A pictorial of the 2009 BC Restaurant Hall of Fame gala
8 Comments
Karen Hamilton
March 31, 2009
Usually, I don’t fuss with makeup and find glasses much more practical than sticking plastic on my eyeballs, but I glammed up last night to attend this year’s BC Restaurant Hall of Fame gala.
Celebration
There was much to commemorate. 12 individuals were honoured for their exceptional contributions to the BC restaurant industry. The evening also marked the soft opening of VCEC West: the Vancouver Convention & Exhibition Centre’s glittering expansion facility. It’s a jewel of glass, air, and timber, still rife with new car smell.
The lobby in front of the main ballroom was where the crowd milled for the first two hours, and good thing that the reception was that long. Valet service for 600+ guests at a new facility meant a car pile-up on the narrow bend outside that resembled Manhattan in rush hour.
Once inside, hors d’oeuvres and drinks were plentiful on the floor. The more astute avoided further line-ups for food by visiting the lonely table dedicated to the VIP room that surveyed the throng from above.
Minglers were treated to exhibition tables that showcased the accomplishments of each inductee. During the induction ceremony, we were regaled with video highlights of each inductee’s exemplary careers. For an industry outsider like myself, these touches made it easy to appreciate why these individuals deserved to be held in such esteem.
I don’t know about you, but watching award ceremonies can be a chore, and I was not exactly looking forward to dinner being peppered with long-winded orations. Thank goodness that this industry has a sense of humour! Addresses, while often outside the 3-minute allottment, were wildly entertaining. Most of the speeches had delivery akin to stand-up act than monologue. Best zingers of the night were from the mouths of Thomas Haas, Jamie Maw, and lifetime achievement honoree, Duncan Holmes.
Feast
Let’s focus on dinner from here on in. Serving over a hundred people at once is already a task, let alone getting plates out to over 600 with expedience. I found dinner service to be commendable: staff were ninjas in the dark of the room, away to serve the next guest before I had a chance to signal my thanks.
My favourite dish was the first – Weathervane scallop tartar with Hecate Sound Dungeness crab salad.
Some at our table didn’t like the cold preparation of the maple sake butterfish; others were presented with pork belly and chicken that was more than a few degrees cooler than intended.
I sympathized with their plight (my dishes being perfectly at temperature) but perceived the experience as a relative success; it was good for the first run of the kitchen and stellar compared to my recollections of a horrid CA dinner that we had had at the Hyatt one year ago.
The dessert reception was wonderful. Stations laden with cheese, sweets, and sippers; conversations with familiar faces met only as we were readying to leave.
Also had a few unusual encounters attendees and staff alike who approached me with compliments on my 50’s pin curls. I have Kristi of East Vanity Parlour to thank for that. The introduction that made me chuckle most was care of Arturo of The Cannery. He documented my fashion savvy with a couple of photos…making sure to include my husband, who wasn’t sure how he felt about his wife being waylaid by a total stranger.
Overall, the gala was a unique experience for this observer of the industry. I’ll let the photos below recount this soirée to you from this point on.
Categories: Events, Food, Restaurants
An anthology of the 2009 Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival
3 Comments Karen HamiltonMarch 25, 2009
Wednesday is my breather from the frenzy of the Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival. I’ll be back in the scene in some way, shape, or form on Thursday and Friday. Till then, please enjoy this collection of Wine Fest recaps from the official and alternative presses, which I will continue to update as new stuff comes in.
