This week, we asked Donna Dooher, executive chef at Mildred’s Temple Kitchen, for her “breakthrough dish.” Dooher found this particular recipe for homemade ravioli in a 1967 edition of House & Garden’s New Cook Book. She was 14 years old.
Since its launch five years ago, we’ve come to rely on lady lifestyle website She Does The City as a sort of online bible. From sex advice to guiding us to the best parties to profiling inspiring career women, it’s a one-stop shop. It’s the type of website we needed when we were teens. These days, with the demise of such Canadian teen publications as Fashion 18 and Teen Flare, we tend to wonder where the super-savvy new generation is sourcing its online information.
In the short while that chef Matthew Sullivan was at Maléna, he revitalized the menu with some ambitious cooking and some of the best ingredients Ontario has to offer. It wasn’t long before owners made him executive chef at their other restaurant, L’Unità, as well. But just a few months after unveiling his first new menu at Maléna, Sullivan has informed us that he’s no longer affiliated with either restaurant, and is currently planning on resurrecting his pop-up concept, Boxed.
Try something different to usher in the Year of the Dragon by taking in Roland Schimmelpfennig’s spicy concoction of a play about a Chinese restaurant’s kitchen staff that is hiding a young illegal immigrant.
Tarragon Theatre, 30 Bridgman Avenue, 416-531-1827. Jan. 18 – Feb. 19.
After a tirade of construction deterred many from heading to Toronto’s Polish village for, oh, almost forever, this west end ‘hood is now enjoying quite the revival. With many plenty of new businesses rearing their heads (with the exception of one landmark bakery shuttering after 39 years), Roncy is becoming a destination, featuring a great medley of boutiques and eateries. Below, some of the strip’s best shops.
Do you love show tunes? Can’t help but sing along with the radio? Do you ever wish that real life included spontaneous dance numbers? No? Well, for three nights this February, anyone who said yes will be closed up together in a dark room when Sing-a-long-a Grease comes to the TIFF Bell Lightbox.
As of next Monday, if you want to order a small coffee at Tim Hortons, you will have to order an “extra” small. The medium coffee we once knew will become the new small. Large will officially become medium and the extra large will become large. All of this is to make way for the new extra large — a 24 oz. cup. Confused yet? We are.
Here’s the bad news: Niagara Street Café has been put up for sale, and its future is uncertain. The good news is that owner Anton Potvin will be bidding the place goodbye with a bit of a flourish. He’s recruited the esteemed Steve Gonzales, a Top Chef Canada contestant and the former chef de cuisine at Origin, to temporarily take over the kitchen starting Feb. 1.
“It’s time to get my ass kicked by a Canadian winter,” comedian Demetri Martin says of his aptly titled tour, Telling Jokes in Cold Places. His first official tour of Canada includes a stop in Toronto tonight at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre. If his sweeping locks and nonchalant attitude aren’t enough to convince you to see the show, he’s also a very accomplished poet, creating a 224-word palindrome poem.
Have you ever wondered what might happen if the characters from Sesame Street actually grew up and moved away? Chances are, they would escape to Avenue Q, the block where humans mix with puppets and monsters. But instead of singing about numbers and letters, the residents here sing about Internet porn and how everyone’s a little bit racist.
Great Lake Swimmers are readying the release of their new album, New Wild Everywhere, set to be released on April 3. A new single, “Easy Come Easy Go,” is out and available for your listening pleasure. If the first song is evidence, the new album could be a great folk-rock record, with front man Tony Dekker sounding more confident and, dare I say, happy. A tour, including a June 2 date at Toronto’s Danforth Music Hall, is imminent, with red-hot singer Cold Specks pegged as the opening act.
Times are uncertain at Hostess Inc. Earlier this week, the company filed for bankruptcy protection, which begs the question: seriously, why aren’t people eating enough Twinkies? They’re sugary sweet and they fit in the palm of your hand. It’s even a fun word to say out loud. Say it: “Twin-kie.” Didn’t that feel nice?
