Lisa Marie is the brainchild and latest addition to the FG business offering street food inspired cicchetti items and sharing plates… and as of this weekend – brunch! I was slightly reluctant at the thought of brunch as I didn’t care much for another boring version of eggs benny or french toast. For those of you who know Matt, know that nothing he creates is ordinary. If there is a way to make something you’ve never eaten before, he’ll do it. When the idea of brunch was brought up, I had one condition and one condition only. Create a brunch menu that would really be creative and unique for this city. Here’s a sample of what he came up with…

Double Pancake Pork Burger

This heavy hitter is a brunch monstrosity – big, meaty yummieness. Two stacked 4oz pork burger patties with pancake buns topped with lettuce, cheese, tomato and served with a side of maple syrup. And if that wasn’t enough, it comes with your choice of mixed green salad, duck fat homefries or pad thai fries.

Sweet and Sour Pork Fries

Fries tossed in homemade sweet and sour sauce and topped with cilantro bahn mi slaw, pork belly and a fried egg.

For a lighter option – Open-faced smoke fish club

Daily smoked fish, in house smoked bacon, lettuce, tomato, red onion, lemon ricotta cream cheese, capers and green onions. Again with the side of mixed green salad, duck fat home fries or pad thai fries.

Other brunch items include The Peameal, eh? – braised peameal bacon, old cheddar, fried green tomatoes, caramelized onions and a fried egg, the Eggy, Sausage and Biscuits – double stacked open faced biscuit topped with sausage gravy, cheese and a fried egg and last but not least Fried Cornish Hen and Corn Bread Waffles- pretty self-explanatory.

Lisa’s Sunset

and what’s brunch without a Lisa’s Sunset – vodka, cherry heering, st. germain, orange juice and lemonata. And coffee of course!

And if you really haven’t had enough of Lisa Marie, there’s always our Meat sweat Sundays featuring our in house smoke boards and 30+day dry aged cuts of NY Strip and rib-eyes. Come in, grab a drink and say hello!

Also our market is open all weekend long, so come and get all your BBQ grilling meats and sides!

k.

This has been unlike any shoot (rather set of shoots) I’ve ever done. Over the past three months, I’ve had the pleasure of working with Matt and the rest of the team on FG’s latest endeavor, Lisa Marie. Photographing and documenting the process of opening a restaurant is unique. While yes, the late nights, long hours aren’t ideal, there is nothing quite as yummy and fun as menu testing and tasting. Along the way, I’ve snapped a couple of pics. Enjoy!

Lisa Marie’s menu is unlike much of the FG traditional pulled pork, braised meat and bun variations. The menu consists of 8 cichetti inspired dishes and 2 sharing plates.  The concept behind the restaurant was to bring the pop up business model, street food and the FG mantra (Food is Fun) to a brick and mortar location. The hope is that with say a table of 4, you would be able to order the menu in full.

Mozzarella and Marrow Sandwich

Last Saturday, we got a chance to feature four items from the Lisa Marie menu at the Toronto Underground Market; smoked duck deep fried pizza, polenta cakes with braised short ribs, cheese belly pork things and the mozzarella marrow sandwich. The mozzarella and marrow sandwich was hit, in fact our best seller! This foccocia, breaded, buttery, cheesy sandwich is finished off with a sprinkle of porcini salt and a lemon wedge.

Top: Deep Fried Cheeseburger topped with a quail egg Bottom: Pork Belly Cheese Thing

Not only is Lisa Marie serving up a dinner menu, the space is also set up with market place for customers to take home packaged goods and preserves. From homemade tomato sauce to pickled beets and heirloom carrots, the market offers grab and go items for the busy  Queen West crowd.

  Jared smoked chili

Picked beets and heirloom carrots

Pickling spice !

Bacon Jam! Yup, that’s right. Now you can grab bacon jam from the market!

