Author: Cassandra Anderton

Tojo’s Dining Room Presents the Noble BC Spot Prawn Make the most of this short but sweet season at Tojo’s! It’s been far too long since we visited. News from Tojo’s today! Spring brings us one of BC’s most celebrated ingredients – Spot Prawns. This year Tojo’s will be offering a special Spot Prawn Omakase dinner at the restaurant and also a Spot Prawn Kit to be enjoyed at home. The dining room will be reopening June 1, and the Spot Prawn offerings will be available June 5. Spot Prawn Omakase This dine-in only experience will feature a half-pound of…

What’s Up In The Wine World This Week Here’s our round up of what’s on our radar for wine. Good Wine Gal, Barb Wild and I will curate this weekly list, so feel free to email us with suggestions of what to include. We’ll add to during the week as time permits. Support BC Local Hero’s with Marquis Wine Cellar Wednesday Marquis Wine Cellars hosts a tasting at Culmina Family Estate Winery. Meet winemaker Jean-Marc Enixon, a classically trained French viticulturist and winemaker who came to the Okanagan in 2015 and joined Culmina to further his passion for crafting unique…

¿CóMO? Taperia Reopens Some more opening news from East Van’s ¿CóMO? Taperia. All the best on your new adventures crew! GLV Announcement: Things may look a bit different when ¿CóMO? Taperia (201 E 7th Ave) reopens its doors, but the team is staying true to their roots as an authentic destination for all things Spain. Starting this Thursday, May 28, 2020, experience ¿CóMO? Chico, a temporary neighbourhood tapas, shop, and drink pop-up. Enjoy prepared tapas, conservas, wine, and cocktails on the patio, or peruse the mercado (market). Sipping and shopping is allowed. “The current regulations make it challenging for us to…

Nuba Re-Open Two Locations For Dine-In It’s happening slowly and safely. Here’s some news from one of our favourite spots, Nuba Mount Pleasant and Gastown opens. Local Middle Eastern cuisine favourite Nuba  are open for dine-in service at their Mount Pleasant location (146 East 3rd Avenue) and Gastown location (207 West Hastings Street). Open at both locations from noon to 8 p.m. Sundays through Thursdays and from noon to 9 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, Nuba’s dine-in menu will include a selection of mezzes, salads, plates and mains plus the addition of pitas for lunch service. Nuba’s recently launched direct delivery…

L’Abattoir Owner and Chef Lee Cooper Announces Dine-In Dinner Service Thanks to L’Abattoir for this news today.  We’re trying to spread the news on our wonderful local restaurants again, as our thoughts are with all our friends in the hospitality industry. Please support your independent businesses.  GLV From their announcement: After making the difficult decision to close L’Abattoir on March 16th, a few days prior to the provincially mandated industry closure, Chef and Owner, Lee Cooper spent several weeks cleaning the entire restaurant, freezing, preserving and donating all the perishable food that remained and boarding up the windows on his…

Dine-In at St. Lawrence Or Grab Some Of Their Popular Take-Out We’ve been trusting our dining experience to J-C Poirier and his team for at least a decade, so look forward to visiting safely soon. They’ve opened up reservations and Dine-In and Take-Out is open Wednesday through Sunday. Our thoughts are with all our friends in the hospitality and other highly affected industries, may we all be able to host more reguary again soon. Until then, please be kind, be patient, and know that your hosts are trying their best to accomodate you, keep their employees safe and at least…

What’s Up In The Wine World This Week We’ve decided to do a round up of what’s going on in wine in and around the city, province, country or world, depending what lands on our radar. Good Wine Gal, Barb Wild and I will curate this weekly list, so feel free to email us with suggestions of what to include. We’ll add to during the week as time permits. Wednesday BCWI – 6 pm at Home with Mijune Pak Instagram Live for 30 minutes and this week Its Hawksworth Restaurant’s Wine Director, Bryant Mao, on Mijune Pak’s “At Home With…

Walter National Caesar Day With Funds To Second Harvest With our social circles smaller, the month of May is looking and feeling different than usual for most. However, there are still classic customs that we can embrace to celebrate warmer weather, and each other. On Thursday, May 14 Canadian made favourite, Walter Craft Caesar and  Paul Mason, aka Fashion Santa, are teaming up to celebrate National Caesar Day and to raise funds for Canada’s largest food rescue charity, Second Harvest.  The organization uses direct delivery and its FoodRescue.ca online donation platform to redistribute nutritious food from donors across Canada to…

Provence Marinaside Celebrates Caesar Day With A Contest Some news about a great Caesar Cocktail Kit from our friends at Province Marinaside! GLV May 14, the Ides of May, is a much more auspicious day than the Ides of March were for the historical Caesar. This year May 14th is National Caesar Day, the day we honour the Bloody Caesar and Provence Marinaside is celebrating it with a tasty contest. Canada’s iconic cocktail was created by Walter Chell in Calgary in 1969. The Caesar, as it’s more commonly called, rapidly became Canada’s National Cocktail, as uniquely Canadian as maple syrup,…

Barb Wild and Mark Shipway Bring You BC Wine Wednesday Starting May 13, 2020 Now here’s an invitation that I will accept. BC Wine Wednesday with two of our great local wine teachers. Barb Wild’s latest news! – GLV Check out  The Good Wine Gal site, and her previous picks here. Are you going to miss your annual trip to the tasting rooms of the Okanagan Valley or Vancouver Island or wine country in between? If the answer is yes (and even if it is not) why not join us for a fun hour that we are calling “#bcwinewednesday” with GOOD WINE…

