Ho Yummy

Whistler: Fairmont Mallard Lounge

What bachelorette party would not be complete without a stop for afternoon tea? As I’ve mentioned previously, I’m a big fan of afternoon tea and luckily for me, so were my fellow bachelorette partiers. I did some research on what type of tea options were available in Whistler and the place of choice for most seemed to be the Mallard Lounge at the Fairmont Hotel.

The Mallard Lounge has quite an extensive selection of teas to choose from. There were quite a few blends that I had never tried before and after checking with the others to ensure we had a good selection of teas, I decided on the ice wine tea. The ice wine tea was a black tea with a slightly sweet grape flavour, which was pretty interesting. One of my friends had the maple tea, which was a bit too sweet but the ice wine had a good amount of sweetness for me and did not require any additional sugar.

Before our tower of afternoon tea treats were brought out, we were presented with a small bowl of fresh berries. The fruits were sweet enough that they did not need any additional marination although some people remarked it would have been nice if they were lightly dressed.

Finally, our tower of tea treats were brought out. We were instructed to start with the top layer and work our way downwards.

The scones were actually one of my favourite tea items that day. They were quite large and had a sugary crispy outside which gave way to a flaky, warm inside. The scones went very well with the strawberry compote and Devonshire cream. I had a great time slathering copious amounts of Devonshire cream and strawberries to my scone.

The finger sandwiches all sounded very tasty in the menu, but we all agreed that they sounded and looked much better than they tasted. The smoked salmon and dill cream cheese pinwheel was probably the best of the bunch but not very original. The other sandwiches, especially the cucumber watercress sandwich and the roasted red pepper sandwich was a bit tasteless in my opinion.

After the disappointing sandwich layer, I hoped that the tea treats could be redeemed by the sweet bottom layer. Both the chocolate éclairs and chocolate dipped strawberries were well done and a nice, sweet way to end our meal. Surprisingly, the dipped strawberry was sweet enough to stand up to the chocolate.  I enjoyed the lemon curd in the mini tarts although I felt that the pastry crust fell apart too easily in my fingers. What can I say, I’m a bit picky when it comes to lemon desserts.

For the most part, we all quite enjoyed our afternoon tea with the exception of the sandwiches. As can be expected at any Fairmont establishment, the service was attentive and prompt. At $20 for afternoon tea, it is also a few dollars cheaper than most tea places in the Lower Mainland.

Details:
4599 Chateau Boulevard, Whistler, BC
Tel: 604-938-8000
Available daily from 12-2pm

Summary:
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Price: $$

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Whistler: Dubh Linn Gate

On our second day in Whistler for Samantha’s bachelorette party, we wanted to have a quick brunch before spending the rest of our morning at the spa. Similar to what we experienced at La Bocca, a lot of our original brunch choices do not take reservations. We could have woken up a bit earlier to ensure we didn’t have to line up but since we were up late the night before, this option didn’t really appeal to us. We decided to have brunch at the Dubh Linn Gate, which is in the Pan Pacific Whistler hotel in the village, because it seemed fairly empty and could accommodate our group.

We ended up sitting outside because it was a fairly nice day and we could also do some people watching. I had some trouble deciding on what to eat so I ordered a tea to by myself a little more time.

I decided to go with my brunch stand by of a classic eggs benny. The eggs benny themselves were pretty lacklustre. I found the Hollandaise sauce to be on the watery side but I wonder if this actually means it is healthier than the usual creamier Hollandaise sauce. I enjoyed mini hash potato patties but they were a bit cold, perhaps because we were sitting outside? They were seasoned with some type of seasoning salt and were quite tasty.

In general, there was not a lot of an Irish twist on any of the brunch items, but perhaps this is because brunch is not their main specialty. The brunch fare here is pretty predictable, from eggs benny to pancakes to sausage/eggs/toast. Service was a bit absent even though it appeared to be a slow morning. Other than the prime location right in central Whistler Village, I was not too impressed with Dubh Linn Gate, at least for brunch.

Details:
170-4320 Sundial Crescent, Whistler, BC
Tel: 604-905-4047

Summary:
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Price: $$

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Whistler: La Bocca

Happy new year, everyone! I’m catching up on a lot of blogging that fell by the wayside during the holiday season. This week, I’m going to focus on some Whistler restaurants I visited in the early fall for Samantha’s bachelorette party.

