Category Archives: √√

I like it – might not be awesome – but it was a good value for what I paid. You won’t be sorry.

Rundles in Stratford – Overpriced – but oh so elegant


Used to be that getting a reservation at Rundles was impossible. You needed reservations months ahead, and even then it would be a challenge. But the food was amazing – so the planning ahead was worth it. And if you asked, and it wasn’t rented, they would give you a tour of the house next door.

Well things have changed over the years – and not to the better unfortunately. Prices are up, food quality is down, service is lacking – and no house tour was available. Guess it figures – getting reservations was decidedly easy.

We arrived promptly at 5:00 – with a theatre at 8:00 – we needed to eat and go. But in 2.5 hours – you should be able to get us in and out. And that went well. We did leave on time, we just didn’t leave impressed.

The menu is now prix-fixe – and at $95 per person, a bit of a gasp if you aren’t planning to eat a lot. We opted for 3 different appetizers, three main courses, and 3 desserts. The meal was so forgettable – I can’t even remember what I had. My sister had duck – presentation was lovely, taste was good – but for the price – well, a tad over kill.

I hate to say this – but Rundles – I think you’ve seen the last of us.

Rundles Restaurant on Urbanspoon

Rundles Restaurant on Foodio54

Oh the people you’ll meet – Riding the train from Montreal to Toronto


There are 4 different ways to get from Montreal to Toronto. You can drive – it’s about 6 hours, and very boring. You can ride the bus – which is about 8 hours, and while you don’t have to drive the thing, it’s not exactly luxurious. You can fly – either to the Island Airport (which I keep promising myself to do, and have never actually done), or to Toronto International which is an airport I avoid under all circumstances.

Or – you can take the train. The train takes 4 hours. You arrive minutes before it is due in Dorval, stand either on the platform or in the train station, climb on – and off you go. From Montreal to Toronto, seats are assigned – so you know which car, you know which seat – it’s quite easy. Most of the time.

And generally fairly reasonable. In the height of the season, a senior ticket is around $100 one way, including all taxes. So it’s less pricy than flying, and about the same amount of time if one includes arriving at least 2 hours ahead for the plane!

So – Friday am, 7:11 finds me on the train heading to Toronto. I’d selected a window seat months ago, but it was taken by a lovely older woman, who explained that she’d given up her seat to a woman with a baby. The baby in question was ensconced in one of those giant carrying seats – and the woman was apparently asleep. Oh well – guess I’m getting an aisle seat this time. I don’t mind the aisle, it’s really just that I prefer the window. But it’s hard not to feel a bit sorry for the baby at least.

I make myself comfy – I brought along fruit to munch, figuring that no matter what they had to sell it wouldn’t be either on my diet or frankly – fresh and yummy. Packaged cakes are easier for the staff – but hardly made this morning.

Naturally, being of similar ages, my seat mate and I start to chat – and chat – and chat. She has 2 sons, and 3 grandkids. She’s going to visit a friend in Toronto that she’s known since elementary school. She recently took a river boat cruise from Prague which was great except that her roommate – an extremely good friend that she’s spent much time with – turns out to be a better house mate than room-mate. In fact, she’s a lousy room-mate – insisting on lights out at 10:30 – and no noise. Hard to take a shower before bed, hard to party if you must undress in the dark. But overall the river boat was apparently a wonderful trip – worth thinking about.

My new friend continues to tell me about her life. Her husband died very young, and very suddenly. He had just been playing golf, came in – complained of not feeling well, and died. She called a neighbor who called 911 – and tried to do mouth to mouth to no avail. That was quite some time ago – since then she’s had a male companion – who she will not marry, nor live with – but loves to travel with. Interesting. I think about how truly boring my life must appear to most people – my husband and I are celebrating 43 years of marriage this September.

We discuss the challenges involved in finding someone to travel with – I remind myself how fortunate I am that I have 2 travel companions – my husband for upscale trips or downscale re-enactments, and the Intrepid Traveller for long stays in one country. Somethings just work out like that. I wonder if she thinks I’m fortunate – or merely boring. The old adage – walk a mile in someone elses shoes – seems so valid at moments like this.

