Cooking and eating. And drinking.

The moment we got our stuff to Vancouver, Joel's inner chef decided to explode. He has always been into making and eating great food, but as soon as we said hello to our new gas cook top, he was off and running. It may have also had a little something to do with the fact that I was happy to unpack boxes while he roasted us organic chickens for dinner. A fair trade, I'd say.

Anyways, we have been checking out our neighbourhood and city for good coffee and food. When Tash was visiting we took her to a place called "Meat and Bread" that has delicious sandwiches. Every order is served on parchment on a wooden cutting board. So cool. And the decor there is as perfect as the sandwiches, which makes me pretty happy. Vintage punching bag? Check!



Our hunt for new and fun Vancouver food led us out to the night market in Richmond, for Joel's first experience with bubble tea and some street meat. And street tofu. It was fun, although we didn't hit on anything that blew our taste buds away it was pretty interesting. The place was packed with food booths and people, and there were thousands of tech gadgets and iphone covers for sale. Overwhelming. But fun.


As for the good coffee, it just so happens we live two blocks from the best coffee we have found in Vancouver, at a place called Kafka's (see us with Tash and Pencil at Kafka's in the photo below). So far most of the other coffee has been a little disappointing (except for Elysian). We thought the coffee here would be amazing, but even at a lot of the places with good reviews it's been THUMBS DOWN. It makes me feel a little smug for Edmonton though, because that city has some darn good coffee. I'm just going to go out and say it...it's better than Vancouver's. Feel free to try to prove me wrong. Maybe I'll get a good latte out of the deal.


Back to the first point I made about our fancy new stove...we have made a whole load of delicious stuff since we got here and it's been fun. I've been snapping photos of some of it so that we can remember a bit of the great stuff and make it again. So here's a few of the things we've been enjoying.

Fresh pesto made with giant bags of basil from the Trout Lake Market


Zebra tomato chutney (in process photo, as it turns out finished chutney does not photograph so well)


Pineapple salsa modeled after some delicious stuff we found in the store here, and made with tomatoes I picked up at the tomato festival that was put on by the farmer's market.



Further to experiment on our stove, I bought Joel the set of Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" for his birthday, and we have cooked a few fun things out of that using our dutch oven, which was a wedding gift that we have been using and loving. I made my first whole roasted chicken in it, and amazing (ahem, this is me, complimenting my own cooking) seared pork roast, and a birthday dinner for Joel with his family (tuna tuna tuna!). Next up is Beef Bourgingnon, of course.

We also went to seattle last weekend and ate our way through that city like you would not believe. Turkish delight, Top Pot donuts, Balsamic Strawberry and Earl Grey ice cream from Molly Moon's, coffee from Cafe Felice, and the most gigantic plate of mexican food that I have ever seen. And we were only there for two days. Ha. Here is a photo of Joel and Tash doing something at the ice cream store. Maybe one of them can tell us what they were doing.




And one final food development...Joel's parents came for a visit and gifted us with a bbq (!!!), so we have been enjoying some great bbq fare since then as well. Like this bbq salmon with dill cream sauce. Oh my goodness.