km stretch of green space and promenade. Of course, New York isn't the first city to build an elevated park; Paris has Promenade Plantée, similarly converted from a railway. But when New York finally built her own, the result just took my breath away.

The High Line snakes from 20th St. between 10th and 11th Avenues, all the way to Gansevoort St. in the heart of the meat-packing district, offering a view of the city never seen before. This time, you can look down on the trendy cafes, clubs and restaurants that line Manhattan's westside and have a peek into lofts and homes that happen to be on the same level. You can even sit in its small, open-air auditorium and, from a safe spot directly above the street, watch New York's infamous traffic - this is theater in itself! You'll also want to laze the afternoon away on those wooden lounge chairs with wheels set on the railtracks, a favorite among sunbathers.

I love that the High Line doesn't have the manicured, self-conscious look of modern parks. In fact, the landscaping incorporates many of the plant species that grew on the rail bed during the 25 years after the trains stopped running.

And that's what I find most inspiring about it, that this "park in the sky" has remained faithful to its history: the ruins of an industrial age where nature refused to die, where grass and flowers grew wild and persistent, like hope that asserts itself through cement cracks and decaying steel.

I can't help but fall in love with this city, again.


Above, a pre-construction shot of the railway, taken from the High Line Blog.

For another post on urban renewal, click here.

Porter Love

I don't have fear of flying; but there's a lot about flying that I dread. I dread being greeted by the smell of tired upholstery as soon as I step into the plane. I cringe at the singsong of welcomes from the cabin crew. Not even a privileged stay in the airline lounge cheers me up for the forthcoming trip. Not only is the food as joyless as what they serve on board, I find airline lounges as musty and eeriely quiet as a public library.

Flying, they say, has lost its romance. But, come to think of it, what's gone is not the romance, but the elements that stoke and sustain it - elegance and design.

So, was it this - the return of elegance and design - that made getting on a Porter flight from Toronto to New York so exciting?

Porter is a Toronto-based airline offering short haul routes between key Canada and US cities. If you're travelling from Toronto to Montreal, Quebec, Ottawa, Halifax, St. John, Thunder Bay, Vancouver, New York, Boston or Chicago, don't go to Pearson in suburban Mississauga but hie off to the dock, no more than 15 minutes from downtown, where possibly the world's shortest ferry ride will take you to the Porter airport on the island.

This, to me, is the Mac of airlines. The design sensibilities behind Porter are, well, very Steve Jobs. Sleek, modern; but there's a sense of fun with a retro bent - from the logo to the airline mascot (a lovable raccoon), the cabin interior (which looks and smells good), the paper (not microwavable plastic) box in which they serve food, the in-flight magazine that you'd actually want to take home and read. Then, of course, the stewardesses' blue caps and just-ironed, fresh-looking uniforms that bring out our nostalgia for PanAm and the whole romance that that era created about flying.

The design company behind Porter, I'm told, are the same guys behind Wallpaper, my favorite design magazine! So I wasn't surprised to find iMacs - not clunky pc's - at the Porter lounge. Here, wifi and coffee are free and unlimited, so are the biscottis, cookies and muffins. The lounge, by the way, is for all Porter passengers and this is where the elegance lies: no one feels left out, no one feels like an economy ticket holder.

The fact is, Porter is an economy airline - but one that, thankfully, didn't scrimp on elegance and design. Roundtrip ticket to New York: CAD$250, taxes and wine included.

Shown right, food box design by Winkreative. Check out their design portfolio on Porter here. Also an interesting read: a Design Sponge interview with Neal Whittington, one of the illustrators/graphic designers behind the Porter look, here.)

Bloody Caesar!

Who'd ever think of combining tomato juice and clam broth to make, not some vongole or marinara sauce, but a cocktail drink! Well, a mixologist from Calgary, Alberta did! Pressed to develop an original cocktail to celebrate the opening of an Italian restaurant, he created what is now Canada's most popular cocktail, the Bloody Caesar - also known as clamato caesar or red eye. The idea was picked up by the Duffy-Mott Company in New York and, thanks to them, we now have bottled and canned "clamato" for times we bloody need a caesar at home.

