People watching on the High Line

A trip to New York City is not complete without visiting the High Line.

My Easter Weekend

1. Martha Stewart’s Best Buttermilk Pancakes.
2. Sweet & Spicy Bacon from Epicurious.
3. Tried Banjara’s Eglinton East location. I prefer the original location by Christie Station.
4. Second meal at Momofuku Noodle Bar Toronto. Had fun watching them make this squid dish.
5. Had some patio time with friends at Futures Bakery & Cafe.
6. Shopping at Galleria Supermarket and came back with some taiyaki!

Hoof Café…is back!

A part of me felt irrationally sad when Hoof Café closed two years ago. With it went the bone marrow doughnuts, foie gras brioche French toasts, beef tongue grilled cheese, pig tails and grits, and all the dishes that made weekend brunch in Toronto exciting and different. It had the charm of robust Quebec, think Martin Picard’s Pied De Cochon and Sugar Shack, combined with a definite Anglo coolness of Queen West hipsters. Needless to say, the lines were long, space tight, and the service harried.

When Jen Agg announced that Hoof Café was back with a new menu, I made it a point to go the next weekend.

We ordered the Fried sweetbreads and waffles (savoury and sweet combo with a green onion waffle and a maple sriracha sauce), Breakfast cassoulet (a heifer of a dish: breakfast sausage, pork belly, duck egg, crispy kale, beans), and  a side of  Hash browns (crisp exterior with chewy interior, the flavours akin to salt and vinegar chips). It was belly-filling. It was rich. It was good.

I already have plans to go back again to try the Bombay hash. (We don’t know what the Bombay hash is either, perhaps a colonial breakfast variation on Mumbai hash? Didn’t mean to inject politics into this as Bombay/Mumbai is a bit of loaded topic, isn’t it? Yikes. But hey, politics make for exciting conversation over brunch though.)

Hoof Café
926 Dundas Street West | Website

Let the weekending begin!

Since the demise of my poor little iPhone 3g, I’ve been left without any point and shoot camera to carry with me to capture the little things that brighten my day. It’s been *almost* refreshing to not have to worry about missing getting the perfect snap shot. Almost. Here’s a few pictures from the iphone archives:

Chinese bakery goods, Te Aro french press and cheese scones, Brazilian cheese bread using tapioca flour, and the funniest little pug. (I realize that the dog pictured is not a puppy, but I have a tendency to call any small, compact dogs puppies.) If my weekend could consist of egg tarts, baking, having coffee with friends, and playing with people’s pets…I’d be fairly content. Hope you all have a nice weekend before another winter chill comes our way.

It’s Sunday again….

 

Geez, who knew brewing coffee required any thinking! After years of my mom making coffee for us every weekend, I’ve finally decided it’s high time I try it myself. Thinking it was just like tea, I was just going to throw in a couple of spoonful and however much water I thought I’d need until my mom stopped me and impatiently explained that there’s some sort of ratio to it all.

For these “Kenya Kangocho” beans from Forty Parallel Ninth, I tried two tablespoon of coffee and measured water for 4 cups of coffee. Other than “bold” and “mild”, my coffee vocab is pretty limited – so please excuse my attempt at describing it. (My mom just peered over my shoulder and asked – scoffed! – if I was trying to tell people how to make coffee.) While I usually like coffee that are bolder, these turned out tasting pretty mild, but bright.

Anyway, who am I kidding? This was all just an excuse for me to take pictures.

 

Have a nice Sunday! I have plans of making Joy the Baker’s almond lemon meringue cookies.