Well, the Ottawa Magazine finally posted its 101 Tastes To Try Before You Die list on its re-vamped website. The list was original published in its September 2009 issue. Though some amendments to the online list were made to account for products no longer available.

Local food bloggers have taken notice, setting up checklists on their blogs. Kaitlin (@kaitli) of Heartful Mouthful put hers up yesterday. Lana (@lana_stewart) of Apron Strings followed suit shortly thereafter.

When in Rome :)

1. Beau's Lug Tread Beer (yes and met the brewmaster)
2. Pascale's ice cream (love Pascale's)
3. Bryson Farm's baby salad greens (do tomatoes count?)
4. Memories' triple berry pie
5. Lamb tourtière from Les Fougères
6. Coriander pesto from Pastina
7. The Red Sea coffee beans from Ideal Coffee
8. Milk (in a bottle) from Cochrane's Dairy
9. Thyme & Again's cranberry peach jam
10. Piggy Market pea-meal bacon (do sausages and heritage bacon count?)
11. Art-Is-In 12-grain and fennel seed Dynamite baguette (love art-is-in bread, but haven't tried fennel seed baguette)
12. Kefir from Herb & Spice Shop
13. Red Apron's peanut butter and banana handcrafted gourmet granola (umm...I'm allergic to peanut butter)
14. Free-range eggs from Beking Poultry farm (used Beking's eggs to make scotch eggs)
15. Spicy fennel sausages from Luciano Foods
16. Whalesbone (Sustainable Oyster & Fish Supply) brown bag lunch (absolutely!)
17. Tower-O-Greasy-Rings from The Works (unfortunately!)
18. Chicken tikka wrap from Shafali's Bazaar in the Byward Market Square (makes crazy good naan, but haven't had the tikka wrap)
19. Restaurant Barbe's roast pork sandwich
20. Meatball sandwich at Parma Ravioli (aboslutely!)
21. Knish from Saslove's Meat Market
22. Sweet potato and cinnamon bread from True Food Ecostere (photo from trip to Ottawa Farmer's Market)
23. Glengyle Garlic's feta garlic spread
24. Rustic, hand-formed miniature pies from Savoury Pursuits
25. Heritage tomatoes from Ferme Orient
26. Christophe's organic mushrooms from Le Coprin (photo from C'est Bon Cooking ByWard Market tour)
27. Asian fruit salad from Saigon Meats and Vegetables
28. Paczki Glazed from Wedel
29. Lobos apples from Cannamore Orchards (do lobo's from Hall's Apple Orchard count?)
30. Raspberry mini-cheesecakes from Second Avenue Sweets
31. Bewitching baking from The Scone Witch (write-up, but no pics)
32. Lover's Leap Ceylon tea from Tea & Ginseng
33. Queen Elizabeth cake from the Bread & Rose Bakery
34. Shortbread La Gaillarde from Pastina
35. Lavender from Fines Herbes
36. Baklava filled with walnuts from Middle East Bakery
37. Black Irish plain porter from Scotch Irish Brewing (yes and met the brewmaster)
38. Sterling's porterhouse steak
39. Burfi from Desh Typically
40. Tiramisù Made by Maria Nicastro herself (no, but walkthrough of La Bottega Nicastro)
41. Island Flava's Caribbean hot sauce (no, but they make a killer good jerk chicken poutine)
42. Shrimp rice noodles from Wa Kiu Foods (no photo, and we suggest going to a dim sum restaurant to order these)
43. Rabbit from Luciano Foods (does rabbit from Saslove's count?)
44. Aubrey's merguez sausage
45. Ground pork from Saigon Meets and Vegetables
46. Organic frisée from Ferme Orient
47. Serrano ham from Misto
48. Glengarry Fine Cheeses (used Glengarry's Fleur-en-Lait for a clafouti)
