It's Always Time for Tea

January is National Hot Tea Month, cause for celebration for dedicated tea-drinkers like me. While it’s possible to get a cup of basic English Breakfast or Orange Pekoe tea pretty much anywhere, it’s worth hunting down the places where you can indulge in a full-on tea experience. Generally, that starts with whole-leaf teas steeped for exactly the right amount of time (it’s always a bonus when your teacup arrives along with a timer).

Canmore Tea Company
737-7 Ave
If you’re looking to stock up and take home a supply of quality tea, you can’t do much better than a visit to the Canmore Tea Co. From rich, flavourful black teas to delicate herbal options, the selection is astonishing. There’s always something unique available for tasting, which is a great way to broaden your tea horizons.

One of the best parts of a visit to the store is browsing through the tea-pot selection. From pigs to tractors, moose and bulldogs to classic stout, round-bellied pots, if you’re looking to add to your collection of pots or in search of a unique gift for a tea-loving friend, you’ll find something cool here. The shop also offers a selection of tea accessories including strainers and cups… heaven for tea-lovers, really - and right here in Canmore! 

Danielle Findlay Pilates & Wellness
608 Spring Creek Drive

Natur’el Teas are just one of many delightful surprises that await visitors to Danielle’s wellness studio space in Spring Creek.

I popped into Danielle Findlay’s boutique pilates and wellness studio in Spring Creek (go, it’s beautiful) and was delighted to be offered a cup of tea. Wild Blueberry Rooibos - it was delicious. Danielle also offers a lovingly curated selection of items in her small retail area - including organic teas by Natur’el Tea blended by hand in Banff.

Black Dog Café
30 Lincoln Park #101

The Black Dog Café is a super place to drop in for tasty breakfasts all day long. They do serve a variety of other things (amazing cheesecakes come to mind), but the other day I was in there to enjoy a frittata washed down by a most excellent cup of tea.

Black Dog Café makes a point of sourcing locally whenever possible - including their teas, which come from the Canmore Tea Company.

Pop in and visit - you’ll quickly be made to feel at home - you’ll be hard-pressed to find anyone friendlier than Brad and Leah and their lovely dog, Shadow.

Dip one of these in your tea… ooh la la!

Communitea Café
1001 - 6 Ave

Communitea in Canmore has a great selection of loose-leaf teas as well as tasty snacks (including vegan and gluten-free options) and amazing soups and salads. A real community hub, this is where the locals gather. Bright, cheery, and busy, there’s a happy tea-fuelled vibe here that’s welcoming and warm.

The Pulse Café at The Malcolm
321 Spring Creek Drive

Is it my imagination or does good tea taste even better in a hand-made mug?

The Pulse at the Malcolm in Spring Creek offers a selection of lovely custom-blended teas as well as an eclectic mix of gifts in their retail area. I’m a sucker for pottery and love these Island Stoneware mugs adorned with Celtic knots.

In the summer, there are few better places to enjoy a leisurely tea-sipping experience than out on the patio behind the Malcolm. With Spring Creek in the foreground and Ha Ling beyond, it’s hard to imagine a finer place in the world to hang out and drink my tea. 

What about you? Are you a rooibos or a white tea fan? English Breakfast or peppermint? Where are your favourite places to enjoy a cuppa’?  Share your thoughts in the comments - I’m always looking for new teas (or places to enjoy them). 

Easter Feasting!

In our family, Easter Sunday was traditionally the day when we sprang out of bed as soon as we woke up and rushed outside in search of chocolate eggs. We suspended disbelief and quite happily imagined a bunny rabbit doling out chocolate eggs, even though none of that makes much sense no matter how you try to find some science to back it up. Bunnies don’t lay eggs. Eggs come from chickens and definitely are not in the least bit chocolatey. 

We didn’t always prepare a big Easter dinner (my mother was just as likely to take us all on a family outing somewhere and treat us to a meal at a restaurant), but when we did, I seem to recall that both ham and cornish game hens made an appearance on the family table. 

