British Columbian Cuisine Unveiled

Cuisine \Cui`sine'\: defined as a characteristic manner of preparing food using to local ingredients; national food

You can get all foods in the port city of Vancouver. This is a restaurant culture. Everyone eats out. It’s affordable and some of the finest menus on the planet are just a step away. French, Italian and Asian (Japanese, Thai, Vietnamese, Chinese) foods dominate, and who wouldn’t want to be dominated by these fabulous cuisines.

So what does this all mean for the persistent question of BC cuisine, do we have one? Is there a consistent style of cooking that would define BC on your plate? First, you have to consider the thousands of immigrants that make up our population. The British and Spanish landed here first, but Chinese, Japanese, Italian, German, Mexican, French, Korean, the list goes on and on, trickled in to form what is now an extremely diverse province. That is a too much ethnic influence to ignore, so a restaurant culture developed from a ‘melting pot’ of these peoples. Our style of cooking is exactly that, ‘a melting pot’, the borrowing of techniques and foods from many countries. I don’t believe you can define our cuisine through style of cooking, so the only other option, if you need a definition while eating some of the freshest most cunningly prepared foods that have graced your plate, is to define it through ingredients.

Locally sourced, fresh, seasonal, this is the palette chefs who wish to serve true BC foods will paint with. Two stand-out examples who have been cooking this way for years come to mind, Raincity Grill, Vancouver and Sooke Harbour House, Vancouver Island. Most other restaurants in Vancouver that serve nouvelle cuisine (a cooking style that seeks to emphasize the natural flavours of foods through application of light sauces etc.) have followed suit. And it’s sooo easy for local chefs with brilliant local seafood like oysters, mussels, scallops, salmon, black cod and Dungeness crab. Local meats range from spring lamb to bison and wild boar. Our growing season runs from spring to fall for fresh produce like sorrel, cherries, asparagus, sweet corn, garlic, chives, squash, apples, peaches, blueberries and hazelnuts. Wildflower honey, mustard, balsamic vinegar, fruit preserves and, of course, the wide range refreshing BC wines are some of the prepared foods to think about. Lots of local foragers help further define our distinctive BC flavours by harvesting wild foods like chantrelles, morels, porcini mushrooms, watercress, miner's lettuce, oregon grape, thimble berry, salmonberry and blackberry. Cheese makers like Moonstruck and Farmhouse Cheeses create mouth watering goat’s cheese and award winning brie. And with a producer penchant for full flavoured organic, sustainable foods, you’ll be laughing all the way to dinner.

If you are searching desperately for true BC cuisine, start by sitting down at Raincity Grill on Denman Street in Vancouver. Order the 100 mile tasting menu with the local BC wines. Close your eyes before each bite, wash down with wine, and then ponder the ingredients, so that you can spearhead the BC cuisine revolution by cooking this way at home.

Scallops and Sake

Qualicum Bay Scallops are fresh, local and tasty as hell, or should it be heaven? They are also on the Ocean Wise(sustainable seafood program), thumbs up list, so you can feel morally superior while you eat them. If you want to win friends and influence people, I'm about to lay a recipe on you that will make you an overnight success.

Ingredients:
1 cucumber, slice and use as 'crackers' to serve scallops on
4 med-large scallops cut in half, you can buy them at Granville Island

Salsa:
5 Jalapeno peppers, remove seeds and dice very fine
1/2 onion, diced very fine
1/2 tomato(good quality!), diced fine
1 clove garlic, grate finely
1/4 cup lemon juice
6 Tbs olive oil
1 tsp salt
The salsa is best when you leave it in the refrigerator overnight to mellow the flavours.

Instructions:
Heat a frying pan on medium, put a little oil in the bottom of the pan and throw the scallops in with about 8 Tbs of salsa. Heat until the scallops caramelize or brown slightly, should take about 5 minutes. Scoop each scallop out and place on a cucumber slice with a dollop of cooked salsa and serve hot.

Here are a few tips to make this appy super yummy:

1. This sounds super hippie, but, always buy local, organic tomatoes, they tend to be the sweetest when in season. Good tomatoes are hard to find in winter, don't add tomatoes if all you can find are crappy field or tomatoes from Mexico, just put in a bit more onion and Jalapeno to compensate.

2. When you remove the seeds and dice the Jalapenos put a plastic bag over you hands or wear gloves if you have them that way you won't have problems if you poke yourself in the eye later. Also don't be afraid that the recipe will be too spicy. The little devilish seeds of the peppers hold most of the heat, also, the salsa will be sauteed which will mellow the spice further.

3. Dice the crap out of everything! We want to make sure no one vegetable dominates.

4. There is a fine balance between caramelizing the salsa and overcooking the scallops. Depending on your cook top temperature and how thick your scallops are, you may want to caramelize the salsa first and then throw the scallop in for 5 minutes to cook just to be sure that you are making magic.

Lastly, pair with cold sake from Artisan Sake Maker(buy in any liquor store), black label. Or try Cedar Creek, BC, Chardonnay, Estate Select($24) if you can find it(maybe at Firefly Wine Stores).

www.artisansakemaker.com