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GlobalFest 2012 – Brazil

I didn’t think I would be fortunate enough to be able to obtain a last minute ticket at a decent price to attend GlobalFest again, and for Brazil night! It was a wonderful surprise that we did get tickets and was able to go! It was an excellent show that was put on, and the fireworks was spectacular! The music and the firework display was absolutely fantastic! The upbeat music made the environment really fun. This time, we sat on the South side for the first time, and I realized there was a stage on this side! This stage was the OneWorld stage.

The fireworks exploded to lovely tunes, and the line up for this years show was:
Real in Rio – Carlinhos Brown, Sergio Mendes, & Siedah Garrett
Girl of Ipanema – Ella Fitzgerald
Cantigas de Capoeira – Mestre Acordeon e Mestra Ra
Pais Tropical – Daniela Mercury
Aquarela do Brasil – Johnny Mathis
Thunder – From Cirque Du Soleil’s “Totem”
Shared Love – Alexia Ramio
Batucada / Samba – DJ Nero

With a song list like this, it really made me excited for the next Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro for a celebration of really everything and anything!

I’m really happy with the fireworks I’ve seen this year – they’ve all been really impressive and I get so excited when I see it!! This evening, the reflections on the still waters at Elliston Park made the show seem so much more spectacular as the mirror image reflected all the prettiness!

Below is a clip I’ve taken to the fireworks show playing to Pais Tropical by Daniela Mercury and you can see the exciting show Brazil put on for us for 2012!

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Open Sesame

I was looking for a special place to go for my husband birthday. We’ve been hearing great things about the Smugglers Group chain, and we didn’t know which restaurant to try. We ended up settling for Open Sesame, for no particular reason really! Eventually, we will try it all! 🙂

Parking was in the back, and there wasn’t too many in the parking lot, but there are street parking available, which seemed like there was plenty! I really felt like something sweet to drink, but non-alcoholic – so I ordered a delicious Aladdin’s Passion. This drink, it says it’s made with Passion fruit sorbet, Orange, Mango juices, slash of Green Tea. It was refreshing, even though the chunks of ice was kind of made it hard to drink until during the dinner entree when the ice started melting.

We started off with a plate of Potstickers as it’s one of my all time favourite foods! I like them even when they’re not good! But, no problem here at Open Sesame, it tasted great! It was stuffed with Ginger Chicken & Shrimp, but for 4 pieces at $7.45, I felt like it was a tad costly! But, that’s probably because I’m use to it being quite cheap from actual Chinese restaurants! Besides, it turned out to be the right amount anyway as the entrees are pretty big!

Now, for the hard part – the actual dinner! I couldn’t choose what I wanted to eat, as a lot of items on the menu sounded so good! From creating your own dinner with an “ingredient” bar to different areas of inspirations on the menu! I finally decided on having Malaysian Blazin’ Noodles which was a huge plate of delicious white, wide rice noodles tossed with Malaysian spices, and then stir fried with chicken and vegetables!

Then, the birthday boy ordered a sizzling plate, which came out steaming and making the area smelling wonderful! It splashed oil/sauce as it was put down, but it was so worth it! It was a very comforting plate of food as we have meals like that in Chinese restaurants. He ordered the Chicken Katsu, made chicken breast that was breaded and made super crispy. Served with this amazing chicken had a bowl of rice and a bunch of vegetables. There was a sauce that was placed on top of the chicken, and it was really good!

At the end of dinner, to be honest, I was way to stuffed for dessert. I even had the rest of my dinner packed to take home! It was really good, and I loved the ambiance of Open Sesame! I loved that a lot of their customers at least try to use chopsticks as they put it on the table with the normal eating utensils! I had fun here, and I’m sure I’ll return one day – but probably after I try the entire group of restaurants as they’re so well known in the city!

Open Sesame on Urbanspoon

Open Sesame

6920 Macleod Trail South
Calgary, AB T2H0L3
(403) 259-0123

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Namskar Cuisine of India

I love Indian cuisine, and when I heard I was going to go to Namskar – Cuisine of India, I was really happy! Apparently I’ve been there once, but it must’ve been so long ago, I don’t remember it at all! Nothing in there rings a bell, so I will consider it my first time there! This little Indian restaurant is located right on 16th avenue, and it’s a corner location. It offers a few spots in the back which I found it was easiest to park on the streets. Once you walk up to the restaurant, you can smell the Indian spices and curries – you know you’re in for a real treat!

We got in, and instead of ordering my usual mango lassi, I decided to have a nice cup of Chai Tea which has always been one of my favourites. Unfortunately here, their chai wasn’t as strong as I would have hoped for. I like it when it’s creamy and full of spices – but that’s a personal preference. Luckily, their food is really good here!

