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The Bison Restaurant – Banff, Alberta

Banff has always been my favourite go to place, and I am always out there for whatever reason! This time, I was out there for Bon Appetite Banff which is their 3rd annual event, and we ventured out even with a snowfall warning! I made reservations at The Bison since it has been a place I’ve been meaning to go to, and this is the perfect time to try new places as they put out special 3 course meals at a set price. This restaurant is located on Bear Street, just off of Banff Avenue and it’s upstairs of The Bear Street Tavern.

We sat down and I ordered my usual drink of choice right now, I seem to have phased into a Virgin Cesars lately, I know, it’s just Spicy Clamato juice in a pretty cup – but who cares! I like it. It was still a tasty drink.

Once we got comfortable, a bread basket came and it was neat as the basket was tree bark! The bread wasn’t anything special, but I guess the butter was… she called it Butter with Olive Oil and Organic Sea Salt. I don’t have an opinion on it as it was kind of like greasy butter? I do appreciate flavoured butter, but I guess I don’t understand this one.

For starters, we had 2. The Bon Appetite menu offers a starter, a main and a dessert for each person… so we just ordered different things to share to get more variety. We had a bowl of Sweet Potato Soup which was absolutely fantastic, with roasted marshmallows on top and a strip of bacon! Everything is better with bacon and this soup needed the salt from the bacon as it’s a sweeter soup! I loved it and I think I will try to make something along the lines of this one day!

The other starter we got was their Seared Sea Scallops which was seared to perfection. It was as though they had one giant scallop and cut it in half on the plate, or they only seared the visual side. It was bare on the underside. Regardless, it was quite delicious and not over cooked or anything like that! It also had a strip of bacon!

Now that we’ve devoured the appetizers our main courses came out! I love seafood so I ordered their Maple Sake Seared Monkfish and it was a nice portioned sized monkfish perfectly cooked and seasoned on a bed of risotto. I love fish, so needless to say, I ate it all up!

The other entree we ordered, more for the husband was the Braised Bison Gnocchi and it had a TON of delicious braised bison on the dish. We weren’t use to the size of the gnocchi, but it was still delicious light pillows of soft potatoes, even though they were “king sized pillows”! This was a fantastic entree!

Now that we’re full and stuffed, we made room for dessert! I ordered their Milkshake with Cookie and it was good! I love any sorts of cookies and this one was pretty good! It was a cookie milkshake but it was quite runny of a shake with cookie crumbs in the bottom. It wasn’t my favourite milkshake as I like them thick and creamy!

The other dessert ordered was their creme Brulee which was a chai tea spiced creme brulee with a shortbread cookie. It was kind of funny as it looked like someone ate half of it! I guess I just would’ve used a shallower dish if I was going to only give the amount given. It was tasty, but I actually thought it was a pumpkin pie flavour, not chai!

Overall, we loved this place! The meal was delicious, the service was fantastic and we had a great window seat table where we over looked the parking lot across the street! It was very entertaining! It was a night to remember and hopefully we’ll be back for more dinners to come! This Bon Appetite dinner was $45 per person, but it was 3 courses – so it was quite alright! This dinner was worth the venture out during the snow storm for sure!

The Bison on Urbanspoon

The Bison

211 Bear St
Banff, AB
(403) 762-5550

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Homemade Vietnamese Canh Chua Hot and Sour Soup

I recently went to my favourite Vietnamese restaurant and asked them what they would recommend for me. It turns out it was Hot and Sour Soup. Thinking they were nuts, I ordered it anyway, and it’s nothing like Chinese Hot and Sour Soup. I guess I liked it even more than the Chinese style Soup. I made my version with some Rice Vermicelli in it as it was a dinner and it was delicious!

Ingredients: makes 4 bowls
1 tbsp chili flakes
2 cloves garlic
1/4 cup fish sauce
1 stalk lemon grass
4 chicken thighs (diced)
shiitake mushrooms
1 tomato diced
half can diced pineapple
1 stalk celery
bean sprouts (I forgot to purchase some, so my recipe doesn’t have any)

To make this soup, it’s actually easier than I would’ve imagined. Well, I took my own shortcuts as I don’t want to spend a ton of time cooking after work. But, you start with a bit of oil and toast the chili flakes and garlic. When it’s fragrant, pour some fish sauce into the pan and let it cook out a little bit on medium heat.

After it cooks up, add some broth or just water is fine and bring it up to a boil with some lemon grass. I actually put some of the pineapple juice in at this time as well when I made mine. I love pineapples, so I didn’t mind it being a bit sweeter than usual.

Once it’s boiling, I turned down the heat and added the chicken and let it cook thoroughly. I made sure it cooked through at this point, but I’m sure it would have been cooked completely by the time the vegetables were done if you cooked it only to it’s half way point at this step.

Now as it’s cooking away, chop up the vegetables and then throw it into the soup and let it cook until it’s tender crisp. In the restaurant they used some bean sprouts which I forgot to purchase, and I think it’s better with it. So, if you’re making this, buy some!

When it’s ready, I just tasted it to season to my liking with salt, honey and some sriracha and adjusted it. I added some rice vermicelli to mine, so I just softened it in some boiling water on the side, and place it in the bottle of my serving bowl. Then, I just ladled the soup on top and it was good to go! A perfect dinner for a cold night!

I really enjoyed this soup. I’ll keep modifying from this weird but basic recipe I made. Some people put lime, thai chilies and basil leaves in their soup and other herbs, so I’m sure it’ll be fun to modify!

