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Celebrity Chefs of Canada wrap-up (also known as the day I ate tuna, elk, pig, lobster, lamb, clam, rabbit and three parts of a duck)

~ Hilary ~ 4 Comments

What an amazing day of food, friends and fun.

Oh gosh, where to begin.

Well, as you know from previous blog posts, I was asked to be one of the official bloggers for the second-annual Celebrity Chefs of Canada event happening on March 25 at the National Arts Centre here in Ottawa.

I had a blast.

Since there are too many things that happened throughout the day for me to write any sort of cohesive blog post, I’m mostly going to post a few pictures with a short description underneath each of them. Hopefully that will help you get a snapshot of the day’s festivities.

Girl bloggers! Claire from foodiePrints, Jen from foodiePrints, Jodi from Simply Fresh, Paula from Ottawa at Home magazine, Kelly from The Gouda Life and me (looking waaaay too excited)! (photo credit: Don from foodiePrints)

But wait! First, I’d like to give a HUGE shout-out to Chef Michael Blackie who did a tremendous job of organizing the entire day. Everything ran so smoothly and I thought the tasting reception after the demos was laid out well and satisfying.

PS: Unlike the photos that I normally have on Hilary Makes, you can click through each image to access the larger file. That way you can have your favourite chef/dish combination as your desktop background!*

*do it!!!!!

The first chef team up was Chef Marc Lepine of Atelier and Chef Quang Dang of West Restaurant in Vancouver. Since they were my team (rah rah!) I knew what to expect from their citrus marinated B.C. geoduck with Ocean emulsion dish. For those of you who have never seen a geoduck clam (which I’m guessing is pretty much everyone), it is a hilarious-looking piece of seafood that resembles a cross between a snuffaluffagus nose and a rather large male appendage. Here is a photo that someone posted on Twitter, just to illustrate.

The impressive thing about this dish was that regardless of how many ingredients went into it (lots), you could still remarkably taste the flavours independently. I also really liked the pomelo ash and piece of beet paper jello that it was served with.

Ah yes, the famous Chef Susur Lee! I think we were all in awe as this statuesque chef took the stage for his demo with Restaurant Ei8hteen’s Chef Matthew Carmichael. This was a really interesting chef pairing, I thought, since the two chefs used to work together. It was the reunion of the apprentice and the master.

Their dish was a “chorizo style” St. Canut suckling pig, Parmesan crusted fennel and lobster salad with saffron mayonnaise. Get this – my first time ever trying lobster, it was prepared by one of the Ten Chefs of the Millennium. Will future lobster experiences ever be able to top that?

Last but CERTAINLY not least was the braised elk ribs-cream polenta-tasty crispy bits dish that was created by Chef Jason Duffy of ARC Lounge and Chef Jason Bangerter of Luma in Toronto. This was definitely my favourite dish of the day.

When it was presented after the demo session, the elk rib was sitting atop a long wooden plank – it was a beautiful serving method and looked rustic and warm. When I actually got around to tasting their creation, I could have died and gone to heaven. The elk meat melted off the bone and the crispy bits (as Chef Duffy said while serving the plate) were an essential part of the overall dish. It was so, so good.

There were also some cool displays of magical kitchen mastery, and the scenes above made me feel like I was back in chemistry class. In the picture on the left, Chef Jason Parsons of Peller Estates Winery Restaurant in Niagara-on-the-Lake used what looked like a hookah to smoke the duck breast using peach essence. It smelled amazing.

In the picture on the right, Chef Marc Lepine (king of kitchen gizmos and gadgets, not to mention molecular gastronomy), used liquid nitrogen to insta-freeze the pomelo. The cameramen loved filming that – anything with smoke makes for good footage.

As bloggers, we also got kick ass, second-row seats for the afternoon demo session. That meant that I could take cool, close-up pictures like these without rushing up to the front every two seconds. That’s Chef Jason Bangerter on the left and Chef Jonathan Korecki from Side Door on the right. Recognize Chef Korecki? That’s because he (and his homemade silk-screen-printed bandanas) is a contestant on season two of Top Chef Canada!!! It’s kind of one of my favourite tv shows…

To end off, it was such a great opportunity to see all the chefs doing what they do best! They all came out at the end for the grand finale – here’s a few of them up at the front.

