On Monday, February 1, 2010, a new set of Ontario Restaurant Hotel & Motel Association (ORHMA) awards were handed out. Deserving winners in my mind included ZenKitchen (634 Somerset Street West) for Ottawa's New Restaurant of the Year, Social Restaurant and Lounge (537 Sussex Drive) for Best Restaurant Design, Play Food and Wine (1 York Street) for Favorite Fine Dining Restaurant (our reccomendation for small plates in Ottawa), and the Works for Favorite Casual Dining Restaurant.

What surprised me was Chef Neil Mather's win. He, the Chef of Graffiti's Italian Eatery at Holiday Inn & Suites Kanata, beat out the likes of fellow finalists Chefs Marc Lepine (Atelier), Steve Mitton (Murray Street), Michael Moffat (Play Food and Wine and Beckta Dining and Wine) and John Taylor (Domus Café) . Everyone, save for Chef Mather are recognizable to anyone familiar to the food scene in Ottawa as either Chefs or Chef/Owners of higher end fine dining restaurants. Chefs Lepine, Moffat, and Taylor have even been fierce competitors or winners in past years' Gold Medal Plates, a national culinary competition that raises funds for Canadian high performing athletes, future Olympians.

Confused, I checked with the ORHMA website to determine how nominees were selected, how finalists were chosen, and how finalists won. Accordingly

Ottawa chefs are judged by an independent panel including previous winners, culinary media and educators. The panel uses both objective and subjective criteria made up of: education and training, industry participation, awards received, work practices, artistry, creativity and ingenuity. Three finalists from ORHMA member establishments [were] announced

Finalists are then voted for via ballot to determine a winner.

When Jenn and I started dating, we visited Grafitti's twice. Twice we deemed the restaurant about as authentic Italian as chicken balls and egg rolls are authentic Chinese. Essentially, the restaurant met, but did not surpass, my expectations for an in-house Holiday Inn & Suites restaurant. We found the food, on par with sit-down fast-food restaurants like Denny's, Kelsey's, or the former Olive Garden.

Curious that Chef Mather had had a positive effect on the restaurant during his tenure, we made reservations with Paola (@cestboncooking) and a pair of fellow local food bloggers, Shari (@whisk_food_blog) of Whisk and Rachelle of Rachelle Eats Food. I had high hopes Chef Mather had reworked the entire menu, offering more authentic Italian fare. What was I looking for? Food that is conservative on technique, but employs extremely fresh ingredients, including seafood.

What did we encounter when we returned? In the 6 years since Jenn and I set foot in Graffiti's, the restaurant has not changed ostensibly.

Interior
The same yellowish beige stucco walls line the dining room and bar area (called a saloon on its website). The same floor to ceiling columns, encased in dark stained wood panels, stand between booths and tables. The restaurant still sports the same green patterned carpets.

The menu was a throwback to earlier days too. In it, we found a "1999 Sample Table D'hote" menu for $19.99 that included classic Caesar salad (yet it included no coddled eggs), linguine salsiccia, and tiramisu.

Menu
But, for a restaurant that boasts "modern Italian cuisine - complemented by Mediterranean influences", I found the options rather pedestrian. Soups included a vegetarian option, a minestrone ($5.99). Appetizers included tomato bruschetta ($7.99), cheese crostini ($8.99), garlic mussels ($8.99) and calamari ($9.99). Pasta entrees included a pesto pasta, a spaghetti with meatballs (suspiciously described as "Bigga" Meatballs) ($14.99), cheese stuffed pasta, and potato gnocchi. Mains included a veal scaloppini ($24.99), a tusacani portfolio ($24.99), a focaccia burger ($13.99), chicken parmesan ($21.99), and an ossobuccu milanaise ($27.99). Also, the menu includes clay-oven-fired, not wood-oven fired, 12" personal pizzas, topped with "Italian mozzarella cheese."

What did we order? To start, the salad special of the day, a "classic" casesar salad, the minestrone, and the bruschetta.

Specials Menu
While the Chef signed menu stated that the salad special included julienne capicola ham, my salad included what looked like processed lunch meat ham.

Insalata Cucina with Julienne Lunch Meat Ham
My fellow diner enjoyed her bruschetta with various toppings. My better half found the minestrone heavily flavoured with wine and another unidentified strong flavoured.

Disappointing Minestrone
Graffit's was also stingy with ingredients, the entire bowl having 9 pasta shells.

