President's Choice Holiday PopUp

President's Choice has created something really new and fun for a large grocery retailer.  They created a Holiday Environment Pop Up on King Street West at Blue Jays Way.The really great part is that it runs for a couple of weeks before Christmas and it's totally FREE to check out and to sample bites of their special holiday PC food items.It's closed on mondays but open until 7 most nights and there are also special events there in the evenings that you have to sign up for.  I stopped by after I attended another event to check it out.  When I got there I was immediately drawn to the Nutcracker's in the window display.  It's located on the corner of the block in a pretty large space.  There is a red carpet style entrance and when you walk in you are asked to sit on a large bench while they organize a certain amount of people for the tour.  It takes about 20 to 30 minutes to go through it in groups of about 8 I think.  The entrance is beautifully decorated in holiday decor and then when you walk in you are brought to 4 different rooms.  The first room we entered had a moving train set up that moved through the town space and had places of food samples as the cargo.  It was so cool and impressive.  We sampled the cherry chocolate cake and the waffles with cookie butter and bacon maple syrup. We were then let into the Mingle room where it was decorated in greens and lighted acrylic trees displaying the dishes.  The appetizers where from the Thai appetizer collection and we also sampled some Gochichang chicken wings, butter chicken poutine and 3 of the different Thai appetizers which were all very good.

The next room was the Dinner room where we sampled a beet pasta, a piece of country ham, brussel sprouts and a potato stack.  Then we had the vanilla bean cheesecake with raspberry sauce.  We were pretty full by this time.  The last room was the Gift Room.  I thought this room was really cute with wall to wall colored boxes and were given the choice of their chocolate covered popcorn in a little clear box and another sweet treat but I can't remember what it was unfortunately.

The space is gorgeous and the fact that they sample all of these products at one time to showcase how you can entertain for the season is a great idea.   You can't purchase the foods at the pop up space but they will tell you where you can get them near you if you ask.  

I would totally recommend checking it out while you can just to see how cool the space is even. You can get great decor tips from this space and I would love to see other big retailers do something like this for the holidays.  It's fun and I know it's all marketing and meant to drive sales but it's a fun thing to do.  Be prepared as I heard that there are lineups sometimes and I am sure there will be more as people hear about it being there.  Go hungry and enjoy.

This is not a sponsored post.  I went on my own and the opinions expressed are my own.

Holiday Entertaining Tips from Ricardo

RICARDO'S Entertaining Tips

Ricardo

I had the pleasure of spending a great couple of hours on a lovely sunny day in an office overlooking the Lake with the amazing Chef and Entrepreneur Ricardo Larivee a well known TV personality from Quebec.  A select few food bloggers, writers, food industry people were invited to chat with Ricardo about Holiday Entertaining in an informal sit down chat.  Ricardo was there to answer any questions we had and also discuss some of his tips and tricks and where he wants to go in the future.  He said he would like to be "the Celine Dion of food" meaning he wants to be a Canadian representative for food around the world.  Kind of a cool thing to aspire to.  He also wants to share the knowledge and collaborate with people like all of us bloggers to move toward the future and be ahead of the curve of where food is going and also the media industry with his magazine Ricardo, his online website and his products and any future TV or other kind of media.
Who knows what's next but he wants to know and wants to be ready for it.

We enjoyed a lovely spread of food that is featured in the Holiday edition of the Ricardo magazine. Appetizers that your guests can enjoy as the arrive at your party.  They could also be the kinds of things for drop in guests.

Some of the things we sampled were:

• Local Quebec cheese and cracker platters
• Fresh mixed crudite with from scratch mayonnaise
• A Pecan crusted cheese ball
• General Tao mini sausages
• Chocolate covered apricots and almonds
• Wine cocktail

I always struggle to with hosting parties even though my friends think it's easy for me.

I asked Ricardo what to do about guests that don't show up on time and have multiple food restrictions.  He said "I don't know I don't have friends like that".  Actually he said that he can get pretty tough on the start of his parties and how long he keeps the food out.

