August 20th 2010

First I need to explain that I am going to be blogging about the past and its going to take me sometime to catch up on the last 3 months I have been missing so please bear with me and enjoy my travel tales :)


So its friday night i just finished doing a lunch/half of dinner service and get home to make a cake for a old highschool teacher of mine:) I am super happy with the out come of the cake even tho it took me till 3 am to finish!


Now its 3 am cake is done and what do I want to do?? SLEEP but nope....not allowed because I am what is known as a procrastinator....I am leaving at 9 am for a 2 week trip and I have not packed a thing! I know that if I go to sleep and tell myself I will wake up early and pack, I will for sure hit the snooze button and have a very angry friend when I show up late! So I stay up till about 430 packing up everything from my hair straighner to socks and everything in between!!

August 21st 2010

Wake up call a short 3 hours later and I head out to meet Sarah at her house....we pack up the car and hit the road! Montreal Here we come :) Our drive to Montreal from Toronto was smooth and exciting...both of us full of anticipation of what the next 2 weeks held for us! We get into MTL pumped that we can take a nap before our dinner reservations at 9:30 when SLAM...traffic hits and we are STUCK and i really mean Stuck....in a traffic jam for almost 2 hours! Somehow we managed so survive through the boredom and the little movement (it was kind of interesting how while sitting in this 2 hour trafic jam complaining we herd on the radio about the 9 day traffic jam in China and suddenly the self pitty party left the building....or car) we made it to our hotel....and had just enough time to shower get ready and grab a cab to the restaurant.

Interesting Fact....Grabbing a cab in Montreal is not as easy as in Toronto...we found this out the hard way.....15 minutes of waving at cabs and having them speed past...we started to get worried we were going to miss our reservation....but finally we caught one on the corner and we're on our way!

Sarah and I get dropped off in Old Montreal, we step out of the cab and look around and dont see the restaurant anywhere....the cab driver speeds off before we can ask him where it is and it seems like people are pretending they dont speak english so they dont have to bother with this silly girls from Toronto. After about 10 minutes of walking around and popping our heads into random restaurants WE FIND IT... and its everything I was expecting:)

TBC

BIGGEST SORRY EVER!!!!

well as you can see i have been MIA for quite a while now....my computer was broken but now it is not and I am back with blogs comming out the wazoo....get your reading glasses on! that is if you arent too mad at me!

todays G20 experience

Trip to center Island, g20, and Franks Kitchen

This is what my city looks like right now due to the G20 Summit...and the protestors are insane....i was about two city blocks away from a mob and was too scared to take a picture....lol they had rocks...i will try my best to give you an idea of the insanity that is going on this weekend but not if it comes at my own safety!

Franks Kitchen

A few friends and I had an impromptu dinner at a cozy restaurant on College st at Clinton. I we shared the buffalo mozzarella, the antipasto platter and the quail liver and it was all amazing...i have eaten Head Chef Franks food before as the previous chef at Flow restaurant and lounge in yorkville and when he worked for years at Centro. I am so happy he has now bought his own restaurant with his wife and has a well deserved fan base....Franks has comfort, service and food down to a T and let me tell you the Sangria....not to shabby!

although i have lived in toronto for a few years and just out side it for my entire life i have never travelled to Center Island (toronto island) before. So i had a monday off and was being visited my a friend and we decided to head on over and check out the buzz. Its beautiful with beaches ( and one clothing optional beach which was interesting) and restaurants, center ville which is like a little theme park for kids, and really alot of history. all in all there were beautiful plants, trees, animals and water so i was a happy camper.

my recent life

we had a wedding at work yesterday and here are some/most of the desserts we put out! :)

chocolate and raspberry mousse bomb

blue berry and lime cheese cake

lemon cream cake

chocolate and coffee mousse cake

cherry cheese cake

lemon tarts

chocolate tarts

As you can see my little nephew is getting to be a big boy....happy and healthy and 3 months old already!

and delicious bbq dinner with the fam!

Taste of Toronto

Yesterday I worked at an annual event we have here in toronto called Toronto taste. It was a great day full of amazing food, wine and people. Top toronto restaurants are invited to prepare a dish and all the proceeds go to second harvest!!!

I met and took a picture with Chef Michael Smith a food network chef from PEI here in Cananda and ate some delicious food!

My Restaurant served a pan seared scallop with a mint and sweet pea ravioli and a pea and milk foam....it was delicious and not to toot my own horn but it was the prettiest dish there :)

Hope everyone had an amazing weekend:)

Sunday Beautiful Sunday

I spent a wonderful sunday up at my oma and opas house in the Muskokas....me and my neice Kyla were wandering around there property and found WILD STRAWBERRIES! I was so excited! we spent an hour picking and only came up with a cup and a half because they were so tiny but they were so packed full of flavor!