Much later, after I developed a taste for lamb, that became my go-to celebratory meal at this time of year. 

Let the Chefs Cook for You

This year, several local restaurants are putting together some delicious-looking feasts to grace your table this Easter. Here are a few that I’ve found, but please share if you have found an offer others might enjoy.

Iron Goat

Phone : (403) 609-0222
703 Benchlands Trail

The Iron Goat in Canmore has turkey and ham on the menu. Choose one or the other or a bit of both. Mashed potatoes, pan-roasted carrots, green beans, stuffing, gravy, cranberry sauce, and rolls round out the dinner. Pick-up or, depending on demand and availability, have yours delivered. 

Image @sagebistroandwinelounge on IG

Sage Bistro

1712 Bow Valley Trail
(403) 678-4878

Sage Bistro never fails to deliver the tasty goods! Order your heat-at-home Easter Dinner ahead of time and then decide when it’s most convenient for you to reheat the dinner for your family.

Order by Friday at noon so you don’t miss out on Sage’s three-course dinner, which includes Sage-roasted turkey and Valbella ham with all the trimmings.

Don’t forget the wine! There’s a full list posted on the Sage website. After you’ve had a chance to browse the wine list, send your order off to Todd by email (todd@sagebistro.ca)

Cornerstone Catering

1988 Olympic Way
(403) 678-2400

Cornerstone Catering is also offering an Easter feast for Canmore locals. Like Sage Bistro’s meal, Cornerstone’s dinner arrives cold and can easily be reheated. For $35 (plus tax) per person, the meal will be delivered curbside in Canmore for free. 

Fully-cooked and ready for reheating, the Cornerstone Easter Dinner includes:  

• Maple glazed spiral ham

• Buttermilk mashed potatoes

• Grilled asparagus

• Strawberry poppyseed salad

• Roasted rainbow carrots with honey orange glaze

• Homemade gravy

• Roasted Maple Yams

• Apple Sauce

• Homemade apple pie

With delivery date options of Good Friday, Saturday  or Easter Sunday, there’s lots of flexibility in terms of how you plan your weekend. The meal will arrive at your place via safe, no contact, curbside delivery.

All eating establishments are following Alberta Health Services Regulations and recommendations to help keep everyone safe and healthy.

Le Chocolatier

701 Benchlands Trail
403) 679-3351

In my book, Easter is not complete without chocolate eggs. Here in Canmore, we’re lucky to have our own creator and purveyor of fine chocolates and as long as you plan ahead, you may be lucky enough to be able to hide some fancy, schmantzy Belgian chocolate eggs from Le Chocolatier.

Note that the shop is only open limited hours and that Easter stock is also limited. (Note: Vegan options in dark chocolate are available, but call ahead as quantities are limited). 

Whether you prepare you own meal or order in (and, every time you do, you are supporting a local business and helping to ensure your favourite eateries will be around when restrictions are lifted), take time over the holiday weekend to appreciate this gift of time with those who live with you. Connect with your wider circles of friends, family, and loved ones via online options. Stay home. Stay safe. Stay healthy. Happy Easter, everyone!

Tips and Tricks for Eating Out With the Kids

Growing up, we often ate at restaurants. It wasn’t because we were super wealthy - we weren’t. But my parents enjoyed dining out and didn’t believe in babysitters. That meant either they didn’t go out for dinner, or they took us along. 

My mother’s strategies for dining out with the whole family revolved around protecting everyone’s right to enjoy a pleasant meal together without disturbing anyone else at the restaurant. We were all drilled about table manners at home - you know, the basics - no elbows on the table, how to hold (and use) a knife and fork, not speaking with our mouths full of food. We chewed with our mouths closed and asked politely for someone to pass the salt rather than reaching across the table and helping ourselves. There were drills about appropriate pleases and thank yous and we didn’t get up and walk away when we were done - we waited until everyone at the table was finished before asking, “May I please be excused?”

