Features

Sauté Wednesday is an excellent food blog written by Bruce Cole. Read it!

I found out about this blog from Meg Hourihan's excellent Blogging for Dollars: Giving Rise to the Professional Blogger where she writes:

I love cooking and I really enjoy Bruce Cole's Sauté Wednesday Weblog. Imagine if Mr. Cole were able to write the blog full-time? What if FoodTV or Food & Wine were to pay him to do it?

The Splendid Table is the companion website to Minnesota Public Radio's weekly radio series of the same name. The site provides endless information on food preparation, appreciation and culture.

From the site, you can listen to the weekly and archived shows (using RealAudio). Regular features include Where We Eat, a food lover's forum and of course, recipes. Interviews, information and forums are interesting, informative and timely.

Our friend, Rebecca, introduced us to a refreshing and easy to make summer drink.

Just take one part Japanese Plum Wine (such as Gekkeikan available from the LDB for $15.95) and add one and half to two parts tonic water or soda water, add some ice and voila instant summer goodness!

Also good with a splash of vodka!

We recently picked up a copy of CityFood magazine (a Vancouver and Seattle magazine about eating, dining and cooking) and noticed that it is their 10th anniversary. Congratulations! Here's to many more years!

Last Saturday at The Gourmet Warehouse, Barb met Sheri of GourmetPlanking.com who sells cedar planks for grilling salmon, veggies and pretty much anything else. They sell both online and at traditional retailers like the Gourmet Warehouse.

Of course, you can buy planks of untreated cedar yourself as we pointed out in July. But this is a lot more convenient. Check it out and please let us know what you think!

At last weekend's East Van Farmers Market, Barb and I picked up some Oliva soft sheep cheese in cold pressed olive oil with herbs from Mountain Meadow Sheep Dairy (RR#2, Chase, BC,V0E 1M0, 250-679-3841).

This cheese is superb! Not too sharp, but very flavourful! The herbs (rosemary was the most prominent) together with the olive oil combined to make an excellent tasting cheese even better.

We briefly went to the Powell Street Festival and enjoyed soaking up the sun, learning about Japanese culture and eating inexpensive Japanese food.

We had yaki soba for $3.75, barley tea for $1.50 as well as mochi. There was lots of other great looking food (such as the very popular squid balls and sushi) which we didn't have the chance to try.

All in all a great way to get a gentle introduction to Japanese culture.

Tonight we had the Sumac Ridge 2001 Sauvignon Blanc ($13.95 at the Okanagan Wine Shop at Granville Island) with Pasta with Zucchini.

We found the wine's lack of oakiness and its subtle peach flavours a great match with the pasta. Drink it!

The Georgia Straight has revamped their website and now most of their food section is on the web.

For example, the food feature (usually written by Angela Murrills) and Jurgen Gothe's Uncorked are both on the web. Excellent!

Anne wrote in again with more Napa and San Francisco dining suggestions.