Born-in-BC Brand Debuts ‘Tacofino-To-Go’ Menu Including DIY Nacho, Cocktail, Family Kits Via Delivery, Curbside Pickup at Kitsilano Location to Celebrate Cinco de Mayo Great news from our friends at Tacofino! I’m getting myself some tacos today! GLV Tacofino fans, rejoice — just in time for Cinco de Mayo, the beloved BC brand is returning to action after a brief hiatus and making its Baja-by-way-of-West-Coast fare available for delivery and takeout with new Tacofino-To-Go options beginning Tuesday, May 5. Available for delivery via DoorDash and takeout with curbside pickup from its Kitsilano location (1909 West 4th Avenue) daily from noon to…

East Van Roasters Gives Back Daily And Now You Can Shop Online To Give To Your Mom News from our friends at East Van Roasters – GLV Beloved Vancouver social enterprise, East Van Roasters (319 Carrall St., Vancouver) is opening its new online shop filled with its freshly roasted coffee, hand-crafted chocolates, and quality cakes from Hazl. just in time for Mother’s Day. These three female operated businesses have thoughtfully selected a limited offering of beautiful gifts that can be ordered in advance for mom to enjoy on her special day. Flowers, cakes, chocolates and coffee from these three local…

JuJu’s Does Takeout and Delivery From Published On Main We didn’t get the chance to eat at Published before this terrible situation raised its ugly head, but we’ll remedy late as soon as we can. In the meantime we got this news about JuJu’s Drink Shack and their tiki drinks and rotating pan-Asian style dishes. A new takeout and delivery spot is popping up inside Published on Main (3593 Main Street) this Wednesday. Named Juju’s Drink Shack, the concept is simple – tiki bar inspired drinks paired with pan-Asian dishes to give diners that addictive but nuanced flavour bomb. The…

Okanagan Winemaker Val Tait And Ian Sutherland announce 2house Winery News from Naramata about a new winery project that we’re pretty darn excited. GLV Winemakers Val Tait and Ian Sutherland are pleased to announce their new venture, “2house”, a project that brings together their passion for winemaking, with the simple joys of the vineyard and cellar together to craft beautiful bottles of wine. 2house is first and foremost a collaborative venture for Val and Ian, and a return to their first love of growing grapes and making wine which is now infused with years of experience. Ian comments, “As both…

Mother’s Day The Cafe Medina Way News from our friends at Cafe Medina – GLV. If there’s a silver lining to the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s that it has helped us focus on what’s really important. We want to express our appreciation for the people we love, even if isolation measures mean we can’t be in the same room with them. For Mother’s Day this year, one of Vancouver’s favourite restaurants is offering a twist on the traditional family brunch so we can celebrate our moms safely. The Mother’s Day brunch special from Café Medina may be ordered online and will be…

Barb Wild’s Weekly Pick Is CAVA Barb Wild has been sipping again and in this week’s post she shares a great pick – VARIAS – CAVA GENUI Brut! Check out  The Good Wine Gal site, and her previous picks here. From Barb (PS – yep we’re a day late again posting…but we try) – Cassandra Happy Wine Wednesday! It used to be called Hump Day but that never really appealed for a couple of reasons which I think are obvious.  My belief is you get what you focus on – so I’m focusing on wine. Isolation started for me March 10. In…

Kitchen Table Offers Fresh, Handmade Italian Fare and Take-Home Pasta, Sauces, Groceries and More News from one of the tastiest pasta places in town! GLV Kitchen Table Restaurants writes a new chapter in the Ask For Luigi lore when it launches its long-simmering new restaurant Pastificio di Luigi (‘Luigi’s Pasta Factory’) in a temporary pop-up location in Pourhouse at 162 Water Street in Gastown tomorrow, Friday, May 1 before moving to a permanent location in the future. Originally developed in 2015 as an elevated, takeout-friendly concept, Pastificio di Luigi is the latest project for the beloved hospitality group, which owns…

Les Dames d’Escoffier International Names 2020 Legacy Award Winners Supported by The Julia Child Foundation for Gastronomy and the Culinary Arts Les Dames have announced our Legacy Award Winners. These talented and deserving ladies are in for quite an adventure when we can all travel again! – Cassandra GLV Six professional women, chosen as this year’s Les Dames d’Escoffier International (LDEI) Legacy Award recipients, have each earned a culinary,  wine, or spirits, mentoring experience delivered by several of the organization’s distinguished members. Established in 2009 and generously supported by The Julia Child Foundation for Gastronomy and the Culinary Arts, LDEI’s Legacy Awards competition…

Barb Wild’s Weekly Pick Is Hillside Winery Merlot Malbec Barb Wild has been sipping again and in this week’s post she shares a great wine pick, Hillside Winery Merlot Malbec. Check out  The Good Wine Gal site, and her previous picks here. Happy Wine Wednesday! It’s that mid – week moment of sipping something delicious that brings delight to both the palate and the wallet. Sidebar: I’m curious about how do you taste wine? Do you have a ritual? For some it’s a favorite glass, a swirl, a few sips to check quality and then a favorite chair with a good view…

The Lazy Gourmet launches new weekly market delivery and pick-up service We received some great news from our friend and fellow Les Dames d’Escoffier member, Susan Mendelson, her catering company, Lazy Gourmet, now has a market with ready to eat meals, groceries and coming soon, BC Wine! Lazy Gourmet is conveniently located in Kitsilano 1605 West 5th  and their food is absolutely delicious. – GLV The Lazy Gourmet continues to evolve its business model by launching services catered to its clients at home. Named LG At Home, people can now: shop for groceries in the Market for weekly delivery or…