49. Lemon and salt pistachios from Shiraz (prefer the lemon pistachios from Shiraz)
50. True Loaf's decadent bun
51. Berg en dal honey from the Piggy Market
52. Zaatar from Aladdin Convenience (have eaten the Zaatar Lahem bi Ajeen from Alladin Bakery)
53. Rosélianne from Verger Lacroix (does the Croquee nordique count?)
54. Cocoa Camino's dark chocolate bar with orange
55. The Table's chocolate cheesecake (well we've had the beet root chocolate cake)
56. Florentines from Le Moulin de Provence
57. Giant Handmade Peanut Butter Cups from Truffle Treasures (do Peanut Butter Easter Eggs, made the same way count?)
58. Stubbe's caramelized hazelnuts No, but I’ve tried many things from Stubbe Half point
59. Banoffee pie from Allium (yes, but we feel Allium's creme brulee is a better dessert)
60. Pure cranberry juice from La Vallee des canneberges
61. Cambodian satay hot sauce from Phnom Penh Noodle Hosue
62. Coconut Lagoon's Travancore-style fish curry
63. Poivre long from the Ottawa Bagelshop
64. Argan oil from the Byward Fruit Market (yes, on a dish from the Courtyard Restaurant)
65. El Meson's Castelo dourado
66. Clover coffee from Bridgehead
67. Fraser Café's homemade doughnuts (yup, they're good!)
68. Almond croissants (almandines) from Les Plaisirs Gourmands Sont Simples
69. Braised veal sweetbreads in a sauce of apple and calvados from La Table de Pierre Delahaye
70. Strawberry pie from Bella Vista
71. Mariposa duck (yes, at many restaurants)
72. Mohammara sauce from Coin du Chiche (no, but have eaten at coin du chiche)
73. Bison from Pykeview Meadows
74. Canadian high tea at Zoe's (absolutely! Makes a great birthday present)
75. Sufganiyot (aka jelly doughnuts) from Rideau Bakery (no, but have been to the Rideau Bakery)
76. Edamame from Oz Kafé
77. The pickled turnip from the Garlic King
78. Soul food from Jean Albert's (yes, but need to revisit)
79. Ottawa River sturgeon from th Chelsea Smokehouse
80. Amber Garden pirogies
81. Rice pudding from Boushey's Fruit Market
82. Bison egg rolls from La Trappe a Fromage
83. Absinthe steak frites (absolutely! favourite in Ottawa)
84. Ricotta blueberry pancakes from Stoneface Dolly's (we've had them, but prefer the non-ricotta blueberry pancakes)
85. Jellies from La Trappe à Fromage
86. Salmon sausages from The Red Apron
87. Tapioca pudding with pineapple and coconut milk from Fuschian
88. Grass-fed beef (if you've had hamburger from Chez Lucien or Hintonburger, you've eaten grass-fed simmental beef, finished with grain)
89. Cinnamon twists from Rideau Bakery (no, but have been to the Rideau Bakery)
90. Acorn Creek Farms melons
91. Beef Rendang from Chahaya Malaysia
92. Cupcakes from the Ottawa Cupcakery
93. Mekong's Hu Nan dumplings (seriously?!!? Been told the dumplings from the Northern Han are tops in Ottawa)
94. Pumpkin pie fudge from Fitzroy Harbour
95. Laksa fromt he Singapore Restaurant
96. Fine Cheese Company's "accompaniments" from Jacobson's Gourmet Concpets
97. Hot-smoked salmon from the Pelican Fishery & Grill (pulease! Buy the hot-smoked salmon from Whalesbone (Sustainable Oyster & Fish Supply))
98. Elgin Street Diner's chocolate-banana milkshake
99. House of Georgie's legendary pizza with gravy (absolutely! It is required eating after a skate on the canal. We recommend gravy-ing the combination)
100. Lebanese cucumbers
101. The BeaverTail (every February!)

