Marion Kane: Food Sleuth®

Apples of My Eye

For me, fall means food fresh from the tree or field. In particular, it usually entails a visit the St. Lawrence Valley – the tiny village of Brinston an hour’s drive south of Ottawa, to be exact – to visit my nanny Evelyn Smail and to savour apple season at its peak.

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This is rich farm country and Evelyn has lived here for all of her 80 years minus the 18 months as a teenager when she came to look after me as a baby in Montreal.

A widow now and sometimes in frail health, she relishes my visits and always has something or someone new to show me. Read more…

My Kleftiko Coup

Whenever I cross the ocean to visit my mother in her lovely North-West London neighbourhood of Primrose Hill, we set out for dinner on our first or second night together to the wondrous nearby Greek restaurant called Limonia. Always packed, it is a local favourite with celebs and regular folk alike.

Often I order fish, souvlaki or lamb in some shape or form. The food is always good, the ambience comfortably elegant and the welcome warm. It’s a ritual dear to my heart.

On our last visit, I suddenly remembered my late dad’s favourite Limonia dish called Kleftiko: a Greek tradition that was originally made by baking lamb secretly under the ground so the cooks in question would not be attacked by their enemies. Read more…

Dim and Then Sum

Having grown up in a family that refused to stay put, I’ve spent much of my adult life trying to put down roots. I found them in an instant when I walked into Toronto’s feisty, colourful and inimitable Kensington Market one sunny day in the late 1970s and knew immediately that this was home. Its ethnic mix, Jewish history and cheaply cheerful warmth proved irresistible and I lived happily in the heart of this wonderful place for more than 25 years, nearly all of them in the same house on Augusta Ave. facing a lively park.

Once you’re considered part of the Kensington family, there’s no looking back. A foodie through and through, I was in the right ‘nabe to pursue my passion. Read more…

Roasts with the Most

You know those magical moments in cooking – when you put something together, almost haphazardly, and it turns out to be sublime.

That happened to me recently when a friend came over to cook dinner at my house using the contents of my fridge as our guide – possibly my favourite way to spend time.

I’d just bought a large, good-looking cauliflower at my local supermarket that we decided to roast and eat along with some leftover chicken in its own gravy, baby boiled potatoes and a big salad. Frequent visits were made to my deck to pluck fresh herbs for adding to a dish where applicable. Read more…

Beloved Bistro

As a longtime food writer and one-time restaurant critic, I dread the oft-asked question:

“Which is your favourite restaurant?”

My usual response to this query about Toronto, my former home of 30 years (these days, the same info is asked of Stratford, Ont., where I now live – more of that in a future blog) is to request that the person name a category: high-end or cheap and cheerful, ethnicity of food, area of town etc. etc. Even then, as I rifle through my virtual restaurant rolodex, I’m often stumped. Read more…

My Favourite Pho

I’ve been eating that delicious Vietnamese soup called pho (pronounced feu) for at least 10 years, mostly at one of my favourite Vietnamese restaurants in the heart of downtown Chinatown: Sai Gon Palace, 454 Spadina Ave. just south of College.

Recently, I had a Calvin Trillin moment at this popular, spacious no-frills eatery with the semi-open kitchen. A creature of habit, I am a regular here with a regular menu choice.

On this day, however, Trillin’s sage advice about checking out what others, especially Asian diners, are eating in an Asian restaurant came to mind. As I was about to order my usual #1 – a big bowl of broth filled with thick rice noodles, beansprouts, rare and well-done beef slivers, beef tendon, tripe and beef balls – I noticed a man at the next table enjoying a thick soup I’d never seen before. “What is he having?” I whispered to the waitress who was about to order me the tried-and-true #1 without my asking for it. “#21,” she replied succinctly. “I’ll take that,” was my adventurous comeback. Read more…

Marion Kane, Food Sleuth®

Marion Kane has been a leader in the world of food journalism for a few decades. She is an intrepid populist whose work combines social commentary with a consuming passion for all things culinary. For 18 years, she was food editor/columnist for Canada's largest newspaper: the Toronto Star. She lives in Toronto's colourful Kensington Market and is currently a free-wheeling freelance food sleuth®, podcaster, writer and cook.

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