Three guesses to what those adjectives described. If you guessed wine, no prize for you. It’s a different type of tasting that I attended on Monday evening.

I am referring to a fruit product. I’m talking olive oil. Not a fan of olives – though in my lifetime I’m determined to find an olive that I like -  I’m big on olive oil. I know, it’s kind of like saying that I like apple juice but not apples, but there is a big flavour distinction for me. Also, a big part of my olive aversion is the smell. I hold my breath as I stride past the antipasti section.

Olive oil, however, is one of my favourite ingredients. Complex with fruity and peppery notes, it’s also my favourite colour (green, that is, not specifically olive). It excited me, then, to get invited to a preview event for Full Moon and Oro San Carlos, two new Spanish olive oils.

Full Moon is made from arbequina olives grown in family-owned orchards located in the region of Extremadura, Spain. Not just a catchy product name, the arbequina olives that make it into every bottle of Full Moon are picked during the full moon in September or October. In 2009, the first year of production, this occurred on October 4 at 6:00am.

The idea behind picking at this time is that this is when the olives are sufficiently ripe, yet green enough, for the ideal aroma and flavour. Picking too early results in an oil with an aggressive, pepper flavour. Olives for this oil are fully crushed and pressed within one hour of picking. Within two hours, the oil is stored in oxygen-inert stainless steel tanks for peak freshness.  I learned that this particular olive crop (October 2009) escaped being damaged by bad rain storms that occurred later in the growing season.

Full Moon was the feature of the evening. After we held the small cups of oil in our hands to warm it up a bit, we were told to take a sip, roll it around in our mouths, then swallow.

Tasting notes: Tomato, green fruit, nutty, fruity, green grapes. Soft and smooth, sweet and delicate. Until this tasting event I never noticed how prevalent tomato-like flavour is in olive oil. This was the mildest oil of the evening.

We didn’t taste every one on that placemat, but we did try 5.

Oro San Carlos is a coupage (blend) of arbequina and cornicabra olives released in 2009. It is ideal for seasoning salads and a variety of dishes as a beautiful finishing oil.

Scent: Green, apple. Taste: Leafy with a peppery finish. The promo material describes the flavour profile as such: apple, fresh cut grass, ripe banana, and citrus – a splendid balance between fruit and pepper with a long, memorable finish. I got butter.

The third variety of olive oil sampled, Dauro, is a coupage of Spanish Arbequina, Greek Koroneiki and Spanish Hojiblanca. Each variety contributes different characteristics as grape varietals do for wine.

This oil intrigues me because the producer manages its groves under Integrated Crop Production guidelines based on ecological principles and biotechnology. Tree prunings are used as fertilizer, flowering grass covers attract beneficial insects, natural bacterial target specific pests, and hormone traps reduce pest populations.  This reminds me of the practices that I saw at the Cutting Veg farm last fall. Read more about Duaro’s practices here and here (both links are to PDF documents).

Duaro has a bitter finish. It tasted of tomato, and greens. I noticed that it was cloudier than the others and upon inquiring, learned that it was unfiltered. This isn’t a good or bad thing, just different.

For the final two, we tasted Ame and Rincon.

Ame is a multicultural blend (I say that oily-tongue-in-slick-cheek): Greek Koroneiki, Portuguese Cobrancosa, Spanish Arbequina and Italian Frantoi. Deep green and grassy, it has notes of citrus and melon with a peppery finish. It feels more viscous in the mouth (I just pulled “viscosity” from my memory of grade 7 science class. though it sounds like promo material language). It’s a delicious oil with a soft kick.  Not yet available for sale in Canada.

With over 65 awards, Organic Rincon is the second most expensive of the oils sampled.  It’s made with Spanish hojiblanca olives, also found in Duaro. I found that it smelled grassy, green and citrusy. It tasted of tomato and herbs. I imagined it to be a good finishing oil. A drizzle could enhance a dish.

Now that I’ve waned and waxed, back to the Full Moon, picked during a full moon: Is it worth it? Is it a gimmick? Well, it’s probably a gimmick. It’s a tasty one, something to experience and something worth having if you’re an olive oil aficionado. It won’t change your life even if you are an epicure.

It’s also certainly not Rachel Ray’s EVOO.

Both Full Moon and Oro San Carlos will be available at Pantry beginning in the next couple of weeks. Call for availability.

