The Restaurants Canada Show is back!

 

The last Food Trade Show Event that I went to just before everything got locked down in the world was the Restaurants Canada Show at the Enercare Centre at Exhibition Place.  So it was fitting that over 2 years later that was my first big show back to almost normal.  It was a hybrid version so there were some things that you could check out virtually but you can't sample food virtually.  I did do the preview with Chef Elia Herrera and made chicken tacos at home after they sent me a Chef Drop box.  That was fun but I really missed the in person experience.

Imagine 4 food bloggers trying to cover a huge show in a day.  It was great to be back with my friend Mary (Mary's Happy Belly) and our friend Ray (https://travellingfoodie.net/)  and we met up with Jon IG(jon_dimsum).  We arrived around 11:30 and walked around until it closed at 5 trying to conquer everything we could.  There are so many samples there,  I had to be strategic this year,  I had a plan to only try things that were new or my favourite things I couldn't get.  I realized about 3 quarters of the way through that I didn't see any oysters while the last time I was there they were at about 3 or 4 booths.  We started at the end of the show where there was a Pop Up set up and food trucks.  I skipped the food trucks because they are full orders so I would have been done after that.  Weirdly the first thing I ate was freshly sliced prosciutto mixed into a salad and then it was on to Donna Dooher's famous Mildred's Temple Kitchen blueberry pancakes.  I have only been able to go to Mildred's once and it wasn't for brunch so I have been waiting a long time to try these pancakes that people line up for.  We timed it great.  Donna herself actually served them up for us.  They were as good as people say.  That was a great start to the day.  

Funny that I saw Trevor Lui in the exact same place on the phone as the last time I saw him at the show.  He is the food entrepreneur who has multiple businesses and was involved in making the Pop Up happen.  I used to see him at so many events and haven't seen him since that last show.

The show was the same yet different.  On one end is the food trucks/pop up as mentioned, then various food vendors and in the middle there are restaurant businesses focused booths with everything from huge steam ovens to tableware and uniforms and even food serving robots.  With the return to the food business the challenges that owners have been having has been staffing so there was a trend to more electronic ways of doing business to save time or reduce staffing needs.   Not great for people entering the industry but a way for restaurants to survive in a tough market.

At the other end of the show was the Bar area.  That's the party area.  Im not a drinker so we kind of whipped through it at the end.  I did stop to get a Seedlip drink.  One of my favourite non alcoholic drinks. 

There are also stages for Cooking Competitions and Industry Panels.  When we walked by the main stage my friend Matt Dean Pettit (@mattdeanpettit) was one of the panelists talking about the ghost kitchen that he is a partner in and how that operated during the pandemic.

Speaking of Ghost Kitchens, that is one of the new trends.  Ghost kitchens are kitchens that operate just for food delivery and can have multiple restaurants involved in one kitchen.  Lots of kitchen hubs are popping up and lot's of restaurants are reducing their risk by partnering up spaces with other restaurants.  Trevor Lui just opened an all Asian permanent Night Market in the Annex called Superfresh (@superfresh.to)

Some of the other trends that I noticed were everything Plant Based.  My friend thought it was funny that they kept calling things meat when it's not actually meat.  I didn't try it because it's not new to me.

As usual there was a lot of pizza but there was attempts to do pizza different ways.  I tried one that used a flour that was mixed with different flours like rice flour and others to reduce the gluten and calories.  I was impressed at how light the pizza was.  

On the other end of the Plant based trend was actual meat.  We tried a steak from England and it was so tender we all fell in love with it.  Lots of charcuterie and steaks this year. 

One of our favourite things was 2 chefs making Beef Birria tacos.  It was mesmerizing and delicious.  Beef Birria tacos seems to be another new trend and popping up a lot on social media as the way to eat tacos these days.

Lots of ways of using technology to solve problems.   One of the things that caught my eye while we were waiting for Mary was a vendor who was selling re-usable take out containers.  I actually thought of this about 5 years ago because I hate styrofoam and some of the bad takeout containers that just go into landfill.  They have a code you scan so I am not sure how it works financially but you scan it when you return to the restaurant and I think you can use it at whatever restaurant follows the program so it may take a while to spread but I think this will be our future.  They are well designed and an attractive clear and teal color so I wouldn't mind storing them in my kitchen if that was available at my favourite places.

This show is so big that I never know what I missed until I see people I know post on social media that they were there and I didn't see them.  

I literally walked 10,000 steps that day and boy did I feel it at the end of the day and the next day.  

Honestly it felt really weird not wearing a mask the whole day and I was concerned about it but it was so great to run into so many people that we haven't seen in a couple of years and just sample food like we used to.

I also stopped at Pluck tea for my favourite Verbeena Blues iced tea.  It was a mix of a few of my favourites and some new things.   

I didn't see any really out of the box things this year in the food side.  I think because of the pandemic it may not have been the time to take on something risky.