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Hey Fanz!

Once again, it's time for the Scoff 'n Scuff! It's a Newfoundland dinner and dance in support of the wonderful music program at St. Christopher House. This is a Sherry Squires production, so you know it's gonna be special! (Don't worry, you don't actually have to dance.)

I'll be the World's Greatest Sound Man once again, but they let me play in the band once in a while, even though I talk funny.

By the way, it says on the poster that Heather Bambrick will be there again this year. She just happens to be the Vocalist of the Year, according to the 2004 National Jazz Awards!

ALSO

Gordon's Acoustic Living Room happens as usual on the third Sunday of the month, May 16, at the Free Times Café. Sadly, I won't be there this month. I'll be in Ottawa, saving the world. Hey, somebody's gotta do it!

Wayne Neon
416-407-7009
www.wayneon.ca

Signs of the Approaching Apocalypse #6,412 - Nouvelle Poutine

From the Toronto Star,
Apr. 26, 2004.

Humble poutine lifted to new heights

MONTREAL-Poutine, Quebec's favourite fatty fast-food concoction, is like a voluptuous mistress. It is loved passionately in a province where eating is virtually an art form, but often acknowledged in public only with embarrassment. Recently, however, the shame has been ebbing.

Quebec's signature dish, made of fried potatoes covered with melted white cheddar cheese curds and gravy, is slowly spreading beyond Canada and winning fans as far away as New York City and Florida. But the really big culinary news is that poutine is going haute cuisine.

Martin Picard, owner of the popular bistro Au Pied de Cochon - known to local critics as the enfant terrible of the Montreal food scene - has begun adding foie gras to the dish. He has also reinvented poutine sauce with a blend of pork stock, egg yolks, still more foie gras and a touch of cream for texture.

"People are just beginning to be proud to eat poutine and understand it is about becoming more confident in ourselves," said the ebullient 37-year-old chef whose specialty is southern French cooking. "We've had this inferiority complex, but we have grown up the last 10 or 20 years."

Picard's wild head of hair and scruffy beard mark him as an iconoclast. But his nouvelle poutine is what is really revolutionary. Before he reinvented it, poutine was the mainstay of bowling alleys, greasy spoons and late-night bars.

"I just love foie gras. I think I was born with a foie gras in place of a liver," Picard explained. "And when you eat poutine it makes you happy."