A bloody caesar consists of clamato (available in the juice section of most Canadian supermarkets), vodka, lime juice, spices like worcestershire sauce, horseradish and tabasco, celery salt (to rim the glass) and garnishings of celery, dill or olives. It's all of sweet, salty, sour, spicy and bitter - a refreshing yet savory drink that's proven to go very well with eggs (think catsup), hence its popularity as a brunch drink.

A recent survey on Toronto's best caesar led us to 5 of the city's trendiest restaurants and bars for their take on this national cocktail: the Gladstone Hotel and the Drake Hotel in Parkdale, Chehozki and Swan on Queen Street West, and Hemingway's in Yorkville. Our verdict: Chehozki wins hands down for their creative addition of red wine and horseradish toppings to the mix; lots of crunchy celery sticks too, when served at brunch. For best value, it's Swan at less than CAD$7. To avoid: Drake. Watered down, uninspired, overpriced at CAD$11 plus tax.

Poch and I prefer our home version: high-alcohol (lots of vodka), spicy (lots of tabasco) and vegetable-y (lots of dill and celery). Call it a spiked salad.

Oh! Baba au Rhum!

We were expecting a simple slice of brioche soaked in syrup and doused with rhum. Instead, we got this glass (shown above). Inside, the syrup/rhum-soaked cake was packed 4 inches high, topped with cream and, whoa, pierced with a straw and two medicine droppers. Yup, the medicine droppers were for adding more rhum to the cake, and the straw, to mop up the the sweet and intoxicating liquid that dripped to the bottom of the glass.

This, Poch and I swear, is the best baba au rhum we've ever had. And guess where we found it. Not in a French patisserie or restaurant (not even the profiterole at Joel Robuchon's elicited such shrieks of delight), but at the coffee/snack bar of what turned out to be my favorite shop in the whole of Paris - the Nespresso store on Champs-Élysée!

Could this be my best memory of Paris? Gleaming coffee gadgets and alcohol in my cake?


Above, top shot of Nespresso's Grands Crus and Collections Gallery. To visit the Nespresso Club in Paris, click here.

L'Atelier de Joel Robuchon Paris

Panic set in at course #4; this 9-course meal was just too much for my Asian tummy. Each dish was a meal in itself! My verdict: good, but not mind-blowing as I imagined a Robuchon dinner to be. Now I am obsessing over Ferran Adria.


Above, Food for Thought/Thought for Food, edited by Richard Hamilton and Vicente Todoli, includes a catalogue of the nearly 1,500 El Bulli dishes created by Ferran Adria from 1987 t0 2007.

Three Steps of Separation

I always knew that until I saw the lay of the land, studied the angle of the sun, loosened the soil in my hand, and plucked a grape from its vine, I'd never really understand what wine was all about. This trip to France was really about leaving behind what books had taught me so far and getting down to (more) serious, empirical education on old world wines - which means a tour along Burgundy's Cote de Nuit and Cote de Beaune and, of course, a lot of wine tasting.

Thanks to Noel of Eye On Wine, I decided to do Burgundy instead of Bordeaux as I had originally planned. Better food, friendlier people, he said. And indeed it was a good place to start any wine journey. Burgundy is a region par excellence when it comes to single-grape wines: pinot noir and chardonnay. It is here that these grape varieties reach the sublime and, in the case of Romanée Conti - reputedly the most expensive wine in the world - a cult status that beats even that of Petrus in Bordeaux. Think upwards of 1,000 euros a bottle, that is, if you can get your hands on one.

That's a huge price to pay for wine from a tiny appellation. While it isn't Burgundy's smallest in terms of size (1.8 hectares), its yield is the lowest in the region - by design. Domaine de la Romanée Conti (aka DRC) follows extremely strict production method and produces only 450 cases a year, or roughly 25 liters/100 sqm. Think 3 grapes per plant!

While I didn't have the fortune of tasting this grand cru wine, a photo op at the Romanée Conti gate was enough to make me happy. I had a good fill of Burgundy wine, though, from numerous wine tastings, including a premier cru from Domaine Serrigny owned by Francine and Marie Laurie, possibly the only women winemakers in Burgundy. I ended up buying their 2006 "Les Peuillets" Savigny-Les Beaune, and for a teeny-weeny fraction of the price of a Romanée Conti, a premier cru from a Vosne-Romanée vineyard - one that's literally 3 steps (okay, 3 vineyards) from DRC, next to La Tache which is another name-droppable vineyard in Cote de Nuit. Call it social climbing by way of wine :-)

The (Other) Spirits of France

My wine path in France took a few interesting detours: Kir. Pastis. Absinthe. What trip to France would be complete without a sip of these local cocktails!