We looked scarily like the kids in this photo when we sat down for dinner. We sat up straight, kept our elbows off the table, and our hands where they could be seen at all times… Photo by Museums Victoria on Unsplash

If all of that sounds like something out of a Dickens novel, for us it was second nature and we didn’t really think anything much of it unless someone else pointed out our good manners. Those basic ground rules were firmly established before any of us were allowed to eat in public. 

When two younger siblings joined my brother and me (there was a ten-year gap between the oldest and youngest kid), they made full use of highchairs and booster seats when they joined the family on restaurant outings. The special seating kept them contained and at eye level with the rest of us. When one of the youngest began to get fidgety, one of the older kids was assigned to take the younger outside for a walk while everyone else finished up. 

Paper and pencils were entertainment kit essentials whenever we ate out as a family.

Entertainment Kits to the Rescue

This rarely happened, as it turned out, because my mother didn’t expect us to sit quietly listening to the grownups talking about mundane adulty stuff. We didn’t arrive at restaurants empty-handed. Each of us brought what we called ‘an entertainment kit.’ We all had our preferences - I often brought a book, my brother loved comics, and we all liked to draw. We packed along a selection of drawing paper, coloured pencils, crayons, and felt pens as well as puzzle books - search and finds, mazes, and dot-to-dots were favourites. Colouring books were popular and we always took full advantage of whatever the restaurants had for us - paper placemats and crayons were well-used at our table! 

New Generation, New Entertainment Tools

When my youngest brother’s kids came along years later, the colouring books and pencils were largely replaced by iPads and phones - but the strategies remained the same. The next generation of kids in our now extended family are rarely left out of the dining out experience. They know how to entertain themselves while the adults are chatting and everyone - from youngest to oldest feels part of the eating out experience. Nobody feels dragged along (or left out), and the adults don’t feel rushed through their meals and conversations. 

Most restaurants these days have kids menus, but if you have a youngster with a smallish appetite, it’s also easy enough to ask for a side plate and take a little from the adult portions to create a small, custom meal.  

Is there a time and place for an adults-only meal out? Of course. But with a little planning and forethought (those entertainment kits were fabulous!), eating out with the kids doesn’t have to be an ordeal. Au contraire. Those family meals we shared in restaurants became our equivalent of the traditional Sunday dinner. They were a time spent together in one place, catching up on each other’s lives, and maintaining the close bonds of family over a good meal. 

Share Your Family Dining Tips

Do you have some good tips to help make sure the dining out with kids experience is a pleasant one? Share your thoughts in the comments below - that’s one easy way to earn menu hunter points and be eligible for some fun foodie prizes! 

Looking for family-friendly restaurants in Canmore? Have a browse through our online menus right here on the TasteMagazine.ca website (just click the orange ‘EXPLORE’ button on the homepage).

Eating Local - What's the Taste that Defines a Place?

Fish tacos in San Diego are just a little different to those I’ve eaten in the Bow Valley…

I find it fascinating to see how many travellers head straight for the familiar when they arrive at a new destination. McDonalds. Starbucks. Burger King. KFC. The big brands are everywhere and it’s easy to seek out something we recognize when we arrive in new territory. 

I do it myself. I know where to get my favourite beverage. Where to find good wifi. Who is likely to have clean bathrooms. 

You know you’re in Paris when you sink your teeth into a freshly-baked baguette…

But as soon as I’ve acclimatized, I make a point of seeking out whatever it is that the local area is known for. As I write this, I’m at a conference in San Diego - a town known for fish tacos. As soon as I’d dropped my bags in my hotel room I set out on a quest and half an hour later I was settled in at an outdoor table, listening to a reggae band, and chowing down on fish tacos and corn tortilla chips. 

In that first moment as I sank my teeth into the lime-drizzled deliciousness of crispy battered fish, soft tacos, shredded lettuce and picante salsa I knew that I was no longer in Canmore. 

