Gremolata 177 | Charlie Ayers | Spinyback Pinot Noir | Asparagus in Season

Gremolata 177 Toronto: May 2008 Good food and drink. Connecting people	Charlie Ayers: Chef 2.0 It's been a short strange trip from cooking for The Grateful Dead to becoming Google employee number 53. Malcolm Jolley profiles the chef and Food 2.0 author who fuels Silicone Valley and teaches the venture capitalists and techno-geeks how enjoy lunch ...[more].
- advertisement - A very special dinner featuring the Russian River Valley's La Crema, Wednesday, May 14 at reds bistro. Associate Winemaker Elizabeth Grant-Douglas presents a series of La Crema's "winery-only" selections, each expertly paired with Chef Michael Steh's acclaimed cuisine. Click here.

Asparagus in Season
May is the time for the most delicious lily. Noelle Munaretto looks at all things asparagus related and traces the history of the shoot from ancient Egypt to Bourbon France, with recipe links ...more].

Spinyback Pinot Noir
It had to happen sooner or later: we'd find a 'critter wine' that we actually like. The 2006 Spinyback Pinot Noir is perfectly good and, at a recent tasting, the $18 bottle easily stood up to other pretty label NZ PN's at twice the price ...[more].

Good Food Revolution Italians eat less pasta, faced with rising grain costs. Eric Schlosser on Burger King's dirty war. Grant Achatz's fight to save his tongue. Tim Horton's timbit nastiness. Rethinking the lemon tart. The new beer is organic. Rob Misfud interviews Hervé This. Plus much more...	Michael Pollan Just in case you missed it: from Gremolata 168 our exlusive interview with Defence of Food author Michael Pollan. Click here for the interview, or click here to browse Gremolata's archives.
News and Notes Vancouver chefs seem to be taking over Toronto as Robert Clark from C Restaurant descended on Jamie Kennedy’s Wine Bar this week to promote BC’s OceanWise program. Meanwhile Rob Feenie will cook for the James Beard Dinner on May 21 at the Drake Hotel. Other hands in the kitchen joining Chef Anthony Rose for this event include Pied de Cochon’s Martin Picard and Tobey Nemeth... Speaking of whom, Toronto foodies received a double hit this week with the news that Nemeth and partner, Michael Caballo, are taking an extended leave of absence from JK Wine Bar and The Niagara Street Café, respectively. The couple plan to drive across Canada, then embark on some kind of European adventure. It could be Spain, where Caballo has family, or it could be Italy: either way both are eager to learn more about curing meat. Celebrity chefs including Claudio Aprile, David Lee, Guy Rubino, and Marc McEwan will mix cuisine and art for the 2008 Luminato Dinner Series happening in Toronto June 6-15. Must be spring: Riverdale Farmer’s Market opens for its eighth season on May 13, and operates from 3:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. each Tuesday until October 28. The Kawartha Ecological Growers Co-op is looking for customers interested in supporting their Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program beginning in June. The program includes weekly seasonal produce deliveries to Toronto. Contact farmer Mark Trealout at kawarthaecogrowers@gmail.com for more information.

Gremolata 176

Anita Stewart
Q: What's Canadian cuisine? A: Just read Anita Stewart's new book. It might not quite be all there, but there's more of it in Anita Stewart's Canada than anywhere else. Gremolata's Malcolm Jolley sits down with Canada's original culinary advocate and the masterpiece of a book it took her 25 years to write and photograph ...[more].

2005 Château Pesquié Terrasses Another "Modern Old-World" red wine from the South of France, the 2005 Château Pesqié Terrasses strays a little from the traditions of its Rhône provenance with a dominance of Cabernet Franc. At $14.95, it's a lovely way to start thinking about summer ...[more].	Good Food Revolution Ramsay in Toronto. The War on Raw Milk. The End of Cauliflower. Food Snob Agony. New New York Sandwiches. LA's hot dogs ...and more.
Andy Shay on the "T" Word Toronto's cheese guru Andy Shay returns to Gremolata with a report on The Ontario Cheese Society's recent conference. Borrowed from France, does the term Terroir really apply to cheese? Or in North America at all? Andy susses it out ...[more].	Whisky Woman The powerhouse behind one of North America's biggest whisky shows is a thirtysomething lady from Ottawa. Johanna Ngoh explains how she got hooked on single malts and why she's made it her mission to spread the word on whisky at Spirit of Toronto ...[more].