Kir was supposedly invented in Dijon, the capital of Burgundy which, aside from mustard, is famous for its wine and créme de cassis or blackcurrant liqueur, kir's two main ingredients. We could have waited to get to Dijon the following morning, but on our first day in France, we found ourselves in the heart of Paris' Marais district, right where you'd find what Frommer's described as "the best falafel in the planet".

A falafel is a fried patty made from chickpeas or fava beans and is usually served with a hummus-based sauce. They say that among the wines, a rosé is best with falafels; but somehow kir seemed the more appropriate drink as it evoked, at least to me, images of Morocco and Algeria. I've never tasted kir before, so maybe it's just how the name sounds. It turned out to be very good with the falafel, with its strong fruit component providing a welcome contrast to the inherently dry, dense texture and mild flavor of the dish. So kir it was, not wine, that was my first alcoholic drink in France.

I first read about pastis in one of Peter Mayle's books. Since South of France - where pastis is most popular - wasn't part of our itinerary, we ordered pastis the first chance we got - at our hotel's fuschia-themed, Philip Starck-ish, thoroughly modern bar. A setting so un-Provence! This anise-and-licorice flavored drink was served with a jug of water on the side, to be diluted according to preference. Interesting how the drink changed color from yellow to milky beige as soon as we poured the water in. Just like absinthe, they say.

Truth to tell, it was absinthe that we were keen on trying. Absinthe reputedly made people crazy and murderous, caused epilepsy and tuberculosis, ruined families and killed people. It was a mysterious, seductive, forbidden fruit, so much so that asking around where we could find it felt like we were trying to score hash or cocaine. A waiter we asked seemed shocked, saying it's banned in France (still ?!?). Anyway he told us about a bikers' bar in Montmartre that served absinthe. Finally, a call to a liqueur supplier led us to La Fée Verte, a bar in Marais. La Fée verte is French for the green fairy, which is another name - a secret code - for absinthe.

I wondered about all the hype made around this drink. It was, like pastis, anise-flavored and just as strong. But our heads didn't spin and we didn't degenerate into streetwalkers. What I loved, though, was the water container the waiter brought to our table. It was an antique piece, a glass jar on a tall pewter (?) base, with 4 metal spouts that released the water for diluting our drink. This was just so Moulin Rouge!

Death by Foie Gras

In Manila, I'd say only Je Suis Gourmand serves a decent-sized foie gras with the salad. Elsewhere, the foie gras is almost lost in the greens or is just a miserable sliver on top of some steak. That's why, foie gras is right there at the top of my list of must-eat in France.

First stop for foie gras was the Les Oenophiles Restaurant in Dijon. Its famous chef, Stephane Cattane, described his foie gras as "bloc de foie gras de canard poché dans un vins fruité, carapace épice, condiment orange-carottes" (right photo). Foie gras poached in fruity wine, who could resist?

What arrived was a shocker: The "bloc" was actually 1 inch thick and 3 inches in diameter! In terms of cholesterol content, I believe that's the equivalent of 20x20 inches of lechon skin. And this was just for starters! But who's complaining? I enjoyed it with a Chateau Henye 2003 Tokaji, a sweet wine much like a sauterne.

I swear I met my year's quota for foie gras with this decadent "bloc". But in France, there is no escaping death by foie gras.

Shown above (top photo) is course # 3 in the 9-course degustation dinner at Joel Robuchon's Atelier in Paris. This was no torchon, but a rich, quivering slice of fat duck liver, pan seared and served in a portion you wouldn't call degustation-size. I thought I'd keel over before I got to the lamb chops!

To think that earlier that day, Poch and I made a trip to La Grande Epicerie to buy that foie gras sandwich that Marketman mentioned here! Enjoyed picnic-style, with a (small) bottle of champagne... yum!

Yes - if it isn't obvious yet - I do love foie gras. Or maybe I just have a deathwish.

Bonjour, Paris!