We chat for effectively the entire trip, interrupted only by trying to figure out the capital of Finland (It’s Helsinki), and by the young man with the food cart. Such lousy coffee – at least it’s not insanely expensive too.

At our arrival in Toronto we part ways – her to find a porter and her friend. Me to drag myself and my tiny traveling bag to the Royal York to meet up with my husband.

Ships that collide in the night – and likely never meet again.

Great trip. Thanks Seatmate!

Angelinas – Expensive Loser in Ogunquit


I’m not totally sure why I so frequently get disappointed at restaurants in Ogunquit. Ok – I’m not keen on restaurants that charge over $300 for 7 people – that’s a lot of money for dinner with 2 kids. And I’m even less of a fan of restaurants that work to evoke fame – pictured of the Chef with Gorden Ramsey on Hell’s Kitchen – cool or Kitch?

But I do know that Angelina’s isn’t the first restaurant in Ogunquit to seriously disappoint me. Although from the crowds – I’m guessing I’m alone out there. We were 7 – and ordered 4 different appetizers, and 6 main courses. We even ordered 2 desserts. So you can’t say we didn’t try a fair sampling. Of the 12 offerings – only one – the Eggplant tower, was impressive. And it was great. The eggplant was lightly fried to perfection, the cheese fresh and definitely yummy. Very good. The salmon was also good – but hardly a Maine tradition.

I guess my main complaint was really the Lasagna that I ordered to share with Sophie. At Varenos – we’d shared a Lasagna large enough to have half left to take home for lunch. For more money, we got about 1/2 the Lasagna at Angelinos. It was yummy – but still. 1/2 the size, more money – not thrilling.

Truly disappointing was the steak we ordered. It was easily the most tasteless piece of meat I’ve ever had. My grand-daughter the ‘steak-aholic’ couldn’t even finish the tiny piece they gave her. More risotto then steak – but given how tasteless the steak was – I guess the portion was acceptable.

Dessert – one winner, one loser. The winner was the carrot cake. Rich and creamy – quite yummy. But the loser was a commercial frozen lemon sorbet. Hey – if you are expensive, and ‘chef owned and operated’ – don’t opt for a commercial frozen dessert. We do know what they look like. And it made me wonder about the carrot cake. Was that also commercial.

Anyway – bottom line – a C. Too much money for the quality of food we got served. But I will give them points for a very pleasant restaurant, and the service was quite acceptable.

Angelina's Ristorante & Wine on Urbanspoon

Angelina's Ristorante & Wine Bar Inc on Foodio54

Sahib – calling it ‘fine’ is a stretch – but for the West Island – it works


The Sahib Restaurant is not the only restaurant convenient to my office – but it is the only Indian alternative – and as such gets my business about 8 times a year or so.

Given that frequency – I’d expect them to at least recognize me – but no – every time we walk in, it’s as if they’ve never seen us before. A shame really – a better ‘host’ experience would do wonders for their popularity – because they do a lot of other things quite well.

They do quite good Onion Bhajia – a fact I had driven home when I ate them elsewhere and discovered that while the ones at Sahib are fully of onions – other people skimp! So one up there. Their tandoori Chicken is decent – the flesh not as juicy as some versions I’ve had – but still pretty decent.

Their killer dishes are the butter chicken – the rice – and the Chaat Papri. What strange is that this dish isn’t on the menu. It’s considered so authentic – that ‘tourists’ won’t enjoy it. But it is easily our favorite dish at Sahib. Made with chickpeas and fried ‘chips’ – it’s a very yummy appetizer. To try it out if you try the Sahib.

It’s not a great restaurant – but it’s a sure bet for a decent meal. I give it a B. It would do a lot better if they just made an attempt to remember their ‘frequent’ guests.

Sahib on Urbanspoon

Restaurant Sahib on Foodio54

Why, oh why is travel so challenging?


I must be a sadist at heart – or else why would I book another trip just a week after flying back from Korea? I mean – isn’t 25 hours of travel enough? It took me 3 days to recover from jet lag. Who needs more of this stuff? Well – apparently – I do.

