Fantastic make ahead salad good for lunches all week. Rice noodles and spicy lime peanut sauce with fresh shredded veggies like carrots and purple cabbage and seasoned with lime wedges, peanuts,cashews, and cilantro. It’s hard to go wrong and real … Continue reading
I picked up a couple of sushi rolls and decided to round out the meal with a home-brewed pot of green tea. Then thought, why stop there? I steamed some fresh spinach and tossed it in the “blast chiller” aka … Continue reading
Just a super awesome dinner of oven roasted chicken thigh with fresh spring herb seasoning, sautéed onions, and cauliflower mash. I cooked the cauliflower with homemade chicken stock and it enhanced the whole meal and really tied it all together. 
Alright, so this was neither paleo nor low carb but you know what, sometimes you just have to take life by the sweet gravy covered fries and enjoy it. Smokes Poutine gives massive portions with a variety of topping combinations to choose from. I ordered the pulled pork poutine, which was very hearty and filling, but I wished there had been more pulled pork. There were also not a lot of cheese curds, but an abundance of fries, perhaps to mask the lack of other toppings and make you feel your $9 was well spent?
We also ordered the Philly cheesesteak which I was not impressed with, at least in regards to the processed orange squeeze cheese that came on top of it. The flavour was so artificial it detracted from the steak/onions/mushrooms/peppers.
If I sound like a poutine snob it’s because I lived in Montreal for five years, and it honestly doesn’t get better than that. A good poutine isn’t about the add-ons, it’s about the quality of the gravy, the cheese curds, and for me, the thickness of the fries ( McDonalds poutine doesn’t cut it for me because those fries are too flimsy).
Smoke’s gravy has a distinct flavour, very down-homey like it was made in your gramma’s kitchen. It packed a lot of flavour, but it is also a very distinct taste. I would like to go back and try a regular poutine with no toppings because it was just a lot going on flavourwise, and overall very jumbled. The fries were thick cut and well seasoned, and that’s a major plus. The cheese curds, well there could have been more.
Amazing chicken shawarma atop a Greek salad from the Babylon Cafe in the West End. Omm nom nom, meat salad.
Fantastic burger (The Max) from Max’s Burger on 8th and Cambie, this place is a hidden gem. There’s really no comparison to grass-fed beef, and these guys know how to make a proper burger. Best of all, the variety of bun options, whole wheat, gluten free, vegan, and regular ol’ hamburger bun! We all agreed the gluten-free bun was one of the best gluten-free bread products we’ve tasted in a restaurant. Yam fries were tasty too! Overall nothing was too heavily salted or over seasoned, just fresh ingredients done right. Move over Vera’s, I’m all about Max.
Oh, and then we had the cheesecake. Scrumtrulescent. The crust was nothing special, but the cheesecake part was creamy and tasted homemade. We’re going back for sure.