There’s nothing like local cuisine to firmly establish exactly where you are in the world. 

A fish taco in the Bow Valley doesn’t go down in quite the same way as one consumed near the ocean in San Diego. 

You won’t find too many of these in San Diego… [@TheGrizzlyPaw on IG]

How Do You Define Canadian Food?

As I was sitting outside in short sleeves, marvelling at the fact that only a few hours earlier I’d been tip-toeing my way across the icy parking lot to get on my shuttle bus, I thought about the food of home. What dishes from home were likely to be scarce down in California? Poutine came to mind. Pancakes with real maple syrup. Bison burgers. Juniper-flavoured anything. Craft beer from Sheepdog Brewing Co. I had a pang of homesickness. It didn’t last too long - San Diego is a fabulous city. But it did make me realize that in exactly the same way that food experiences can define our travels, it also defines the place we come from.  

What Does ‘Home’ Taste Like?

Here’s a challenge for you. This week, eat something that’s distinctively Bow Valley. Post a photo. What does southern Alberta food mean to you? Tag us @tastecanmore or #tastecanmore and let us know what you think of when you think of local food.  

Happy Bloody Mary Day, Banff!

I’m not sure you’d find a day of the year with a higher per capita hangover rate than New Year’s Day. Maybe that’s why January 1 has been designated National Bloody Mary Day. The popular cocktail is said to be a hangover remedy: the vegetables are said to settle an upset tummy, the salt to rebalance one’s electrolytes, and the alcohol acts as an analgesic. I’ve always looked at Bloody Mary’s as a convenient way to deliver a salad and your morning shot of vodka in one handy highball glass. 

Whether you believe that a Bloody Mary has medicinal qualities or not, chances are if you enjoy this tasty cocktail it’s one you’ll consume with a hearty brunch, one of the most popular meals with which to serve one up.

Who Invented the Bloody Mary?

George Jessel in Love & Laugh, 1929 [By Fox Films - eBayfrontback, Public Domain]

Though one popular version of the history of the Bloody Mary says the cocktail was first served in Paris at the New York Bar in 1921, other evidence suggests it’s more likely that the basic recipe (half and half tomato juice and vodka) was actually invented by the comedian and vaudevillian actor, George Jessel, who is also said to have named the drink. 

Later, the bartender Fernand Petiot (who, confusingly, did work at the New York Bar in Paris) is said to have created the modern version of the drink while serving drinks at the St. Regis Hotel in New York, perhaps as early as 1934 by adding salt, black pepper, cayenne pepper, Worcestershire sauce, lemon and ice. [For a full and fascinating theory of how the modern Bloody Mary came to be, read this article at Diffords Guide.]

What’s in a Bloody Mary?

Wherever the drink may have originated, the modern version generally starts with a recipe similar to this official one published by the International Bartenders Association:

Bloody Mary Recipe

3 parts vodka
6 parts tomato juice
1 part lemon juice
2-3 dashes of Worcestershire sauce
Tabasco sauce
Celery salt
Black pepper

To preserve the viscosity of the tomato juice, the cocktail should be handled gently, stirring rather than shaking the mix. 

A celery stalk is the most common garnish, but you might also find an olive, lemon wedge, or dill pickle spear topping off the drink. Sometimes bacon or shrimp may also adorn the glass. 

How Did the Drink Get its Name?

Those who accept  Petiot’s claim (which does sound like a bit of revisionist history) that he invented the drink back in his Paris days may also believe his account that he named the drink after Queen Mary I, dubbed Bloody Mary for her fondness of executing others. Other theories attribute the name to Mary Pickford or a waitress called Mary who worked at the Bucket of Blood, a Chicago bar.