Months ago my 2 sisters and I had agreed that it had been way too long since we’d had a decent conversation with each other. get-together with kids and husbands around were fun – but opportunities to actually talk – non-existent. So despite the conjunction with my trip back from Korea – we’d planned an “I’m not yet 65” birthday sisters weekend – in Lake Lure, N.C. This meant I’d fly to Columbia, S.C. on Wednesday, see my sister’s newly redesigned kitchen, then we’d drive the 2 hours to Lake Lure. Sounds great.

Bonus – when I go to check in on-line – I’m offered a $49 upgrade to business class! Winner. Amazing. Sure – I’ll take it.

So it’s Wednesday night – and here I am – at the Montreal airport – booked on a United flight thru Washington, D.C. I eat a lousy dinner at the airport – something billed as meat lasagna – but tasting more like cheap tomato sauce with meat waved in its directions and I join the suspiciously large crowd around gate C82.

Hmm – the sign doesn’t say Washington, D.C. yet – is says Cleveland.

But like most well laid plans, the weather angels decided it was a no go. Cancelled flights here, there and everywhere – just because of some rain and severe thunderstorms lasting 6 hours in a 250 mile swatch running across most of the midwest. Honestly. Is plane travel so retarded that they can’t land in a little rain? Maybe it was the cross winds. Whatever – no plane, no go. So sorry.

Options – I fly to Dulles, spend the night on my own dime (if I can find a hotel room – with canceled flights all over – likelihood not good), and fly on in the morning from there. Or – I go home, spend the night in my own bed – and just start over again on Thursday.

I opt for my own bed. Bad news – the guy who rebooked me doesn’t do it right – I lose my paid for status as ‘business class’ –

So now it’s Thursday. And with better weather, planes are at least taking off on time. I’ll manage to get where I want to go some time today.

Being a optomist at heart – I’m willing to forgive United the boo-boo – particularly because when I get to Chicago (mid-point of flight – nothing from Montreal goes direct to anywhere I want to go) – I discover what really bad looks like.

Chicago is a mess. No seriously – a mess. On Wednesday flights got canceled and delayed – and when they re-route, reschedule you because of weather – they have a lovely little pre-printed brochure that effectively says no food, no lodging, no refunds! I ran into a wonderful family of 4 that had finished a fab holiday in Spain, including a cruise, and were just trying to get home. They’d arrived in Chicago at 7:30 pm on Wednesday – I ran into them at around 10:00 am on Thursday – and it didn’t look good. They’d been re-booked onto a flight that got canceled early this morning – been standby (and clearly not made it) on two more flights – and were now officially giving up. They got an absolute booking for a flight on Friday – and were on their way to a hotel to sleep.

There are literally people everywhere – some just sitting and looking sad – some actually asleep. The stand-by lists to just about everywhere are filled – and I’m guessing that they can’t just bring in a larger plane – or 2 – or 3.

This is truly sad. On the positive side, a gentleman just got up to give his seat in this overcrowded waiting area to an older couple. Nice.

And just to make sure I’m awake – another guy just announced that there are severe thunderstorms forecast in my destination city.

If nothing goes wrong – it’s not much of an Adventure, is it?

Signing off – and hoping the plane flies…. The Soup Lady

Imadake – Japanese Pub with style (and a lot of noise!)


Follower alert – I’m back in Montreal – but not for long… Next Stop – South Korea.

The Imadake is in a great location if you are doing the theatre at Dawson – and need a quick bite to eat, but heads up on the noise level. This is a pub – and the waiters encourage the customers to scream and yell each and every time they serve them. But noise level aside – the food was quite yummy.

We ordered a variety of the appetizer sized portions – the absolute best of which was the Miso Glazed Black Code. I mean – this was delicious. The Black code was perfectly cooked – white, tender, and tough to explain – actually juicy. I loved it.

2nd best were Takoyaki – or Octopus Balls. I mean who knew Octopus even had balls? Learn something new every day I say. These ‘balls’ were deep-fried and yummy. I liked the dipping sauce too.

