Engine No. 374
There is an amazing piece of Canadian history not far from where I live.
It’s Engine No. 374. Engine No. 374 is the locomotive that pulled the first transcontinental train across Canada ― from the Atlantic all the way to the Pacific ― arriving in Vancouver on May 23, 1887.
I have to admit I get a little thrill every time I walk by Engine No. 374. It’s the history geek in me.
British Columbia is a part of Canada because of the railway. The young colony joined Confederation in 1871 after Sir John A. Macdonald, our esteemed first prime minister, promised to build a railway to connect it to the rest of Canada. That was quite a promise; even more amazing was that Sir John A. said it would be done within ten years.
It took fourteen, but it got done ― an incredible engineering feat for a country not yet two decades old. There was a political scandal, which brought down the government, and there was a rebellion. But eventually, on November 7, 1885, the two ends of the railway met somewhere in the middle of BC’s Interior.
All that is now part of Canada’s national myth. Myths are great, and necessary, to a national identity. And that is why, when I walk by Engine No. 374, I get a little thrill.
I also love the romanticism of trains. Great stories begin on trains. It used to be that new Canadians began their lives in Canada by crossing the country by train. My ancestors did. And I, many years ago, travelled across Canada by train because I’d decided I needed to do it at least once in order to truly understand this vast and varied country of ours. When I finally disembarked in Quebec City after five days of coach travel from Vancouver, the conductor remarked that I had become part of the furniture.
The most surreal moment of that trip, however, was when I and the fellow who sat down across from me after boarding the train in Sudbury recognized each other, and it took us to North Bay to figure out where from. We finally put it together that we had met a couple of years earlier at the youth hostel in Baden-Baden, Germany, and then bumped into each other a few weeks later in the Venice train station, and yet again a few weeks after that in the middle of some demonstration in the centre of Athens. (Yes, the Greeks were already demonstrating back in the 1980s.) We were both criss-crossing Europe by train at the time. Great stories begin on trains.
Engine No. 374 was built by Canadian Pacific Railway in Montreal in 1886. It was completely rebuilt in 1914, and then continued in active use until 1945. After sitting at Kitsilano Beach for almost forty years, it was restored and put on display for Expo 86. Today it stands in a glass pavilion that is part of the Roundhouse Community Centre in Yaletown.
When I was taking the photos for this post, the volunteer working at the pavilion wouldn’t leave my elbow. As I knelt down to get a shot, he told me that once a year, on the Sunday closest to May 23, Engine No. 374 is taken out of its glass pavilion and moved into Turntable Plaza.
Now that’s a thrill this history geek won’t want to miss.
Dishing: ensemble
Update: ensemble closed in August 2012.
A number of months ago, my friends took me out to celebrate my turning another year older and (this is debatable) another year wiser. I chose ensemble for the event ― it’s yet another new place on the north-east corner of Thurlow and Smithe in downtown Vancouver that has seen a high turnover of restaurants over the past few years. 
But, more than a year after its opening in May 2011, it looks like ensemble is here to stay. The executive chef is Dale MacKay, winner of Top Chef Canada Season 1, and one reason, in addition to the reviews I had read, why I chose this particular restaurant. I was curious if the judges at Top Chef Canada knew what they were doing when they gave MacKay the top prize.
Two of my friends were waiting for me when I arrived; we ordered cocktails while we waited for our fourth companion, who finally showed up 45 minutes later. But, despite the busy room, there was absolutely no rushing us on the part of our server. The atmosphere was lively ― a perfect venue for a birthday party and for four boisterous, laughing friends who were in the mood to make a lot of noise.
Like many of Vancouver’s fine dining establishments, ensemble characterizes its food as “Contemporary French meets West Coast.” All of the dishes are tapa-sized, and we opted for the four-course tasting menu with wine pairings.
First up was a Dungeness crab crêpe with pineapple, daikon, and avocado. This appetizer was picture-perfect, served cold, fresh, and crisp, and the pineapple gave it the smallest hint of sweetness. I absolutely loved the wine choice: a bubbly Spanish cava.
The second course was Moroccan spiced black cod, with chick peas, cashews, and black trumpet mushrooms. I’ve never had cod so delicate and light. The black trumpet mushrooms were the perfect accompaniment, as was the 2010 Pinot Gris from Penticton’s Poplar Grove winery.
The meat course was beef shin and fries, with watercress and a carrot purée, paired with the 2011 Enrique “Icque” Foster Malbec. Like the cod before it, the beef was melt-in-the-mouth quality. I’ve often eaten steak et frites in France, but have to admit that I’ve never been overly impressed with French frites. The fries that accompanied the beef shin, on the other hand, were the best any of us had had in a very long time.
To finish: chocolate fondant with hazelnut-nougatine ice cream. Chocolate fondant was a new experience for me and I loved it. Its soft pudding-like centre reminded me of a dessert a long-ago roommate used to make, with the rather ordinary name of Brownie Pudding.
In honour of my birthday, I was also presented with a cone of piping-hot sugar-dusted madeleines, which I gladly shared. For the dessert wine, we returned to the Old World with a glass of Broadbent Madeira.
By the end of the evening, both my appetite and curiosity were sated. Dale MacKay is certainly a Top Chef, and my friends and I were so impressed with our first experience at ensemble that I am sure we will be back.
Chinatown
Last week, my dad and stepmom were in town, and my stepmom told me she wanted to go for Chinese in Chinatown. That was easy enough to arrange: there are oodles of restaurants in Vancouver’s Chinatown, one of the oldest and largest Chinatowns in Canada.
