THE PUMP HOUSE GRILLE Co. ~ Port Credit ON

Back in May, before I left for Ottawa, I was actually at a work retreat out at the University of Toronto Mississauga campus. Like last year, several of my co-workers got together, talked about working together, best practices etc and of course, had wings together. Ok I had wings, everybody else at pretty healthy.

Greg and Sean were our hosts at UTM and we relied on them to take us to a good location for lunch. They recommended the Pump House Grille Co.. It was actually down in Port Credit, which is an area I have not explored, did not have a chance to, but would love to in the future.

Here's the gang from left to right: Sean, Greg, Heather, Kristen, Dave, Leah and Candice. A great bunch to work with.

Inside this place was a mix of bar and restaurant. It was slightly more upscale from the average pub. On the bar side you had a mix of older locals and some suits on their lunch break. In the dining room, we had families with one kid who loved dinosaurs that made laser sounds.

The night before we had tex-mex food, so most were interested in clearing their palettes and eating healthy. Above are Lobster and Avacado Wraps ($15.99) or Thai Chicken Wrap ($13.99) - I can't remember which, with massive salads.

Above is a massive salad/meals. They are both Phoenix & Dragon salads (shrimp and chicken for $16.79) but the bottom had the shrimp replaced with fried cheese.

Then there was a Turkey Panini ($14.99) with massive salad and an Asian Salmon Salad ($16.79). I think everyone really enjoyed their salads, wraps, sandwiches and more salads.

I had no qualms about not having salads. I went with wings, of course.

Wings come in orders of singles or doubles. I went with a single order which was about 10 wings. There are no sides on this plate.

The size of these wings were a medium length. But what they lacked in length they made up in being very meaty wings. When the wings came out they were crispy, but they became soggy very quickly as the dusting absorbed all the sauce.

HOT

This was my base flavour and it was a standard hot you find at most pubs. Good. Not really hot in my opinion though, more a medium.

SUICIDE
I ordered suicide on the side and it came out cold, which I am not a fan. But this did have a bit of a kick. More hot than suicide, but still a good sauce.

FINAL SCORE:  This was a great little pub with very fresh food. The wings were meaty and saucy, but sauce on the side might be the way to go. You can also get your wings grilled after they are sauced, and that might be an interesting way to go. 5.5/10

Plus, great company made this also worth while. What a productive and fun retreat!

The Pump House Grille Co.
40 Lakeshore Road, Port Credit ON
pumphousegrilleco.com

Frank's Red Hot @ Nathan Phillip Square

Last weekend I was out and about. I was headed to the subway when I saw a big event going on at Dundas Square. It had something to do with Football and the Grey Cup, and not being into sports I didn't care. But I did see a Frank's Red Hot food truck and was intrigued.

They were offering samples, and there was like no line-up, so I decided to do some tasting. If you sampled all 7 of their sauces, you could try a hand at their prize wheel. So with a little old lady, we took our tortilla chips and had some hot sauce. 4 I have had before:

• Original
• Xtra Hot
• Chile and Lime 
• Wings (I don't care for this - I prefer to make Buffalo sauce myself)

But I had not had:

• Thick (tastes like original, just thicker like a dip)
• kickin BBQ (tastey sweet bbq sauce like any commercial bbq sauce with a sight cayenne bite)
• Sweet Chili (tastes like every other sweet chili thai sauce)

There was also two dudes (above its the guy on the right) who would ask people if they were the ultimate Frank's fan, and had to yell out to the crowd "I put that @#(&* on everything!" I like Frank's, but yelling out in a crowd . . . that's not my thing.

I stood in line at the prize wheel. The prize wheel was a little sad in my opinion. 10 of the 12 slots were for a free tattoo. One was for a fridge magnet I think, and that might have been it. I thought it might be at least a bottle of sauce. I won a tattoo. Anybody want a temporary hot sauce bottle tattoo?

Anyways, it was fun. And I got to sample some sauces without having to buy a whole bottle.

Caplansky's Food Truck @ United Way Event

I have never been quick to adopt fads. I am never in style. I like things once they are not popular (or before they are popular). But you would think when it comes to food I would be on top of things, right? Well the food truck craze has been going for a couple of years now, and last week was my first visit to an official food truck event.

I was at work, walked passed a window, and saw a little truck town set up in the park next door. I did a double take and put my hands and face to the window to confirm it was true. See it's not that I eschewed food trucks, it's just every event where they have taken place has been swamped with people. But this event was still early on so the lines were small. Nobody in my office seemed to be excited, so I ran to get my wallet, my camera and soon I was at the United Way event at City Hall.

Actually, before running out I checked torontofoodtrucks.ca to see what the deal was and who was there. There were 3 trucks: Caplansky's, Gourmet Gringos and Hogtown Smoke. At the event, I scanned their menu for chicken wings. No deal. So it came down either Deli & Smoked Meat, BBQ, or contemporary tacos.