Also ordered was Negibuta – pork belly slices wrapped around an entire green onion. My dining partner loved this dish, but I found difficult to eat. I wanted to bite it in half – but it’s hard to bite thru a green onion.

Definitely less thrilling were the Tempura Veggies (cut way to thick), and the Ponzu Beef Tenderloin. And last and clearly least thrilling were the Udon Noodles. I really didn’t care for the taste of these.

So – some winners, some losers, lots of noise, but very fast, and for the ‘in-crowd’ who were screaming and yelling – clearly a really good time was being had. Maybe not that great for seniors though. Just saying.

Imadake on Urbanspoon

Imadake - Japanese Pub on Foodio54

PF Chang – the Montreal Version – Not quite up to snuff. Sorry folks.


PF Chang – High end Franchise opens near me – cool, eh?

My first experience with PF Chang was in Florida – I was hungry – they were there. It worked out. I thought the restaurant was beautiful, and the food quite delicious. So I was very excited to discover that they were opening a branch right around the corner (sort of) from my office.

We eagerly planned our next luncheon to be there – and since we had lots to discuss, knew it would be long lunch. PF Chang was great on at least that aspect – we could sit as long as we liked, no problems. There were plenty of empty tables (not a good sign, eh?) – and we were tucked nicely into a corner where we were out of sight – out of mind. Perfect.

Unfortunately, that was the highlight. Well, that and the Signature lettuce wrap with chicken, mushrooms, green onions and water chestnuts. That was delicious. I was not really impressed with much else unfortunately. And I wanted to be – I really did.

I will give our waitress full credit for a nice try. She was extremely pleasant, and very well-informed on the menu – nope – the problems lay elsewhere.

We managed to confuse the kitchen by mixing up our order, one of us ordered the lunch special, the other 2 ordered a la carte. Shouldn’t have been an issue – but I guess the kitchen is still working out the kinks – the luncheon special main course arrived long, long before the rest of our order – to the embarrassment of our waitress. She apologized, but it ended up meaning that one of us ate a cool lunch that should have been hot. Better – just remove the dish, and take it back. By asking if it’s ok – you put the customer into complaint mode – and my friend felt awkward complaining.

My ‘main’ course was billed as Cold Ahi-tuna Slices with a mustard sauce – way too heavy on the sauce unfortunately – couldn’t taste the tuna at all. My friend who got convinced to order a chicken dish wasn’t exactly thrilled with hers either. And the cool instead of hot main course of my friend was never going to be right.

In comparing the menu we were offered in Montreal with the menu on the US website – I think part of the issue might be that the Canada franchise isn’t offering exactly the same things as the US version – at least the menu seemed quite different. I couldn’t even find my tuna dish on the US menu – good thing to be honest. It wasn’t great.

We ordered one desert to share – the Banana Spring Rolls with coconut pineapple ice cream. It was good – but not blow you away. They ‘under-drizzled’ the caramel and vanilla sauces in my opinion, at least I couldn’t taste them. The ice cream was so cold that you couldn’t taste the coconut and pineapple – and I thought the fried banana spring rolls were terribly rich. Not a bad thing for dessert of course, but I wasn’t thrilled.

So – lovely restaurant, nice waitress, some good, some not so good food. Can’t give PF Chang an A. Sorry people. Better luck next time.

P.F. Chang's on Urbanspoon

PF Chang on Foodio54

Are National Museums a Window into the soul of the Country?


I think that National Museums might be considered one Window into the Soul of a Country, along with school curriculum, and the employment rate. After all, what National Museums say, and what they don’t say, how they look, and how they are maintained, while not the only way to get to know a country, can be imagined by the visitor as one way to find out how the country sees itself and how at least officially it wants ‘foreigners’ to see them.

From this perspective – the National Museum of Korea in Seoul – the 12th most visited museum in the world – offers a unique and intriguing glimpse into how Korean see themselves.

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The Museum is huge – and extremely modern. I’ll give the Korean’s credit – they sure know how to do huge public spaces. This is not the first example I’ve seen of this kind of massive public building here in Korea – and if Museums are windows – the first look at this Museum says – I’m a huge house.

