Eating Our Way Through Victoria… Tea Time!

Hi Folks:

In a couple of previous ‘Food‘ posts we’ve discussed some of our favourite coffee shops in and around Victoria.  We thought we’d switch that up a bit and talk about tea instead.

1) Murchie’s Tea and Coffee: Murchie’s has been an icon in Victoria for somewhere around a century.  Located on Government Street, it’s a short walk from the Inner Harbour, and a ‘must stop’ location on many visitors’ agendas.  Murchie’s has a seating capacity of 110, and in addition to fine teas and coffees they have a wonderful lunch menu and many different choices for desserts or accompaniments to ‘afternoon tea’.  There’s also a large shop with loose teas, coffees, spices, teapots, coffeemakers, cups, saucers, kitchenware and more.  The ‘tea rooms’ at the top of the stairs also feature work by local artists.  If you’ve walked out of Munro’s Books (just up the street) with a package under your arm, this is a great place to sit and flip through your purchase! Continue Reading →

Eating Our Way Through Victoria… Pumpkin Time!

Hello Dear Reader!

Well, we’ve had a few culinary adventures to share with you this month.

Before we get to that, however, earlier this month Marcia went out to dinner with the folks she works with at a restaurant downtown.  She ordered the equivalent salad to the one we’d shared at Café Brio last month; in her estimation there was no comparison.  Café Brio was far superior.  She found the service at this restaurant was good but the restaurant was somewhat dark and the food overly salty, so in keeping with our only ‘rule’ about our food posts we’re not going to mention them – at least until we have a second opportunity to try dinner there.  Café Brio we recommend without hesitation!  Actually, we planned to go back there this month, but plans changed. Continue Reading →

Eating Our Way Through Victoria… Café Brio

Hello, Dear Reader:

If you’ve read our other ‘Food‘ blogs you’ll know that we both have some background in the hospitality industry. We’ve also travelled extensively (both individually and together) over the years, and when one has gotten used to eating in restaurants day in and day out for months at a time, the novelty wears off very quickly. Having said that, we both enjoy a really good restaurant, and a few weeks back we realized that we had yet to discover Victoria’s ‘signature‘ restaurant. In other places we’ve lived we’ve found that there is usually one place, sometimes a very few, that we come to associate with that particular area. When we lived in Ontario, for example, Ottawa’s signature restaurant was Chef Pierre. In Kingston it was Mino’s. In Toronto there was Penelope’s and The Old Mill. We’ve tried some good and very good restaurants in Victoria (and one we chose not to write about), but so far, nothing really defining. For us a signature restaurant is about more than just the food; it’s about the ‘experience‘. Good food is a given, but there are a few restaurants that, for various reasons really go above and beyond in providing a combination of wonderful tastes, presentation, exemplary service, ambience and an excellent overall evening. Continue Reading →

Photo of the Month

Hi Folks:

Well, September descends upon us tomorrow – back to school for those who are so inclined, and the end of summer vacation for most.  On this last day of August I had a look through Lightroom to see that I made nearly a thousand images this month.  In the digital age there are many who make a thousand images a day, but I’m still from the film era, where I would get a dozen images from one roll of 120 film.  Anyway…

I’ve put a lot of thought into what to make my ‘photo of the month’ for August.  We had family visiting at the beginning of August, and while I made several ‘tourist’ shots, I’m not a people photographer at heart.  We went to two different car shows this month and there were some good prospects there, but I profiled an image of an automobile last month.

I met some old friends for lunch today as they passed through town, and in explaining to them what we like about Victoria I mentioned that this is largely a city of villages, each one unique, and yet forming a coherent whole.  We haven’t been everywhere in Victoria yet, not by a long shot, but of the various places we have toured Oak Bay is my favourite.  While a separate municipality from the city of Victoria proper they are adjunct, with Oak Bay covering the city’s southeastern shore.  From our walks there we’ve found that Oak Bay has a sense of neighbourhood and community that we really like.  To that end I thought I’d use one of my Oak Bay images for this month’s selection. Continue Reading →

Eating Our Way Through Victoria – Literally

Hello, Dear Reader!

August seems to be harvest time here on the island.  Last month we wrote about some of the farmer’s markets in the area, and we’ve been adding to our food cache by eating the many fruits that are ripe and ready as we wander the roads and trails around Victoria.  Himalayan blackberries are unfortunately highly invasive around here, and so (strictly as a means of suppressing their spread, you understand) we’ve been collecting and eating their berries by the bowlful.  The canes do have quite persistent thorns, however, and don’t give up their crop easily, as our scratches can attest!  We’ve also been fortunate to find some tayberries, and in one spot a few loganberries that we simply couldn’t pass up.  We’ve also found some semi-wild apples, and if our neighbour’s pear tree would only grow a little more over the fence… oh well.

But enough about that.  We were fortunate also this month to have family come for a visit, and they’re big fans of Korean food.  Although we’ve sampled various Chinese cuisines as well as Japanese and Thai food, we’d never been to a Korean restaurant.  We ended up at the Korean Gardens (3945 Quadra St. in Saanich, just south of McKenzie).  Actually, our nephew-in-law did a wonderful review of the restaurant, so we’re just going to copy what he said here:

“After reading some of the negative reviews we were hesitant to visit the Korean Gardens restaurant. In fact, we first tried to find a Korean restaurant downtown instead based on those reviews. Luckily that restaurant was no longer in business and a hunger for Korean food drove us to the Korean Gardens.

