Flint Surprises!
Flint, Michigan rewarded us with some great culinary surprises during our stay with Amanda’s Aunt Libby and Uncle Olle on their farm in the nearby town of Goodrich. They took us on a tour of Flint that they call “the good, the bad, and the ugly.” We drove through bleak urban landscapes of boarded-up homes […]
A Familiar Dish, With a Local Twist!
During our family vacation on the Leelanau Peninsula of Michigan, our family took turns cooking. When it was our turn to cook, Amanda and I decided to make a fresh, summer version of tomato soup with grilled cheese sandwiches using only local ingredients. We had a beautiful loaf of sourdough bread from our trip to […]
Stuffing is For the Birds!
In Northern Michigan, hunting is very popular, so I was not surprised to see quail stuffed with venison on the menu of a restaurant on a lazy summer evening. It was a quaint old lakeside inn with a charming dining room and plenty of windows to welcome in the evening sun providing peaceful views of […]
An Ode to Prince Edward Island
For our final meal on Prince Edward Island we decided to pay tribute to some of the island’s amazing ingredients. Simple potatoes are elevated by creating fluffy pillows of gnocchi. In another dish, potatoes become infused with the heady aroma of seared island lamb steaks marinated with wild lavender. In our version of summer succotash, […]
Dueling Breads, Gardens, and Chowders
Freshly baked bread, farm-fresh ingredients, amazing seafood chowder: these are all things that fine restaurants on Prince Edward Island are passionate about. The Shipwrights and The Dunes are two of the lovely restaurants we went to with our Aunt Karen and Uncle Stephen, and each one had unique ways of expressing each of these passions. […]
Sea Food, and Eat It!
Beautiful North Rustico Harbor in Prince Edward Island (PEI) has long been home to a thriving lobster industry; Amanda and I were lucky to call this place home for one magical week. Lobster boats line the harbor shore, each one with a corresponding shack. Lobster traps are neatly stacked on the docks in the wake […]
Raspberry Point Oysters
On the Northern coast of Prince Edward Island (PEI), the hills are covered in a patchwork of bushy green potato plants sprouting their white flowers alternating with squares of brilliant golden fields of swaying canola. We drove on Route 6 over Stanley Bridge spanning an inlet of the Stanley River off of the New London […]
We Came, We Saw, We Crossed the Line
There is a restaurant in Montreal, Quebec that has earned a reputation for itself. It needs no sign to draw people in, and the food it serves has stunned and inspired a generation of chefs by breaking all the rules of discretion, embracing extreme culinary excess, and creating a menu full of unique signature dishes […]
Cherries, and Berries, and Jams! Oh, My!
There are tiny jewels in the bushes and trees of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. They arrive as tiny, sour buds in the spring and mature into colorful, juicy, and sweet berries during mid to late summer. Last year’s mild winter made for an early berry season this year, and during our recent stay in Michigan, Amanda […]
Happy Harbor
Driving North up the Keweenaw Peninsula in Michigan, after passing a giant thermometer which shows the level of accumulated snowfall of the previous year, there is a stretch of highway where the trees create a canopy overhead like a covered bridge and the golden evening sunlight paints streaks on their shadows. Speeding over the curving, […]