Afterwards I took them past the Millennium Gate. It was built in 2002 and serves as the unofficial entrance to Vancouver’s Chinatown, which was declared a National Historic Site in 2010.
There’s an awful lot of history in Chinatown to explore and to write about. For now, I’ll leave you with this photo of the Millennium Gate, and the promise of more posts to come.
Millennium Gate, Chinatown
Through My Lens: Cherry Blossom Time
Vancouver has almost 40,000 cherry trees that burst into bloom every March and April. It’s my favourite time of year.
Art Talk: Fred Herzog
One of the most interesting photo exhibitions I’ve seen in a long, long while is the inaugural show at Vancouver’s Equinox Gallery Project Space. On display until March 31, Fred Herzog: A Retrospective showcases the work of a Vancouver-based street photographer who has become well-known only in the past five years or so.
Fred Herzog immigrated to Canada from Germany in 1952. He worked mainly with slide film (Kodachrome), which, until recently, was expensive and difficult to create prints from. He also shot in colour at a time when fine art photographers were shooting in black and white. As a result, his work wasn’t taken seriously for many years.
The first retrospective of Fred Herzog’s work was in 2007 at the Vancouver Art Gallery, which is when I first discovered his images. His body of work ― some 100,000 photos ― is an incredible photographic record of Vancouver’s social history from 1950s to the 1970s. Those of my readers who live in Vancouver: do not miss this exhibition.
Dishing: Market
My second Dine Out outing of 2012 was to Market with my Book Club. Market is a Jean Georges restaurant at the Shangri-La Hotel, Vancouver’s newest luxury hotel and, since its completion in 2009, the tallest building in the city.
I first went to Market about a year ago with my sister. We were celebrating our birthdays and on that night enjoyed a sublime six-course tasting menu. It took us several hours to eat our way through the meal, but we enjoyed it immensely and appreciated the effort and time our server took to explain the rationale behind the wine pairing chosen to accompany each course.
Market’s Dine Out menu offered a choice between two items for each course. I started with a roasted carrot and avocado salad with sour cream, citrus, and seeds. The carrots were slender and deliciously crunchy, cooked just long enough to not be raw. For my entrée, I choose the fish: slow-cooked snapper on a bed of sautéed spinach with a sweet garlic lemon broth. The lemongrass in the broth totally made this dish. Dessert was chocolate pudding with a light, foamy dollop of whipped cream, topped with candied violets. Can one ever go wrong with chocolate pudding? I think not.
Being Book Club, my friends and I chatted long after our coffees were gone about every topic under the sun except the book we had read. There was absolutely no rush on the part of our server to get us to leave, despite the crowded room, which was thanks to the draw of Dine Out. A most enjoyable evening; I highly recommend Market during Dine Out … or on any night of the year.
Through My Lens: Vancouver in Spring
Spring is Vancouver’s longest season. It’s always a bit of a shock to me when I see the first crocuses (I took this photo yesterday), but summer temperatures rarely arrive before the end of June.
Dishing: L’Abattoir
Dine Out Vancouver, which just finished its tenth year, is an annual culinary celebration when Vancouverites get to, well, dine out. The deal is: you order from a three-course set menu for a set price. It’s incredibly good value and lets you try out higher-priced restaurants you might not get to otherwise. And the restaurants that participate benefit as well: they are booked solid for 17 days in the dead of winter.
This year, my friend and I decided to head down to L’Abattoir, rated by enRoute magazine as Canada’s third-best new restaurant of 2011.
L’Abattoir’s French name means “slaughterhouse.” The name is not in reference to its menu, however, but to Vancouver’s original meat-packing district. The restaurant is located in Gastown, just around the corner from Blood Alley, and the building itself stands on the site of Vancouver’s first jail.
The setting is more bistro than fine dining, but don’t let the decor fool you ― there is nothing casual about the food at L’Abattoir. Chef Lee Cooper’s menu is French-influenced West Coast ― a description heard frequently about Vancouver’s best restaurants.
I ordered a starter of poached egg over potato gnocchi with a leek, mushroom, and pecorino sabayan. The combination of egg and gnocchi was unique and a nice surprise upon first bite, although I would have preferred it if the yolk had been slightly softer. The sabayan was light and airy and not too cheesy. I really enjoyed the dish. To be honest, the country-style pork patê on toast ordered by my friend looked a bit dull in comparison.
Next was a spicy chorizo–crusted Pacific cod over white beans cooked in red wine. The cod was perfectly moist and the texture and flavor of the chorizo crust added a nice kick to the fish. My friend enjoyed her roast tenderloin with ravioli stuffed with braised lamb shoulder; the combination of red meats worked really well.
Each course was paired with an Okanagan wine ― a crisp cold Tantalus Riesling for the starter and the 2008 “Adieu,” a pinot noir from Le Vieux Pin, with the entrées. We both ordered the chocolate caramel bar with banana ice cream and chocolate yogurt ― the most popular dessert on the menu, according to our server.
Innovative décor + good wine + excellent food + impeccable service = a delightful evening. I’ll be back.
Through My Lens: Stanley Park in Winter
Vancouver received a blanket of snow this week. It doesn’t happen often and it never lasts long, but when it does, it’s awfully photogenic.
Through My Lens: Winter Frost
Christmas Day 2009
We don’t often get frost in Vancouver, but on those rare mornings when the mercury does dip below 0°Celsius, it’s a great excuse to get out the camera and go for a walk.
There and Back Again 