Brewer’s Plate Toronto 2011 – Attended!

Oh goodness gracious. What a massive event. This Year’s Brewer’s Plate in Toronto took place in the Wychwood Barns, a really cool City of Toronto event space. It’s an old TTC building, that appears to have housed streetcars, but it’s been hipped up with cleaned up brickwork and old beams. BP had set up in the main hall, a long high-ceilinged space, with vendor tables running down both sides and a combination of high-top and seated tables down the middle. Glassware and a napkin were given at the door, and attendees were welcome to wander through the space, sampling the many beer and food pairings, from a who’s who of Toronto beer and food. As noted by Jordan St John, trying to talk about all the pairings would be an exercise in futility. Especially as I didn’t end up trying them all. I was far too happy standing around chatting to people; friends I already know, brewers and chefs I have immense admiration for, and random people who were as happy about getting to eat and drink and socialise as I was.

So, to be clear from the start: I didn’t have a single bite or sip that wasn’t at least exceptional. This is a rarity for me. You will know, if you read this blog, that I drink a lot of beer, and while I try to stay as positive as possible in review, I am highly critical (you should see the negative posts that never make it off my screen…). I also was trained as a chef, and while I’ve been out of the industry for years (and wouldn’t want to test my chops on the line) I am still equipped to be fairly critical of food. So to attend an event where all the food I ate was beyond “constructive feedback” is unusual. Again, I didn’t eat everything there, so perhaps Jimmy’s Patented Boiled Veal Spleen needed more salt, but I’ll never know. Everything I ate was lovely, and more importantly, served by passionate, knowledgeable people who were willing, despite the hustle and bustle, to talk about their offerings.

Top picks for me:

– Tawfik Shehat’s Fish Tacos. Perhaps it’s due to the fact that you don’t see fish tacos that often around Toronto, but I’m yet to have a bad one. That being said, this one was a monster. Served up on a corn husk (helpful for the stint when the dishwasher broke down), the taco featured a smoked tomato salsa and a candycane beet slaw. The fish was battered in Steamwhistle beer batter, and while it suffered the usual catering curse of having steamed itself less-than-crispy, it was fatty and rich, as you would hope. The sweetness from the slaw and smokiness from the salsa added balance and layers to the taco that were sublime. Don’t under estimate this, though, of course it makes sense, smokey, sweet and rich. It will work right? But the proportions were such that everything held hands and sang We Are The World. I love a good slaw, and thought it looked a little scant, compared to how I would have served it. And yet, it might have dominated, hiding the sexy smokiness of the salsa had the portion been as heavy-handed as I would have wanted it. Awesome.

– Lora Kirk’s Braised Pork Belly. Yes, I’m a vegetarian (actually, peskatarian, I eat seafood), but in this type of event, I’ll eat meat. While I don’t really “like” the meat element, I can objectively understand what the chef was trying. So that being said, I was a little surprised about this. Pork is such an overdone thing right now. Artisanal species of pork. Old southern ways to prepare pork. Pork in things that shouldn’t contain pork, like vodka and creme brulee. But this doesn’t mean that it can’t be done well. And it would be hard indeed, to make a bad piece of pig belly, when you’re braising it in the stellar Black Oak Nut Brown Ale. But this wasn’t just “not bad”, but rather “very very good”. The depth of flavour and rich fattiness in the pork was juxtaposed against a light fragrant apple slaw (again with me and slaws….). While this might be a bit too heavy or rich for Tuesday night dinner at home, it was a piece of culinary mastery that demonstrated an ability to rise above common trendy cookery and elevate a “low class” cut of meat to epic heights.

– Oyster Boy’s Beach Angel Trann-oyster-ous.

Oyster Boy Beach Angel

My hands are small, but not that small.....

Sorry for the picture quality, but all I had on me was my old dodgy iPhone 3G. I like oysters. Actually, I adore them. I lust after them. I wish I lived near a cove on the sea and could just row out, lift a line, and shuck some right there. But I don’t and can’t, so I do eat them whenever I can. So while wandering around the venue, I was well aware of Oyster Boy being there, and was sure I would probably eat a good number of their mollusks. But then I got all side-tracked and was socialising, and suddenly realized that I had been in a room with oysters for over an hour and still hadn’t eaten any. So I made my excuses and took the most direct route I could to the Oyster Boy table. The view when I arrived did not bode well. A white-coated fellow removing sauces. A long tray full of crushed ice and nothing else. People moving empty oyster boxes. But one of the shuckers was working on an oyster. A massive oyster at that. He opened it and offered it to the woman who had been watching, but she said “no way”, so I tagged-in. I asked him if he should cut it up or something, because I didn’t think there was any way in hell I would be able to fit the entire beast in my mouth. He explained that as soon as it touched my mouth, it would become a part of my body, and therefore there would still be plenty of room. While that made absolutely no sense to me, I was too excited to eat the oyster, so I took the half-shell, a good breath and dove in. The good new is (big mouth jokes aside), it fit in my mouth. Just. Barely. I was using every muscle in my lips to keep them together as I chewed and swallowed it. Aside from the disturbing size, it was quite a nice oyster, not massively flavourful like some of the European species I’ve had, but nice and mellow with a good mineral balancing the brine. Unknown to me, a good number of people around me were watching as I ate it, and I actually got some back-slaps and kind words for my efforts. Possibly the first time in my life I’ve received support for eating something. Aside from the novelty, the sheer volume of oyster that I ate in the single one was probably about how many I would have eaten anyways, so despite my delay in starting, I caught-up quickly.

– A far as beers go, much respect to Beau’s, for serving what I think was the only cask of the night, Beaver River IPA.  They were also pouring Matt’s Sleepy Time Imperial Stout and Lug-Tread.  It was nice to have the Sleepy Time again.  Michael Hancock from Denison’s was pouring both his Weisse and Dunkel, and they were lovely as ever.  Black Oak was there, and I enjoyed (as ever) a Pale Ale.  Mill St was serving, among others, some type of Bock that I had right before I left.  I can’t remember the name, but it was sweet and spicy and really very nice.  There were, of course, numerous other brewers serving up beers, but between the crowd, holding food, and socialising, there was no hands available for note-taking, and if I’d sampled them all I would not have so much as walked out, but been dragged.

This is seriously one of the best beer and food events I’ve been to (there was even wine for the non-beer folks).  The average person (me) probably spends upwards of $125 at the Food and Wine Expo, by the time you’ve gotten there, paid entry, and bought sample tickets.  Plus you have to deal with ridiculous line-ups, too many sales type people, and more than a few vendors that just aren’t up to muster.  Brewer’s Plate, while crowded by the time I was leaving, was friendly, full of excellent food and drink, and was to benefit an amazing charity.  Don’t worry, I’ll let you know next year when it’s on; you will want to get tickets.

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