Spanish food expert Lola Csullog-Fernandez hosted the preview at her fine food store, Pimentón, on Mount Pleasant near Eglinton (Toronto). She also provided tapas* accompanied by Spanish wine. Csullog-Fernandez and her chef conceived seven types of tapas, some of which used Gasull and Oro de San Carlos olive oils. Lifford Wine Agency provided Spanish wines. I could list the tapas and provide tasting notes but in the interest of space, here are a few of my favourites:

• Lamb meatballs with membrillo Oro de San Carlos Alioli (that means alioli, or aioli, with quince and olive oil),
• Salchichón Inbérico popcorn croquetas (basically sausage croquettes)
• Deep fried pimentón chickpeas, which were crunchy, salty and sweet; the ultimate TV snack food.

The sausage, Salchichón & Chorizo Ibérico Fermín, was a big hit. Both are made from the famous black Ibérico pig unique to Spain. See Pimentón‘s home page under “new products”  for descriptions (no, really, read it).

*(If you’ve seen season 1 of the British TV Show the IT Crowd the word “tapas” might make you giggle with recollection of Moss and Jen’s discussion of how to pronounce it.)

The wine I especially liked was the Telmo Rodriquez Basa, with it’s clean, crisp, melon, lemon taste that was almost like juice. I had a couple of nice reds too. If I recall correctly, Joel of blog Get the Foodie 411 raved about the Gazur.

On a final note, I kind of got busted at the tasting: Two people approached me and said (in some way or another), “So I guess you’re not doing Meghan’s Low GI program…” I was actually thinking of doing it on my own next week during Passover when I’ll be light on the carbs anyway. Meghan, if you’re reading this: You appear to have spies everywhere.

More photos to follow.

Other people’s posts about the Full Moon preview*:

• Olives and grapes, who knew they were similar?: Get the Foodie 411
• Olive Oil Tasting at Pimenton: Mark and Stacey of Tasting Toronto
• Full Moon Olive Oil Tasting: Food with Legs.
• The Spanish EVOOlution: Greg Bolton, Good Food Revolution (I revolt against the pun, Greg.)
• Full Moon Fever: Tod Stewart of Tidings Magazine

*For the record, I avoid reading other people’s reviews before writing my own – though sometimes I refer to them during my final edit for fact-checking purposes – because I don’t want them to influence me.

Related recent news:

Just how pure is that extra-virgin olive oil in your kitchen? – National Post

Being budget conscious I resisted temptation to order the “Fixed Flight of Ontario VQA Wines”, a flight of 3 oz pairings + 1 oz of Henry of Pelham Late Harvest Riesling for dessert. $19 was steep – although I’m sure it was worth it. I’m a fan of Henry of Pelham and their Riesling and a couple of friends who know the family that owns and operates the winery have gotten me into their wine and their story (I had the pleasure of meeting Daniel Speck at last year’s Picnic at the Brickworks when my friend Kerri introduced us).

I ordered a glass of the Flat Rock Chardonnay 2007. It tasted nice and clean with hints of vanilla and apple and went really well with the amuse bouche – although I sipped it slowly to savour through all courses. I’m also a fan of Flat Rock’s line of “Twisted” wines.

The menu:

A bread basket of red fife whole wheat biscuits, petits pains, multi-grain rotis and butter rosettes.

Amuse Bouche: Ruby Beet, Swiss Chard and Goat Cheese Roulade with potato “hay” and pea tendrils.

Appetizer: Summer minestrone soup topped with arugula pesto.

Mains: Choice or “pork or pepper” [Imagine hearing the waitress ask that to each of 8 individuals sitting around the table. It reminded me of a game of "duck duck goose".] The pork: Roast Berkshire Port Loin– Caramelized shallot and apple cider jus. The pepper: Stuffed Red Peppers– Quinoa, pine nuts, apricots and chickpeas, baked with honey and balsamic vinegar, dusted with smoked almond Dukkah.

Sides: All mains were accompanied by crisp potato rosti and “Tian” of zucchini, tomato and herbs.

Dessert: Fresh Blueberry Tart with lemon cream and an edible flower garnish.

Amused:

The potato “hay” on the amuse bouche were crispy potatoes, lightly salted. Reminded me almost of a potato latke flavour. As far as I’m concerned there’s never anything wrong with crispy potatoes. The beet was moist and juicy, sweet, slightly tart from what I think was treatment with vinegar. The swiss chard was wonderfully earthy.

Souped:

The minestrone was a mixture of a tomato base with tomatoes, broccoli, onion, potato, cauliflower, carrots and green beans  topped with arugula pesto and a shredded mild cheese that I couldn’t identify. It gave me a warm fuzzy feeling.

Pepper, Pepper, Pepper, Pepper, PORK!

(In retrospect I should have gotten a photo of the pork. Maybe Sarah or Greg C. or Sheryl got one.)

