Why I Love Coconut Water

There has been a lot of buzz about coconut water in the past few years. Bottled coconut water in particular, has exploded onto our food scene and there are several different brands out there on our grocery store shelves right now. Coconut water helps to hydrate your body naturally, contains many natural minerals and nutrients your body needs to perform optimally, and contributes to overall health and wellness.

 

I've always loved the taste of coconut water. Before bottled coconut water was around, I would often buy young coconuts and attempt to open them before giving up and passing it to my HB to open. If you don’t know the proper way to open them (like me), it takes a lot of effort. Similar to opening an oyster, you have to know the proper technique.  But fresh coconut water is so delicious! It has a very mild taste with a slightly nutty flavor combined with a very light sweet and salty taste. 

In addition to the liquid inside a young, green coconut, I also enjoy the coconut meat. It's so soft that you can scoop it out with a spoon. 

After I drink this liquid, I'll scoop the white coconut meat out and devour it!

There are so many health benefits to coconut water. Here are just a few:

 

• It is packed with a lot of electrolytes, potassium, minerals and is very light on sugar so it is way more effective in hydrating your body than a sports drink
• It is low in calories, low in sodium, fat free and cholesterol free
• It has calcium, magnesium, zinc, iron, B-complex vitamins and vitamin C
• It is said to help with kidney cleansing, muscle performance, heart health, has anti-aging properties, and is a natural hangover cure
• It helps with the digestion process because of it's fibre content 
• It is often called “Natures sports drink” because of the enormous potassium content 

While I prefer to drink natural coconut water straight out of a young, green coconut, it’s not always convenient. If I were to bring one to work and start banging away with my clever knife, I’m sure I would get a lot of strange looks at minimum. So I’m really glad there are other options out there for coconut water.

 

I've tried several different brands and the one I always come back to is the O.N.E. Coconut Water brand because it resembles the natural one the most.  So delicious and refreshing!

Michelin Star Restaurants

To be awarded a Michelin Star is probably one of the highest honors a restaurant can receive. A dining establishment can be awarded 1, 2 or 3 Michelin Stars. The rule of thumb or meaning behind each star is as follows:

1 Michelin Star – A very good restaurant in it’s category

2 Michelin Stars – Excellent cooking, worth making a special trip to visit

3 Michelin Stars – Exceptional cooking, worth making a special journey specifically to visit this restaurant (i.e. Vancouver to San Sebastian, Spain )

Of course, describing a restaurant as ‘very good’ or ‘excellent’ does not do it justice as there are so few restaurants that are ever awarded a star, and this honor is only given to the elite dining establishments in the world. Typically, the criteria for awarding a star is determined by several factors including quality of the food, technique and skill used, consistency, originality and overall experience.

The Michelin Guide is a publication published by the French company, Michelin, and they have been around for over 100 years. They are the ones who determine which restaurants are awarded a star.  On a similar note, the Michelin company also determines whether a restaurant who has already earned a star or stars, can get a star taken away.   They employ a full time staff of anonymous restaurant reviewers who are known for their passion for food, their exceptional tasting palate, high attention to detail, their ability to articulate and describe food to an audience, and excellent memory and recall of their food experience. BTW, this would be my dream job!

These stars can be instrumental in determining the success and profitability of a restaurant.  For example, if you are a relatively unknown restaurant and then you are awarded a star one day, then the next day you can expect to see hundreds of people lining up outside your restaurant, food bloggers writing about the restaurant, and the press and media surrounding you.  Michelin starred chefs are like the rock star of the food world.

Japan leads the pack with the most 3 Michelin Star restaurants in the world.  France comes in second, followed by Germany .  To my knowledge, there are no Michelin Star restaurants in Canada but there are some in the United States with several restaurants concentrated in New York .

I’ve been fascinated by the whole concept of Michelin Stars and the restaurants that have been awarded them after watching a documentary on Netflix about this the other day.  Michelin starred chefs were interviewed in this documentary and it’s interesting to note that as much as one strives to earn a star, I didn’t think of the opposite side of this until now.  There is such a huge fear of getting a star taken away if you have already earned a star(s) so you constantly feel the pressure to produce at the top level that earned you a star.  It has been known that chefs will cry themselves to sleep if a star is taken away.