Some of Ricardo's tips for entertaining:

1. Have food that people can nibble on and serve themselves when they arrive at the party.
2. Only give people about a half an hour to arrive before you start serving the main dishes.
3. Don't put out all of the food at the same time.  Start with the nibbles and then remove them after an hour and put out the next course.  
4. Never leave a course out for more than an hour.  It's best for food safety and also for clean up and keeping the party moving.
5. Serve them wine or have some pre mixed drinks that they can serve themselves but limit it and make sure they have food before they start drinking.
6. If you know they are going to bring you wine ask them to bring specific wines that you want that will go with the food you are serving at the party.  
7. If they have so many restrictions you might suggest that they bring something that will be safe for them.
8. You decide on what you want to serve and you don't have to cater to everyone but he also takes notes on what people like and don't like and makes changes the following years.
9. He generally invites the same people so he knows what they like.
10. Put the food away after each course is done but let your guests know that there is some in the fridge if they would like some more.
11. Don't make too many things.  
12. Keep it simple.
13. Think about the kinds of appliances that you are going to need to make all the food.  
14. Use crockpots to keep things warm or free up on appliances.
15. Make as much stuff in advance as you can and you can freeze or make ahead a lot of the food.
16. Ricardo heats his plates in the oven to keep the food warm longer.
17. If you can't find unsalted pistachio's you can rinse salted ones and then roast in the oven to dry them out.  He recommends toasting all nights to bring out the flavours.
18. He doesn't do the dishes until after the party so that he can spend more time with guests.
19. He believes that the one job the guests have is to entertain themselves and bring the party.
20. He makes sure he has everything ready so that he can greet his guests and they can make themselves at home when he is greeting other guests.

I must say that I have tried to do a lot of these things but I am going to try a few other of his tips.  My challenge is that I have a small kitchen and no dishwasher so there is only so much space for the dishes but if I host a party this year I am going to consider some of these tips and make a few adjustments.  

I hope some of these tips help you enjoy your holiday gatherings with your friends and family.

Ricardo and I wish you a very happy holiday entertaining season.

Ricardo and me

Holiday Event Venue and Catering

It's that stressful time of year when you start to panic about all the Holiday Entertaining you need to do or maybe you have a company that you need to entertain your clients in a nice place.

I recently went to a great Art Gallery called Urban Gallery on Queen Street East in downtown Toronto to check out one of their monthly Art Show events.   The bonus of this Gallery is that they also have a catering business right beside the art gallery.   So if you need to simplify your life when it comes to entertaining then this is a one stop shop for you.   Catering at Urban Source Creative Catering is supplied by Executive Chef Lyndon Wiebe.  The Art Gallery is called Urban Gallery.  The caterers have been in business for over 30 years and were voted as one of Canada's Top Caterers in Martha Stewart Living "Weddings".

When I went to their Urban Foodie event recently the Artist work on display at the Gallery space was from Karen Silver and the exhibition was called OTHERWORLD.   She has some very beautiful photographs on display.  I believe they have new artists every month.


I think this is a nice space to have a cocktail party with people that don't know each other because they can sip and nibble while discussing the artists work.  It's a nice ice breaker and the space is ever changing because of the work.

If you have your own space but need a caterer then you can also have Urban Source Catering help you at your own event.   They have done many large scale events but I am sure they can help you with whatever you may need.

Here are some photos of some of the food that was presented at the Otherworld exhibition.  The mustards were provided by Whisky and Spice a Canadian company.  There mustards really pack a punch and great for your party platters.

Candied bacon

Prociutto wrapped dates

Sweet Potato chips

Salmon Dip

Charcuterie platter

Whisky and Spice Mustards

Terrine with Whisky and Spice Mustard

terrine

Cheese and fruit tray

Caramelized Brie and fruit

Disclosure:  While I was invited to the Gallery event and provided with food and drinks the opinions of this post are my own.