Ramps
Ontario's brief wild leek season has arrived and Ivy Knight makes a feast (from Gremolata 126) ...[more].

Gremolata 175

Michael Green
"If you only have one chicken dish, why do you need 40 Napa Valley Chardonnays?"
Gourmet magazine's wine consultant Michael Green asks some pretty tough questions about wine service in our exclusive Gremolata interview. One of New York City's top wine experts and educators, and founder of Liquid Assets Consulting Group, Green shares his strong opinions on what's wrong with most wine service and offers his easy remedies to restauranteurs, sommeliers and customers alike ...[more].

Urban Harvest Organic seed seller Colette Murphy's mission is simple but effective: to teach us to grow delicious food in the city ...[more].	Zoltan's Wine Cocktails Sommelier Zoltan Szabo turns his attention to mixed winne drinks ...[more].

Good Food Revolution Is Jancis Robinson a humble parasite? Is the best foie gras ever ethically raised? Are 30 minute meals ever really 30 minutes? Is El Bulli still the best restaurant in world? Is Michael Pollan bothered? And who has the best food snob kitchen ever? Find out here.

Gremolata 174
Ten Ways to Improve Your Cooking Now Ottawa's urban element team of professional chefs serves up ten simple tricks to bring your cooking up a notch and make your life easier ...[more].

F-O-O-D in Cincinnati Beyond the great turkey massacre of 1977, Cincinatti cuisine deserves a second look, says the Gremotraveler, who dines among its seven hills ...[more].	Château Calissanne 2005 From Aix-en-Provence comes a "modern-Old-World" red wine with an interesting blend, value priced at $16.95. Plus: a last chance at a $12.95 Languedoc gem ...[more].
News & Notes Toronto food lovers are invited to The Cheese Boutique at 6PM on Monday, April 21 for the unveiling of (and treats made by) the 2008 line-up of their Festival of Chefs including Jamie Kennedy, Massimo Capra, Keith Froggett, Patrick McMurray, Bruce Woods, Jonathan Gushue, Mike Steh, Ted Corrado and Lino Collevecchio. Vancouver Magazine's Best Restaurant Gold Medal was awarded to West this week (click here for full results). Montreal doctoral student (and Gremolata contributor) Nathalie Spielmann is circulating a fascinating survey tied to thesis, querying the "personality traits of restaurants" take it here for fun. Slow Food Toronto, Jamie Kennedy Kitchens, and SeaChoice present For the Love of Fish: Celebrating Sustainable Seafood Workshop click here for details. Next week: OHI Gala Awards results...

Good Food Revolution
Are prunes better than chocolate? Cussin' chefs. Sticks beat picky eaters. England's killer breakfast. Fake artisanal cheese. Is it wrong to tong? And more...

Gremolata 173

¡Ola Chile! Roving celebrity sommelier Zoltan Szabo returns from the vineyards west of the Andes with dozens of tasting notes taken on the spot for just released Chilean wines ...[more].

Best Butter Bets
Can you really believe it's better butter? Journo-chef Ivy Knight conducts the Great Canadian Butter Tasting with a few friends and comes up with some interesting results. Find out if there's a better butter ...[more].

Phill'er Up!
Our intrepid Gremotraveler returns with notes from what he calls The City of Foodie Love. It's a tastecentric look at Philadelphia. (And, yes, it includes cheese steak.) ...[more].

Good Food Revolution (GFR100): Nigella fights back! The melon must die! David Lee's Canadian cuisine. Do hamburgers cause crime? The new Czech cuisine scene and more...

Gremolata 172
La Bastide Blanche Bandol It's a rare treat to find a wine from the celebrated Provençal region of Bandol. This 2004 lives up to the AOC's association with food culture royalty ...[more]e].	How to Plan a Wedding Dinner As the wedding season approaches, expert caterer Tony Loschiavo has seen it all. In an exclusive interview, L'Eat Catering's main man goes through the nuptial do's and don't's, and shares a few horror stories ...[more].