I also learned that there is a large team of staff working behind the scenes in the kitchen and they produce all these exceptional dishes with hard work and extreme dedication but they often work for free so they can learn from a Michelin starred chef. The dishes that come out of these restaurants are so creative, and each plate is given so much attention to it and the amount of detail is incredible. It is like each plate is a canvas and the food is the artwork and there is so much time spent on each plate.   Some of these exceptional restaurants may serve only a handful of customers each night, and reservations may need to be made several months, or even up to a year in advance.  This is not just a meal, it can also be a once in a lifetime experience.  A typical tasting menu may cost around $300 a person, but these restaurants really depend on the wine sales to make a profit.

On my bucket list of restaurants I would like to visit in my lifetime are:

1) Arzak and 2) Akelare, San Sebastian, Spain - San Sebastian is known to be one the top culinary destinations in the world with 3 of 5, 3 Michelin star restaurants in this location. These chef have the ability to think outside the box and bring the idea of what food is and can be to the next level.

3) Le Bernadin, New York– Chef Eric Ripert (not only is he handsome with his salt and pepper hair, but I’ve seen him on television with Anthony Bourdain and he is so charismatic, talented and passionate about what he does)

4) French Laundry, San Francisco and 5) Per Se, New York – Chef Thomas Keller (I do own his French Laundry cookbook and his recipes are extremely detailed and look very complicated and time consuming but you can tell the outcome will be outstanding)

I have only been to a Michelin Star restaurant once in my life and that was when I as in Seville , Spain.  It was at a restaurant called Abantal, Seville’s longest running Michelin starred restaurant, which serves spectacular Andalucian cuisine. I was blown away at the creativity and attention to detail given to every dish that I received and the taste of the food was phenomenal. Some dishes were so original that it confused and fascinated me at the same time.  To see a sharp contrast of how I thought something should be prepared and what it should taste like versus their interpretation of the dish in the complete opposite form was so interesting.

For example, I was given a cookie as part of my starter dish, thinking it was going to taste like a traditional cookie.  However, this was a chorizo cookie which had the same appearance of regular cookie, but the savory taste totally made me rethink what a cookie could be.

Here are just a few of my pictures from Abantal but pictures don't really do it justice:

Unfortunately, combining a full day of site seeing, a bottle of wine and the typical late night dinner you often see in Europe equates to extreme exhaustion by the end of a long meal.  The takeaway from this experience going forward is that on the day I have a dinner reservation at a Michelin Star restaurant, I will take it easy and perhaps even take an afternoon nap so I can enjoy my dining experience to the fullest and be wide awake at the same time!

Bacon

I just can’t seem to get away from bacon!  Bacon is everywhere and it’s been the 'cool' and 'it' ingredient for a few years now.  I don’t know if bacon-with-everything is just a food trend or if it is here to stay for the long term but I do know that it is doing no favors for my waistline.  Whatever happened to those days when bacon would just be a breakfast side with eggs or pancakes? Or just be inside 2 slices of toasted bread with tomatoes and lettuce?  Now bacon has been used in such creative ways that it can be incorporated into almost anything.

Let me give you an example of how much bacon has consumed my life.

I was craving a donut one day and noticed they had maple bacon donuts on the menu, so how could I say resist…

I ordered a Caesar drink expecting it to come with just a traditional stalk of celery but they added bacon to it!

I was looking at jam and marmalade at the grocery store and look what happened to be calling my name...

I went to a fundraiser one afternoon, and they were serving bacon popsicles…

The same fundraiser also served good old fashioned bacon with maple syrup as finger food...

Then I saw this...

There is bacon salt, bacon vodka, bacon mayonnaise, bacon chocolate, bacon olive oil, bacon jam, bacon ice cream and I could go on and on. They even have food events and food menus revolved around bacon where they really pay tribute to the term ‘Everything tastes better with bacon!’

I honestly think bacon-with-everything is here to stay for good so if that's the case, that's fine with me because I have already made it part of my regular diet.  Maybe the next thing will be maple bacon syrup for my pancakes...