Paris-Dijon-Beaune in 10 days: To eat what "women who don't get fat" eat and to drink the wines that define "old world".

Either You End Up In the Gutter...

... or too much drinking can land you on the pages of some glossy magazine. My dad didn't warn me about the latter.

(Photos by Noel of eyeonwine for the Philippine Tattler, June issue. More on the Chateau Siran Dinner and featured wines by wine gurus Noel here and Jay Labrador here. My short Homage to Age - the Chateau Siran Margaux 1959! - here.)

Because Wine is Music to the Palate...

… this Martin Codax Albariño 2007 has music notes printed on its cork. Unfortunately, composer and wine buddy Charo Unite (of Lupa and May Bukas Pa fame) isn’t around to read and play it on the piano for me. I don’t read notes and I don’t play any musical instrument, so until Charo comes back from her US sojourn, this piece of music will remain a mystery to me. A Spanish nursery rhyme? A Galician love song?

What if it turns out to be just another advertising jingle for Martin Codax, the most popular Spanish white wine in America? Bummer.

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Martin Codax Albariño 2007 comes from Galicia’s Rais Baixas, which is the only wine region in the world that grows the albariño grape variety (although some attempts to cultivate the varietal have been made in California). While you’ll find a lot of wines that are a blend of albariño and other white grape varieties grown in the region, a wine must contain 100% albariño to be labeled as such.

I’ve found that a 100% Albariño, like this Martin Codax, and a 100% tempranillo from Ribero del Duero make the easiest, least intimidating and most enjoyable first lessons on Spanish wines.

Wine and Remembrance of Things Past

I first learned about wines when I was about 10 or 11 years old - but not from my parents who I never saw drink a drop, not from any of my older siblings, and certainly not from a brother-in-law who worked with San Miguel and didn't drink anything but.

I learned about wine from books – and god knows what I was reading at that age, because I read about a Greek god called Bacchus and the many “wine parties” held in his name.

In fact, my first attempt at painting was that of a Bacchanalian feast, with Bacchus surrounded by men carrying amphoras of wine. I remember shouting “Obra maestra!” as soon as it was finished, in a big voice emulating a crazed and drunken character in some Tagalog movie or radio drama. “Obra maestra! Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha!”

When I switched interest from painting to writing, I wrote a tragic love story inspired by Edgar Allan Poe’s The Cask of Amontillado” and submitted it to the Philippine Free Press. Shortly after, I received my first ever mail and my first ever letter of rejection. Well, it was the only letter of rejection from a publication I’d ever receive in my life, as I swore never to write for competition nor hope to get published in a literary magazine again. I was 12.

From the arts I had a brief excursion into science, during which I learned the principles of fermentation. For example, to test the effects of yeast on fruits, I would secretly inject our papayas with a solution of yeast and water, hoping to ferment their slushy juices into wine. When this failed, I tried the yeast on Coca-Cola and Royal Tru-Orange. When that too failed, I figured it was better to skip the fermentation trials and experiment with alcohol itself.

So, one lazy afternoon, when nobody was looking, I crept under our dining table with a bottle of rubbing alcohol in hand. I unscrewed the cap, toasted an imaginary friend and took a quick swig.

Arrghhh! Arrrgghhh! Aaaaaaaaaarrrrggggh!

To this day, three things remain a mystery to me: 1) why, from all the books and popular science magazines my older siblings handed down to me, I was drawn to the subject of wine; 2) why my mom didn't even ask what I did with all the yeast I pleaded her to buy; and 3) why, despite an early taste trauma, wine continues to be a subject of exploration, learning and profound pleasure for me.

(Above, Wine Stoppers from Disneyland HK, a gift from A.)

Pork is Good! Pork is Evil!

In Bangkok it's simply called crispy pork - sweet, cured pork sliced ever so thinly and baked to a crisp in a conveyor-belt oven. I call it "pork brittle", because - with apologies to Anthony Bourdain who described lechon skin similarly - it is like candy!

Like the skin of "best pig ever!", it's incredibly crisp and crunchy; except grease doesn't drip down your chin when you bite off it. I must warn that this is pork you can take to the couch and finish off as you watch tv. Devilishly deceptive, dangerously addictive. You'd have eaten half a pig without realizing it.

Thanks, M.O., for this pasalubong from Bangkok.