For mains, the tuscani portfolio, the ossobuco milanaise, the spaghetti (substituting "bigga" meatballs for chicken), the seafood linguine with pesto, and chicken parmesan. The tusacani portfolio did not come in a pastry crust as our waitress explained. The chicken supreme was tender. The accompanying starch, a baked potato the menu said would come with sour cream and chives, came dry. The osso bucco was braised tender. The truffle risotto that accompanied it was devoid of any truffle or truffle flavour, again contrary to what the menu described. The rice was also under cooked. The spaghetti was overcooked and tasted as if it had been washed prior to plating, having absolutely no starch coat.

Overcooked Spaghetti
The accompanying chicken was dry and bland. My seafood linguine was over-seasoned and oily, leaving a significant pool of olive oil on the plate.

Oily Pesto Linguine
The scallops were slightly overdone, just bordering on tough. The pasta, however, was toothsome.

For dessert, we split an apple pouch ($8), cooked apple in crisp filo, served with store bought vanilla ice cream (it melted very quickly). The filo was somewhat singed at the edges, but the dish was enjoyable.

What was the best part of our meal? The cheese stuffed bread that was served to us before any of the dishes.

Cheese Stuffed Bread
It came with a nutty hummus and salted eggplant.

With cliche Italian dishes, sauces and soups that taste like they came canned, dishes that do not adhere to the menu half of the time, badly made starches, and overcooked proteins, I was left to wonder how the restaurant's chef won his award. His cooks made mediocre dishes.

Did I mention our waitress hovered impatiently over us throughout the meal, hurrying us through the courses, impatiently busing our table and repeatedly reminding us new dishes were ready? No? Well I guess there are a number of reasons to find another Italian restaurant in Ottawa to visit.

Particulars:
Graffiti's Italian Eatery & Saloon
101 Kanata Avenue
Kanata, ON K2T 1E6
(613) 271-0921

ZenKitchen
634 Somerset Street West
(613) 233-6404

Social Restaurant and Lounge
537 Sussex Drive
(613) 789-7355

Play food & wine
1 York Street
(613) 667-9207

The Works
Various Locations

Spearheaded by United Way Ottawa, our fair city embarked on a "Kindness Challenge", beginning Friday, February 12 and ending Friday, February 19. The challenge: to create a "kinder community."

Coordinated by a website (kindottawa.ca), a twitter account (@kindottawa), and an army of volunteers, the kindness initiative empowers Ottawans to choose to be kind to one another be it buying the person behind you a coffee as you pickup yours to donating used suits to Funk Your Junk. Here is the Twitter hashtag to highlight kind acts: #kindottawa.

Local businesses have pitched in, donating directly to the United Way or via today's "Stuff the Bus" event.

Several eateries also held their own events. Among them Boston Pizza (Orleans) and the Royal Oak.

Here are our contributions:
Friday (February 12, 2010): We took Toronto mommy blogger and foodie, Vicky (@momwhoruns) to Jak's Kitchen on Bronson (479) for breakfast.

Afterward, we picked up Chinese New Year candies as a surprise treat for students, parents, and teachers at Ottawa's Spirit of Math School.

Saturday (February 13, 2010): Jenn and I experimented with a Chinese New Year dish called turnip cake and documented the results to post a blog on the subject for 3 friends on Twitter.

Sunday (February 14, 2010): I thanked the sales person who helped me pick out a bottle of wine for a lamb shank dish I prepared, documented, and submitted for February's Beet 'n Squash You cooking competition.

Here is the related tweet:

@foodiePrints (Feb 14, 03:41 PM)
Random act of kindness today: Thanked sales person who helped me pick out a cabarnet/franc blend for a dish 2 weeks ago #kindottawa

We also picked up potted pink roses for our neighbour, who celebrated her 89th birthday on Valentine's Day. She slipped the following thank-you card under our door the following Monday.

Thank-you Card

Monday (February 15, 2010): I accepted Sunday's "Silver Medal"-level kindness challenge and baked short bread to accompany the candies and a Chinese bakery bought Swiss roll for Monday's classes at Ottawa's Spirit of Math School.

The recipe I followed comes from the Half Baked blog, entitled Honey Short Bread. A modified recipe follows after the jump.

Here is the related tweet:

@foodiePrints (Feb 15, 09:54 PM)
Random act of kindness 2day: Made honey (infused w/ginger & star anise) shortbread 4 teachers of #ott Spirit of Math tonight #kindottawa

I also volunteered to help haul equipment for that evening's setup and tear-down.