We've not done too badly over the past year the list has been around...

We at foodiePrints are very lucky to be able to call Chef Andrée Riffou and Paola St-Georges of C'est Bon Cooking friends. These two entrepreneurs are actively lending their voices to a growing chorus, singing the praises of Ottawa's evolving culinary scene.

Their walking tour of the ByWard Market is groundbreaking. The first of C'est Bon Cooking's "Foods of Ottawa" tours, it lets residents and visitors alike "experience the city through our award-winning restaurants and ethnic, gourmet, and fine food shops."

They recently launched a combined tour and cooking class that begins with a shopping trip to the ByWard market to meet some of Chef Riffou's favourite merchants and purchase ingredients. Afterward, you prepare a seasonal menu and sit for a delicious meal. The fee, $125/person (HST included).

Here are sample menu items:

• Local Charcuterie and selection of Ontario and Quebec cheeses.
• Mme Rochon's tender salad greens garnished with Mme Cadotte's edible flowers.
• Gaspacho or Ratatouille.
• Scallops Crudo.
• Grilled Sirloin or fish served with savoury melon salad.
• Pavlova with seasonal berries

Earlier this week, Chef Riffou and Paola took some time out of their schedules to respond to some questions by e-mail.
1. Tell us a little about yourselves and your ties to the food industry in Ottawa? Chef Riffou, you are a Cordon Bleu trained chef?

Food is my passion. I have been on a quest to eat well all my life and am always digging to find out more about food and how to prepare it. Cordon Bleu was on my radar for a number of years and I finally accomplished my dream by studying there in 2008-2009. The Cordon Bleu Grand Diplome program also allowed me to practice in the school production kitchen, to observe cooking and pastry in a five diamond restaurant: Signature, to do apprenticeship in France and in Canada. I studied in Canada and in Paris. It was a fantastic experience.

2. What had you come up with the concept of food tours? Have you participated in food tours in other cities?

I was always asked by my friends in Ottawa to take them along to show them where to buy specialty foods. I loved taking them on my very own gastro-tour and share tidbits of local goodness. I had the chance of experiencing the New-York Food Tour 6 years ago and last summer and a Paris food tour 2 years ago and though it would be great to have it in Ottawa as well.

Paola here: On my side of things, I was catching up with what was going on via Twitter and came across a very interesting tweet from none other than @foodiePrints (do you know of him?). This tweet basically went something like: "Oh, look at what they do in New York" and provided a link. I promptly followed the link and discovered this concept of food tours. I was instantly captivated by the idea and realized that Ottawa was ready to offer this type of tour as well. When Andrée and I sat down last fall to chat and catch up we realized that both of us were hoping to bring food tours to Ottawa and decided to join forces.

3. What tours have you have setup?

Paola here: The Foods of the ByWard Market Tours were launched in May and I will offer special Beechwood Avenue and Wellington West Tours before the end of our outdoor season in October. We’ll also participate in La Vendemmia and will offer a special Preston Street Food tour on September 25th. We’re very excited about these opportunities to share Ottawa’s best food with our guests!

4. Do you concentrate on specific neighbourhoods?

Paola here: Yes, we hope to give our guests a sense of life in a particular neighbourhood so as the food scene develops and expands into different areas of the city, we bring our guests along to experience the "flavour" of that particular area. We currently have the ByWard Market, Beechwood Avenue, Wellington St. West and Preston Street tours planned for this summer and fall.

5. Are all the tours walking tours?

Paola here: All the tours are walking tours so far. We are hoping to organize a local farm tour in the fall - we haven't decided whether this tour will be by bus or in a "rendez-vous" format yet (people driving their cars and meeting at the various stops). I'm also planning a very special tour at the end of November with a theme: Christmas shopping for your favourite gourmand. (transportation will be included for this tour).

6. Have you considered incorporating wine/food tastings into tours?

Paola here: Food tasting is a big part of our tours and although we have thought of adding a wine tasting component, it remains to be implemented. We’ve done a private event with a sommelier centered on wine and food pairings and are chatting with other sommeliers as well-there is a natural synergy between our interests.

7. Your newly launched website says "one of the best ways to understand a people and its culture is to explore local food markets, experience local specialties and meet with local Chefs and food
artisans." What sets Ottawa apart from other cities?

Ottawa is well surrounded by local farmers. The proximity of food supplies is such that access is easy. The past 10 years have been particularly great: fruit, vegetable, cheese, wine, duck, pork, beef, veal, chicken ...pretty well everything you need is within reach.

Do we have a characteristic food or food style? Over the past few years, with the economic downturn, Ottawa, like many other North American cities, has focused on upscale comfort food. There has been an increase of upscale restaurants, with extremely good chefs, transforming comfort dishes into gourmet food.

8. What other services does C'est Bon Cooking provide?

C'est Bon Cooking also offers Cooking Classes and Team Building events. Cooking Classes are centered around French-inspired cuisine where participants learn popular French recipes based on essential cooking principles and techniques. The team building events are focused towards leadership development and team building in a kitchen setting. Participants get to learn about themselves and their colleagues while cooking up some fun and camaraderie at the same time.