I am SO happy I got to chance to go to this event, meet some great people and (of course) eat some beyond-delicious food. Happy stomach. I already wait in anticipation of next year’s event.

DIY rainbow bead necklace

~ Hilary ~ Leave a comment

It’s crafty project time!

One of my favourite bloggers lately has been Alexandra. I met Alexandra in Copenhagen when my friend Gord and I stayed at her apartment as part of our European adventure. Reading Alexandra’s blog, She is Red, is a guilty pleasure of mine, and I love drooling over her beautiful outfits, stunning accessories and gorgeous photo shoots (I seriously want to visit Oregon thanks to her pictures).

Anyways, in one of Alexandra’s most recent blog posts, she writes about this beautiful black bead necklace that she made using homemade clay beads. I thought the finished piece looked so super that I wanted to make something similar myself.

My inspiration - Alexandra's DIY necklace (Photo via She is Red)

Since I’m not really one to do anything sans colour, I decided my version would be inspired by the seven colours of the rainbow. Mr. Roy G. Biv himself (did your mom ever teach you that trick to remember the colour order? red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. Now you know). Since I didn’t have the time or money to buy seven different colours of clay (though I do love the medium), I did the next best thing – took a trip to The Sassy Bead Co! I love this place. Mini mason jars filled with every bead imaginable line the walls. Clay beads, glass beads, big beads, little beads… all lie in small velvet boxes on a centre table. Two middle aged women sit by the front window making small talk and tiny beaded flowers.

I spent half an hour looking for the perfect beads. These choices can’t be taken lightly, you know.

My initial choices sit atop miles and miles of boxed beads

I finally settled on my favourite ones, and popped over to the counter where the friendly salesperson helped me string the beads onto a thin wire and attach it to a delicate gold chain (ok, she did this last part). I love the end result. Love, love, love it. It screams Hilary and I will wear it everywhere.

PS: It was such a beautiful day in Ottawa. Inspiration is pouring in.

It’s my party (and I’ll make a cake if I want to)

~ Hilary ~ 9 Comments

So I’m 22. Holy. I remember when the big 2-2 was just another number in my 11x table. A lot has changed since elementary school multiplication drills.

Toddler Hilary, circa 1993. Snake-shaped chocolate cake decorated with Smarties.

To celebrate that I’m one year closer to death, a year older and therefore 366 days more awesome, I decided to bake myself a cake. A four-tiered, rainbow cake with chocolate whipping cream frosting, that is.

To be fair, it wasn’t all for me. My friend Christine‘s birthday is a day before mine. This year we decided to have joint birthday festivities at her house. It’s practically a tradition that I bring a kick ass cake to her place. You may remember this little gem from last year’s Fourth of July in March party.

"Let's cut the cake like it's our wedding!"

Anyways, we were turning 22. And 22 means adult. And adult means CAKE KINGDOM. Right?

Right. I’m a year older and more wise, remember? This means I’m never wrong.

The layers were made using Dorie Greenspan’s Perfect Party Cake recipe. It’s my all-time favourite and creates a light and fluffy base with just a hint of lemon flavouring.

Note when making a four-tiered cake: buy a real cake pan. 

Please listen to me, it will make your life so much easier. If you have an oven that bakes things evenly, buy four pans and bake all the layers at once. All the power to you! Just don’t use a springform pan and bake each layer one at a time. Otherwise, four hours later you will find yourself transformed into a kitchen zombie waiting for that final blue layer to be complete. Le sigh.

Since I didn’t want to spend $20 to make a luscious buttercream icing for this cake (because, lets face it, when you have FOUR layers, that’s a lot of butter), I opted for a light, chocolate whipped cream frosting. There is half a litre of whipped cream on this cake.

Whipping cream turned out to be the perfect choice. It meant the finished product wasn’t unbearably sweet and was far easier to spread than traditional buttercream icing. Which is ideal for someone who is god awful at icing cakes. There is a layer of whipping cream in between every layer, as well as a thin spreading of four-berry jam. Got to amp up the fruit (sugar) content, you know.

