Archive for food & wine
Moving on to epicurean and delectable delights and you can walk into the Palm Court Restaurant at the Hilton Kingston Hotel, Strawberry Hill Hotel, Norma’s on the Terrace at The Devon House or Red Bones Blues Café. Any of these restaurants will treat you to fine dining and customer service as only Jamaicans can. If you can imagine it, they can find it. Anything and everything is on the menu, at a price! It is well worth the extra expense however because it is a food experience that you will find hard to top. From hand rolled sushi to fresh seafood dishes and the best steak tartare (The Palm Court Restaurant), topped with signature cheesecakes and fresh brewed Blue Mountain Coffee (with a dash of 125 year old VX Special, if you wish!).
Many classic dishes are done with a dash of island flavor to make them uniquely Jamaican; so tropical fruit flavours to complement steak Roquefort; sweet potato fries to replace the traditional savoury fries; mint, pineapple and mango flavours with pork and lamb served up with superb sunsets and breathtaking views of the Caribbean Sea are all on the menu.
Strawberry Hill Hotel or Boone Hall Oasis is a must do for Sunday Brunch if you are in Kingston. Perched 3100 ft above sea level in the Blue Mountains, the former will give you high mountain air, majestic views, extravagance and luxury. Their Seville Orange seared Duck Breast or Jerk Style Lamb Rack will give you an idea of that island flavor on the classics I mentioned earlier. As a favourite, I am partial to their Ceviche Martini with a vodka libation!
Boone Hall Oasis by comparison is a rustic, totally Jamaican experience by the river, however don’t be fooled by the location. Stephen and his team will whip up anything from an international buffet that will surprise and tantalize your palate and as you take off your shoes and wade into the river to sample your goodies on a rock, you will know the true meaning of a foodie’s paradise! Recommendations include their shrimp dish in a rum sauce (he won’t budge with the recipe!!) and this year for restaurant week they had a codfish bruschetta in an avocado shell (maybe they’ll make it for you if you ask really nicelyJ) and coconut ice cream served in a papaya boat, sprinkled with ortanique liquer, and there’s that island flavor again…
Moving on to the Palm Court Restaurant at the Hilton Kingston will take you into international cuisine as only an international hotel like the Hilton knows how to deliver. Anything and everything goes as Olivier and his team strive for perfection everyday and brings the best of Asia, Europe and North America to your table. Everything on the menu is fabulous and please never order your steak well done as this French Food & Beverage Director will remove it from your table and to the nearest bin…”It is simply a barbaric way to have a steak”! Tres desagreable (pardon my french if I messed that up!).
Alas! I have waxed poetic about food for long enough and need to move on. Check back tomorrow for more destination wedding news from 2009!
Food in Jamaica….where do I begin?
I guess this will probably be a two part post because it is important to note that you can find any type of cuisine in Jamaica for any kind of palate and on any type of budget.
Maybe I will just borrow the categories that restaurant week uses so that I can separate and give you a variety. Let’s start with restaurants that serve Jamaican fare, and we’ll call that Tasty! The first ones that come to mind are Starapple’s on Hope Road in Kingston, Bobsled in the Montego Bay Airport Departure Lounge, Gloria’s Roadside and Top Shop for seafood in Port Royal, Gimbilyn Restaurant at the Alhambra Inn in Kingston and for local flavor if you are adventurous, the “pan chicken” stop at the corner of Mannings Hill Road and Whitehall Avenue also in Kingston. Those would be my top picks for great Jamaican flavor anytime. There are certainly many other places that you can find the experience but these are my favourites.
At the restaurants, you can find traditional Jamaican meals such as the island’s national dish of ackee ( a local tree grown vegetable) and saltfish (salted cod) with fried dumplings ( a mixture of flour, salt and water, made into a dough and then fried) or boiled green bananas. You will also have a choice of many more local or regional dishes to tempt your palate with island flavor. You will also be able to get fresh seafood, and when I say fresh, I mean literally just caught and brought to the restaurant directly from a fishing boat (Gloria’s for example, is right by the seaside) cleaned and seasoned and cooked to your liking.
No Jamaican experience would be complete without jerk chicken or jerk pork with festival (a dough made from flour, cornmeal, salt, sugar and water and fried…yes we do love fried!) hardough bread or bammy (a savoury cake made from dried cassava flour and salt and baked on a large flat, metal disc over a wood fire). You can find this quintessential Jamaican dish on any street corner, on any road, in any parish on the island! There are many popular places for this in every parish, Faith’s Pen in St. Catherine, enroute from Kingston to Ocho Rios Portland Jerk Center as well as a myriad of stops on Spur Tree Hill on the border of Manchester and St. Elizabeth.
Stay tuned for more epicurean and delectable Jamaican delights from our diary as we taste our way through 2009!
It’s the time of year when food & drink plays a big part in our celebrations and it got me thinking about the very best I have had in 2009.
Before I get started, there are a few things that I should establish as a base. I am a convicted foodie! I love food of all kinds; food from anywhere and everywhere; my vice is wine and I’m willing to try anything at least twice (just in case the first time around, someone didn’t get the hang of preparing it properly:)
Having got the ground rules laid, 2009 was a fantastic year of food for me! I traveled around in the province of Ontario, to the USA and Jamaica a few times on wedding business and just had the greatest gastronomic adventure of all times. I have been keeping a food diary (as all committed foodies do!) and am willing to share my best discoveries with you.
In Ontario, there are a few popular places that deliver all they allude to. The one that jumps to mind first is the Rosewater Supper Club in Toronto. This beautifully appointed space will make you feel special and pampered as soon as you walk in the doors and their decadent menu will give you a hard time to chose your meal. My recommendations: The Grilled Atlantic Salmon meal served with Leek and Potato Rosti ( a lovely new way – well new to me anyhow - to serve up that must have staple!) and Prosciutto Threads and the Wild Mushroom Risotto with Dungeness Crab and Truffle Essence. Absolutely to die for experience! They keep on delivering long after you leave because you know that the next experience there is going to be just as magical and so if you are like me, you have a happy place to go to when the daily grind gets you down!
My second go to spot is very close to home and is the Nine18 Restaurant at the Turnberry Golf Club in Brampton. This is my favourite place to hang out anytime of day or night and I have adopted it as my home away from home (hey Jim!). Since opening at the end of the summer 2009, they have gained the reputation of Brampton’s Best Kept Secret (well, I guess, not anymore!) for a restaurant or just a place to relax in a plush armchair, right by the fireplace and catch up with friends after a long day over a glass of wine or a Spanish coffee. I have tried everything on the menu now and everything is good! I kid you not! I do have my favourite things based on time of day though. For example, the chicken club sandwich is my lunch time fare of choice (it has an avocado based dip that is just beautiful!) but the 8 oz. sirloin with sweet potato fries trumps that for dinner and that perfect little bite of mini cheesecake and a monte cristo coffee hits the spot for me when I am hanging out at the end of the night with my girlfriends.
I am eagerly awaiting their wedding menu, due out soon and am just as excited to see the tented wedding dining room to be added in he springtime. My first local client is waiting to book her tasting for a Fall 2010 wedding and I am really excited to introduce her to Brampton’s newest and by far nicest wedding venue yet.
Stay tuned for part 2 of the foodie diaries!
