Salt

Interesting new experience in eating establishments last week.

While over in Vancouver interviewing witnesses for my next foray at (well can't tell you that now can I?) I went out with two friends to an interesting little dining establishment on the edge of Gastown called Salt.

Salt is not going to make its business on walk-by traffic -- it is situated down a small sidestreet called Blood Alley which will not be drawing the tourist hordes any time soon -- nor on the big appetite crowd. It has no kitchen and essentially specializes in what my friend Mary kindly refers to as 'picnics' (although most armies of ants would be sorely disappointed with the quanitities).

The idea is simple -- there is a board which lists a column of cheeses, a column of cured meats and a column of interesting condiments, you choose three out of the first two columns and three condiments and you are away to the races. The tastes are good, the quantities are small (which is good for me as I have been neglecting the gym of late) and it is important to supplement all of the above with wine.

While it may be tempting to dismiss the experience out of hand as something that could be replicated at any deli, in fact it is worth the visit. The decor is minimalist and stylish and the environment encourages experimentation in a way that the deli counter just does not. This is particularly so in respect of use of the condiments as one is unlikely to be tempted to buy a bottle of balsamic reduction at the local deli to try dipping some new meat into. Also, the space is oriented towards sitting down and enjoying the company with whom you have arrived -- something that also is not generally encouraged in most delis.

Not cheap -- but interesting.

Foods That Should Be In Fashion -- Episode I

There are a lot of foods that are in fashion for reasons good (and for reasons inscructable) but I am more interested in foods that should be in fashion. That is, there is no good reason that we should not roll out of bed on any given day and realistically be able to look forward to having some chance of eating this food but because of the whims of fashion -- we won't. I am going to write on and off about my list of these foods (this is a type of resisting eating them therapy for me).

English cuisine is largely noted for not being notable but it has produced one (well there are others -- but this note is about one) excellent dessert -- the trifle.

For those of you who have not had the experience a trifle is a multi-lyered dessert which contains some form of sponge cake, custard, cream, fruit or jam and just the right amount of alcohol -- preferably a sherry or some such beast. There is no fixed rule on the details and a great deal of creativity can go into introducing variations and improvements of one sort or another (I like to make sure that the cake is lemon flavoured myself to get that enhancement in almost every flavour that comes from having a real citrus note). I am also becoming persuaded (and this is a major deviationfrom childhood) that jam is to be preferred to fruit -- although if you work in enough layers you can easily have both.

This is a holdiay dessert. It is best served at Christmastime amidst a table of other cakes and cookies with the trifle in the centre sitting in a glass bowl with vertical sides. It is a dessert (if you do it right) that shows well without requiring the fussing that nicely decorated cakes do and will not require individual serving inorder to maintain esthetic order -- anyone can dig right in with a large serving spoon.

The late Alan Davidson describes it as a relative of the english dessert called the fool and likely a descendant of syllabub (now there is the best name for a dessert -- wine suspended in cream and sugar). For me it is the dessert of childhood holidays.

Make a trifle this christmas (invite the neighborhood kids).