If the drink was actually first mixed by Jessel, his version of the story of the name is rather fascinating (if scary). According to Jessel’s autobiography (The World I Lived In!), the story goes that Jessel was in Florida and had been drinking hard all night. He wanted something to clear his head and ease his hangover. When the bartender offered him vodka, Jessel countered with asking for tomato juice, lemon, and Worcestershire sauce. Mary Brown Warburton, who had also been out carousing all night long, joined the conversation. When she tried the new concoction, some spilled on her white dress and she’s said to have declared, “Now, you can call me Bloody Mary…”

About a year later,  Mary’s sweetheart Ted Healey read a newspaper account that Jessel had named the drink after Mary. He apparently considered such intimacies as drink-naming to be inappropriate. Healey pulled out a pistol and took a shot at Jessel which, fortunately, missed. 

How is a Bloody Mary Different to a Caesar? 

A close cousin of the Bloody Mary, the Caesar was invented in Calgary by Walter Chell in 1969. The main difference between the two cocktails is that the Caesar includes clam broth. Clamato juice is a mix of tomato juice, clam broth, sugar, spices, and MSG and is commonly used as the mixer for a Caesar. To garnish, a wedge of lime is often added to the requisite celery stick. 

Where Can you Get a Great Bloody Mary (or a Caesar) in Banff? 

There are lots of options when it comes to finding a fabulous Bloody Mary in Banff. Here are just a few of our favourites.

Elk & Oarsman
119 Banff Avenue

The Elk isn’t know just for, you know, elk. Voted one of the top 12 mountain bars by Buzzfeed, you know your Bloody Mary is going to be a good one!

Bear Street Tavern
211 Bear Street

Settle into this comfy local favourite spot and see how they handle the Tavern Caesar (hint: the recipe involves pickle juice).

Ramsay Bar
405 Spray Avenue

Looking for a little pampering along with your Bloody Mary? The service at the Ramsay is without equal. Indulge yourself as you sip…

Wild Bill’s Legendary Saloon
2-201 Banff Avenue

Bloody Marys and mechanical bull riding go together like… bloody noses and mechanical bull-riding? White Stetsons and the Calgary Stampede? BBQ sauce and Wild Bill’s take on the classic Caesar? Check it out for yourself!

Rose & Crown Banff
202 Banff Avenue

If you’re like me and love live music, the Rose & Crown is a safe bet with live music pretty much every night. Pair some toe-tapping-tunes with a Bloody Mary and you know you’re in for a good time!

Not sure what kind of bartenders are mixing your bloody drinks? Check out our article on identifying bartender species likely to be spotted at local watering holes. 

Let us know in the comments where you’ve enjoyed the best Bloody Mary (or Caesar) in Banff. What made it so terrific?

Become a Menu Hunter!

To earn points and rewards as part of our Menu Hunter program, snap a photo of you and your Bloody Mary (or other beverage of choice) and then tag us (@tastebanff) on Facebook or Instagram. We’ll do the rest.

Happy New Year

So another Christmas is behind us and the New Year is right around the corner. Between nursing a sugar and cheese hangover, trying to stay relatively sober before New Years Eve and saying farewell to another Christmas while the tinsel and tree are packed away, there are a lot of emotions to sort through.

With each year that passes, at this point in the month, I find myself taking stock. This year has been difficult – the events on the world stage from devastating earthquakes, mass shootings, refugees and a clinically insane billionaire businessman as President of the U.S. are depressing enough. And then on a personal level, watching friends experience devastating loss, heartache and disappointment. But flip the coin and watch countries open their doors to the refugees (yay Canada!), earthquake survivors rebuild their lives, survivors of shootings standing bravely, expressing love and understanding toward their aggressors. Then I look next door and see friends welcoming new babies, celebrating sobriety, finding happiness, getting married. And each year, I am overwhelmed with how life is a series of paradoxes – conflicting experiences that creates this beautiful, roiling, emotional existence.

Ultimately though, at this time of year I am overwhelmed with gratitude. Gratitude for the life I lead, my friends and family, my health and, of course, this gorgeous city we live in.

So for New Years I’m going to eat well, drink moderately, be merry and dispense with resolutions except one: be grateful - always be grateful.