I was lax on the notes here. I was the only one taking notes (how do the others do it when they blog about meals?) and was getting into the rhythm of conversation, a conversation that included the book and film Julie and Julia (Sheryl, as she’s posted many times, is not a fan of the book), cooking vs. watching cooking shows, the reality of cooking dishes from cookbooks written by current celebrity chefs, the place of the Food Network and Giada De Laurentiis’s rack (well, I’d have referred to it as a “rack” but Sheryl beat me to it with a similar comment while I was waiting my turn). Occasionally non-food topics arose. Foodie 411 at the end of the table was fairly quiet except for a couple of comments about farmer’s markets.

“Crunchy on top” was all I wrote in my notes and Sheryl and I discussed Dukkah. In the last couple of days I’d read reference to it in a post about almonds (I think on Serious Eats: Talk, someone questioning what to do with an abundance of almonds) but I didn’t know what Dukkah was (nor did I really know until right now when I grabbed the link). The dish was quite nice but I wasn’t in love with the potato rosti. There was a flavour that I couldn’t identify nor was pleased with. The vegetables were fresh and flavourful. I pushed aside the green stuff.

Homer was right: Purple IS a fruit… but it’s also a flower

Sarah said that I got the best flower

I liked the light, crispy crust with a slight chewiness and just a hint of oil.

Look at those berries!

Look at those luscious berries! They were juicy and plump. I was reminded of Violet Beauregarde of Charlie And The Chocolate Factory.

I got a lovely surprise when I bit into a piece of lemon zest and found that it was candied.  Crisp and sweet-tart!

The lemon cream was light and fluffy and the texture played well with the juicy berries and crispy crust but wasn’t the highlight and without it the dessert would have been just as good.

A good time was had. All the dishes were great, with most having some components that I liked better than others. The conversation was enjoyable. There were laughs and smiles and a toast. It was a really nice, comfortable evening.

I will go back for more. I’d been for their opening party where I got to speak with farmers and producers and had a lovely chat about food photography with one of the guys Seth from Forbes Wild Foods (I thought that I blogged it and put photos on Flickr, but can’t find either). It’s worth regular visits to see what the chef will do next, and possibly get some inspiration. I’d really like to check out more tastings. The challenge of course, is overcoming the mental barrier of spending the money. Heck, if I’m going to indulge in anything, it will be food. (My comic book graphic novel habit never took off due to financial priority.)

**

About Harvest Wednesdays

Harvest Wednesdays is a weekly event at the Gladstone Hotel. Some weeks offer a three course dinner (+ amuse bouche), some weeks is more of a cocktail party with hors d’oeuvres. Regardless, each week between July and October chef Marc Breton serves up fare made with the contents of that week’s fresh produce harvested and distributed by Chick-a-Biddy Acres CSA. As well, local meats, cheeses, wines and beers are used.Local ingredients are used in the meal as much as possible. To find out more, see the schedule and past menus and buy tickets go to the Gladstone Hotel’s website.

On Wednesday I attended the IACP (International Association of Culinary Professionals ) Toronto Grassroots Event, Sensory Adventure and Foodie Show & Tell, hosted by Arlene Stein and Dana McCauley.

Cheese from About Cheese

After some wine and schmoozing, Cole Snell from About Cheese started us out with a little presentation of cheese followed by a tasting. Liking what I was hearing while the cheeses were being presented, I turned to my friend David and joked (well, half joked) that I was having a “cheesegasm”. I enjoyed most of what I tasted but what stood out was the sweet butter (from Thunder Bay?), an aged cheddar, the Figaro and the Celtic Blue- if that’s the cheese I’m thinking of, brie-like with a blue vein.  There was no Red Leicester, Red Windsor, Camembert or Venezuelan Beaver Cheese (in case you didn’t pick up on it, that’s Monty Python’s Cheese Shop sketch).

I wish I’d taken notes because there was a lot of interesting information presented. For example, which cheese you’re not allowed to transport from Quebec to Ontario, artisan cheese makers in Ontario and Quebenc, and pasteurized milk cheeses vs. unpasteurized milk.

Charcuterie

Lots of cheese later, we were schooled on charcuterie by Mario Pingue of Niagara Specialty Meats (Pingue Prosciutti). In an article at Gremolata, Carlos Fuenmayor referrs to Pingue as the “go-to guy for local prosciutto”. Beautiful prosciutto was wrapped around thin bread sticks, and small rounds of three types of salami lay a plate. I didn’t take notes on the varieties, but there were two that I liked, one that I wasn’t crazy about. All three were better than those kosher salamis I ate as a child. Incidentally, I told someone about the prosciutto in an email yesterday and when it ran the spell check, Outlook didn’t recognize “prosciutto” and instead suggested “prostitute”.