(L) Jam layer, (R) One of these things is not like the other

The finished cake was possibly the girliest thing I’ve ever made, and looked like a cross between a dessert worthy of Barbie’s wedding and an Easter egg hunt. It also would have been appropriate for a five-year-old’s birthday party. What can I say? I’m getting older age-wise, but my baking is regressing in maturity appeal alongside.

And to that I say: Happy fifth birthday, Hilary!

PS: A few of my friends made me a surprise birthday dinner! How sweet are they? Here we are… thanks to Freya for taking the picture!

Hilary, Shannon and Tara

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Carmen’s Veranda (in restaurant & home form)

~ Hilary ~ 2 Comments

We all have our favourite neighbourhood breakfast retreats. Mine is Carmen’s Veranda, an eclectic little cafe nestled between a maternity shop and a photography studio. In the rush of Bank Street traffic, you’d miss it unless you knew where to look.

Well, I am here to tell you that you should look. Or don’t, so I never have to wait in line for a table.

Carmen’s falls under the category of “I will never be able to write a restaurant review about it because it is a sacred food space.” The heart-of-Old-Ottawa-South cafe is kept cozy in that category by my beloved Art-Is-In Bakery, Stella Luna Gelato Cafe and the Scone Witch. I would be substantially more wealthy and less happy without these four local loves.

My last trip to Carmen’s was this past weekend, on the Sunday morning after my birthday (no, I was not hungover, mom). I went with my two roommates, Freya and Shannon, Shannon’s sister Erin, and my other good friend Tara. They are all lovely people and wonderful brunch mates.

Shannon, Tara and Freya at my surprise birthday dinner (which they made!) the night before

Now, not only is the food at Carmen’s great (more on that later), but the look of the place is spot-on, Hilary-appealing.

There’s colour everywhere, and the tables (the kind like my gramps had, with the opening drawers and winged extensions) have been retrofitted with fun studs (not of the male variety) and patterned tops. Beautiful artist displays adorn the wall, colourful dishes scatter our table, and the front window where we sit fogs up in accordance with our steaming plates of brunch. A piece of plastic mounted in between the two windows is printed with a yellow “8” – something that I just realized meant the number of year’s the restaurant has been open. Happy eighth birthday, Carmen’s!

The brunch menu at Carmen’s remains generally the same, with omelette and quiche ingredients switching up every so often based on the seasonal readiness of items. My favourite item is the poached eggs, which are perfectly cooked and ooze onto the English Muffin beneath and mingle with my potatoes.

Speaking of the potatoes… they are the best. I don’t know what it is about them, but I need them everytime I visit.

Story: about a year ago I went to Carmen’s late in the morning with Freya and my then-roommate, now Paris explorer extraordinaire, Brittany. I ordered my usual poached eggs, my mouth watering in anticipation of that oh-so necessary yolk-potato tango. My conversation with the waitress (indicated as “W”) went something like this:

W: What would you like today?
H (in a sing-songy voice): I’ll have the poached eggs, please! I’m so excited for my potatoes! Carmen makes them soooooooo well!
W: Oh no, we’re actually out of potatoes this morning…
H (GASP GASP GASP): Oh my GOD! But..but.. I know, can I run down to the grocery store and buy you some more? …

I continued to beg, plead and drool until finally the waitress told me that there was, in fact, enough potatoes left for one breakfast serving. She probably just wanted to shut me up, to be honest. Regardless, the potatoes and I were united again. I went back to Carmen’s a few months later and the waitress remembered me: “Oh you’re the one who offered to buy us potatoes that one time!” she said. Guilty as charged.

This past Sunday I ordered the same thing, as did Freya, Tara and Shannon. Hey, it’s just that good, okay? Enjoyable as always.

Step 1: morning cappuccino. Eat a brown sugar cube like you're a horse.
Step 2: order the poached eggs, the best thing ever
Step 3: dessert. Yes, even after brunch. We got a lemongrass crème brûlée and a slice of apple berry pie.
A job well done

Two days later, Freya, her cousin Madé, and I recreated this brunch at home. This was after I had already eaten my usual two pieces of toast with peanut butter and apple sauce. I couldn’t resist.

