The Medal Ceremony

During the Olympics there was a night for each of the Canadian provinces. We were lucky enough to get tickets to PEI night at the Olympics. We got to see the medal ceremony for the day and attend the Premier's party on the top floor of The Bay!

The medal ceremony was exciting because it was the day that Christine Nesbitt got gold for speed skating and Marianne St-Gelais got silver.

Here we are eagerly waiting...in our matching jackets nonetheless!
Here is Christine getting her gold!
At the Premier's party I got to have my picture taken with Marianne St-Gelais and her silver medal!
How exciting is that!

Eating with the Team

As a group of aspiring culinarians (wow, that makes us sound so snotty!) eating at some of Vancouver's best restaurants was quite important. We managed to dine out at some well-known restaurants as well as some that were equally delicious but more hole-in-the-wall. Here are a few of the highlights!

We went to Tojo's Restaurant for some delicious Japanese food. I had tuna for the first time...I was saving myself for the right restaurant, and boy was I satisfied! We got our picture taken with Tojo himself...

One of the other restaurants we went to as a group was Vij's. Vij's has the best Indian food in Canada and the coolest part is that the entire kitchen staff is made up of women. I have never seen a place run so smoothly...it was so calm and everyone felt so attended to. The woman working were so beautiful, never breaking a sweat or raising their voices, they kept smiling at us as we ate. I had the goat stew...it was so, so, so delicious and it was served in the cutest red pot that I wanted to take home with me!Another memorable meal was tacos at La Taqueria downtown. Ah-mazing! Just a little place with no tables only stools. And smiling Mexicans! I had 4 tacos, I just let them choose which ones to give me. My favorites were the one with beef tongue and the vegetarian one with creamed corn and roasted poblanos. They made me pretty happy!
One night a graduate of Chef Kevin's dropped off seven 30 day dry aged steaks for us. They were mammoth.
We BBQ'd them up and had one helluva dinner.
And one last bit of deliciousness...my Valentines day treat...a heart-shaped jam filled doughnut!

YUM!

PEI Home

While I don't have all my stuff or all my people in PEI I do consider where I live here to be one of my homes. I have my home in Winnipeg that has always been my home and will always be my home, but I also have this place that I spend most of the year, that I have settled into and grown to find quite comfortable. Coming back from Vancouver I was particularly struck by the things I love about this home in PEI..

Like this patch of sun in the living room...I have been known to take the occasional nap in this spot...I missed the sun when I was in Vancouver.

Or the view from this window...Blue skies and blue water...beauty.

And the kitchen, though it may be small, it has my purple spatula in it and it has the perfect sized pan that only sits flat on the stove if you prop the handle up with the sea salt container. It may be messy but good food and fun comes out of it. I missed cooking in it.

And my bed. I love my bed. I love my pillows and my cupcake pj's. I love the pile of books on my dresser that never seems to be finished.And the one picture that I'm missing is of Tracy and I sitting at the dining room table playing the game bananagrams. We are both laughing and congratulating each other on our long or creative words. We are in comfy clothes and drinking tea.

This is what I miss when I'm not here...I'll be graduating in a little more than 2 months and leaving this home, I think these will be the things I will remember the most when I look back on my PEI home.

More Vancouver tomorrow.

Adventures with Tobey and Michael

You may remember Tobey and Michael from my months in Italy. If not, here is a quick recap. They are both chefs and lived above me in an apartment and worked at Petraia for the whole year. They are twp of the most kindest, warmest, and beautiful people that I know. They are so fun to hang out and they make me smile! By some strange alignment of stars are paths crossed again...sooner than both of us expected! They moved to Vancouver from Spain and it just so happened we would be in the same city for 3 weeks.

We both had very busy schedules but we managed to see each other four times!

The first time was the night I got to Vancouver...as soon as I unpacked and settled into the yacht I hightailed it to Tobey and Michael's where Michael cooked an ah-mazing meal. Just one of the great perks!

