This month I turn 30. To mark such a remarkable event, I’m spending every day of October drenched in awesome-sauce.

Ate tasty food at the Nick with Vince. We shared nachos and jalapeño poppers, so fucking tasty.

This month I turn 30. To mark such a remarkable event, I’m spending every day of October drenched in awesome-sauce.

Previously on Rocktober. Adam went to Montreal, Adam came back from Montreal… and now the continuation.

So, I went out for dinner at the Old Nick with Emily (aka Watcom). Emily will be involved in many more Rocktober adventures, as she’s pretty fuckin’ awesome. I had the Garlic Mushroom sandwich, which is garlic, mushrooms, cheese, and tasty buns. SO GOOD! I love the Old Nick.

Emily nearly cried with Christine (the owner of the Nick) told her that the veggie quesadilla was no longer existent, and it was now a cheese quesadilla. I was surprised, as I had both, and never noticed when they changed it. Emily took Christine up on her offer to have them make it with some veggies for her. Emily seemed to be happy with her awesome-tacular meal.

We chatted about boys, and girls, and work, and friends, and babies¹, and other such fun stuff. We had a fun time! It was Rocktober-tacular, and a good way to chill after a weekend packed with Quebec.

1. No Mom, I’m not going to have one. [↩]

I visited a shop in Whitby called Soda Pop Centre. These are my stories.

Capt’n Eli’s Strawberry Pop

355ml
Ingredients: Water, cane sugar, natural and artificial strawberry flavours, Red 40, citric acid, and sodium benzoate.
Linky link.

So, it’s been a fruity three weeks, we had tangerine and peach in the previous weeks, now it’s strawberry’s turn. I think next week will have to be another root beer, but who doesn’t love a root beer?

I don’t recall ever having strawberry pop before, but it’s good. It reminds me of a strawberry wine, but not alcoholic (sadly), but we can adjust that surely. It’s quite sweet, but also quite refreshing .

Note on photo: I’m slightly embarrassed by this photo. Starting next week, I used my lighting rig, it should get much better.

I visited a shop in Whitby called Soda Pop Centre. These are my stories.

Jelly Belly Gourmet Soda: Tangerine

355ml
Ingredients: Filtered carbonated water, cane sugar, citric acid, sodium benzoate, natural flavours, sodium citrate, and FD&C Yellow #6.
Linky link.

This one’s quite delicious. It tastes like a cross between an actual Jelly Belly and a freezie. With just a hint of sour, a bit more bubbly than the Nehi, it’s very distinct¹.

1. Though, the Nehi is the better of the two [↩]

I visited a shop in Whitby called Soda Pop Centre. These are my stories.

Peach Nehi

354ml
Ingredients: carbonated water, high fructose corn syrup and/or sugar, citric and malic acid, potassium, benzoate, potassium citrate, artificial flavour, gum acacia, and red 40.
Linky link.

For those unfamiliar, MASH’s Radar O’Reilly’s poison of choice was a Grape Nehi. The young gentle company clerk was not interested in the harder drinks that his colleagues chose, instead he went for Grape Nehi. I didn’t know it was a real drink, but apparently it is, and the store had the grape variety, but since I’m not a fan of grape pop, I decided to go for either the strawberry or peach. Seeing as I already had numerous other strawberry pops in my cart, I opted for the peach.

Holy crap, I didn’t expect it to be this fucking good. A strong peach flavour, and the carbonation is subtle, so as not to overpower the drink, which is the problem I have with a lot of grape pops. This make me wonder if I should try the grape version when I restock.

I visited a shop in Whitby called Soda Pop Centre. These are my stories.

Thomas Kemper Root Beer

355ml
Ingredients: carbonated water, honey, caramel colour, maltodextrin, sodium benzoate, natural flavour, gum acacia, phosphoric acid, sucralose, salt, vanilla extract, and acesulfame K.
Linky link.

This Portland-based pop company makes a rather delicious root beer. It’s quite sweet, from both the honey and the sucralose, but the major flavour actually comes from the vanilla. It’s rather strong. If you’re a fan of vanilla, you’l like this root beer, I think. I personally think it’s a bit too strong.

Editor’s note: I’m not a connoisseur of brunch, I do enjoy it, but I don’t believe it is the be-all and end-all of food. Thusly, I have only tried a few of Toronto’s brunch venues. For more in depth Brunch-Love, I’d suggest you read my friend Kristin’s blog, Death by Brunch.

I woke up on Sunday before Victoria Day, and didn’t want to cook, who would? After a few hours, I realized I was quiet hungry, and I was in the mood for brunch, mmm, brunch. Unfortunately, it was a Sunday on a long weekend, where the hell would I find something that wouldn’t take 12 hours for service? I decided to wander down Danforth and see if I could find anything. I came upon The Old Nick¹. They had a sign outside advertising their Organic Brunch. The Old Nick is a lovely pub a few metres down the street from me on the Danforth. It seems to be the go to pub in the neighbourhood, good beer, and a flirty gay bartender who seems to love all the women I bring in there, but who would blame him, I have excellent taste in women. They’re even kind enough to let a handful of people hangout, steal some tables and play board games in their bar. I had even eaten there once before, a couple days after moving into Playter Estates, my friend aL took me to that fabulous bar, where we had some food which was stupendous. I was shocked that a pub’s food was that good. Yet I never ate there again. That Sunday, I rectified the situation.