9. What do you see in the way of Culinary Tourism in Canada's Capital?

In Ottawa and in general, there is a keen interest in food, whether it is eating better quality food, eating in better restaurants, events around food such as cooking shows, cooking competitions, food festivals, food associations: Just food, Savour Ottawa,..... many organic groups are forming as well. Ottawa has seen the number of food markets increasing throughout the city. There are many great neighborhood markets offering excellent quality food. That said, we think Ottawa is becoming a destination for people who like to plan their travel around a specific interest such as wine, food etc.

Sounds like we will be hearing about some great upcoming events from C'est Bon Cooking. Do check their website for updates!

Update: Chef Riffou was recently interviewed by Paula Roy for the Kitchissippi Times community newspaper. A full page article was published in the August 19, 2010 edition.

A Chef Follows Her Passion

Particulars:
C'est Bon Cooking
560 Churchill Avenue N.
(613)291-9155

As someone who is learning how to cook, which my two failed bakery projects this past weekend can attest to, I have the following advice. Firstly, when you look at cook books, look for publishings that explain why a certain method or ingredient is used. This way, you are not enslaved to heavily granular recipes. Also, look beyond cook books to culinary references that delve into flavour pairings and techniques. Secondly, avail yourself of some cooking instruction. This can range from taking a weekend course at a local culinary school to having friends over to learn how to make a new dish together.

Chefs, trained on the savoury side of the culinary arts, tend not to use recipes. Pastry is a partial exception, as you need to be more precise with proportions (ratios) and quantities of ingredients. As a fledgling baker, make a scale your friend. You needn't buy a kitchen scale. Nutrition scales work just as well. If you can afford it, avoid spring loaded models whose mechanical parts succumb to wear. Go with digital scales. But, I digress...

Many home cooks from generations past had more sophisticated instincts for cooking. Theirs was an understanding of why adding an ingredient or performing a specific action produced a result. Ours is a practice of scouring traditional (newspapers, magazines, or books) or new media (websites, forums, twitter) for recipes with highly detailed step by step instructions. As a result we have no ability to substitute missing ingredients or expand on a recipe to make new dishes.

Couple the growing loss of culinary knowledge with hectic everyday life-styles and technology that fosters a sense of instant gratification, it is no wonder producing processed foods is profitable. Processed foods are fool-proof and convenient. Our groceries are even abstracting us from the food we eat. Meat that was once an animal comes cleaned and portioned in sterile shrink-wrapped trays. Increasingly, I am seeing seeded, peeled, and cubed vegetables for purchase. Need I even mention frozen chopped herbs?

When I was last at the supermarket, I overheard a father suggest his adult-daughter buy a whole chicken instead of deboned chicken breasts. "It is cheaper", he said.

His daughter's response, "Do I look like I know how to take apart a chicken? I haven't time to figure it out."

While I shook my head, 3 realizations struck me, our hyper globalized and high speed world makes us

1. increasingly afraid to fail
2. increasingly afraid to try new things
3. quick to give up.

Does the growing leaning towards locally produced and/or organic foods help things? Not really. Market pressures urge producers, small and large, to tailor their product offers to consumers. Many are home cooks who do not necessarily have the skills to prepare anything with them. Eating locally means cooking seasonally. We need to have collections of dishes or techniques that adapt to the changing availability of meats, fruits, vegetables, and starches.

Worse, some people are deluding themselves that non-locally sourced or non-organic certified products are inferior. It makes an interesting landscape when intensively grown "organic" produce competes with locally produced fruits and vegetables whose growers cannot afford organic certification. Both tend to charge similar prices. This forces another question, are consumers beginning to equate paying a premium with quality food?

More after the jump...

The last two weeks of July and first two of August are prime vacation times. During these four weeks, the school year has already ended. Summer school is winding down. Summer camp has had its run. Home renovations and landscaping projects are nearly complete.

Where I work, it is actually referred to as the "summer lull", a slowdown that results from significant numbers of personnel, taking vacation. Many project teams are reduced to skeleton staff. Remaining staff are often rotated into critical roles to ensure service levels to high priority projects are maintained.