The landscaped grounds alone are impressive – acres and acres of lakes, sculptures, pagoda, entrance walkways, ramps, and gathering spaces. So large that I can’t even imagine walking around the entire complex – not if I wanted to see the Museum too.

And it’s clean and it’s all free. Only the special exhibits carry a charge – and the next one is a bit surprisingly entitled – “Art in America”. The good news – it hadn’t opened yet – so we were free to concentrate on seeing the Permanent (Rotating) collections. The museum’s total collection is 330,000 pieces – only 13,000 of which can be displayed at any one time. They have 67 National Treasures, 131 General Treasures, and 4 folklore assets.

There are 3 huge floors – each one large enough to be considered a museum on its own, a gigantic and un-photograpable rotunda paved in marble, a children’s museum which we could not enter (no kids with us), a huge and moderately priced restaurant on the main floor, 2 more restaurants on other floors, a tea room, a gift shop that stretched at least 500 feet, free lockers for back-packs, stroller rental, cell phone charging station (not sure why on that), an information booth, and an audio rental booth with 2 kinds of guides – an audio only one and a fancier Samsung version complete with pictures. The pleasant hostess told us that foreigners tend to like the simpler one better – so we opted for that. Grabbing our maps – we headed into the Museum proper.

Korea is extremely proud of its history – and there is evidence of sophisticated civilizations on the Korean Peninsula since pre-historic times. Clearly this pride rings out thru the museum – and is one of the reasons I felt that I was looking into the soul of the country. School groups, even on Sunday, were present though out the museum, but unlike other groups we’ve seen – these groups were small in numbers (10 to 12 max) – and the instructors focused the kids attention on selected small sections. Discussions were clearly animated and conversational not lectures. Very different from what we’d seen in other Museums on other days.

The first floor of the museum covers the history of Korea – from Paleolithic to what is called on the map – Early Modern – but in fact ended just prior to the invasion by Japan in 1905. This in itself is interesting. Nothing in the museum dates from the last 100 years. Consider the meaning of this – is the modern history of Korea inappropriate for the National Museum? Is it not interesting? Is there nothing worth collecting? To say I was surprised by the abrupt end of the ‘history’ section is an understatement, and left us wondering who and why this happened.

There were several extremely interesting sections in the ‘history’ portion – primarily a copy of a book printed in moveable metal type 71 years before Gutenberg’s bible and an exhaustive explanation (in English) of the events between the end of the Silla era and the beginning of the Joseon Dynasty. We’d been wondering what had happened during those almost 500 years – and we finally got to find out.

The most interesting parts of the exhibits on the 2nd floor were the collections of works donated by individuals to the museum. It is amazing how many beautiful things are saved by the actions of just a few individuals.

The third floor was split into two sections – One half was a series of mini-rooms devoted to the art from other Asian countries – most impressive of which was an animated multi-part Chinese painting. As you watched, the seasons changed, people moved around the landscape, night fell, snow-covered the ground, the moon rose. All very beautiful and very peaceful. The 2nd section was devoted to pottery (see one pot, seen most..) and a fabulous collection of Statues of Buddha rescued from various temples around the country. Easily my favorite part.

Bottom line – this is a huge museum – there are highlights, a lot of things to see – and while nothing outstanding breath-taking, well worth the full day it took us to see all 3 floors. And such a great price point – free!

Signing off – The Soup Lady and the Intrepid Traveler.

Surprise – There’s a Science of Happiness! Who Knew?


Backpacks to Briefcases – Free Workshops for Concordia Students and Alumni

I don’t generally attend these workshops – the price is right (free) – but the topics generally are not that thrilling. I’m pretty sure my resume is about as good as it’s going to get, and I have a tough time getting all worried about how to be interviewed.

So imagine my surprise when I realized that one of the series was enticingly called – ‘The Art and Science of Happiness’. Interesting, eh? I didn’t know there was a science to happiness – but I’m willing to give it a listen.