Contrary to what others have experienced, the waitresses were prompt, yet patient, as we navigated the menu looking for dishes similar to those we were familiar with from other Korean restaurants. Once ordered, food began arriving quickly. The food tasted great, and the size of the dishes was average for this type of cuisine. All through the meal the service remained superb. It’s a rare restaurant where the staff will go out of their way to make a two year old, our son in this case, feel at home.”

It’s a restaurant we look forward to visiting again.  We also had the opportunity to have breakfast out at Floyd’s Diner earlier this week; we wrote about Floyd’s in our first ‘Food’ post.  The experience was wonderful, as always, and we maintain that the servers there give the best hugs in town.

Enjoy!

M&M

P.S. You can read more of our Food posts and restaurant reviews here.

Photo of the Month

Hi Folks:

Last day of the month, and that means it’s time for me to sort through the images I’ve made this past month and pick my favourite. I’ve actually started working on a book of photographs (details will surface somewhere down the road when I get closer to my goal), and part of that means going through, sorting out and editing about a thousand images in Lightroom so that’s been taking up a lot of my time. Continue Reading →

Photo of the Month – Butterflies

Hi Folks:

Well, it’s a little late in the day but it’s still the last day of the month, and time for my ‘Photo of the Month’.  Each month I pick my favourite image of the past month, although lately it’s often been more than one image.  Most of my work involves landscapes, but sometimes I also stray into macro work.  My dedicated macro equipment is in storage at the moment, but I have enough to get me through temporarily.  I found two new (to me) species of butterflies this month.  The first is an Anise Swallowtail, seen up on the top of Christmas Hill in the Swan Lake/ Christmas Hill Nature Sanctuary.  The second is a Lorquin’s Admiral I found at the Oak Bay Native Plant Garden.  I trust you’ll enjoy them as much as I do. Continue Reading →

Eating Our Way Through Victoria – To Market, To Market!

Hi Folks:

In our last several ‘Food‘ posts we’ve discussed our adventures at several of Victoria’s restaurants, from the humble coffee shop to the Bengal Lounge at the Fairmont Empress Hotel.  There are still many more fine dining establishments to visit, but it’s summertime and in summer one’s thoughts turn to picnics and backyard barbecues.  There are quite a number of markets that pop up in the Greater Victoria area (from Sidney to Sooke), on up the island to Duncan, Nanaimo and points north and also out into the Gulf Islands, but since we live in this ‘City of Gardens’ we’ll refine our discussion to the ones down here in the south (at least for this post… 😉 ).  We haven’t been to all of the markets here yet, but virtually all of them share one common theme: one must make it, bake it or grow it in order to sell it.  Eating local food is definitely a ‘green’ choice, but there’s a different feel, a different energy to local markets.  One connects directly with those who are providing their wares, and each bunch of carrots, each loaf of bread and each link of sausages have a history.  There’s also a more direct sense of community, and we appreciate that.

So, starting from the north and working south and west, here are at least some of the markets you can discover for yourself.  If you know of others, please feel free to leave us a comment below! Continue Reading →

Photo of the Month: Signs

Hi Folks:  It’s the last day of the month, and that means it’s time for me to select my favourite image for this past month.  I’m still processing images from April at the moment, so I’m a bit behind; fortunately Lightroom is patient with me.

Although I mostly make photographs of landscapes/ scenery, as I walk around I also keep an eye out for signs that strike me as being funny, irreverent, or sometimes just a little bit odd.  I’m not the only one; Ellen Degeneres sometimes profiles such images on her show (according to Marcia).  Anyway, I thought I’d show one of those images as this month’s photo.  As an image it’s not great, but I like to think the message is cute.  Read the signs and you’ll see what I mean.  I wonder if there’s an interconnecting door?

Before and After

Before and After

Now go out and make some photographs!

Mike.

P.S.  You can see some more of my ‘Signs’ images on our Flickr site (although not all of them fit into the above categories).

Being Green – Cost/Benefit Analysis

Hi Folks:

Friday once again…  Before I get started on today’s ‘Being Green‘ post I thought I’d take a second for a little shameless self-promotion.  Marcia and I write on a variety of topics, as you can see from the columns on the left side of the page.  In addition to Friday’s  post, on Mondays Marcia does a ‘Marcia’s Meanderings‘ segment, on Wednesdays she writes her ‘Poetry Corner‘, and on Sundays we both write on a shared topic in our ‘He Says, She Says…‘ posts.  There are also sections on food, photography, random items, spirituality, and at the top of the page you’ll find links to some of our short stories and other creative writings.  Okay, that’s all the ‘advertising’ you’re going to get here, so on with the show!

Okay, the title for this week’s post is ‘Cost/Benefit Analysis’, and it has several sources for its inspiration.  In some Native societies there’s an idea of the ‘seventh generation’ – that we must plan our actions now for how they will affect the earth seven generations from now.  In a world run by politicians we tend to think in four-year terms instead, knowing that a new candidate or a new government can overturn much of what’s previously been done .  If the world were run by accountants, everything would have a margin of profit or loss and everything would be measured in terms of whether or not a specific product or activity made a profit.  We tend to apply such thinking to most if not all of what we do as a society. Continue Reading →