Tuesday (February 16, 2010): I randomly bought the person behind me his afternoon coffee when I went to pickup mine, a "Bronze Medal"-level kindness challenge.

Wednesday (February 17, 2010): Today, we sponsored our friends Izzy (@spoonsie) and Falk (@isfalk) who are participating in Ride for Heart Spin-a-thon on February 20, 2010, proceeds going to the Heart and Stroke foundation.

I encourage you to sponsor someone for the Spin-a-thon as well. To follow our lead, click here to sponsor Izzy. Click here to sponsor Falk.

More after the jump...

As a foodie, one of my frustrations is following the many blogs in the growing food blog community, local or otherwise, and reading about food or food-related events I could have attended had I known beforehand.

As a local food blogger whose goal is to make Ottawa a foodie destination, I blog to highlight our growing restaurant scene and encourage people to visit our eateries and attend events. To date, I have been mildly successful via Twitter, a calendar application, and Post-It notes.

Yesterday, I discovered BeTidings. According to the Webster's dictionary the verb "betide" means "to happen (to); befall." Aptly named, BeTidings (@betidings) is a free online social calendar, built by local entrepreneur Treena (@TGrevatt), to make events accessible. It allows registered users to setup calendars, add events, share events, "collect" events, and "follow" other users' calendars. Best of all, individual calendars are publicly accessible and the web application is really easy to use. Though, I have not tested the GCal integration yet...

Here is a screen capture of the calendar I setup for Ottawa food/food-related events.

foodiePrints on BeTidings
Click here for the live calendar.

To date, I have added the events I know about. And, I have tweeted several local event organizers, caterers, and restaurateurs to send me lists of upcoming events, which I will add as I receive them.

As time permits, I will also add a widget to foodiePrints’ layout to list the 5 upcoming events.

In the meantime, if you know of a food or food-related event, feel free to drop me a comment. If you see us on twitter, drop us a tweet too.

There are some foods that are traditional to celebrating the lunar new year in Chinese Culture. Among them are various dried fruit and root vegetables, such as melon, lotus seeds, and sliced lotus root, everything candied. There are also bright coloured foil-wrapped candies, typically red and adorned with gold Chinese characters for fortune.

Foil-Wrapped Candies
Red signifies good luck.

During the eve of the lunar new year, family and friends gather for a feast. One of the typical dishes served is whole chicken, representing prosperity.

Roast Chicken
The tradition, most likely has something to do with how cost and risk-intensive it is to raise livestock. Slaughtering a chicken was done only on a special occasion.

Fish is also served, with head and tail intact, signifying a good beginning and end to the coming year. Also, lettuce wraps are commonplace, because the Cantonese word for lettuce is a partial homonym for good fortune.

Me, I am fond of two dishes, traditionally served during new year: steamed turnip cake (lobok gao) and baked New Year cake (nian gao). Turnip cake is savoury. New Year Cake is sweet. Both are more puddings than cake, but such are the English translations. Both are baked in round tins, signifying family reunion.

Turnip Cake
Turnip cake is such a favourite of mine that I have spent a good amount of time working to learn how to make a good batch. While foodiePrints does sport a recipe, Jenn and I have developed the physical memory and learned the visual and textural cues to put a dish of turnip cake together without measurements.

In doing so, we discovered there are two methods to prepare the white turnip, called lobok in Cantonese and daikon in Japanese. To make turnip cake, white turnip is normally shredded coarsely using a box grater or other rasp implement. When I last visited Vancouver, I learned another method in my better half's grandmother's kitchen, chopped turnip cake. This lunar new year, we made two batches of turnip cake, one coarsely shredded and the other, brunoise.

Brunoise is a French culinary term for chopping 2.5-3 mm (1/8") cubes out of julienne vegetables.

Julienne and then brunoise white turnip

Brunoise white turnip
And yes, the brunoise was sloppy.

Brunoise Turnip Cake

Ready for Steaming

Freshly Steamed

Texture after Resting

Coarsely Shredded Turnip Cake

Ready for Steaming

Freshly Steamed

Texture after Resting

Comparison

After Resting, Bottom: Coarsely Shredded, Top: Brunoise

Slices, Left: Coarsely Shredded, Right: Brunoise

Which do I prefer? I prefer the brunoise turnip cake because the turnips, even while sweated and then steamed, have more "turnip" character (flavour and texture) than the shredded variation. But, such is my palette. For me, brunoise vs. shredding, takes approximately 15% more time.