I walked into a nearly empty bar, where only two other tables were occupied, I took a seat and ordered tea while I perused the menu. While they won points for being empty, they lost points for a paltry tea menu. I went with orange pekoe. When the tea arrived, I ordered The Razzle Dazzle, which was eggs benedict with avocado and a cheese that I can’t remember. I was surprised when the plate arrived, it was stupid-big.

The home fries were lovely baby potatoes quartered, seasoned and fried, and they were damn tasty. The salad was fresh and lightly drizzled with a tasty vinaigrette. The eggs were cooked to perfection and slathered in a beautiful, thick hollandaise, sprinkled with shredded cheese which slowly melted over the eggs, on top of a large whole wheat english muffin, and fresh and creamy avocado.

Mmm, food.

1. Worst website, ever! [↩]

I’m drunk. No, I’m not drunk at 9 am on a Friday when this entry will be published. I’m drunk on a Saturday night¹ For those who don’t know, I used to have a super power. I was physically unable to get drunk. As much as I drank, it never affected me. That was until I had eight shots of absinthe over 45 minutes, one night. Good times. Thanks Tim. I got buzzed that night. Then a week ago, I went to Clinton’s, I was meeting someone there, she was late, I sat at the bar drinking as I waited and by the time she got there, I was slightly buzzed. It was strange. I had only had three beers, and there I was feeling the effects of alcohol. What the hell?

Tonight, I went out with a gentleman named James. You might know him from parties at the Nat Cave, or other such shindigs. We met up with some friends of his, and we drank. Again, I had three beers, but this time over the course of a much longer period of time, but once again, I feel the effects of alcohol. What the hell? This is just strange. So, either I’m becoming a normal human being, or I have liver failure. I’m hoping for the former. However, neither of these are the point of this blog post, the point is poutine. I just hope that this gives you context in case 1) I’m completely wrong and later discover the opposite to be true, 2) my spelling and grammar are worse than normal. ;lsajf;adlsjf;asdl

So, poutine. A long time ago, a place opened up called Smoke’s Poutinerie. They had some poutine which was vegetarian², as a Canadian vegetarian, I was obviously excited. I grabbed my friend Belinda, and told her, “hey sexy lady, we need some poutine.” Either that, or she grabbed my arm and said, “hey sexy bloke, we need some poutine.” It was too long ago for me to properly remember, but we bonded over poutine.

As two poutine aficionados, we were excited by this new Toronto restaurant. We shared two different forms of poutine, and were underwhelmed. The water gravy was “clone of Karen Carpenter” thin³ the fries weren’t fresh or anything to write home about, and worst, they tried to fancy it up, when all that really mattered was french fries, gravy and cheese curds. Fail. I’ve been back once, and was just as ashamed of the experience.

Tonight, however, I ended up⁴ at Poutini’s on Queen West. Everyone else can take a lesson from these masters of poutine. 1) Their fries are to die for! Hand cut, fresh out of the fryer, and they even have skin on them!⁵ 2) Their gravy is nice and thick. 3) They put in just the right amount of gravy, not too much, not too little. 4) The curds are fabulous. 5) They don’t try to fancy up the poutine, they know what poutine is, and they make it well.

In conclusion, screw Smoke’s, have some Poutini’s.

1. Well, Sunday morning, but that’s being technical. [↩]
2. They’d use a mushroom gravy, or some other sort of vegetarian gravy. [↩]
3. Oh god, why am I laughing at that so much? I didn’t even write the joke, I stole it from Clone High. [↩]
4. Post-boozing [↩]
5. Om-nom-nom [↩]

Before we went to see Hot Tub Time Machine, we needed to eat. If you’re in the Annex, you’re going to be eating one of two things: Sushi or Sky Blue Sky. It’s kind of ridiculous how many sushi restaurants are in the Annex, but we opted for the Wilco-themed sandwich shop Sky Blue Sky. This was my third visit to the restaurant, the first had me ordering “Hoodoo Voodoo.” The second trip had me securing an order of “Via Chicago.” Of the three, my favourite is still “Hoodoo Voodoo” who’s drippy cheese love and crisp pear was incredible.

“Wishful Thinking,” my latest selection is a close second. The meaty portobello mushrooms were fantastic and beautifully paired with avocado and onion. They even added a checkered wrapping which just adds to the class.

So, to summarize…
Hoodoo Voodoo: 7/10
Wishful Thinking: 6.5/10
Via Chiago: 5/10

If I could go back in time, I’d probably up the rating of Hoodoo Voodoo up to an eight, but I cannot, so these are scaled to my initial reactions of Hoodoo Voodoo.

In addition, I should mention that this time, I paired the sandwich with a cucumber and mint salad, which was the best part of the meal, and that’s saying a lot.

Over the weekend, I went to Sky Blue Sky again. For those who don’t remember Sky Blue Sky is the Wilco-inspired sandwich shop in The Annex.

This time I went with Via Chicago.
Roasted onion and chick peas with a hint of curry topped with mango chutney and a tomato on the bread of your liking.

The lovely man who I believe owns the place, suggested I try it on the french bread, I was more than happy to take his suggestion.

Ooh! Depth of field. Wait, I’m supposed to talk about the sandwich.

I was asked to rate the Hoodoo Voodoo by someone, a while ago, I don’t remember who, but I gave it a 7/10. On that same scale, I’d rate Via Chicago a 5/10. It’s damn good, but I think I wasn’t necessarily in the right mood for the chickpeas, and we all know chickpeas have a very overpowering taste.

Five more vegetarian sammiches to try.