Gooseneck Barnacles

Do not be frightened!  No, I did not go on the Jurassic Park movie set and take a bunch of dinosaur toe and dinosaur finger props from the set. These are fresh and local gooseneck barnacles! Say what?

Gooseneck barnacles are a rare delicacy. These odd looking sea crustaceans are named because they are shaped like a gooseneck and live attached to hard surfaces of rocks in the ocean. Fisherman will go out to the sea and when it is low tide, and when the sea conditions are ideal, they will use a long and sharp hand tool to pry and remove the gooseneck barnacles from the rock.

You can only get them in certain regions of the world.  They are very popular in Spain and Portugal (also known as percebes) and in very high demand, therefore quite expensive. They are considered far superior to lobster and prawns. They are not as well known in North America (yet) however you can get them in some Western regions of the United States and Canada.  I didn’t know what a gooseneck barnacle was until about 2 years ago, when I was watching a travel food show on television and I was so intrigued by them when I saw someone eat one and he described it as ‘the taste of the sea.’   I have always wanted to try one and I missed my opportunity when I was in Spain.

However, I found out we have fresh gooseneck barnacles right here in BC! They are harvested in Vancouver Island and the season is very short. My HB had called a seafood wholesaler near Granville Island in advance to ask about whether a fresh shipment of gooseneck barnacles had come in.  They said yes and immediately he went to pick some up. This was finally our opportunity to try them!

 

The fresh shipment of gooseneck barnacles

Although they do not look very aesthetically pleasing and they do look a little obscene, I can also say that about a lot of other seafood that tastes delicious. What about geoduck, or oysters or uni (sea urchin) or razor clams? Not the prettiest thing to look at but they taste great.

You can eat these steamed or boiled. You then peel off the outer skin and you eat the meat inside. This is what the meat looks like below.

Ready to eat now 

I noticed that the smaller they are, the better they taste.  The smaller ones have a better texture and are sweeter in flavor. If I had to describe the taste, I have to agree and say it honestly tastes like the sea. A little salty from the sea water, sweet and succulent.  It has a unique flavor but it almost reminds me of a combination of geoduck, clam and lobster.  Many fine dining restaurants in Vancouver are offering these for a limited time on their menu so you can either get them fresh from the local fisherman, or go to a restaurant and have them prepared by the chef.  Enjoy!

Slow Food Part 3: Farm to Table Feast

If you are looking for a traditional, family style, farm-to-table Tuscan meal, I highly recommend Fattoria Poggio Alloro in San Gimignano.  This is a family run restaurant/farm/agriturismo where all of the ingredients for their restaurant are sourced from their farm.  Their fixed menu changes according to what is in season.

Dinner is served on a long, communal table so guests who visit from all over the world can eat together, family style.  On Saturday nights, they serve their famous Florentine steak (also known as Bistecca alla Fiorentina). In the summer or when the weather is warm, tables are set up outside on the terrace so guests can enjoy the beautiful view of San Gimignano while enjoying their dinner, and even observe the beautiful sunset. In the winter months or when it is raining outside, long tables are set up inside in a cozy environment with a fireplace.

View of the town centre from the restaurant

We had made reservations to Fattoria Poggio Alloro about 2 weeks in advance for their famous Saturday night  dinner and we were anxious to try to the Florentine steak, the star dish of the night.  True Florentine steak is made from Chianina cattle, is cut very thick (typically four fingers high), and one steak can weigh more than 2 pounds.  It is cooked rare because Chianina meat tastes best served this way, and not over cooked.

We were one of the first people to arrive so we picked a table near one side of the wall and sat down across from each other.  A few minutes later, the room started to fill up and we got to know the people sitting next to us which we would eventually enjoy the evening dinner with.  We took turns telling one another what brought us to Tuscany . Two of the ladies were from Montreal and were best friends since kindergarten so this was their girl’s trip away together. We also met 2 guys who were from Germany and they were here for the Mille Miglia Thousand Miles race car event in San Gimignano. This is a huge event and people from all over the world will come to watch this event. On the other side of us was a large extended family from Italy, who I assumed were related to the owners of the restaurant based on the way they interacted with one another.