What does turnip cake taste like? It is definitely a carbohydrate, tasting of turnip and starch.

To serve, I usually fry up slices in oil until edges crisp. Though, I will have to attempt the Singaporean version, frying slices up with sliced red chillis.

New Year Cake (Nian Gao)
Here is a recipe for nian gao.

Electric Egg Beater-based Stand Mixer

Nian Gao Baking

One, Golden Crusted, Done

Other, Golden Crusted, Done
What you'll Need:

• 4 large eggs
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 2 cups of milk
• 1/3 cup of vegetable oil
• 1 package of glutinous rice flour

Method:

1. Preheat an oven to 325F
2. Crack the eggs into a metal bowl or the metal bowl of a stand mixer
3. Add the sugar to the eggs
4. Either use an egg beater or the beater attachment of a stand mixer to whip the egg and sugar mixture until it lightens
5. Add the milk and oil to the emulsion and beat until everything combines together
6. Slowly sift the rice flour into the wet mixture and beat until smooth
7. Pour the mixture into two 8" pie tins
8. Bake both for an hour

To serve, slice into wedges.

Slicing

Served

The texture of Nian Gao is dense. It is thick, sticky and sweet, signifying a rich and sweet life with abundance to come.

This past Friday, Jenn and I had the pleasure of meeting Vicky (@momwhoruns), blogger for the Urban Mom's blog and foodie. The "Not So Supermom" (but could have fooled us!) was visiting Ottawa for meetings, one with Costco and another with Farm Boy. She, an Ottawa ex-pat who makes her home in Toronto, we tweet quite the bit about the many foodie splendours her city has to offer. Before she arrived, we arranged a tweet-up for breakfast at Jak's Kitchen (479 Bronson Avenue), one of Ottawa's locally-owned restaurants, known for it weekend brunches.

After some pleasant discussion about food, blogging, some of Ottawa's better purveyors of pho, coffee, sushi, and the state of Chinatown post T&T, we tested Jak's reputation for serving our fair city's "best Eggs Benny."

Well, Jak's has a list of Eggs Benedict dishes, one shorter than the Lieutenant's Pump on Elgin (361).

Jak's Kitchen Eggs Benny Menu
The two Eggs Bennies Vicky and I ordered were nonetheless impressive.

Mine, the Don Francisco ($10), comes on black bean cakes with corn sofrito and a red pepper coulis.

Don Franciso Eggs Benny
Accompanying sides included deep fried freshly cut potatoes and a fresh salad, lightly dressed with a balsamic vinaigrette.

Poached eggs on black bean cakes, corn sofrito, and red pepper coulis
The black bean cakes were crusted on a flat top and provided an earthy alternative to English muffins. The corn softrito was made with frozen corn and sweated celery and onion. It provided savoury flavours and some texture. The red pepper coulis provided sweetness and brightness.

Runny Poached Eggs
The eggs were well poached so the whites were set and and the yolks, still runny.

Vicky's, the Michelangelo ($10), comes on rosemary foccacia with capicolo ham and basil cream sauce.

Michelangelo Eggs Benny
Accompanying sides included the fried potatoes and a cup of fresh fruit.

Jenn ordered a Balderson omelette, sans cheese. It comes with sauteed sliced mushrooms, chopped shallots and chopped bacon.

Balderson Omelette
Accompanying sides included a buttery freshly made biscuit and a cup of fresh fruit.

What surprised me were the condiments. The jam tasted like it was made and jarred in-house, naturally fruity sweet, neither metallic nor artificially sweet. There was also a nice hot pepper sauce called "Shania", made by local Chamomile Desjardins.

Shania Hot Sauce

Total: $27.12 (before taxes, including tea and coffee).

Vicky, Jenn and I enjoyed our breakfasts very much. The food was great and so was the company. Vicky even blogged a quick mention of our encounter on Urban Mom's.

Would Jenn and I return to Jak's Kitchen? For brunch, absolutely! Given the specials we saw that day, we want to try its lunch too.

Specials
However, with Jak's Kitchen only having less than 2 dozen seats available, we suggest visiting in small groups.

Business Card

Jak's Kitchen's Business Card

Particulars:
Jak's Kitchen
479 Bronson Avenue
(613) 230-2088

More after the jump...