2009 October : Tiny Bites

Feast on October: a calendar of yummy events

2 Comments Karen HamiltonOctober 1, 2009

October is here, and with it comes vestiges of the chill and grey that autumn in Vancouver wears. It seems that the food purveyors in our city are aiming to perk all of us up this month with good eating and plenty of festivities. With such an action-packed month ahead, we’ve decided to break from our tradition of talking about events we’ve attended in order to give you a heads up for some of the events that are in our radar.

October birthdays of note

First off, I’m turning the big 3-0 on October 28, and am still figuring out how I’m going to celebrate the occasion besides dressing up as Juno and baking another Birthday Cake of Immortality. Any ideas?

Wild Rice celebrates its 8th year tonight and you’re invited! Come by the restaurant on October 1st from 8pm onwards – I may see you there.

La Brasserie is also celebrating its first birthday this weekend. As is fitting for a Franco-German restaurant, they’re bringing out the lederhosen and other Oktoberfest goodies from 7pm – midnight on Sunday, October 4th. We’ll be there too, so find us and introduce yourself.

October 1-11: Okanagan Fall Wine Festival

A bit outside of Vancouver’s borders, but worth the day trip if you are a lover of BC wine and have someplace to work off the alcohol sweats.

We’ll be in the area during the last weekend of the festival for the Kelowna Marathon and a Thanksgiving reunion with the scattered Hamilton family. If the runners of the group are up for libations before the big run, you may find us at the Grape Stomp or the WAM Festival on Saturday, October 9th.

Check out the full Fall Wine Festival agenda >

October 1-31: Eat & Drink BC

The BC Restaurant & Foodservices Association (BCRFA) is blitzing our province with a huge “buy local, eat local” initiative: Eat & Drink BC. This month-long campaign means 31 days of menu specials and consumer packages (called BC Bundles) across the Lower Mainland, Vancouver Island, and beyond. Yay, us!

With the sheer volume of growers, suppliers, retailers, and service providers participating in this event, BCRFA has made it easy for us as consumers to see what offers are available – they’re categorized down the page by region and across the page by budget.

Look up the specials near you that fit your wallet and support BC! >

October 3-16: Sustenance Festival

The first annual Sustenance Festival aims to depict our love of food through arts and culture…and food, of course. From festival start on October 3rd to their wrap-up on World Food Day on October 16th, this event claims to have something for everyone.

We’re planning to cover as much of this festival as we can, including, but not limited to:

El Maiz Es Nuestra Vida exhibit from Oaxaca [wah-HA-cuh]
100 Mile Diet Society’s food shed map of the Lower Mainland
Jackie Connelly’s Food Photography 101 workshop on October 7th
Oooh, Food! “adult night” on October 8th
Tableland screening on October 14th
Family Day on October 10th

We hope that our media coverage will be supplemented by updates from our friends over at Foodists, and by the feedback you provide about the workshops and events that you’re able to catch.

Check out the full festival lineup at the Roundhouse Community Centre website >

October 4: Township 7 Harvest Picking Party

If you can’t make it all the way out to the Okanagan for the wine fest, consider a day trip to Langley this Sunday to help local winery Township 7 with their grape harvest efforts. To thank you for coming out early and picking grapes with the team, you get a hot chili lunch, coffee / tea / wine to drink, and a bottle to take home. Space is limited so let them know that you’re coming as soon as you can.

(If you can’t make it out to the harvest party, come by for their Fall Release Party on October 10th and 11th.)

View the Township 7 Harvest Picking Party details and RSVP >

October 14 & 15: Coffee and Tea Show + 2009 Canadian Barista Championship

Whether you’re a Coffee Geek, a tea aficionado, or you bat for both teams, this 2-day industry trade show will have something for you. Don’t worry if you’re not “industry” – I’m not, and I’m still planning to be there to catch the final day of the 2009 Canadian Barista Championship and cheer on our Western Canada reps.

If I weren’t missing half the fun by being in the Okanagan, I’d be seriously considering the Certified Tea Sommelier program: a 2-day Basic Level course put on by the Tea Association of Canada. I’ll be popping in on the 15th to snap photos and glean what I can…perhaps it’ll help me do a better job of reporting on future installments of our High Tea Series!

Want to catch some of the action? Register using the coupon code Online9 for free Trade Show (Package C) access, which grants you show floor privileges and Barista Championship spectatorship for both days.

Visit the Canadian Coffee and Tea Show website for full details >

October 17 & 18: UBC Apple Festival

Lawrence and Hayley mentioned how they loved last year’s UBC Apple Festival when I was hanging out with them at the Gastown Blues & Chile Fest, so we made tentative plans to check it out together this year.

From what I understand, the UBC Botanical Garden gets transformed into a consumer classroom, market, and tasting room for over 60 varieties of apples, from new breeds to crowd favourites to BC heritage varietals.

General admission is $2 for adults and free for children under 12. To get in on the apple tasting, bring $3 more dollars, and even more if you want to take home some of the ~30,000 lbs of apples that they’ll have on sale.

Info, transit, and parking directions for the 2009 UBC Apple Festival >

October 15-31: Taste of Yaletown

Overlapping with Eat & Drink BC is Yaletown’s 5th annual restaurant extravaganza. As with previous years, Yaletown eateries will be offering $25, $35, and $45 set menus. A portion of the proceeds will go to the Greater Vancouver Food Bank Society.

Menus should be announced some time today so bookmark this page >