An early morning conference call with my business partners, then Steve and Lauren walk over and we go together over to Granville street to catch the number 10 bus down to Granville Island for a morning culinary and shop tour. We get there way earlier than we needed to (who knows how long anything takes the first time?) and have a bit of coffee and start with the pictures before we meed our guide.
I just love “A La Mode”, which of course has the usual sweet pies, but then there are all the savory pies:
In case you can’t read them, there are chicken, salmon, mushroom, canadian pork and all manner of treats.
Around the corner from that is a store with a name that I think is especially clever:
Yes, folks, they give a whole new meaning to the term “stock market”, and this is one I can relate to. Homemade soups and stews they serve up right there, as well as selling in sealed bags and frozen packages. If you prefer to do your own crafting, you can take a shortcut and purchase only their base stocks as well.
The public market space is filled with purveyors like these, craftspeople selling wares, tea, coffee and of course, fresh produce:
The space reminds me a lot of the Oxbow public market in Napa that we visited last spring. We meet up with our tour guide and she takes us to several of the vendors for tastes (coffee, tea, french bread, salami, cheese, doughnuts, birch syrup and walnut jam. here we are after a taste of maple smoked salmon chunks)
as well as some artisan studios. I’m a little antsy because there’s not much history nor things we couldn’t have done on our own, but who knew? This tour was listed in my National Geographic book “500 Best Trips in the World” or some such nonsense. When we finished, Steve and I made a beeline back in; me to buy some of the locally made pates and he to buy a wider variety of salamis. We sit out in the sunshine (yes, it’s actually warm today) and eat.
OMG! I eat so much pate I hope I don’t get sick like Betsy at mom’s 75th birthday dinner. We split up to finish up whatever shopping or browsing we each want to do (I go buy some of the locally crafted sake and a small container of birch syrup, which is less sweet than maple syrup) and head back onto the bus back home. I hope off closer to my pad, and we plan to meet up later to go down to Vij’s, supposedly the best Indian restaurant in all of Canada.
A rest and we’re back on our favorite bus, #10. We get out and walk about a block to Vij’s and there are already plenty of people waiting outside (they don’t take reservations). We put our name in and learn that the wait should be about an hour and a half. Discouraged but determined, we walk around the neighborhood to find a place for a cocktail or something. We end up going into their version of Barnes & Noble, called Chapters, and mess around there for a bit. I run across the street to buy a pack of cards ($6 at bookstore, $1.50 across the street in the dollar store) so I can refresh the Scheibes about cribbage. We head back to the restaurant, sit outside with some drinks and start playing. Of course, then we get our table! the smells in the place are really yummy. We order and wait. First course was sauteed portobello mushrooms in coconut curry sauce (kind of like soup and Mr. Steve wasn’t planning to leave one drop of it before they took the bowl!) and a couple of lamb samosas. Next up was goat curry (me, of course) and chicken breasts sauteed in butter and spices (sounded plain but by far the better dish:
As you can see, this isn’t your father’s Indian food – rather gourmet and definitely yummy. As far as I was concerned, the most flavorful and finger-lickin part of the meal was the tomato
coconut curry that came with Lauren’s samosas. Mmmmmm. I had to get every drop of that! Sated, we walked (waddled?) back to the bus stop and back home.