My pictures didn’t really turn out, but we ordered a bunch of curries, rice and naan. We started with Butter Chicken which was a delicious dish with chunks of chicken pieces in a tomato and cashew sauce. The sauce was really thick, creamy and a hint of sweetness to the spice! For the first time, we also went ahead a tried some Fish Curry which was chunks of Basa fish cooked with fresh vegetables. It was a medium heat dish but came out to be one of my favourites of the evening.

For the spice dishes, we ordered Lamb Vindaloo which of course was lamb. Vindaloo has always been the killer dish for me but they made this sauce really nice – infused with so much flavour and fragrant, the spice was really nice with the lamb. We also had a order of Goat, which I don’t really remember what kind of curry it was in. It didn’t have as much sauce to it, and it was cooked with a lot of vegetables. Regardless, it was a great dish, and I ate a lot of it!

To end the night, we actually took a different spin… we ended with a plate of appeitzers instead of dessert. We had the Namskar Mix Platter which was a great idea to start with. For us, it was too much food as it came with pieces of Veggie Pakoras, paneer pakoras, Fish pakoras, onion bhajia, Veggie samosa, and a piece of lamb samosa. It came on 2 plates, which was great as we had a relatively large group and it made it easy to share.

This was a wonderful place to go for dinner. The service was really good, and they kept filling up our glasses with water – as we needed it. This would be a location I would return to for Indian food because I really enjoyed my experience here! This time, I will remember I’ve been here!

Namskar Cuisine of India on Urbanspoon

Namskar Cuisine of India

202 16 Ave NE
Calgary, AB
(403) 230-4447

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Curbside Grill – Calgary Food Truck

I love visiting food trucks that are parked at Deerfoot Meadows, but this time, I went to Shawnessy, which was okay. We did it to purposely visit Curbside Grill, which is a new food truck that has hit the streets of Calgary offering burgers, sausages and fries.

It was a late lunch, and I must say we were hungry! We ordered a Poutine which was about $6. It was quite expensive, but it was stuffed with french fries and good gravy drizzled all over it. The cheese curds they used are really good too! I like the poutine more than just normal fries that came with my burger combo.

The hamburger combo that we ordered was the Double Cheese with Fries combo – and it also came with a drink for $10. It’s kind of funny, now that I look at the menu that I took a picture of, I don’t think I got my pop. Oh well, it’s not a big deal. The burger itself was pretty delicious, however the bun was crumbly! It didn’t hold the burger with all it’s dressings properly. It felt like where I hold the bun, it crumbled and fell apart. I’m not sure if it’s because the bun has been previously frozen or just a bun that shouldn’t be used to hold such a big burger… or maybe the bun just needed to be warmed up slightly to soften. Regardless, since I was making such a mess trying to hold the bun, I just discarded the bun and ate the burger “as-is”. It was delicious and the meat had lots of juices running throughout!

We also ordered a Bacon Swiss – Sausage on a Bun and this one was interesting! It was a giant sausage in a hot-dog bun, and the sausage was really tasty! I can’t say I could taste the bacon, but the sausage alone was really good! I did add some condiments to my sausage and this was pretty enjoyable!

Overall, the food truck wasn’t bad at all! The food was fast and quite reasonable. Price wise, I think comparable to other food trucks, as the sausage in a bun was $6. I did have fun here, and I think I would definitely change out the hamburger bun as it would make a better experience!

Curbside Grill on Urbanspoon

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Vasili Food Truck – Calgary

Canada Day this year was exciting as we went down to Prince’s Island Park for some festivities, dinner and fireworks! On top of all that, it was cold and rainy (on and off), but it was made better after visiting Vasili’s Food Truck which was parked on the East side of Centre Street bridge.

We walked by and saw the food truck, and knew that was going to be our dinner!! I ordered the Twisted Pig which really was marinated pork wrapped in pita with some fresh vegetables and topped with tzatziki sauce and feta cheese. This was my favourite from the 2 items we ordered. The meat was tender, juicy and full of flavour. Then, you put it with pita, fresh veggies and tzatziki sauce… what’s not to like?

We also ordered their Zeus Sub which essentially was meatballs on a sub bun topped with feta, sweet peppers arugula and aioli. The meatball was huge, so there was tons of meat in the sub! It’s a really cook take on the classic “meatball sub”, and I can say I like this one more!

Overall, it was a really nice experience eating from Vasili’s! The food was fresh, and the balance of flavours was great! Each of the items we purchased for dinner was $8, which isn’t bad at all! Where else are you going to get something for around that price!? I enjoyed it thoroughly!

Vasili's on Urbanspoon