I'm Only Here for the Food!

If you live in BC, you might have seen ads about this event running in local TV, radio and newspapers. To those not in BC, it is a once-a-year event where, to quote from Eat! Vancouver’s site, “celebrity chefs, popular local restaurants, wineries, food and beverage manufacturers, cookbook authors, retailers, artisans, and many others from the culinary world will come together for a three day public extravaganza at BC Place Stadium”. I have been there in the previous couple of years and was hesitant on going this year (on the same lines of “I have a bad feeling about this…“). But, in the end, I chose to go and here is my report.

Location: BC Place Stadium. Did somebody say there were a LOT of people?

I arrived just before noon and haven’t had lunch yet. Going to a food event with an empty stomach? Unlike going to the supermarket with an empty stomach (which usually means you will end up buying a lot of not-necessarily-good-things), here, I am not sure! ^_^;;;

 

Ashiana Tandoori and Mama Mia! gelato/ice cream next to it.

The colourful stand to the left is Doña Cata, a well-known Mexican restaurants in the area (post pending…) and, to the right is Zin.

New India Buffet and Sweet Chili

There were other restaurant exhibitors but I did not really take picture of those as there were way too many people standing in front, as I did not want to take pictures of other people. However, in the end, I had to end up doing exactly that. Now, before I could get any food, I had to buy some tickets. Yes, they themselves don’t take cash and, oddly, some of the exhibitors with wares don’t take tickets. Oh, well…

 

20 tickets for $10. Ended up buying another $10 later.

Butter chicken with saffron rice from Ashiana Tandoori (6 tickets)

With a samosa (2 tickets)

I started with Indian as this is one of those cuisines I seldom eat any, not because I don’t like it, but rather because eating alone in an Indian restaurant, well, you don’t get that much variety. Unless you go to an all-you-can-eat, but… Unfortunately, that was barely enough for me so I went on the hunt again.

 

A chicken wrap (8 tickets)

Mango drink (? – 2 tickets)

A wrap from Brasas Peruvian Grill. I wanted to try this because, from afar, it looked good and was curious on what the Peruvian part meant. An interesting sauce? Different way to prepare the meat? Well, in the end, it was a disappointment. The wrap hand nothing special. And to go along, a mango drink from Atithi Restaurant. It did not really taste like mango but passion fruit. Anyway, now with the stomach full, I started to go around.

The International Culinary Stage. Here, Hidekazu Tojo from Tojo’s Restaurant, one of the best known Japanese restaurants in Vancouver.

CityTv Master Chef competition, where several chefs from local restaurants would compete against each other. Think a mini-version of Iron Chef, hehehehe.

Food Network stage, here, Rob Feenie, formerly from Feenie’s and Lumiere, currently food architect for Cactus Club Cafe

Also in the Food Network stage, Ricardo Larrivée.

I must apologize for the two pictures above. In a previous post, I mentioned I am using only a 35mm lens which does not allow to “zoom in”. And there is that much you can crop…

 

I decided to take a break for the Dairy Farmers of Canada seminar, aka, the cheese demonstration. There, I sample seven cheeses, as well as an explanation about all of them. They cheeses are from the top, clockwise, starting with the baguette, brie, mapple cheddar, cheddar of red wine, Rosenborg blue and oka mushroom. Not shown because I finished the entire sample piece was havarti. It was a really informative stage; however, in the end, one piece of information was missing… How do you prepare a good cheese sandwich??? ^_^;;;

 

Some of the smaples from the BC Chefs Association Chocolate Competition.

 

The Wine, Beer & Spirits Tasting pavilion. As expected, alcohol would be popular. And, for the first time, I did not get IDed at the entrance!!!! (It is a 19 years or older event). I have mentioned previously that I have a low alcohol tolerance so I had to hold myself back. And to get the most bang for the buck (or ticket in this case), I went for samples from two different stands of ice cider (think ice wine but done with apples rather than wines). They were quite good, specially the second one as it was tart rather than sweet. However, it did pack a punch (don’t take my word for it, again, due to alcohol tolerance). And, oh, just outside of that area, a chocolate fountain.

 

At that point, I started to get hungry again, so I stopped for some salmon (6 tickets a skewer). I knew there were more options (see below) but I wanted salmon. Ah… Fish…

 

This is from the Consulate General of Indonesia and they were presenting some food. They were serving these for $4 (actual $4, not tickets!). Do I regret not getting it? Partially, yes, specially considering I did not like the wrap (from the beginning)… From here on, some of the different samples/stands:

 

True North almond and other similar snack samples

Kozy Shack pudding. This is one of the most popular exhibits, as people were queueing to sample there free goodies.

Grapefruit soda from Bosa Foods.

Cold cuts from Freybe, in my opinion, one of the “best” cold cuts shops in Vancouver.

Potatoes from the Little Potato Company.

Kimchi from the Korean exhibit

Grill sticks from Zakkushi. They were at $2 each (if memory serves me right).

Jamón Ibérico, the Spanish version of cured pork ham. I had a really thin slice. I won’t say it was as good as people say it is but, then again, it was just a small slit…

Chocolate from Schokolade Cafe. With the remaining tickets, I got some chocolates from them.

At that point, I was there for a little bit under 5 hours and was getting tired, not to mention, I was starting to “feel” the crowd. Like that bad stomach-ache that you get after gouging in an all-you-can-eat but you go anyway next time, I was reminded of one of the reasons I did not want to come to this event. With some many people, specially people queueing up for free samples, that it is literally impossible to move around. (Though some suddenly stop in the middle, rather than move aside to let people move, which really piss me off). No, I am not afraid of crowds, as I will fight my way if necessary, but, I would rather avoid it. Would I come again next year? We will see but, unlike previous years, I have written this down rather than hide it somewhere in my head. So, if I do not go, I here is the reason why. Don’t get me wrong, the event was good in its own ways, just that there is a limit on what I am willing to tolerate.

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