Amazing Day!

Open Letter to Pride Toronto from founders of Pride in 1981

May 27, 2010
As founding members of the Toronto Lesbian and Gay Pride Day Committee, and people involved in organizing the first Pride event in Toronto at the end of June in 1981, we stand totally opposed to the decision of the current Toronto Pride Committee to ban the use of “Israeli Apartheid” at Toronto Pride events. This banning of political speech is clearly an attempt to ban the participation of Queers Against Israeli Apartheid (QuAIA) and queer Palestine Solidarity supporters from the parade and from participation in a major event in our communities. This sets a very dangerous precedent for the exclusion of certain political perspectives within our movements and communities from Pride events. We call on the Pride committee to immediately rescind this banning and to instead encourage QuAIA’s participation in the pride parade.
We remind people of the political roots of Pride in the Stonewall rebellion against police repression in 1969 and that the Pride march in 1981 in Toronto grew out of our community resistance to the massive bath raids of that year. On the Pride march in 1981 about a thousand of us stopped in protest in front of 52 Division Police Station (which played a major part in the raids) and our resistance to the bath raids was rooted in solidarity with other communities (including the Black and South Asian communities) also facing police repression. Two of the initiating groups for Pride in 1981 — Gay Liberation Against the Right Everywhere (GLARE) and Lesbians Against the Right (LAR) — organized Pride as part of more general organizing against the moral conservative right-wing. This included not only its anti-queer but also its anti-feminist, racist and anti-working class agendas.
We also remember in the 1980s that lesbian and gay activists around the world, including in Toronto in the Simon Nkoli Anti-Apartheid Committee, took up the struggle not only for lesbian and gay rights in South Africa but linked this to our opposition to the apartheid system of racial segregation and white supremacy in South Africa. This global queer solidarity helps to account for how it was that constitutional protection for lesbians and gay men was first established in the new post-apartheid South Africa.
Solidarity with all struggles against oppression has been a crucial part of the history of Pride. To break this solidarity as the Pride Committee has now done not only refuses to recognize how queer people always live our lives in relation to race, class, gender, ability and other forms of oppression but also breaks our connections with the struggles of important allies who have assisted us in making the important gains that we have won.
Signers:
Katherine Arnup, founding member of the Lesbian and Gay Pride Day Committee, member of Lesbians Against the Right and Gay Liberation Against the Right Everywhere.
Hugh English, one of the first organizers of Toronto Pride, a former member of GLARE, and a queer in solidarity with struggles against oppression around the world.
Amy Gottlieb, member of Lesbians Against the Right.
Gary Kinsman, founding member of the Toronto Lesbian and Gay Pride Day Committee, member of Gays and Lesbians Against the Right Everywhere, member of the Simon Nkoli Anti-Apartheid Committee.
Ian Lumsden, founding member of the Toronto Lesbian and Gay Pride Day Committee and member of Gay Liberation Against the Right Everywhere.
Michael Riordon, co-host (with Lorna Weir) of the first Toronto Lesbian & Gay Pride Day, 1981; founding member of Bridges (between gay/lesbian & Latin American liberation movements); author of the forthcoming book, Our Way to Fight, on peace activists in Israel and Palestine.
Lorna Weir, co-host (with Michael Riordon) of the first Toronto Lesbian and Gay Pride Day, founding member of Lesbians Against the Right.
Brian Woods, member of Gays and Lesbians Against the Right Everywhere, and founding member of the Toronto Lesbian and Gay Pride Day Committee.

Day off....WHAT??

Today I had a wonderful day off...woke up with out an alarm, had a shower, put on my sunglasses and summer clothes and headed out the door! I went to vist one of my past chefs from a restaurant I was at last summer! he just opened up a new place so I had to go check it out! The venu is beautiful and I am going to go there for dinner soon so I will post about the food there after I eat it :)

After visiting I just started walking looking for a place to eat some lunch, I ended up at the corner of Church and Maitland (the village) at the Village Rainbow Cafe....I have spent countles hours in the village here in toronto but never eaten at the rainbow so i decided to test it out! I guess I was a little dissapointed but it was what I expected...I had fish and chips and a salad....to be honest i could have done with a big garden salad there home made greek dressing was wonderful! The fish was ok...cooked well and not soggy but the chips....fresh from a bag in the freezer...i hate that! i dont get why people/restaurants buy frozen fries...i am pretty sure its cheaper to buy a big bag of potatoes and a fry cutter and your customers will be much happier...hint hint nudge nudge!

