two Peters are better than one

I am not the only Peter out there, you know.  Shocking, yes, but believe me.  There are others.

My favourite other Peter and I had dinner last night.  We've seen plenty of each other at conference these past days, but it was terrific to get together and just have the two of us enjoy food and gossip about everyone else.  I exaggerate a little, only a little.  Certainly, we enjoyed food!

Peter and I hopped in a car and headed to a neighbourhood away from where I normally get whilst in New Orleans.  Our destination:  Toups' Meatery. 

Isaac Toups was a contestant several years back on Top Chef.  He was kind of fun, and he did win Restaurant Wars, though I admit that I rolled my eyes at the conversation he had with his wife on one episode where they talked about him making sure he didn't come home all Californian or something, as if New Orleans is all and only good and California has nothing of merit to offer.  No matter.  I'd been curious to try his food, so Peter and I set off to enjoy a meal there.

Cocktails first.  I had the Sloe Poke,

and after Peter tried it, he had that as his second dish.  We had some fried turkey necks,

pickles,

and cornbread

to start with.  And you know, those turkey necks were pretty freakin' awesome.  And plenty of food.  We should have stopped with those three items, but no, we underestimated portions and - curious for two generously-proportioned gentlemen - overestimated our appetites.  Out came my lamb neck

(necks were a theme, I guess), and oh, yep.  A lot.  No photo of the brownie we shared (it was fine, maybe a little dry), but um, yeah, we had dessert.  I also had a cocktail of pork fat washed bourbon, and that was fine, but the Sloe Poke was better.

I woke up this morning remembering that I don't usually eat that much food, let alone that much rich red meat.  Gosh.  My kingdom for a cauliflower or a big stalk of broccoli.

But in the end, hooray for seeing Peter!  I'm looking forward to the next time.

variations on a theme

If I may, I will frame this entry by stating the obvious: I am pale, pasty white. To this I add that I spent my formative years in northern BC where - though it could get hotter than most people here can believe - cool and wet was the norm. My summers are ideally set no higher than 24 degrees (that's Centigrade - no jokes about sled dogs being needed once you cross the border into Canada). I loathe the heat.




And yet I live in Chicago (fast approaching my 11-year anniversary), and heat and humidity are the essence of summer here. My response? I turn on the AC as high as it will go and stay away from the oven and stove. I'd love to say that dinner then becomes a choice between ice cream and Popsicles, but no, I try to keep us eating something halfway decent.




Lately, given the heat, it's been salads, cold fish, nuts, cheeses, fruit. Things I don't need to cook. Wash, cut, plate, yes. But no cooking, not if I can help it. Wine as well with the occasional martini sneaking in. Call it a rut, but so be it if a rut means that I - pale, pasty, cold-weather loving Canuck that I am - can survive the Chicago summer!

Friday dinner, Campagnolo

It's a habit that we've nurtured over many years of dining at Yoshi's: we like eating at restaurant bars. Is it the high stools and counter? Is it the chance to have more casual interaction with the bar staff? I don't know, really. I just know that if we get the option, we often take it. And so it was Friday night at Campagnolo.

Busy place - we're glad to see it so packed if it's a sign that the neighbourhood will continue to develop nicely. When we arrived, we asked to sit at the bar. The backroom where the bar is had a table for four available, but not enough seats for us at the bar itself. Ah well, the table it was. And so we sat with menus and water a handful of minutes, and wouldn't you know it? The bar freed up! We moved quickly (I think the waiter was a little miffed, and I felt badly a moment or two), and soon Marie, Conrad, and I were parked with a bottle of red wine and an order of smaller plates submitted.

I like Campagnolo a lot. It's funny - we almost never go out for Italian food in Chicago or elsewhere. I'm not really sure why. But we like our little Vancouver neighbourhood place in all of its minimalism. In fact, we'll have our rehearsal dinner there this autumn, and I'm excited for that. In the meantime, though, here's a look at what we had:

Marinated Olives (cerignola, mantequilla, peppadew)
Crispy Ceci (chickpeas, chilies, mint, citrus)
Spring Vegetable Salad (crispy bread, bagna cauda)
Bruschetta (trumpet mushrooms,buffalo mozzarella, olive oil)

Conrad and Marie split the Margherita pizza (fior di latte mozzarella, tomato, basil) with prosciutto added while I enjoyed a plate of ravioli (wild nettles, soffrito, spot prawn butter). The butter was an especially sweet and delicious touch.

No dessert, we were well-enough fed (and two bottles of wine meant we were well-enough beveraged, too!). By the time we left, the bar was even more packed, and our spots were being eyed hungrily...

Deep South culinary delights

As soon as I typed that title, I thought, "Someone - Dale, for example - will come along and lecture me on how Canadians don't know the South from the Deep South and that North Carolina isn't anywhere near the Deep South."

To which I say: accents, heat and humidity, and food like hush puppies. Deep South enough from my perspective.

Again, no work chat on this blog, but a dip into a work-related thing (and heck, why not? I blog social activities when I'm away at library conferences, after all).

These, my friends, are some of the culinary delights I experiences last week in Chapel Hill. No, that is not snark. I rather enjoyed the food I ate, simple as that.

For starters (though not a the first meal), I had lizard chips. How cool would it be if they actually were going out to the back yard, snaring some iguanas (they must roam free in those tropical climes, right?) and slice and dice them into tasty chips? Well, maybe not, and I admit the name was a little too bar-food chic/cheesy. But come on, pickles and jalapeno rings batter dipped and fried? Good stuff.

The South is known for barbecue. A lot of places are known for barbecue, of course. In this case, it was a vinegary-tasting shredded pork dish - pulled pork for the one or two of you in Canada who are reading this.
Don't look at me like that: it's not common outside of the South, truly. The Hopping John on the plate, however, was nothing more special than rice, beans,and salsa. The collard greens, not pictured, were fine. That was at a place called Crook's Corner on the Tuesday night. Good as it was, the dessert was better: banana pudding. Nicely done, topped with a fluff of meringue lightly browned. Good.

Dianne and Meredith do not look happy with the meal, and fairly so: the vegetarian option wasn't quite as good as what we had. But see? Carolyn and Jake also partook of the barbecue-laden Carolina sampler and were mighty happy.

Back to the home of lizard chips, the Top of the Hill. Oddly, I didn't photograph my steak dinner, a tender and tasty piece of meat. Instead, I caught Dianne, happier with her dinner, portabello grits cakes. Oh, and Richard,
the adorable and whipsmart roomie from this past week. I don't know what he had for dinner, however. Steak?

My last night in Chapel Hill I went with Dianne and Meredith, Jason and Hilde (shown in the photo) for some music and a drink on the lawn of the Carolina Inn. Hilde went back to the dorms after that, but the rest of us continued on to the Carolina Brewery for dinner. Cheap, and good beer. Jason's Tarheel Burger looked impressive, I admit. I had the barbecue again, and it was fine, but not as good as the Tuesday night meal. Dessert was lovely, though: gelato from a little sweets shop in the thick of the Franklin Street crowd. A cup of pistachio and pomegranate gelati brought out my best come-hither look. And that capped a week of North Carolina dining quite well, I do think.