always & forever, the perfect midnight snack.
illustration by rebecca rose.
A glass of wine at lunch can change your whole afternoon.
—Trevor Stahelski (so glad someone finally agrees with us! -xo, lw)
perfect for summer. thanks,
(Source: w-avelength)
an old image by our good friend reynard li from our late night snack parties at the common (rip); this time, with teeny tiny meatball sandwiches.
a couple weeks ago, leah took her first introductory beekeeping course in kitchener, ontario (i was supposed to go to, had i not stayed up until 6am drinking prosecco with a line cook… oops!). saw this video and thought of her.
xo, lw.
stick & poke.
photo by eric kaluzy; toronto, ontario.
I want both, and right now I’m getting exactly what I want. dating a cook at a restaurant when you’re a non-restaurant person is the worst. you have to deal with long hours, bad tempers, constant bitching + griping about a fellow cook’s mise en place, or the inane allergies that come out when people in toronto go out to eat (romaine lettuce? serrrriously?). fortunately, i live for this shit. there’s a reason front of house dating back of house goes better together than bread and butter, because we servers deal with the same shit too.
having dinner at your new lover’s restaurant is always a harrowing experience for both parties. you as the cook want to put out the best meal possible. you as the diner are worried that your lover’s restaurant will judge you for not ordering good enough wine, or not ordering the proper amount of food. in a way, it’s like the true test of whether or not it can work out. on tuesday, i think we both passed the test with flying colours.
without saying who i am seeing, i did the tasting menu at local kitchen & wine bar the other night + could have died happy afterwards (and not only because i was wretchedly hungover from the dinner party mentioned in this post). in case you are interested, this is what i ate:
house-cured anchovy
butter soaked toast + thyme, purple kale
freshly pulled mozzarella
served warm, stuffed with paulo petrilli tomato
fresh b.c. spot prawns
olive oil, salt (a note on this dish: i received the sexiest text message that afternoon from aforementioned gentleman friend in which he said “I just received your appetizer at the restaurant… still alive.” Needless to say, one of the spot prawns was still moving when i picked it up. creepy and beautiful.)
duck tartare
blood orange + fennel, crostini
pasta alla chitarra
polpettine di coniglio (teeny tiny rabbit meatballs)
fazoletti
stuffed with ricotta + mint, braised lamb
smoked potato gnocchi
taleggio + rapini
pan-seared lake bass
wild leek + fiddleheads + roasted radish
the most perfect panna cotta
campari + rhubarb
cannoli
ricotta, chocolate chip, frangelico
what i loved most, other than watching him scrub down the kitchen at the end of the night (doing “line cook-y things”), was the simplicity of all the dishes; little things like the crisp skin on the fish, or the perfect ratio of butter + pasta water to make a simple sauce for the polpettine, all done on a single, shitty electric stove. he has yet to come into my restaurant. i have great faith in my chef, bartender and all of our staff but this is going to be a dining experience that will be tough to top.
It seems to me that our three basic needs, for food and security and love, are so mixed and mingled and entwined that we cannot straightly think of one without the others. So it happens that when I write of hunger, I am really writing about love & the hunger for it, and warmth and the richness and fine reality of hunger satisfied… and it is all one.
—M.F.K Fischer
just got word that leah + I will be a proud vendor at the junction flea; toronto’s newest (raddest) flea market! soon, you will be able to come visit the kissing booth to buy tasty snacks like cold fried chicken + pink lemonade.
every second sunday of every month. mark your calendars.
xo, lw.
lucky peach.
momofuku ssam bar; NYC september 2011.
xo, lw.