From the wire
Reports from TV, radio, mags, and rags:
- Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival is just around the corner (Anthony Gismondi, The Vancouver Sun)
- BC wines face homecoming test (Alexandra Gill, The Globe and Mail)
- Good Eats: B.C. wines take centre stage at Vancouver Playhouse Int. Wine Festival (Bruce Stephen, North Shore Outlook)
- Vancouver Playhouse Wine Festival Launches (Anya Levykh, Metro Vancouver)
- Reality Check in Vancouver (Peter Mitham, Wines & Vines)
- Playhouse Wine Fest Cheat Sheet (David Scholefield, Vancouver Magazine)
From the blogosphere
What bloggers and online publications have been saying:
- How to Survive the Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival 2009 (The Blog According to Buzz)
- International Wine Fest 2009: live coverage of BC wines at Earls and West (Tiny Bites)
- Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival – Day 1 (Wine Bard)
- Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival Begins! (Full-Bodied)
- Winefest Blog #269: The 1st Day In The Big Shoes Of Sid Cross (Scout Magazine)
- WineFest Blog #628: Dinner At Bishop’s And 17 Again At Boneta (Scout Magazine)
- Wine Festival Kick Off (Urban Diner)
- Joy in a Glass (Urban Diner)
- The 2009 Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival Kicks Off (Vinifico)
- WineFest Blog #270: Heidi Noble As Globe & Mail “Flashpoint” (Scout Magazine)
- International Wine Fest 2009: live coverage of Caymus Vineyards at CinCin (Tiny Bites)
- WineFest Blog #271: Sid Cross Shares His CinCin Tasting Notes (Scout Magazine)
- 2009 Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival – Brunello, Barolo and Beyond… event (Vinifico)
- WineFest Blog #272: 2 Wines And 20 Vintages With Sid Cross (Scout Magazine)
- WineFest Blog #273: The Trade Tasting & Mike Bernardo’s Shoe (Scout Magazine, with a gallery containing my photography)
- CedarCreek Winemaker Dinner at Bishops (City Food Magazine)
- Make Wine She Said: Divas at the Met (City Food Magazine)
- New Wines to Try at the Festival: Pink Elephant Sparkling (City Food Magazine)
- Vancouver WineFest Thursday Trade Tasting Report (Full-Bodied)
- Andrea Vescovi Named Sommelier of the Year (Urban Diner)
- Caymus Wine Dinner At Cincin (Urban Diner)
- 2009 Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival – Beringer Private Reserve Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon Vertical Tasting (Vinifico)
- 2009 Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival – Wine folks talk about their wines and the value of social media (Vinifico)
- WineFest Blog #274: Spit Bucket Barricades & Fashionistas (Scout Magazine)
- *News Flash* 2010 Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival (Wine Bard)
- WineFest Blog #295: Five Days And Nights & Still Going Strong (Scout Magazine)
- Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival – Summary (Wine Bard)
From the Twitterverse
Trying out yet more fun tech. Below is a feed of the most recent Twitter musings that have been tagged by the official hashtag of the event, #vpiwf.
If you’d like to see the full collection of #vpiwf commentary, you can look it up on Twemes, which has the added benefit of showing you all Flickr photos (like mine) tagged with vpiwf.
Update: Wine Fest personalities on Twitter
Would you like to know which participating wineries to follow after the Wine Fest winds down? Here’s a list to start you off.
- @township7 – Township 7, BC
- @blackcloudwine – Black Cloud Wine, BC
- @dfwinery – Dunham & Froese, BC
- @stoneboat – Stoneboat Vineyards, BC
- @road13vineyards – Road 13 Vineyards, BC
- @prospectwinery – Prospect Winery, BC
- @tinhorncreek – Tinhorn Creek Vineyards, BC
- @sokolblosser – Sokol Blosser Winery, Oregon
I had a heck of a time finding many participants on Twitter from outside of BC, although there are at least 60 wineries on Twitter from around the world. Please help me flag down any wineries that you follow that were represented at this year’s Wine Fest.
Share Wine Fest news with me
Help me add to this Wine Fest round-up by dropping a comment with related articles on the interwebs.
Festival Gallery
Here is my share of visual documentation of this week’s festivities. Click on a thumbnail and use the Prev and Next buttons to navigate through the rest.
Categories: Downtown, Events, Food, Gastown, Kitsilano, Restaurants, South Granville, Wine
International Wine Fest 2009: live coverage of Caymus Vineyards at CinCin
1 Comment Karen HamiltonMarch 24, 2009
Day 2 of this year’s Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival brings you more live commentary. Tonight’s revelry is a winemaker’s dinner at CinCin with California’s Caymus Vineyards.
Wine & Dine Agenda
The event brief is listed below for your perusal while I get my tech set up at CinCin:
Vancouver’s celebrated CinCin Ristorante and California’s iconic Caymus Vineyards will partner in an ingredient-driven menu expertly paired with an extraordinary portfolio of wines. Kristy Skrabec, Export Director for esteemed Napa Valley producers—the Wagner Family—will lead guests through a selection of their flagship wines: Caymus Cabernet and the notable “Special Selection”, the lively Conundrum proprietary blend, two distinctive chardonnays, and the exciting new portfolio of Belle Glos pinot noirs. Named in honour of Lorna Belle Glos Wagner, a co-founder of Caymus, these wines see black tea, black cherry and licorice on the nose, with flavours of tea, ripe cherry and cola on a lasting finish—the very essence of the vineyard. And CinCin executive chef François Gagnon’s multi-course menu will reach a hand over the 49th Parallel, sourcing from our local fishery, ranches and farms, promising “to marry the Napa to the Pacific coast” at this not-to-be-missed convivium.
The menu is nearly a novella. I shouldn’t have posted this on an empty stomach. My salivary glands are now in overdrive.