There’s no recipe with this post, so I encourage you to go to Carmen’s Veranda and try the brunch for yourself. I swear on my love of potatoes that you won’t regret the visit.

At-home preparations

Celebrity Chefs of Canada profile: Chef Marc Lepine of Atelier

~ Hilary ~ 2 Comments

This is the second post in a series I’m writing about the second annual Celebrity Chefs of Canada event. Confused? Find out more details in my original post!

A word to the wise – if you ever ask Chef Marc Lepine to describe one of his dishes to you, the answer will not be short.

Chef Marc Lepine in his Ottawa restaurant, Atelier

I should have known better, as I asked Chef Lepine to describe his favourite dish of the moment. It’s the scallop plate that he first prepared for February’s Canadian Culinary Championships in Kelowna (where, in case you haven’t heard, he blew the competition away).

The five minute answer that followed made me gape in awe, and feel terribly guilty for having him recite all 20 ingredients on the spot. The dish involves ingredients ranging from celery compressed with sambuca to an aerated potato and truffle puree to tonka beans (one of his favourite ingredients at the moment that is actually banned in the United States). Even with his impressive naming of most of the ingredients, Chef Lepine had to email me a few hours later because he forgot to mention porcini mushroom powder.

A sampling of Chef Lepine's Atelier dishes: (top left) an elk tenderloin plate with trumpet mushrooms, (bottom left) a beet and citrus dish with walnut, (right) a chocolate, pomegranate, banana, and passion fruit dessert

It is this attention to detail and use of creative techniques and flavours that make Chef Lepine unique. The creations that come from his kitchen are equal parts complex and obscure, creating a memorable mix of innovation (smoking chocolate cake with a pipe) and homespun “guilty pleasure food goes gourmet” (Dorrito gnocchi, anyone?).

Chef Lepine beat out nine other chefs to win the sixth Canadian Culinary Championships

Despite recent culinary wins, Chef Lepine is still incredibly down to earth. He offers me a mug of green tea to match his own and we sit near the front window of his gastronomy kingdom, Atelier. When I ask to take pictures, he self-consciously points at a small brown stain on the front of his otherwise pristine chef jacket. I tell him to hold his restaurant’s Holy Grail – the large Canadian Culinary Championships trophy – in front of it. It works.

With Celebrity Chefs of Canada three weeks away, Chef Lepine is looking forward to participating for his second year.

For him, the highlight of the annual event is simple: it’s all about the chef-to-chef interaction.

“I look forward to it more than a lot of other events. Meeting some of the chefs from the other cities is really cool and something I enjoy,” he says. “You get to learn a lot.”

This year he’s paired with Chef Quang Dang of West Restaurant in Vancouver. The two have been collaborating over email for the past few weeks, bouncing ideas back and forth before finally settling on a guidock clam dish.

“I’ve never worked with that product so I’m really excited to watch him and learn,” Chef Lepine says about their choice of protein. “It was one of the ingredients that I was scared might turn up during black box challenge out in Kelowna.”

As for his pairing, Chef Lepine says he can sense Chef Dang’s passion for food through his emails.

On the day of, Chef Dang will be responsible for the clam, while Chef Lepine will work on the rest of the plate. That plate involves jalapeno, beets, herbs, and a charred citrus pomello ash, all served with a side of Lepine-style creativity. Case in point: the latter is created by burning the leftover pomello rind to produce a special, charred coal. That coal is then ground into an ash, which Chef Lepine says is incredibly fragrant.

“Chef Dang was really intrigued by that technique and apparently he’s doing something similar with apple cores and chives. He’s getting excited about the dish,” Chef Lepine says.

Though I mention that he seems to be achieving a sense of national notoriety following his big Kelowna win, Chef Lepine remains modest and humbled by others’ talents.

We’ve had our success here in Ottawa and last month’s win probably helped people in other parts of the country get to know us a little better, but the caliber of chefs this year – it’s quite the roster,” he says. “I’m really looking forward to it.”