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Just before Samantha got married, Lucy and I had the honours of planning her bachelorette party. After some brainstorming on where we should go and what we should do, we finally decided on Whistler. Due to my Ho Yummy background, I was in charge of deciding where we would eat. Our trip to Whistler was quite short and we arrived there just before dinner on a Saturday evening. Victoria had told me that she went to La Bocca once for another bachelorette party so I decided to give that a try.

Despite the fact that La Bocca does not take reservations, we were pretty lucky and were able to score a table for our party of 8 without needing to wait. To get the party started, we ordered some pitchers of sangria to share. The sangria was nice and fruity with a lot of limes, which I liked.

I wasn’t too hungry that day so I just stuck with a main course. The West Coast Cioppino was a bit on hot side but I suppose that is better than it being lukewarm. There was quite a bit of seafood although perhaps because of the super hot plate, the fish was slightly overcooked. It had a nice saffron flavour to it and it would have been really nice if it was served with some crusty warm bread.

Lucy was kind enough to let me sample a bit of her seafood linguine. The linguine was prepared al dente and there was quite an abundant amount of seafood. I usually prefer oil-based sauces over cream sauces so this linguine was quite tasty. I actually told Lucy that I liked her linguine more than my cioppino.

Overall, I found La Bocca to be pretty good for a Whistler restaurant. Due to its semi-touristy environment, it can be difficult to find a good value Whistler restaurant that serves tasty food. Even La Bocca, which is classified on the cheaper side, still charged $25 for my cioppino main. I know there are quite a few higher end restaurants that are supposed to be quite good but I generally stray towards cheaper eats when I’m at Whistler.

Details:
4232 Village Stroll, Whistler, BC
Tel: 604-932-2112

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Price: $$$

Posted in Italian, Reviews, Whistler | No Comments »

Puerto Maldonado, Peru: Dinner in the Amazon

Jenkins and my first dinner on the Amazonian leg of our trip came after our boat ride to look for alligators that lived near our eco-lodge. After such an exciting experience, we were definitely hungry and ready to eat something tasty! You’ll notice that must of my pictures are quite dim as there were hardly any lights in our dining area. Bright places attracted bugs at night so we found that most of the places in our lodge that did have lighting had very low light.

Our dinners always started with soup and on our first night, we had a type of lentil soup. The soup was very flavourful although it was a bit salty for my taste. I really enjoyed the ground Brazil nuts in this soup though as it gave it a nice extra flavour.

Jenkins had a curried chicken with almonds on rice. The curry was very mild but the addition of nuts was different and gave the curry an extra dimension. The rice was prepared in a similar fashion to steamed jasmine rice and went very well with the curry.

I had a popular Chifa dish called Lomo Saltado, which is basically beef with peppers, tomatoes, and onions. The Lomo Saltado was a bit watery but the combination of the beef with veggies was tasty and very similar to a Chinese-style dish with basically the same ingredients.

Dessert was poached custard apples, an Amazonian fruit, with dark chocolate sauce. The apples tasted like a cross between an apple and a pear and almost had a creamy texture to it. I would have actually preferred the poached apples on its own as the chocolate was a bit overwhelming for the apple’s delicate flavour.

We discovered that brochettes are pretty popular in Peru. I had a grilled beef brochette with sides of green beans and fried potatoes. The beef came with a roasted pepper-like sauce which I really enjoyed but I found the beef cubes themselves to be a bit overcooked.

On our last evening, I had some pasta with a beef, tomato, and black bean sauce. The pasta was actually cooked al dente and the black beans in the sauce added something different to the dish.

Jenkins had rice with a creamy chicken, leek, and mushroom sauce. The dish actually was quite light despite the fact that it looked quite heavy.

For dessert, we had a rice pudding-like dish with raisins. I’m not a huge rice pudding fan so this was not one of my favourites.

Both Jenkins and I really enjoyed our first crack at trying Peruvian food. We’re not sure if all the dishes were authentic Peruvian dishes as the staff liked to joke around with us and make up names for some of the dishes. For the most part though, everything was quite tasty although I think dessert was not one of the lodge’s fortes.

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Puerto Maldonado, Peru: Breakfast & Lunch in the Amazon

Jenkins and my first stop on our Peru trip was at the Corto Maldes eco lodge in the Peruvian Amazon. I really enjoyed this leg of our trip and I think it was a great first stop to get us immersed in Peru. One good thing from a food perspective was that all the food we ate in the Amazon was prepared by the lodge’s chef who specialized in French and Peruvian food. I would say that the food tended more towards the Peru spectrum rather than French and gave us a good preview of what Peruvian food was all about.

Here is the main lodge where we ate most of our meals.