 It all sounded good, it all looked good. But I have had Caplansky's deli on my radar for a long time, and a smoked meat sandwich sounded good.

The menu consisted of:

• Smoked Meat Sandwich $8
• Brisket Sliders 1for $5 2 for $9
• Smoked Meat Gravy "Train" Poutine
• Big Turkey Special $8
• Grilled Salami & Cheese $8
• Fries $5 (add gravy $2)
• Grilled Cheese $6
• Maple Beef-Bacon Donuts: 3 for $3, 6 for $5, 12 for $9

I went for the Deli Combo though: "Sandwich 'n pop with your choice of fries, soup or salad" for $11. Oh and I got some of the donut hole's to share with the group.

First off, my beverage was a Black Cherry Cott cola. My favourite beverage is Cherry Coke, which I like because it has a marichino cherry flavour. Other cherry beverages like Cott are black cherry, which tastes like real cherries. There is nothing wrong with that - this was a tasty beverage. And it`s caffeine free too.

The fries were awesome. Fresh cut, fried right. Crispy but potato soft inside. Since I was eating in my dinning hall I added my own malt vinegar and ketchup. So good.

Kosher dill pickle. Tart, crunchy, dilly. Perfect addition. Someone at the food truck left theirs at the condiment table, and I was very tempted to take it for myself . . . but that would be a little gross. How could someone do that though?

The smoked meat sandwich. It may not look like much, but it was much. The bread is a light rye from local bakery Silversteens (I love walking past this place and smelling the yeasty aroma of baking bread).

Caplansky's truck had several types of mustard to put on. On one half I put their spicy hot mustard (which had a nice kick, pictured above). On the other half I put honey mustard, not because I thought that was a good flavour combo for this sandwich, but because I like honey mustard.

When I ordered this, I confused it with Montreal Smoked Meat, so while it was good, I felt it was a let down for a smoked meat sandwich. But upon reviewing my pictures, it is simply smoked meat, not Montreal style. What's the difference? Well Montreal smoked meat flavour is a bit different, and much more moist. This was a bit dry, but had a nice subtle meat flavour.

I've seen sandwiches pilled higher, but this was the perfect lunch portion. I love smoked meat, and this definitely made me want to go to the actual restaurant to eat a meal.

. . . and for dessert, maple bacon-beef donuts. I had no idea how these were going to taste. And even though there were a bunch of people at our table, most were vegetarian on this day. But Kelci and Sarah were keen to try. Kelci loved them . . . Sarah, not so much.

So to be clear, its a donut, with bacon inside, deep fried, with syrup poured over top, and sprinkled with icing sugar. I don't know where the beef comes in though . . .

I liked it. It made me think back to a scout camp I used to go to where they would make mash-potato donuts (they would make it from left over mashed potatoes, and we would almost collectively refuse to eat the mash potatoes so they would make the donuts). The taste is very savoury, slightly salty inside contrasted with the sweet maple syrup and sugar. Drool. Drool I say.

Overall, this was a great lunch. I wish food trucks would stop by more often!

The LUNENBURG PUB & BAR ~ Ottawa ON

RIP - THE LUNENBURG PUB is NOW CLOSED

Back in May I went to Ottawa to visit LJ, and we took a jaunt across the border and I reported on our Applebee's visit. But Monday came and LJ had to go back to work, but I was off for the week. Wanting to have lunch somewhere new in the Capital, I had seen a new place called the Lunenburg open, and Mondays they had half price wings. I thought it was worth checking out.

The Lunenburg has been many pubs over the years, but now it is an East Coast themed establishment. The building itself is a heritage structure which gives it a cool feel from the start. There was a patio on the side, but I decided to head inside.

I kinda felt out of place right away. I had gone for an early lunch on a Monday, and the only patrons were several old men at the bar with the waitress. Everyone looked to see who came in, and by myself, it took me aback. The waitress/bartender said I could sit where ever I wanted to. I chose the main dining room, but it was clear this place was a maze of areas to sit. It was huge inside.

I loved the decor with the old exposed stones, giant wood pillars, the black rimmed glass panes. I felt like I was in an old sea tavern. I looked over the menu and saw the pub classics, the East Coast specialties (deep fried pepperoni) and then the wings.

I asked about specials, knowing they had wings on according to their website, but when asked my waitress said there weren't really any. Fearing their website was out of date, I just went with a single order. I waited for a bit, but things went . . . well, wrong.

Here's the story:

The wings came out fairly quickly. They looked great - much larger than expected, lots of sauce, beautiful colour. I started into my wings and while the skin was a bit crispy it was sogged down by the sauce and the meat was awfully tough. And pink. I forced myself to eat the wing. I bit into another one and it was pink. Then another bite and it was really red. It was bloody in fact. I tried eating it (not wanting to shy away from a wing) but couldn't. I took another and the same thing. I had never had chicken wings that were under-cooked before.

