Greater Vancouver Hot Chocolate Festival is back and it’s going to be a month of delicious indulgence of chocolate goodness! This year, 66 vendors have put forth 145 flavours of hot chocolate creations. I have started going around to taste some, how about you?
First up, Motoretta Gelato, part of the Kitchen Table Restaurants, with Salvatore Boccarossa at the helm. You may know Sal from Passione Gelato so you know his flavours are always spot on. They offer two unique pairings of sweet and savory.
Dine Out Vancouver is back and it’s celebrating its 20th anniversary! Running from January 14-31, 2022, over 300 restaurants are offering prix fixe menus for dine-in or take-out priced between $20 and $59 (side note: this was up from $15-$54 last year). It was very exciting to be able to dine in again when things opened up last year. Things may be a bit iffy now but you can still enjoy Dine Out Vancouver whether it’s dine-in or take-out.
As per previous years, I took the time to review the menus and here are what caught my eyes, based on past experiences (Dine Out or not) as well as menu attractiveness (e.g. value for the money, choice of ingredients, creativity in the menu, enough options for two people, etc.). Also keep in mind that I curated the list based on my preference (as you know, I’m a meat lover and I’m biased against chicken and salmon) and my way of thinking, so it may not necessarily suit your taste. But hopefully this gives you a place to start.
Same as last year, with the varied price points, I have organized my list into Lunch, Dinner, Take Out, and Special Offer. I’ve included a link to the menu, as well as listed price, to make it easier for you. Remember, my recommendations are for that specific menu and specific location(s) only, even though the restaurant may have other locations and menu options. If you have been to any of them, let me know what you think!
I like stone fruits: peaches, plums, cherries and mangoes. What are stone fruits, you ask? Also called drupes, they are fruit that have a large stone, often mistaken as seed, inside. Think about what a peach looks like when you cut it open, or a plum, or even a cherry. What we usually call a pit is actually the stone, and the seed is inside the stone. I love the juicy flesh of stone fruits and they are so good, and so sweet, just on their own. However, I’m always curious about finding savoury ways to enjoy them. And now, I have one idea.
Did you know: …plums are a good source of vitamins A and C, as well as several antioxidants? …there are only 46 calories in a 100g serving of plums?
Recently I got my hands on some Chilean pluots. Pluot is a hybrid fruit, part plum and part apricot. It’s nicknamed “Dinosaur Eggs” in Chinese because of its spotted skin. The fruit is in a beautiful red colour. I decided to make a grilled cheese sandwich with them. Now I don’t think plum and cheddar, the typical choice of cheese for grilled cheese, go together, so I’ve substituted it with brie. And to elevate it, I opted for sourdough for a chewy texture and some tang in flavours.
Fun fact: Chilean plum season is from mid-November until April, which is the opposite of local fruit season in BC.
The beauty of a grilled cheese is that you can build it in however way you want, so I’m only providing a guideline here in terms of ingredients.
As we spend more time at home, Mama Lam is trying different recipes to keep ourselves entertained. We found this Korean style baked mochi ball recipe online and tested it out. The recipe is very easy to make and suitable to involve kids.
In a nutshell, the dry ingredients make up the flavours while the wet ingredients bind them together. We tried it with 4 flavour variations and made some adjustments based on our experience. The steps are the same regardless of the flavours.
When I asked for restaurant recommendations for Las Vegas, most people suggested Eggslut. So we went. At 12:30am on a Friday night/Saturday morning.
It’s amazing to be in the sin city, where a restaurant would open at 12am. Yep, Eggslut opens at 12am on Saturdays, to cater to the clubbing crowd I assume. We flew in late that evening so we figured we would grab a late night meal. There was still a line outside Marquee, right across from Eggslut.
Food
We ordered the Slut, one of their specialty items. Coddled egg on top of potato puree, topped with gray salt and chives, served with slices of baguette. It’s cooked with an immersion circulator so the egg was in perfect consistency. (more…)
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