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Boogie’s Burgers – Calgary, Alberta

I guess one evening, my husband really wanted burgers for dinner. He ended up taking me out to Boogies Burger which was very interesting! I’ve seen the sign for it when we drive along Edmonton Trail, but oddly, I’ve never once thought about trying “boogie” burgers! But, we did it! The location can be a little tough to find as it’s tucked in a bit, and it’s not really lit up.

The interior is pretty neat, it’s kind of decorated retro style and it definitely brings you back into the past with arcade games, which my husband did try to play them… and reported one of the buttons was broken, so he stood no chance. I think he just had no chance and came up with the excuse. Regardless, I think he had fun!

I was browsing through the menu and I found a huge section on milkshakes! I love the good old fashion style milkshake, and I was curios to see if this place would hit a home run with it. I got their Strawberry Milkshake as it’s my favourite and it use to be the one I’d get in our old family restaurant. My husband ordered the Pina Colada Milkshake and I’m so happy to report these milkshakes are AWESOME! It’s thick, creamy, delicious and proper! I can’t wait to go back for another shake!

For the burger, I got the Fay’s Burger and it was a decent burger stuffed with a patty, some bacon, mushrooms, onion, lettuce and tomatoes. It almost sounds like a standard burger but the burger was huge, almost the size of my head. The patty wasn’t a well formed patty but it was still good! Being the person I am, I ordered some spicy fries with my meal and it was quite good! It wasn’t too spicy, but well seasoned! I enjoyed the fries!

My husband decided to order their Boog-Mac which is probably their take on a “Big Mac” with 2 patties, thousand island sauce, cheddar cheese, pickles, lettuce, onions and tomatoes. It was a gigantic burger and a messy one, but it as nice with more sauce in the burger! It was nice!

Overall, I fell in love with the milkshakes as it bright me back to my childhood! I would only have the straw to complain about as it seemed too flimsy for the milkshake. I’d suck the straw and it seems to collapse! That’s probably just an Elsie issue though. But, this was a great place to be!

Boogie's Burgers on Urbanspoon

Boogie’s Burgers

908 Edmonton Trl NE
Calgary, AB
(403) 230-7070

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Heritage Bakery & Deli – Calgary, Alberta

I really love Ukrainian and Polish food and when I heard about Heritage Bakery & Delicatessen, I knew immediately it was a place I needed to go to! This summer, we spent a few days up North, north of Edmonton to attend Babas and Borsch and other fun Ukrainian events and even visit Glendon, where the largest perogy sits! So, needless to say, when we got back from that type of cuisine, I missed it and had to seek it out – so we came to Heritage Bakery!

This place is like a store and a sit down place combined! I love the idea and I’m glad it works in Calgary! It’s not a huge place, but I want to say it’s big enough! Of course, it would be more fun if it carried even more items for me to gain ideas for, when I cook at home!

But, after we browsed around, we ordered 2 combos an sat down. We ordered their Combo #1 which included Cabbage Roll, 4 Perogies, Hunter’s Stew and Sausage! I really liked this combo as it was like a variety plate where you can sample a lot of items!

The other combo that we ordered was definitely one of my favourites! It was Combo #4 which was Small borscht and perogies! It was great and just what I needed! The perogies and borscht was quite delicious!

I can’t say “we” liked this place, because I don’t care! I LOVED this place and I already think about going back to eat their meat crepes or potato pancakes and their schnitzels! Hopefully that second visit will come around sooner than later!

Heritage Bakery & Deli on Urbanspoon

Heritage Bakery & Deli

1912 – 37th Street SW
Calgary, AB
(403) 686-6835

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Dairy Lane Cafe – Calgary, Alberta

My favourite thing to do on weekends is to wake up early and find breakfast! I love breakfast, as normally I have the weirdest breakfast… so, I really enjoy traditional (I guess “American”) breakfast. Lately, I’ve been eating wontons for breakfast which a lot of people think it’s so strange. So, I seek out regular breakfasts when I have the time! This time I find myself wandering in the Northwest part of the city at a place called Dairy Lane Cafe which is a small but popular cafe!

We got seated about 20 minutes after arrival, and that was pretty much as fast as it can get for this location! Once we got seated, I needed a Hot Chocolate… as nice as the outside looked it was still quite breezy! Now that I’ve warmed up some, it will take me another 20 minutes to figure out what I want to eat!

This particular day, I figured I’d try some Stuffed French Toast which is an unusual item for me to pick from if you know me at all! I even picked it with the sweet toppings of cinnamon cream cheese and field berry compote! I thought it was very odd as well, but I’m glad I did! Even the table beside me had to ask what it was that I ordered! 🙂 It wasn’t overly sweet probably balanced out with the thickness of the bread. It wasn’t all bread either, it as stuffed with the compote, and I drizzle it with syrup! I loved it and I recommend it!

My other half has always loved savoury food, so he ordered himself a Double Triple which from the name is obvious, right? Well, if not, it’s a breakfast consisting of 3 eggs, pork sausage, chicken sausage and bacon! The sausages were really nice, I enjoyed the textures and flavours of it, and of course bacon, there’s nothing better than bacon in this world! I didn’t try his toast, eggs or hashbrowns, but the meat on the plate was wonderful!

Overall, it was a nice sit down place for breakfast! I nice way to kill some time when you’re planning a lazy day! As busy as they are, you don’t feel rushed to get out, but yet your own conscience will tell you to take your conversation elsewhere! The prices are decent, I consider it high, but it’ll always be higher than breakfast at Chinese places. The bill here was just over $35… not good, not bad! But, I left happy and really full, and even got to show off my french toast – so it was wonderful!

Dairy Lane Cafe on Urbanspoon

Dairy Lane Cafe

319 19 St NW
Calgary, AB
(403) 283-2497