The other day I made my way over the The Kensington Cornerstone for a nice lunch! I had a wonderful pulled pork bbq open faced sandwitch and a green salad with my first taste of gluten free beer! It tasted clean and fresh and is deffinatly somthing I would get again!
Then I took a look at the menu again and realized a little note on the bottom that the whole menu was gluten free...how amazing is that!!!! absolutly wonderful! so if you are ever in the kensington market area of toronto....check out the kensington cornerstone for sure you wont be disapointed!

tonight the plan...going to a local bar with some of my work friends...Cory... for some fun dancing and drag shows! should be a great time...it always is! Hope everyone is having a wonderful week so far!


go eat somthing :)

Work Party

we hosted a silent auction and fundraising event last week for a university here in toronto and here is some of the food they got to enjoy!!

i wish

I have been sitting here staring at this blank new post section and not being able to think about a thing to write... i mean there are lots of things i could write about...work last night, the amazing weather toronto is so lucky to have right now, how badly i need a vacation, or the current book i am reading but none of it seems right, maybe i am just not meant to blog right now. maybe work will clear my mind and i will be able to focus more tonight...well till then...have a great day my gender benders!

Kristen

New Tattoo!!!!

Mornin (or afternoon or evening depending on where in the world you are :) )

So the other day I got a new tattoo!!! its writing in braille that means "feel love, be love" I think that alot of people throw around the word love like its a bon bon, but are not focused enough on actually being love! thats right folks love can be used as a verb! its an action not just a feeling! with that being said I also believe that alot of us are scared to feel love...and I mean real love, not roman candle, hot pink, hollywood love.....I mean I got your back love!

So I guess with that my challenge to you is to try and let your self feel the love, and let yourself be love! it makes life even more wonderful then it already is!

I havent done it in a while so here are some enviro tips for ya!

26. bring back your used beer and wine bottles to the store! if you bring them back and dont just recycle them, the bottles get washed and reused. That means that there is less processing (melting them down and making them into somthing new) and will reduce your carbon toe prints!

27. use a natural Laundry detergent! the brand I use is "Attitude" and I absolutly love it! it smells wonderful, gets my clothes clean as a whistle and is certified eco friendly! it also has a picture of cute little penguins on it and this may or may not have been the reason I picked this eco friendly detergent off the shelf at my local "Noah's" ( eco friendly store here in Toronto)

28.Use a Natural Tooth paste! you can make your own or you can go and but one if you dont have the time! I found this more of a difficult switch because the taste and mouth feel of natural tooth paste is a much different one then crest or colgate! but like anything it just takes a bit of getting use too! YOU CAN DO IT! think of all the chemicals u are not flushing down the toilet or into your body! and if your worried about not getting flouride buy a brita and drink tap water...I know that there is flouride in Canadas tap water!

Also I dont know about what mother nature is giving you where you live BUT right now I have never been happier with her :) she makes me warm inside and out and I absolutly love it! I dont work for another 3 hours so I think I am going to go and enjoy the sun! go lay at the park and read! Have a great Day my non gender specific and gender specific friends!


I love you! (remember feel it, be it!)

Kristen xoxo

long time no talk!!!

hey ladies and gents, so I must say a HUGE sorry for being absent for the past few weeks work has been absolutly insane now that Patio season has come to a start here in toronto, but I do have some pics of a the food I made for a Party I catered and some pics from this restaurant that i went to with my best friend in the whole world its called Waterfalls : Indian Tapas Bar, and I have to say it wasnt bad, I had butter chicken with some basmati rice and i did enjoy it but the name of the restaurant has tapas bar in it, so going there I was expecting to recieve a tapas menu as well....THERE WAS NO TAPAS...so that kind of put me on a slump in my chair...but all in all i did really enjoy my butter chicken and would go back !!!

brandy poached pears in a caramel tuille

dark chocolate mousse on a lemon short bread cookie

jerk chicken

sweet,hot and smokey BBQ brisket

jerk chicken, brisket and tofu skewers

curry turkey burgers with apple and cranberry chutney and milk bread buns

roasted carrot and ginger soup

avacado, tomato, sweet baby shrimp and horseradish shooters

pasta shells stuffed with tomato, basil and goats cheese

spinach, blood orange and pine nut salad

asparagus, pecarino salad with a white truffle and taragon vinager dressing

milk bread

just some of the bread i make at work this is our focaccia, we go through about 2 trays a night :

Butter chicken at Waterfalls: Indian Tapas Bar

Happy World Schizophrenia Day - lets help understand this disease and spread some education!! its time to kick this disease in the BUTT