The workshop – really a lecture with some audience participation – was run by Gillian Leithman – a phD student in the field of Postive physiology. Bet you didn’t even know there was a field of Positive Phycology. Well live and learn I say.

Turns out – at least according to Gillian – that our brain is hardwired for negative behaviors. We scan the world looking for issues to give us time to avoid them – and often miss seeing the positive things around us. If that sounds a bit like “Stop and smell the roses” it’s not a surprise – because that thought is one of the basic tenements of the field. We just don’t stop often enough – and spend too much time being on the alert for disaster to really be happy.

Gillian started us off by getting us to list 10 (if possible) things that make us happy. She then proceeded to explain the 3 different general types of happiness producers – pleasurable activities (like taking a hot bath), “Flow” (like losing ourselves in a book – or a blog), and Meaningful activities (like volunteering, or caring for our kids). The best is to have a mix of the different types so that you aren’t putting all your happiness eggs in one basket. I tend to “Flow” activist (writing is one of those), over Meaningful activities (I’m great at the grand-kids – but volunteering isn’t my strong suit).

At the end – her message was that you can change any behavior permanently if you can do it for 30 days. So she had us set a goal of being happier in 30 days by just picking an activity that corresponds to one of the above types of happiness (different from what you naturally do today) and just do it. To make sure you commit – it’s important to announce your intention. In my case – I’m trying to blog every day – and trust me, it is getting easier to keep it up after 30 days. In fact – this is my 54th blog. In 65 days. Pretty cool, eh?

The key question, however, is – Is writing a blog making me happier? Maybe. I am taking a more observant look at the world around me because I know I’m likely to be writing about it shortly. I love thinking about what I’m going to be saying – and I adore checking my visitor stats. So far my greatest number of visitors in one day was 111 – and that was just 2 days ago. How cool is that? And I do love writing – surprise, surprise.

So I think I’d have to say – Gillian – you were right. “Flow” activities – done regularly – do make for a happier outlook.

(Want to contribute a guest blog…. All in the name of making you happier of course… Just let me know.)

And if you want to get in touch with Gillian – her website is:
http:www.lifeskillstoolbox.ca
and her phone # is 514-824-1967

Red Mule Pub – great name, good Ruben sandwich – but you have to go to Brooksville, Florida to find it!


Consider the challenge – you are a tiny restaurant in a small town about an hour from Tampa – who is going to find you? Well I did, and I loved it.

There isn’t a lot to either the restaurant, or the menu – it’s the Ruben, silly. But they also have a few other sandwiches – Pastrami, Turkey, Salami, even Liverwurst. And a short but yummy dessert list – including my favorite – brownie with whipped cream.

I knew this place would be fun when we walked towards the front door. It wasn’t the ‘winner of the best…’ sign – I’ve learned those can’t always be trusted – it was the way they had taken a single strip mall entrance and turned it into a cabin in the woods. So cute I had to take a picture. But walking in convinced me that this place would be fun. There is ‘fun junk’ every where – from the words of Jimmy Buffet songs to cartoons, signed photographs (including one of Snow White – go figure), and bumper sticker slogan signs. The tables were adorable too – they’d taken ‘toys’ like lincoln logs and covered them with plexiglass – creating a conversation piece while you wait for your food.

All 4 of us ordered exactly the same thing – a Ruben Sandwich – your choice of bread, comes with a pickle slice and a small bag of chips. The sandwich was clearly the star – tons of great tasting corned beef, sauerkraut, melted swiss cheese, and a ‘special’ sauce. Just fine.

Was it the best Ruben I’ve ever had – nope. I prefer my bread toasted – puts some crunch into the sandwich – but maybe that’s an east coast thing where people have stronger teeth. Never-the-less – it was pretty darn good – and I ate the whole thing. Always a sign that they did a good job.

My dessert was sinfully simple – a rich brownie (no nuts, sorry) served with whipped cream and a drizzle of chocolate sauce. Sometimes simple is best – and there is totally nothing wrong with a great Ruben followed by that chocolate brownie.

Sigh

Red Mule Pub on Urbanspoon

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Red Mule Pub Inc on Foodio54