The Depths of the Carillon
We visited the New World Market, and found everything we needed for dinner in one place. Once again, I marveled at how cheap fresh fish and produce is here. The prepared stuff seems to be more pricey, but we were going as fresh and local as possible.
I picked up some giant green-lipped mussels for less than $3.00 a kilogram, tomatoes, mesclun mix, fresh herbs, fancy $7 /250mL Village Press olive oil, a salt and pepper grinder, fresh pasta, parmesan cheese and fresh berries for dessert. All for around $40. And remember that’s $30 Canadian. That’s much more affordable than our dinners out. Jody grabbed some white wine, and we were good to go.
My first impression at the Carillon’s commercial kitchen was that it was creepy, but very cool, and had everything I could need. At closer inspection, it was less so. There didn’t appear to be any decent knives, and there was no tea towel to be found anywhere. Where I’d thought that there were unlimited pots and pans to choose from, I realized that most of them had been burned out on the uber-powerful gas range. All I had to cook pasta in was one small saucepan.
The wok, which I’d figured would work for the mussels, appeared on closer inspection to have accumulated a whole other layer of grime on top of the cast iron. I tried not to think about it as I began chopping.
In the meantime, Kelly and Jody set to work to heat up the dining room by lighting a fire in the wood stove. With great patience and cunning (there was no kindling to be found), they managed to get it going. I managed to fit the pasta into the little pot, and got the mussels started.
We set the table with whatever mismatched plates and cutlery we could find, and marveled at the cupboards and freezer full of unknown bags of things that may belong to current tenants at the Carillon, or to people who had left an unknown length of time ago. It had the feeling of a midden, which you could study for years to learn about the Carillon inhabitants.
While other tenants came down to boil water for noodle dishes (that’s all anyone else appeared to use the kitchen for—and probably with good reason), I pulled off mussels marinara on fresh tagliatelle and a mesclun salad topped with Parmesan and lemon and olive oil dressing. It all turned out remarkably well, and we enjoyed it with our wine in the dimly lit and eerily quiet dining room. When we had cleaned up, I took one last look at the empty kitchen…and shuddered.
I’m still glad we cooked there—what’s life without a little adventure?
I picked up some giant green-lipped mussels for less than $3.00 a kilogram, tomatoes, mesclun mix, fresh herbs, fancy $7 /250mL Village Press olive oil, a salt and pepper grinder, fresh pasta, parmesan cheese and fresh berries for dessert. All for around $40. And remember that’s $30 Canadian. That’s much more affordable than our dinners out. Jody grabbed some white wine, and we were good to go.
My first impression at the Carillon’s commercial kitchen was that it was creepy, but very cool, and had everything I could need. At closer inspection, it was less so. There didn’t appear to be any decent knives, and there was no tea towel to be found anywhere. Where I’d thought that there were unlimited pots and pans to choose from, I realized that most of them had been burned out on the uber-powerful gas range. All I had to cook pasta in was one small saucepan.
The wok, which I’d figured would work for the mussels, appeared on closer inspection to have accumulated a whole other layer of grime on top of the cast iron. I tried not to think about it as I began chopping.
In the meantime, Kelly and Jody set to work to heat up the dining room by lighting a fire in the wood stove. With great patience and cunning (there was no kindling to be found), they managed to get it going. I managed to fit the pasta into the little pot, and got the mussels started.
We set the table with whatever mismatched plates and cutlery we could find, and marveled at the cupboards and freezer full of unknown bags of things that may belong to current tenants at the Carillon, or to people who had left an unknown length of time ago. It had the feeling of a midden, which you could study for years to learn about the Carillon inhabitants.
While other tenants came down to boil water for noodle dishes (that’s all anyone else appeared to use the kitchen for—and probably with good reason), I pulled off mussels marinara on fresh tagliatelle and a mesclun salad topped with Parmesan and lemon and olive oil dressing. It all turned out remarkably well, and we enjoyed it with our wine in the dimly lit and eerily quiet dining room. When we had cleaned up, I took one last look at the empty kitchen…and shuddered.
I’m still glad we cooked there—what’s life without a little adventure?
posted by Noelle | 8:01 PM
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