Local, fresh ingredients

I had some great conversation and felt inspired. It was great to finally meet Arlene – who I’d exchanged emails with in the past – and Dana. Wish I’d had more time to talk to Dana but she had to fly off to Winnipeg for a day. Met and briefly chatted with Dana’s husband, chef Martin Kouprie of Pangea Restaurant. It’s one of those restaurants that’s close to where I live – about 4 blocks away – but I’ve never been. I guess I should now.

Also chatted with Peter of kalofagas.ca, who brought out a small sample of …?, a thin meat product that had a sheen to it and tasted of cumin, curry, allspice and other spices. “Kalofagas” is greek for “gourmet”.

Cookbook author Margaret Webb told my friends and I (well, mostly my friends) about her new book Apples To Oysters, and made us guess which farmed food product she associated with which Canadian province in her book. Jodi scored admirably. I had recently read something about the book.

The lovely Rebecca LeHeup-Bucknell told me about her organization, The Ontario Culinary Tourism Alliance. What a fantastic organization. Reading the organizaton’s website made me giddy because it is so inline with my interests and speaks to the Ontario government employee in me and the former non-profit professional/professional advocate in me.

As I said, I left inspired. (And with cheese and bread.)

Foodie Tweetup

Oh, the many uses of Twitter. One of my favourite uses is for the planning of social events.

@spotlightcity (Suresh Doss) of Spotlight Toronto and @TOfoodie (Andrea Chiu) recently had the idea for a “foodiemeetup”. What was an idea grew into something big (search “#foodiemeetup” on Twitter). Nearly 100 people, mostly Twitter users, gathered on the patio of Brassaii on what turned out to be a gorgeous day.

Beer tickets were handed out for pints of Steamwhistle beer and raffle prizes were up for grabs: A Day At Elbulli signed by Ferran Adria, two Tea Emporium prize packs, a Nikon digital camera, and a gift basket from Pantry. I was two numbers away from winning that and it’s the prize that I really wanted, filled with fleur de sel, maple syrup, maple vinegar (an upgrade replacement from the cider vinegar), and two other items that I’m forgetting. Suzanne was the lucky winner.

I spoke to Pantry owner Greg Bolton for awhile over at the wine table and promised to come over to his end of College Street some time. It’s an easy streetcar ride away, but it feels far. I’ve been aware of Pantry for awhile and see them represented at food events, where they sometimes sample their products. Greg and I spoke of food blogs, food writing, food writers, running a store and more.

“Wine table”? Oh yes. There was a wine tasting courtesy of @liffordwine & Craggy Range Winery. I tried a half dozen wines- 2 whites and four reds (?) and liked the Sauvignon Blanc the best. A light wine with notes of straw and citrus.

But the food! How about the food?! (Or, this is a food blog, isn’t it?)

I opted for the “pre-theatre” prix fixe menu. Choice of daily soup or Brassaii Salad, choice of main course, choice of White Chocolate Orange Crème Brûlée or flourless chocolate torte.

The soup was a Moroccan chickpea with crème fraiche (at least, I think it was creme fraiche). The Brassai Salad, a lovely mixture of mixed greens, pear, stilton, walnut, and honey lemon vinaigrette.  Among the entree options: The “vegetarian special of the day”, which was mushroom risotto,  seared salmon with lemon crème fraiche with green beans and fingerling potatoes, roasted chicken with piri piri sauce, basmati rice and green beans, and brassaii bistro steak with shallot jus and fries.

Moroccan chickpea soup

I chose the soup and the risotto, although I also considered the salad and the salmon. The risotto came with greens (arugala? I forget) on tops, which is why I chose the soup. Both were excellent. Nice, earthy mushrooms in a creamy risotto. I tasted the salmon. It was cooked more than seared and looked dry but it tasted really good.

The highlight of the meal? The Crème Brûlée. I could smell the burnt sugar before I tasted it, which made it more of a sensory experience. The torched topping always looks beautiful. And then the perfectly creamy interior that contrasts with the crunch of the burnt sugar layer. I’m getting excited thinking about it.

Crème Brûlée

The food was outstanding and the service impeccable. My server, Drew, managed to find me most of the time even though I was flitting about.  Even when there were slight mixed ups with orders they were taken care of promptly and with a smile and sense of humour. No one seemed to mind when the wrong plate was set in front of them.

The restaurant isn’t cheap, with appetizers running from $8 for the soup to $13 for the Crispy Shrimp (though they gave a special price for this event) and mains starting at $13 (for mussels and fries) to $39 for the ribeye. It couldn’t become a regular habit for me. However, as a special treat it was worth it and for those who can afford to go regularly, I say do it.

More photos:

Crab cake

beef tartare

flourless chocolate torte

I look forward to more food events like these.

Eat well, be well.