All of our breakfasts came with freshly squeezed juice from various Amazonian fruits. Jenkins liked to call our drinks Jungle Juice because we never had any clue as to what fruit was used to make the juice. One such juice is the one below made with the fruit you see in the foreground. I don’t remember what the fruit was called but it was related to the tomato so it had a hint of tomato flavour crossed with an orange.

Breakfast was usually a pretty simple affair. Along with some scrambled eggs, we were always served a plate of fresh fruit. The fruit would vary from day to day but the one below had pineapple, watermelon, banana, and a type of passion fruit. I really liked this variety of passion fruit because it was not overly tangy and I enjoyed crunching down on the edible seeds.

Snacks during our hikes usually consisted of some crackers, mandarin oranges, and bananas. I particularly liked eating the bananas in Peru because even though they were yellow and brown, they always remained a bit firm. I hate eating mushy bananas so I really enjoyed eating these firmer Peruvian bananas.

Jenkins and I really enjoyed eating a Peruvian-style “tamale” called the Juanes. It came wrapped in banana leaves, which helped the Juanes to retain quite a bit of its heat.

Inside, the Juanes has rice, chicken, vegetables, olives, and a boiled egg. The salty olives permeate the rice and it is flavoured with some spices and the vegetables helped to bind everything together. As you would expect, it is quite filling and also very tasty.

Another interesting thing we ate for lunch was chau fan. Chinese food is immensely popular in Peru, so much so that Peru has its own type of Chinese-Peruvian fusion food called Chifa. All throughout Peru, we saw several Chifa restaurants that served its own unique spin on what we would consider traditional Cantonese dishes. Jenkins and I thought it was especially interesting that most of the Chifa dishes were pretty much direct translations of its Cantonese name, such as chau fan.

Chau fan is a bit moister than regular fried rice and is bound together by a soy sauce-based sauce. The version we tried in the Amazon was made with chicken and also had peppers and some other type of leafy green vegetable. Our guide told me to try the rice with some fresh lime juice and mayo and it turned out to be quite tasty. I would argue that it is quite different from regular fried rice so you can’t even do a direct comparison.

In addition to the limes and mayo, I also added some fresh chillies that our guide had picked for us out in the jungle. Now that I think about it, that may have been a bit sketchy but these surprisingly spicy chillies really added a nice heat to the rice.

Next up, I’ll share with you some of the dinners we had in the Amazon!

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Puerto Maldonado, Peru: Snacks in the Amazon

Jenkins’ and my first stop in Peru was to the small-ish city of Puerto Maldonado. It is the gateway for most travellers who are headed to the Peruvian part of the Amazon jungle. Jenkins and I were to stay for a few days in an eco lodge about an hour’s boat ride down the river from Puerto Maldonado city itself. After our friendly guide met us at the airport, she took us for a walking tour around the city as we waited for the rest of our fellow travellers to the eco lodge to arrive at the boat docks.

Also joining us for the walking tour was a British family that happened to live in Lima, Peru. We were pretty fortunate because the family pointed out to us all the good snacks during our stay in the Amazon. The kids in the family wanted to stop for some ice cream because it was extremely hot that day, probably 35 degrees Celsius and very humid! After we found an ice cream shop that sold what the kids were looking for, I asked if they could recommend something interesting for me.

They suggested that I try the Alaska popsicle, which was a fruit juice popsicle made with an Amazonian fruit that was tangy and similar in taste to a guava mixed with a passion fruit. I forgot to take a picture of the popsicle itself but it was a similar colour to the wrapper and none of the black seeds were showing. It was slightly tangy and very refreshing on a humid and hot day. This only cost $0.30 so I easily could have eaten a second one if it wasn’t for the fact that the rest of the tour group was waiting for me.

Soon, it was time for us to pile onto the boat that would take us to our eco lodge, Corto Maldes. After an hour’s boat ride down the muddy Madre de Dios river, we finally arrived.

We were directed to go to the eating area upon our arrival, where were greeted by the lodge’s bartender. He promptly served us some fresh passion fruit juice, which tasted nothing like the passion fruit juice I get in Vancouver mixed with my bubble tea. It was slightly chilled and was less tangy than I would have imagined. I really enjoyed the juice and only wished that I was served a larger glass.

During our stay in the Amazon, all of our meals were either eaten at the lodge or were eaten off-site but the food was prepared by the lodge staff. As for what we ate, you’ll just have to come back and read the next post! Most of the food we ate was a local or Peruvian specialty so we had a really good preview of what was to come during the rest of our trip.

Posted in Other Cities, Peru, Puerto Maldonado | No Comments »