Provence - A Superb Fish Tasting Menu All Month
April 8, 2009
Fish.
Harsh as it sounds there are few restaurants in Vancouver capable of doing this denizen of the sea justice.
And we mean justice across a wide spectrum, not just sushi and sashimi.
But this month a great opportunity has come along for you to have your fish and eat it too.
We're talking about Provence Marinaside, a wonderful spot overlooking the water at False Creek.
All month Provence has a tasting menu consisting entirely of fish at the reasonable price of $42 for a superb three-course repast.
We started off with a trio of smoked fish - trout, mackerel and salmon. A delight to the eye this dish got the palate going.
The trout light and silky, the mackerel strong and robust and the salmon delicate and rich.
Even though everything was smoked ever so slightly the unique taste of each fish was evident. The pearl onions, the gherkins and the mixed greens provided a symphony of colours and tastes.
For the mains we chose halibut and baked sardine fillets.
The halibut sat atop bamboo rice - a short all natural grain white rice infused with pure fresh bamboo juice. The rice was moist and viscous with a pale green colour to it.
It went perfectly with the halibut that was moist and tender and that accompanying shaved asparagus salad completed a superb dish.
The next dish was the sardine fillets and it was the hit of the evening.
First of all cooking sardines is an art. Not everyone can do it and do it well, even though the best way to prepare this overlooked fish is to do it in a simple way, the way it is done along the Mediterranean with a little olive oil and some salt.
The biggest problem is that sardines are so tiny that they have tiny bones and deboning this fish is hard, really hard.
Our dish arrived with the sardines split in half, each draped over an ancient grain called farro that has an earthy almost nutty taste to it.
Farro used to be a staple for the Roman legions.
Arugula and spinach added an extra dimension to the dish.
The sardines were outstanding. No bones and moistened with a light vinaigrette.
Sardines have a very pronounced taste to them. The fish is oily, rich and full of flavour.
There is nothing subtle or light about this fish. It is simply delicious.
We loved it.
For dessert we had Provence's outstanding lemon tarte with Hazelnut brittle.
And what a tarte it was - smooth, creamy, with that real tart lemon taste. The brittle provided great contrast with the silky texture of the lemon.
But then of course that should come as no surprise given that one of the owners, Chef Jean-Francis Quaglia made his first lemon tart when he was only 12 years old.
Great Movies - The Good, The Bad & The Ugly
Sergio Leone.
An Italian.
As a director, he more than anyone else, is responsible for the reinvention of the Western in the annals of movie history.
One of his best, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, stars none other than Clint Eastwood as a good guy, Lee Van Cleef, as a super-bad guy, and Eli Wallach, as the ugly guy.
It is a story about gold lost during the civil war in Texas and the attempts to find it.
Leone is masterful in the way the movie is shot, aided by a memorable soundtrack.
Incidentally when Eastwood was doing these cowboy flicks for Leone he had fallen on hard times but his performance and the movies popularity revived Eastwood's career and the cowboy movie's genre.