These days, I hear many of my friends and colleagues, opting for partial vacations (staycations) or extended weekend summers. The former is a compromise. Employees take vacation, but must remain within a city's radius of work. They are required to check their electronic correspondence regularly and return to work should a crisis arise. The latter involves employees, distributing their vacation time to create shortened work weeks. Neither permits much travel.

But, remaining city or mostly city bound does not mean locals cannot be tourists. Make plans just as you would if you were traveling abroad. If you are an Ottawan, I recommend participating in a culinary tour. One of the reasons journalist Michael Kaminer of the Washington Post deemed Ottawa "Canada's cool capital" is its evolving food scene. What better way is there to learn about it than by taking a tour, lead by passionate food enthusiasts?

Paola St-George (@cestboncooking) and Andree Riffou (a Cordon Bleu trained chef) offer one such culinary tour of the ByWard Market through C'est Bon Cooking. It is a 2.5 hour walking tour, costing $45. Wear comfortable shoes and bring a little notebook to take notes. If you happen to be a food blogger, bring a camera with a freshly charged battery (a spare helps) and lots of memory.

Here are snippets from one Jenn and I participated in:

Not included in this slide show are photos from our visiting the Courtyard Restaurant (21 George Street), Murray Street Kitchen Charcuterie and Wine (110 Murray Street), and La Bottega Nicastro (64 George Street), all of which were incorporated in other blog posts.

Now, if you plan to wander the ByWard Market unguided, as Jenn and I often do, here are some additions I would like to recommend:
The Farm House (55 ByWard Market Square)

Signage
For a quick lunch in between shopping at the boutiques, fashion houses, and farmer's market, the Farm House in the ByWard Market Square serves pork and chicken schnitzel. Schnitzel is a flattened piece of meat that is typically breaded, deep fried, and baked crisp.

A-Style Sign

Chicken Schnitzel Platter

Cross Section

Pork Schnitzel Sandwich

Cross Section
While the platter came with unremarkable salad (poor attempt at tabbouleh) and instant rice, the schnitzel was made to order, fresh and crunchy. The sandwich was a little heavy on the bread, but it was quite well seasoned and tasty.

More after the jump...

Located deep in the New Edinburgh neighbourhood (also known as Beechwood), at a corner of residential Union Street, Forty-Two Crichton Street Fine Foods (42 Fine Foods) is a self-dubbed "take-with" shop with "unofficial seating." Having opened in September, it will celebrate it's 10th month anniversary this July.

During the past 10 months, Chef/Owner Susan Jessup and her staff seem to have firmly established a take-home food shop with a local-food philosophy. This, in the former cozy location of New Edinburgh's original Scone Witch.

Shop Window

Front Door

42 Fine Foods boasts a constantly changing menu of take-home products, including complete meal solutions, that employ ingredients sourced almost exclusively from local producers. A quick skim of its FaceBook Fan page includes mention of Aged Lankaaster cheese from Glengarry, fiddleheads and mushrooms from Le Coprin, heritage meat from Upper Canada Heritage Farms, and greens from Jambican Studio Gardens. These are many of the same Savour Ottawa accredited producers, you will find at the Ottawa Farmer's Market at Lansdowne Park on Sundays. Most recently, 42 Fine Foods announced a line of frozen "designer" burgers that "thaw quickly and can be grilled or pan seared." As of last week, beef with pesto and venison burgers were available for purchase.

Besides frozen foods, 42 Fine Foods sells bakery, preserves, artisan cheeses, local honey, fair-trade coffee, soups, salads and sandwiches. When Jenn and I visited in March, the store operated an e-mail subscription service that would send you out menu updates of what Chef Jessup and her staff prepared for take-out dinner. We received 3 months of mouth watering e-mails.

According to its constantly updated website, 42finefoods.ca, Chef Jessup is Cordon Bleu trained, having apprenticed in kitchens in both France and Canada. She worked at Chez Eric in Wakefield, was an independent food consultant, and continues to be of the core chef instructors at the Urban Element.

The following photos were taken in March, several months after 42 Fine Foods' web developer approached us to visit.

Sandwich Sign with Advice

That Saturday's Specials


Coffee Corner


Refrigerated Display Case with Cheeses and Prepared Salads

Buttercream Caramel and Walnut Scones
Beside the scones, a vegetable quiche.

More after the jump...