Dining in Victoria as good as it gets #1 · Monday May 26, 2008 by colin newell
To describe the restaurant, Brasserie L`ecole as unpretentious is like pontificating on the genuinely modest nature of the Dali Lama.
Shut up and eat already.
This is one of the reasons I find Eat magazine so amusing – whenever it appears on the stands that is.
They gush and genuflect on restaurants like Brasserie L`ecole, Cafe Brio and Zambri’s…
And others. They back slap. They self reward and worship.
It is a veritable love fest.
But I digress.
Brasserie L`ecole is a great restaurant with some amazing pluses, twists and turns in what should be a stuffy and boring French restaurant.
Starters: It appears that guests can order 2 glasses of wine from virtually any bottle in their cellar. Name one other restaurant in Victoria where this is an option?
We go for the Steak-Frites… Steak perfectly prepared served with a bassinet of skinny Belgian fries, anointed with salt, baptized with truffle oil and parmasan.
Expect to book 2 weeks in advance for a good seating during the dinner hour(s).
In this 1st in a marathon of local restaurant reviews, diner Colin Newell hopes to educate, entertain and reveal some of Victoria’s gems. Bon Appetit!
Big Brother Air travel rant #2 how long is your pocket knife · Sunday May 25, 2008 by colin newell
Long delays at Vancouver International Airport on Friday were the product of a traveler slipping through security screening with…
- A handgun?
- A grenade?
- A copy of the Koran?
- A copy of the Torah?
- A copy of Mad magazine?
- A bottle of mother’s milk?
Nope. Security staff spotted something on an X-ray machine around 10 a.m.
The passenger had already collected his bag and walked into the secure area of the domestic terminal.
At least 10 domestic flights were grounded for the next hour and a half while staff searched for the passenger and a knife.
What kind of knife? Steak knife? No. K-Bar knife? Hardly.
A pocket knife… probably 10cm long.
Woo! Scary!! Pocket knife! Woo!
Listen up folks. I am Ex Canadian Army and I can do more damage to the average human with a slice of stale pizza than a randomly selected civilian can do with a hunting knife.
So. Enough of these stupid security alerts at Airports.
Small statistic: The U.S. has spent billions on protecting us from terrorists in the U.S.A.
Ironically, bath tubs have killed 100 times more Americans since 9/11 than honest-to-goodness wild-eyed terrorists.
That’s right folks, bath tubs. You’ve seen them in bath rooms all over America… perhaps you have one in your own home. But do you really know what lies behind those porcelain surfaces, composite materials and space-age plastics?
I do: Mayhem, tears and death…
by slippage.
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Big Brother Air travel rant #1 what`s in your pocket · Saturday May 24, 2008 by colin newell
The federal government is secretly negotiating an agreement to revamp international copyright laws that could make the information on Canadian iPods, laptop computers, mp3 players, iPhones, cell phones and other electronic devices illegal and greatly increase the hassle of traveling anywhere with such devices.
These new laws could also impose strict regulations on ISP’s, forcing those companies to hand over customer information without a court order.
The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA), would see Canada join other wing-nut countries, including the United States and members of the European Union, to form an international coalition against copyright infringement.
Right. And who is behind this nonsense? That’s right – formerly unstoppable and now foundering record company multi-nationals like Sony Music. It seems that American Idol is simply not producing enough revenue to buoy their titanic-bound fortunes of old.
This deal would create a international regulator that could turn border guards and other public security personnel into copyright police. These byte police would be in charge of checking your laptop, iPod and even your cellular phone for content that “infringes” on copyright laws; like the video of your son or daughters performance in their school’s production of Oklahoma.
Is it just me, or are you sick and tired of the Canadian government wanting to peep into your bedroom, your kitchen, your financial records and now your personal electronic entertainment devices? Enough already! Enough!
The ACTA document divulges… officials should be given the “authority to take action against law breakers (authority to act without complaint by rights holders).”
Anyone found with infringing content in their possession would be open to a fine or have their devices confiscated or destroyed.
The trade agreement includes “civil enforcement” measures that give security personnel the “authority to order ex parte searches” (without a lawyer present) “and other preliminary measures.”
Have you seen some of the security personnel that work at our airports and border crossings? They are power mad wieners that will go crazy with this new authority.
Currently in Canada, border guards already perform random searches of laptops at airports to check for illegal content. ACTA would expand the role of those guards.
Food on the table #2 · Tuesday May 20, 2008 by colin newell
Our Monday to Friday morning coffee circle is an enigma.
Imagine one or two tables pushed together at the Finnerty Express (our UVic hang-out) at 10:00AM.
Ironically, I show up with coffee brewed in my lab and healthful treats that I baked in my kitchen. The only redeeming thing is that my posse (entourage and extended coffee family) are a combination of retired and semi-retired faculty and working professional stiffs – that buy stuff in this hallowed campus canteen.
It is a pretty modest affair; mugs of whisker scalding black coffee and Texas sized multi-grain bran muffins share the formica with dentine Necrotizing rice-crispy squares, carrot cake, green tea, lattes and cappuccinos. Each personality at the coffee table is pretty much matched to his beverage (and snack) of choice.
Topics of conversation run the circuit from World conflict, pestilence, plagues, pleasures, local politics and politics abroad.
Todays topic (one of several actually considering the number of times we change direction per minute!) was food portions in Canadian restaurants versus the ones in American restaurants.
Before I transcribe our findings today, let me start with this snippet I picked up this evening via BoingBoing.Nets link to lileks.com as James riffs on Disney World…
Dinner was large. The portions are huge. They might as well put the plate down and say “here’s more than you can possibly eat, and here’s nine potatoes on the side. Would you like another gallon of high fructose corn syrup? Okay, well, don’t forget to leave room for six pies.” There’s something a bit sad about seeing childless adult Disney fans, lanyards spattered with pins, eating slabs of prime rib thick as a Tolstoi novel, the chairs about to splinter from their enormous fundaments. On the other hand, what gives them happiness? Food and Disney. This is the happiest place on earth after all – even though there seems to be a subset of Disney nerds who appear immune to the very thing they’ve come to experience.
Wow. Yea. Wish I could think and write like that.
One of our cafe crewmen recently returned from a motorcycle trip to Washington state – the interior of which (Yakima, Walla Walla, Ellensburg, Wenatchee) appeared to have been sucked into a surreal black hole and spat out by a David Lynch novella — dusty roadhouses where middle aged dance girls sport feather boas, drink tequila fizz, disappearing into back rooms with muscle shirted men – smokes rolled in sleeves James Dean style while men with alarming big white teeth tend bar…
My kind of place.
And the adjacent eatery might as well have been named The Terminal Diner for its artery clogging, indigestion inducing and gastric lavage promoting coterie of all things Too Much Food!
Order the Pork chops? You get 4 6 ounce chops with 2 baked potatoes and enough rice pilaf to feed a family of five.
Dessert? Their 7-layer cake is $4.95 and is a whopping 10 gravity-defying inches high and 3 inches wide.
I would go on… but I have lost my appetite for words.
Point being – Our brothers and sisters to the South eat way too much stuff… and we are quickly falling into their size grande shoes.
Thankfully, there are still a few eateries (fancy and not so…) in Victoria where you can come away feeling somewhat peckish. Oh yea… and if there is anyone out there that can explain the disparity between Canadian and American portions… please dish me up some opinions!
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