Dish

La Marzocco’s GS/3 has been heralded as the home machine for professional baristas, being as close as you can get to a commercial machine. It comes with digital display, a pre-heating system and dual boilers, which optimize espresso brewing and steam. The AV (auto-volumetric) is semi-automatic, $7,500 and the MP (Mechanical Paddle) system is $7,800. The folks at National Cappuccino will walk you through every single aspect of this remarkable machine, which, when you are laying down enough cash to buy half a Fiat 500, is the only way to go.

get cooking yeg!

Kathryn Joel, the owner of Get Cooking Edmonton, officially opened her new teaching/catering space on the main floor of the MacEwan University student residences in October. One of Get Cooking’s chefs, Stephen Baidacoff, leaves for NYC in December for a year-long gig at Eleven Madison Park, probably the top restaurant in the USA right now. The evening was also a sneak preview of Prairie Noodle, a fledging ramen business.

The best taste of the night? Chef Israel Alvarez’s puffed tortillas. Israel deep-fried palm-sized tortillas, made a hole, piped in refried beans and topped them with a creamy disc of ripe avocado and a spicy crunch of jalapeno. We’re calling the delightful tidbit a Mexican bismark.

They eat the cabernet at Culmina, but at Tinhorn they love the Muscat and Viognier, which Tinhorn Creek Vineyards doesn’t grow a lot of; winemaker Sandra Oldfield says it’s a race between the bears fattening up and the crews getting the grapes off. Last year was the first year they didn’t go back up into the hills, but denned in the gully. They hang out in the trees during the day, and come into the vineyards at night to eat grapes. They looked benign, sitting in a tree across the gully, like in a storybook, but across the gully is about as close as you would want to get, ever.

“Nicola of Irvings Farm custom-makes a spicy Malaysian sausage for us, blending Berkshire pork with our Rendang curry sauce,” says Richard Lim, chatting about the new menu at Lazia Restaurant. It’s not just a new menu but a complete overhaul of the dining experience, from suppliers on up. The kitchen team led by Jimmy Ng is working closely with local suppliers such as Irvings and organic vegetable grower Peas on Earth, offering sustainable seafood, and serving smaller, more modern portion sizes. The room has a new look and a DJ on Saturday nights. We love the Malay flavours in the KL seafood hot pot and also this earthy kale salad.

culinary journey through canada’s desert

It’s how we want travel now — to dive into a country, experience it in a personal way, not just watch it go by from a car or train window. We think of it as a European thing, such as a farm stay, or visiting food markets in southeast Asia. For those who travel on their stomachs (and who doesn’t really) it’s the only way to go. But to do it at home? Why not? Watermark Resort in Osoyoos has created a guest experience called the Culinary Journey through Canada’s Desert. The resort partnered with Covert Farms, their vegetable supplier, to help guests make a direct connection with the Okanagan landscape. They bop along verdant fields in a li’l red truck (’52 Mercury), wander through vines, feed wildflowers to Scottish Highland cattle, forage on the farm, tasting fruit, picking veg, and bring the bounty back to Watermark for a farm-to-fork dinner. It’s remarkable country, a rare antelope-brush ecosystem, Canada’s only pocket desert with steep bluffs that are home to 18 species of bats, and a sandy plateau where a glacial ice dam burst 10,000 years ago. The Watermark Covert Farms Signature Experience is the brainchild of Ingrid Jarrett, general manager of the Watermark, lover of the Okanagan region and Slow Food advocate, and it’s now part of the Canadian Tourism Commission’s Signature Experience Collection, which shows the world what Canada is all about. And, it’s right next door.