Executive Chef, Francois Gagnon
Chef Patissier, Thierry Busset
Restaurant Director, Ricardo Ferreira
Wine Director, Michael Mameli
Caymus Vineyards + Wines from the Wagner FamilyCanapes:
smoked albacore tuna
fingerling potato and creme fraichegrilled pacific octopus
chickpea friti and cilantroscallop tartare with perigord truffles
citrus and sea salted bread crumbstomato gaspacho
crostini, crispy shallots and cressServed with Conundrum, 2007
Amuse bouche:
house cured swordfish
meyer lemon, pistachio oil and purple basil
Mer Soleil Silver Unoaked Chardonnay, Santa Lucia Highlands, 2007
Mer Soleil Chardonnay, Santa Lucia Highlands, 2006morel and chanterelle mushroom cannelloni
truffle marsala sauce
Belle Glos, Clark & Telephone Vineyard Pinot Noir, Santa Maria Valley, 2007wood oven roasted rabbit
prosciutto wrapped saddle, sunchokes and rosemary gnocchi
Caymus Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley, 2006wood fire grilled lamb
basil pesto, piperade and tomato confit
Special Selection Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley, 2000
Special Selection Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley, 2006lime mousse cake
lemon sorbet and strawberry sauce
Late Harvest Viognier, Santa Lucia Highlands, 2004petits fours
Live Twitter Feed
I’m trying out ScribbleLive, a live blogging service that integrates short blog updates with comments and responses from Twitter. Let me know if this was useful for this event.
Let the Feasting Begin!
6:30pm – reception and starters
I arrived at 6:30pm on the dot to an already buzzing lounge. Setting up shop inside the L-shaped bar with a glass of Caymus Conundrum 2007 keeping me company. More after I upload some prelim shots.
Joie and I found the perfect spot to station ourselves for free-flowing canapes. We agreed that the grilled octopus with chickpea friti was difficult to handle in one bite, and that the scallop tartare was the clear winner amongst its peers. We didn’t get the chance to try the Tomato Gaspacho, but at least two people were stalking the servers that pushed that item…it must have been noteworthy.
8:15pm – amuse bouche and first course down
Impressed by the Silver unoaked chardonnay hailing from the Mer Soleil vineyard. Chablis in style, this wine is high in acidity (almost effervescent) and mineral in character. Kristin Eddy of Caymus, who sits to my left, described how the Silver was aged in vats of limestone and concrete rather than the usual stint in stainless steel tanks. Such vats are normally used for reds; the Wagner family imports theirs from Burgundy, in fact.
Gotta run – the pinot’s been poured and I’m missing out on the second course!
9:15pm – 4th course in our bellies
Please allow me to gush about the 2006 Caymus Cabernet Sauvignon. If you’ve spoken with me before or have attended any of the Vancouver Wine Casual tastings that I’ve been to, you will already be aware of my aversion to bold reds.
Finding a cab that I can wholeheartedly endorse is a rare occasion. Lots of dried fruit in a dry, subtle style — raisin, blackcurrant, blackberry, you name it. It doesn’t punch you in the face with tannins (I must commend it for its demureness, really) and it embodies what neighbours at my table describe as “old vine Napa Cab”.
The rabbit that paired with it was pretty damn delectable, as well.
10:30pm – lamb devoured and dessert stealthiness
The fifth course, a wood fire grilled lamb with tomato confit, was paired with three different cabernet sauvignons from Caymus’ Special Selection series. I still have lots to learn in the arena of wine appreciation, and the idea of sharing discourse with the food and wine conoisseurs that sat around me was, to say the least, nerve-wracking. I needn’t have worried: the cabs were incredibly distinctive.
The 2000 called to mind gorgonzola, blue cheese; the 2006 presented cinnamon and candied berry. The 2008 was a bonus, taken out of the barrel on Monday as a teaser for this evening, evoked ratatouille to me and sundried tomato to Shelora Sheldon, who sat to my right. Shelora relayed that the plot on which those vines now grow was previously used for a tomato crop. I guess terroir really does come through to the glass!
Dessert was prettily presented with esses of strawberry sauce as backdrop to lime mousse cake and a lemon sorbet housed in its originating lemon. The combination was strong on citrus, much like the house-cured swordfish that started the multi-course tasting. Some found the dish too sweet; others overly tart.
I enjoyed both items, but not nearly as much as I did the espresso macaroons on the accompanying plate of petit fours. One scan of the tables and it was plain that the room was in consensus. Hardly a macaroon was left on any plate, while the other dainties lay relatively untouched. I expressed my sadness and not being able to horde any more for myself, so my enterprising assistant returned swiftly with a secret bag of 5 macaroons for me to take home. One was for my husband; the rest are charged with keeping my mouth happy as I put the finishing touches on this recap of another fantastic winemaker’s dinner.
CinCin Ristorante + Bar
1154 Robson Street | Downtown
(604) 688-7338
Make a reservation through Open Table
Visuals from the Road
Categories: Downtown, Events, Food, Restaurants, Wine
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