While trying these wings I heard my waitress back at the bar where she was coughing. A patron asked her about this and I heard something about suicide sauce. Then something about how the kitchen made my wings all suicide (I had ordered that on the side) so they had to remake my wings and she couldn't handle the suicide of the original batch. Then it all made sense. These wings were under-cooked because the first batch was messed up and they wanted to get me wings fast. A ha!

Now, I hate to complain at a restaurant, but there was no way I could eat these wings. My waitress eventually came back and I politely apologized but showed her how the wings were way under-cooked. She apologized and put in a new order.

Wings come by the pound, and there were about 8 wings in this order. The menu says that they come with celery carrots and dip, but nothing came with my wings. Sometimes places do this on wing night, so maybe that's why there was no sauce.

The wings were medium in length, but mega meaty. My first batch were under-cooked so the meat was super tough, but my properly cooked second batch was tender and juicy. The first batch of wings were floating in a lake of sauce and the skin was no longer crispy. On my second batch I had almost no sauce, but the chicken skin was crispy. All but the last picture of wings in this post are from my first batch, just so you know.

HOT

The classic hot was a great classic hot - cayenne based, vinegary, buttery, orangey, good.

SUICIDE

I went with suicide on side. As mentioned before, I do this in case the suicide sauce is gross. This is one of those cases. It had a kick, mind you. This was a true suicide that burns the mouth and the nose. Hot is what I am saying. But the flavour was revolting. Bitter, sour, nothing redeeming.

FINAL SCORE:  I loved the ancient sea tavern feel of the place. The wings were jumbo meaty. One order was super saucy, another not. One soggy, one crispy. Hot was good. Suicide, while very hot, tasted terrible. Yes they messed up my order twice, but I can't hold it against them that a mistake was made since they did try to correct it quickly, so yes, I would go back again.  5.5/10

Lunenburg Pub & Bar

14 Waller Street, Ottawa ON

theburg.ca 

PS: it was wing day after all. Now several month later they have AYCE wings daily thanks to KISS FM.

ALL Dressed Rubbed Hot Wings

Making supper over the weekend and I picked up some fresh wings. But once I got back to the kitchen, I didn't know how I wanted to cook them. I knew I was going to be baking them out of simplicity. But I wanted something different. I could rub them down with just spice, or even put on a coating. I could try and mix up some crazy sauce - but I was out of ideas. I opened up my fridge and looked over my sauces and then my cubbords and my spices. Then something jumped out as something interesting. Something different. Perhaps, something awesome?

Popcorn seasoning. Yes, popcorn seasoning. I've used it before with Dill Wings but I have not tried All Dressed seasoning.

I am not crazy about Club House's All Dressed (AD) seasoning for popcorn. I've had other AD seasonings at theatres that I liked better. I tried to imagined this brand's flavour on wings - I checked out the ingredients, and while there are some things in there I'm not crazy about (or at least I don't think I like because I don't know what they are) but it did have spices (including red pepper), garlic, tomato, onion, fancy molasses (oooh 'fancy') and smoke flavour. That could work, right?

So into a bowl the whole wings went (too lazy to cut them up). Then the AD seasoning. It was interesting that the rub basically became a liquid on the wings - I thought it would be more like, well a dry rub. I used about 2-3 tablespoons of seasoning . . . although I just sprinkled it on and didn't measure.

I put the wings on a metal pan covered by parchment paper. The oven was set to broil at 400 degrees. Once it was hot, in they went for about 20-30 minutes.

I actually have no idea how long they were in for, but 20-30 minutes sounds about right. At this point they looked almost ready.

I still flipped them over for another 15-20 minutes and then flipped again for 5 minutes. Visually I was loving the slightly charred, crispy looking wings.

I ate one wing on it's own with the rub. It was right out of the oven and too hot, but it was good. It immediately reminded me of these chicken wings my dad would make when I was younger that you put in a plastic bag, shook up, and put - bag and all - into the oven (if you know what I'm talking about - who made it and does it still exist?). The flavour is a little smokey, a little red peppery, a little salty. It was very mild,, but it worked as a base layer. I could eat it just as it was, but I prefer saucy wings.

So I took some homemade Buffalo wing sauce from the fridge, added some other hot sauce and tossed that (after heating it) over the wings. Shazaam!

The All Dressed seasoning blended in with the hot sauce. Again, it wasn't bold enough to stand out on it's own, but as a foundation, it was great for these wings. The chicken was crispy, wet and the flavours all worked. This was a great meal.

This was a good experiment. I would definetely use Club House All Dressed popcorn seasoning again for the wings. I think next time I might add even more rub and I think this would be a perfect wing for those that like mild heat and little sauce.