It was a lively environment and you could feel the room buzzing with excitement. Wine was served almost immediately. They brought out several bottles of their own wine from their farm to start with.  This would eventually be replenished over and over throughout the evening to the point where I lost count.  It felt like a truly authentic dining experience knowing almost everything we had that evening including the wine, olive oil, and food was made directly from them and came from their farm. Even the cows for the Florentine steak were raised on the farm and the grains used for making the bread and pasta we were served was from their farm, so it truly was a farm to table feast!

We didn’t wait too long for the food, probably because there were so many dishes to serve throughout the evening.  One dish was served at a time rather than everything being brought out at once, so when we finished one course, then another was served, and then another and it seemed endless.  The food was sooooo good! Some of the dishes served included:

Chicken liver parfait on homemade biscuits

Fresh tomato basil crostini

Charcuterie platter

My favorite - wild mushrooms on top of fried polenta

Tuscan sausage and cheese crostini

Cavatappi with a light cream and Parmesan cheese sauce

Our Florentine steak!!!

Four hours and several glasses of wine and 9 dishes later, it hit me… I might be too full to eat dessert! But as soon as I saw the dessert come out, I had to at least try it.

Tuscan apricot crostata

Vin santo wine with cantuccini cookies

Ending the evening with a glass of Limoncello and Grappa!

Fattoria Poggio Alloro is so charming and there is so much history, that there is even a book written about it by Sarah Fioroni called 'A Family Farm in Tuscany.' Sarah is the manager of her family farm and she writes wonderful stories about it, what life is like on it, and breaks it down on a month to month basis where she describes what is in season each month.  If you visit the restaurant, you can see if Sarah is working and purchase the book from her directly and speak to her in person.  That is what we did and she is such a pleasure to talk to. We took home a wonderful souvenir from the evening along with several delicious recipes that are in the book!

Slow Food Part 2: Cooking Class in Tuscany

I was so excited to be taking a cooking class with my HB in Tuscany! Before we even left Vancouver, I had visions in my head of what this experience would be like. I imagined that I would be in some rustic farmhouse overlooking the beautiful rolling hills, with castles, cypress trees and wineries surrounding me. I would be in a room full of other students from all over the world who were eager to learn traditional Italian cooking techniques from the instructor. Then suddenly Mario Batali would appear and announce that he would be our instructor for the day! The class would go at a leisurely pace and we would be drinking wine and eating cheese and laughing with Mario, in between making our dishes.  I would become an expert pasta maker, and know how to cure my own meats and make cheese after that class….Well, not quite… the fantasy versus the reality version were a little different. 

We drove from Montalcino, a beautiful Tuscan hill town known for their famous Brunello wine, to San Gimignano where our cooking class was going to be held. 

Our hotel in Montalcino where we stayed for 3 nights

The beautiful view of Montalcino from our hotel

The average driving time to reach our destination was estimated to be about 1.5 hours. We set our GPS to Agriturismo Guardestelle, the place in San Gimignano where our cooking class was going to be held and we were all set to go!

Look at the beautiful scenery surrounding us on our drive there!

The class was scheduled to start at 3 pm. It was a beautiful, sunny afternoon and the weather was textbook perfect that day and there wasn’t a cloud in the blue sky.  We were chatting away in the car and were in great spirits.    We didn't realize how fast time was going because we were talking and laughing in the car and enjoying the scenery.  Suddenly we noticed a sign that said ‘ Florence ahead’ with an arrow pointing to the left.  Florence is about an hour past San Gimignano and then it hit us.  Our GPS had froze and we didn’t realize it until we drove way past our destination. Yikes!  We quickly turned around and drove back to San Gimignano. It's funny because if this happened in my normal environment back at home, I would be very stressed and frantic.   However, being in Tuscany brought a sense of calm and peace, and being stressed and frantic goes against the philosophy of what the whole Tuscan experience is.  So we just laughed it off and said this experience would just be another funny story to bring back home with us.