News & Notes: Season two of Laura Calder's 'French Food at Home' premiered this week on Food Network Canada (see her interview from Gremolata 118 here). Calder tells Gremolata that she's pleased with a rework which stresses Calder's favourite dishes. She's thrown out the script for a more natural style that compliments her simple but elegant dishes. "This is how French people actually eat," she explains. | The Ontario Hostelry Institute has announced their annual list of Top 30 Under 30. | Ontario's boutique wineries present Somewhereness atat Toronto's Coupe Space

Good Food Revolutionn
Kitchen gadgets, Australia's wine drought, return of the microwave: Harold McGee and Mark Bittman weigh in, liquor store archaeology, Mimi Sheraton and Paul Levy debate critique technique, what to eat at Guy Savoy, Paris' rose fever, Robert Parker The Movie, cultivores, omnibores and baggists, Susur Lee to New York andnd more...

New Notes Zoltan Szabo tastes his way through the latest wines from Legends Estate ...[more]. Browse Zoltan's library of 2008tasting notes at his exclusive page: www.gremolata.com/zoltansnotes.htmtm.
Gremolata 171

Great Canadian Chefs Conspire Culinarily!
What's inspiring the great chefs of Canada? Ivy Knight finds out at a super chef catered dinner in Toronto. Rudy Guo puts together an all-star line-up including Lynn Crawford, Normand Laprise, Michael Stadtländer, Anthony Walsh, Michael Blackie, Robert Clark, Massimo Capra, Brad Long, Patrick McMurray and more...
Photo: Ron Turenne

Vellend's Vancouver Update Roving writer Eric Vellend returns to the left coast and eats his way through his three favourite Vancouver gustatory themes: coffee, Japanese and Pacific Northwest	Sugar Off! (We Hope) Lucky for lazy sugar bushers, the permanent winter affecting the maple belt from Michigan to Vermont (and including Ontario and Quebec) has meant the taps and lines have yet to run. Warm days and cold nights should get things going any time, though. Read more in our maple syrup feature from Gremolata 69 here.
A Cambodian Chef's Odyssey From privilege in Phnom Penh to horror in The Killing Fields to peace in the kitchen in Toronto. Chef Chandra masters his culinary tradition in his new country and works to heal his old one ...[more].
Good Food Revolution Chatting about books with Grant Achatz and Heston Blumenthal, teenagers tasting wine, K-Paul shot, eating your lawn, Delia Smith, French drinking, MP White and more...

Gremolata 170

Is Spring Possible? A trip to the Atwater market convinces Nathalie Spielmann that spring will really happen, despite the howling wind and snow outside ...[more].	Oysters and Red Wine Sommelier Zoltan Szabo calls up oyster expert Patrick McMurray and leads an all star blind taste test: what reds go with oysters? ...[more].	- Advertisement - Women and Wine in Sicily with Dr. Linda Bramble. Click here to find out about an Italian food and wine trip of a lifetime for women only, hosted by one of Canada's most celebrated wine experts ...[more].
Good Food Revolution The restos of Kabul, the drinks books of Kingsley Amis, the Microplane, being nasty to Nigella the end of the fat food writer? Milk delivery and ...more.	Lagrange-Monbadon A well made Bordeaux, that's eight years old retailing for $13.95? Amazingly, it hasn't sold out, yet ...[more].
Pasquetta Pasquetta means "little Easter" in Italian and traditionally takes the form of a picnic the day after the holiday. It's a chance for friends to get together after spending time just with their families. The Pingue family of Niagara (cousins of the prosciutto makers) have brought the tradition over from their family's roots in Abbruzzo at their restaurant Napoli on April 1. Explains Anthony Pingue "This event represents who we are as a restaurant, that is, we believe in keeping the old traditions alive. We've been doing it for seven years and it's one of our most popular nights." Contact Napoli at napolipizzeria@cogeco.net to see a menu or to reserve.

Gremolata 169
L'Express in afternoon sunlight. Photo: Jamie Drummond

The Montréal Latino Connection Latin cuisine's ambassador, Carlos Fuenmayor reports from Montréal ....[more].	Montréal Gastronomique After more than a decade, Malcolm Jolley, goes back to Montréal to cover the Highlights Festival, and eats rather well ...[more].	- Advertisement - Women and Wine in Sicily with Dr. Linda Bramble. Click here to find out about an Italian food and wine trip of a lifetime for women only, hosted by one of Canada's most celebrated wine experts ...[more].
Good Food Revolution This week: an $11,000 coffee machine, Ruhlman's rant on fat, Prince Charles' rotten veggies, NYC's reservation market and more...	Jameson's Irish Whiskey Tired of green or dark brown beer on the 17th? Consider sipping an Irish whiskey. Jameson's is the oldest surviving brand from the country that claims to have invented the stuff.

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