The second time Tobey and I met up and did some serious eating. One thing that you can always be certain of is that if you are with Tobey you will eat lots and you will eat well. The first place we stopped was Thomas Hass's bakery, possibly the best croissants in Canada. And I would have to agree!

We shared two croissants and drank macchiatos...just like in Italy!

Then we went downtown and ate at Japadog. Yup, that's a Japanese Hotdog stand! Before you start shaking your head at me, imagine a berkshire pork hotdog topped with caramelized onions, teryaki sauce, wasabi mayo, and strips of nori....ahhh, now that's a hotdog. And served up to you by a smiling and incredibly cheerful Japanese lady! The line ups are long but worth it!

I was ecstatic!

The third time we all met up for a delicious hamburger at a little diner, that serves just hamburgers and fries. That's it. No salad, no other sides, just straight up. Then we went downtown and had the biggest most delicious cream puffs I've ever had. A franchise called "Beard Papa's" from Japan makes these cream puffs right in front of you and fills them as you order them. So they are crunchy and soft. Imagine and shop dedicated to only cream puffs. Heaven.

We then waited in the insanely long line up to get into the Bay so we could purchase some Olympic merchandise...
Just so that during that night's Canada vs. US (not the final game) we could look like this:The last time we saw each other was on Tuesday morning, the day I left. We met up for bagels and doughnuts at Granville Island Market. Then we said goodbye. It was sad. But not too sad, I know (because it was proven to me by this surprise visit) that we'll be seeing each other again soon. And I can't wait!

Workin'

Morning sometimes started pretty early at work. The only other people that were up on Granville Island were the folks that worked in the market. I liked it best at this time...before all the craziness of the day began.

Here we are waiting for the trailers to be open and the work to begin!The trailers were roomy when there was just 4 of us in them...but anymore than that it got a little tight! Looking pretty cheerful for 6:30 in the morning!
We had fun while we worked...
When you work in a trailer without windows for hours upon hours people (mostly me) tend to go a little bonkers. There was lots of laughing. And lots of swearing. There also seemed to always be candy hanging around and it always was gone at the end of the day! I don't have many pictures of the food...we were too busy making it! But here is a little peek at some of what we did!This is Team PEI all decked out!
At the end of the day we were tired...so tired!

Vancouver 2010

I once read somewhere that most great adventures happen far from hot baths. I must agree. Going to Vancouver and living on yachts was very from any bath was quite an adventure. Something I'm bound to not forget anytime soon! It was wonderful and exciting, lots of work, and lots of play. I met many great people and got to reconnect with some of my friends from Italy. It was perfect.

I will divide up all the pictures I have to show and do a post on them each day. It'll last longer that way! Today I'll show you where I lived and where I worked!

Here is the yacht I called 'home' for 3 weeks:

It was cute and only 2 years old, so it had nice blue upholstery!
This was my room...
Someone said it looked like I was sleeping in a cat scan machine...it kinda was!

Here I am unpacking, little did I know this was the cleanest and most freshly laundered I would be for 3 weeks...

This is what I called the 'neighborhood', the docks where our boats all were. Beauty, isn't it?

Here is where we worked:
One trailer had stoves, ovens, a fryer, a huge skillet, and flat-top grill. The other trailer had a dishwasher, fridges, and work space. There were only a couple of feet from the building that was housing the Atlantic Canada House. It was definitely a squish to fit 16 students and 4 instructors into the trailers...and even more interesting pumping out enough food each day for 3 tastings each with 200 people. That's 600 people a day eating 4 little appetizers each. So, each day we made 2400 bites for 2 weeks straight! It was fun and the food was awesome. We (The Atlantic Canada House) got rated as one of the top 3 places to visit in Vancouver un-sport related. We also had an article in the Vancouver Sun featuring not only the food but music, atmosphere, etc. We were feeling pretty good!

Here is Team PEI (minus one guy) on the first day of set up:
Stay posted for more tomorrow!

Get Ready!

I am back in PEI after a whirlwind 3 weeks! We took the red-eye flight home and I think I may have gotten 20 minutes of sleep in the last 24 hours....just maybe.

I am promising a post tomorrow!!