It’s not that Jamie Kennedy isn’t more than capable of making a fabulous dinner and one worthy of being named a meal of the year for us – it’s just that Gilead is not a place that comes to mind for dinner. I didn’t realize that they opened for dinner – and had no idea just how fantastic their once-weekly nightly feast is.
It’s not often I openly admit to being a fan of someone or something. My Grandfather would remind me that anyone worth admiring should not be put on a pedestal by constantly reminding me that they used the bathroom just like the rest of us. That reminder was echoed by my Father and I am sure I will repeat the same to some unsuspecting ankle-biter at some time in the future (mine or someone else’s). I am very careful to lend praise to strangers which makes my admiration and open gushing on Chef Kennedy’s vision very atypical.
For those unfamiliar with Jamie Kennedy, he is a champion of local food, creating and cooking with his own preserves and generally cooking honest to goodness decent food that you can feel good about consuming. The food is decent for your health, conscious and world around you. The shelves at Gliead are stunning to anyone who is a fan of preserving -hundreds of jars of fruit and veg line the walls and just excite me thinking of their potential.
The restaurant is typically closed in the evening – a recent series of dinner parties has brought the casual room to life on Thursday evenings. Reservations are required to a 4-course tasting menu. We dined for $60 and chose an optional 4-glass wine pairing for an additional $28 each. We were part of a 19-person party which represented about half the total people in the room. Seating is communal and all were friendly.
What separates this dinner from most of everything (there are a few others doing similar events, such as the ROM’s C5) that is happening in Toronto is the guests of honour – Chef Kennedy, a local farmer and artisan wine maker from the area. We will be featuring posts on the two of them in coming days (Mark from Kawartha Ecological Growers and Norm from Norman Hardie Winery). All 3 presented their vision and commitment to local food. Each ingredient was described and we were informed when each was harvested (all within 18 hours of dinner service) from the field. A special batch of chicken were raised just for our dinner.
The dinner for the evening was:
Hors d’Oeuvres
Asparagus shot with wild leek vinaigrette
Smoked duck breast with pickled kohlrabi
Deviled egg with chive
2008 Melon de Bourgogne
Menu
Gartin of cattail heart and wild ginger
2007 Riesling
Whitefish saute with radish and onion salad and chevril beurre blanc
2008 Pinot Gris
Pinquant marinated and grilled chicken with stinging nettle chimmi churri
2007 Country Pinot Noir
Rhubarb crisp with chantilly and maple syrup
Coffee and tea
We’ll share more about the food and drink in posts on Norman and Kawartha Ecological Growers (KEG) in the next two days. For the purpose of this article, let us summarize just how amazing the experience was. The staff were friendly, chef was humble and guests (including our guest “stars”) were informative, charming and passionate.
The food was outstanding. Who knew that one could eat stinging nettle or cattail (I thought these were exclusively for lip-synching or sword fighting with others). Mark explained to me that you could even roast the large brown head in the summer just like corn and serve it thinly sliced. Stinging nettle can be blanched for a few seconds like spinach – which causes it to disarm and drop it’s spiky ends. There is so much food hiding in plain site around us that it’s humbling that I can’t find it.
The chicken was served very rustic – my “drumstick” arrived still on foot. Not everyone had the honour and many guests (including yours truly) were caught off guard on first site. I loved the challenge and used every piece – lights were too low for a good photo at that point.
The strongest testimony I can provide is that 19 of us were delighted. It was a fantastic evening celebrating several birthdays and was arranged for us by a great friend Tracey. Go out of your way to get reservations while you can.
[...] wall is well hidden from the sun and was, partially, inspired by the wall at Gilead. I have done my research and spoken with several who display their preserves in plain sight (as [...]