When we arrived to Agriturismo Guardestelle, we got out of our car, took a deep breath of fresh air, and stopped for a minute to stare at our surroundings.  I can’t say enough about Guardestelle. It is consistently rated one of the best places to stay in San Gimignano on Trip Advisor and I completely understand why.  We stayed there for 4 nights after Montalcino.

Agriturismo Guardestelle - our cooking class was upstairs by the balcony

Just outside Guardestelle

We then walked into the class and luckily, we were only 20 minutes late.  We introduced ourselves to our 4 other cooking colleagues who were from England and Eastern Canada and the cooking instructor, Nicole.  She was fantastic!

The first thing we made was a nice arrabbiata sauce for the pasta we would be making later. We chopped up locally grown, organic red onions and Italian pancetta. I learned that you can actually eat pancetta raw over there so everyone tried a piece although we hesitated at first.  None of us had tried raw pancetta and it actually tasted pretty good raw.  We then fried up the pancetta and onions on the stove, and added a simple tomato sauce to the mixture along with some Tuscan spices.   Using fresh, locally sourced ingredients, it was all so simple.

Nicole showing me the proper way to chop the pancetta using the ulu knife

The finished arrabbiata sauce

The next dish we made was a leek cream sauce for another pasta dish. We chopped the organic leaks and added cream to the pan. Italian cream tastes different then the cream I am accustomed to back home and it is much thicker in consistency. Right before serving, we would then sprinkle walnuts to the dish.

Italian cream - it almost looks as thick as  Devonshire clotted cream

The finished leek cream sauce 

Making pasta the traditional way was very labor intensive. It was the most challenging part of the cooking class but also the part I enjoyed the most (aside from eating and drinking all that wine).  You had to knead the dough a particular way and had to master the technique to make the pasta properly.  I learned that the proper technique was to push down on the dough ball and away from you with the palm of your hand.   It had to be repeated over and over by folding the dough over on itself in a 90 degree angle, and pushing down and away again until the dough was smooth. This is actually much harder than it appears. It took most of us a while to learn the technique but eventually we all learned to do it the proper way.

The perfect dough ball!

We made 2 types of pasta noodles, pici senesi noodles and tagliatelle all'uovo noodles. This is where I truly understood what Slow Food was! Look at these beautiful pici pasta noodles.  These pici noodles were made with durum wheat semolina and water and each pici noodle was rolled by hand. Yes, each individual noodle was given so much love and attention and was the product of our very own hands.  There was no fancy machine we used to make these noodles so all 6 of us rolled hundreds of noodles with our own 2 hands. The technique is to pinch a little dough and roll it on a flat surface under the palm of your hands, pulling outwards into a spaghetti like shape.

Pici senesi noodles that I rolled myself!

I lost count after I rolled a hundred noodles.

The other pasta noodle we made was a tagliatelle all'uovo noodle which is made with durum wheat flour and egg.   These noodles however, were made using a pasta maker.

By that time, I looked at my watch and 4 hours had gone by. We were having so much fun laughing, talking, chopping, and drinking wine that we only noticed the time from our stomachs growling from hunger.  Nicole had brought in some jams that she made herself, and had cut up a variety of cheese and we took a well needed break.  

Sitting and enjoying the moment with a nice glass of white wine, cheese and homemade jam

That recharged us for our next dish which was our antipasto or starter, Crostone Stacchino and Salsiccia, and also tuna and capers stuffed tomatoes.  

Made with stracchino cheese and Tuscan sausage. Stracchino cheese is a cow's milk cheese from Italy which is eaten very young, and is very soft and creamy.

My favorite dish was by far the pici noodles in arrabbiata sauce.  I devoured my whole dish while HB could only finish half of his.  Our cooking colleague, MK, looked over at HB and started eyeing his unfinished pici dish. He asked him if he was going to finish it.  (Translation: the leftovers in your dish equates to 10 minutes of labor and hard work so it must not go to waste).  After HB said he was stuffed and couldn’t eat anymore,  MK asked if he could finish it because it was so delicious and he polished it off in minutes.

By the time our cooking class and dinner ended, it was already midnight and I have to say that the reality version of this experience was much better than the fantasy version.