For more pics and insight into the nitty gritty of opening Lisa Marie, check out the FG

Filed under: Lisa Marie, Uncategorized Tagged: cichetti, cooking, elvis, FG, Fidel Gastro, food, food photographer, food photography, food trucks, foodporn, lisa marie, Matthew Basile, meat, Photography, Rebel without a kitchen, restaurant, sharing, snacks, street food, toronto ]]> http://kylazanardi.com/2013/04/09/introducing-lisa-marie-photo-essay/feed/ 1 BONES-AND-MEAT--LOGO kylazanardi BONES-AND-MEAT--LOGO IMG_1316bonemarrowcheese cichettiefinal meatballs5 Hot saucy - Kyla Zanardi LM Beets Carots Jar Pickling handsandbaconjam http://kylazanardi.com/2013/03/10/sunday-eats-stockyards-smokehouse-ladder/ http://kylazanardi.com/2013/03/10/sunday-eats-stockyards-smokehouse-ladder/#comments Sun, 10 Mar 2013 19:42:50 +0000 kylazanardi http://kylazanardi.com/?p=1923 Read More →]]> Nothing to do on a sunny sunday in the city? Check out these yummy eats from neighborhood favorite; Stockyards Smokehouse & Ladder. You’d almost miss it if it wasn’t for the line up outside the door. Tucked away, just west of the corner at Christie and St.Clair West is the infamous food joint. Consider taking out your eats and heading to the park at Wychwood Barns.

699 St.Clair Ave. W
Toronto
M6C 1B2
416 658 9666

Matt’s Entry (Rock Lobster)

Rossy’s Entry (Supi Cucu)

Fun times in the kitchen!!

Adam helping out with our taco. Thank El Gastro!

Such a great event! Big thanks to organizer , Joel Solish for the invite and throwing such a fantastic event!!

big love,

k.

Lucky for you, in between bites, I grabbed some pics. These are some bad-ass saturday meals, I highly encourage you to go and try it yourself.

Rose and Sons

Beast Restaurant

          96 Tecumseth St. Toronto, ON M6J 2H1

          647.352.6000

big love,

k.

When I was asked to host a supper club by Restaurant Club TO, a group of good friends turned collective food bloggers, I immediately thought, yes! Or rather… ole!!! I enjoy changing things up and I definitely enjoy a challenge, and to be honest this pushed me to think beyond sandwiches and opened up new possibilities for the fidel gastro’s business. 

Not only did KY and I get excited about the unknowns of putting a proper supper club together, but we were also stoked about the menu creation. Right from the get-go we knew that regardless of the individual menu offerings, the theme would have to be street food inspired. Hence the street food supper club.

Now for the tough part…. Coming up with street food fit for a plate. 26 of them to be exact.

Ky and I totally collaborated on this menu as well as the presentation. She’d say sausage, I’d say bison. She’d say pogo and I’d say tempura.

That’s basically how we did the entire menu word associations. One week before the event we went up to the prep kitchen and played around with some of our street food ideas. By the time we left we had a 6 course street food inspired menu and some amazing photos.

Course 1: Beef chichetti two ways

Inspired by Chichetti, proper Venetian pub/ street food. On one side of the plate you have a deep fried cheeseburger with tomato jam. On the other side rare beef tenderloin topped with a quail egg and Dijon. Probably my favorite of the evening and a great dish to kick the night off.

Course 2: Kimchi Cesar Soup

Integrating two worlds; Korean street food and vintage beverage. The soup was served warm and had all the Cesar offerings: clams, tobasco, wostershire, horseradish etc… the too boot we added Kimchi to the soup to not only add a little extra kick but also to replace the complacent “celery stick”.

Course 3: Whole roasted whiting on a stick served on a bed of asparagus and chow mein coleslaw.

Inspired by  San Francisco in every way. It had  flavours of sesame and rice wine vinegar and it also embraced seafood as a substantial element of street food.

Course 4: Bison Tempura pogos served with cranberry relish

We took the carnival style pogo stick and kicked it up a notch. Pure Ontario bison sausages cooked then deep fried in tempura batter. The cranberry relish started off as a cranberry sauce. I gave it more body and cut the tartyness of it by cooking Spanish onions in ice wine and adding it to the mixture.

Course 5: The big pig taco

With the abundance of tacos in Toronto, how was I going to come at it differently? Ky and I were adamant on showcasing what went in to the taco. Enter a whole roasted pig. 32lbs of porky loveliness. Cooked to perfection using a La Caja pit smoker this 32lb’r took only 3.5 hours to roast. I injected it with apple cider vinegar, cider beer, lemon juice and Mexican spices 24 hours in advance. The pig was wheeled out whole and cut into sections and set throughout the supper club setup. I Went through the different parts of the pig as I cut through it. I explained the different areas and sections and how the meat differed from section to section. My personal favorites were the cheeks and the cap meat just above the ribs. Tender and fatty. The taco was served with an apple slaw, chimichurri sauce and jalepeno aioli.

Course 6: A tribute to Elvis.

I for one am not a dessert guy. I don’t bake well and it doesn’t get me excited like a whole pig does. So instead of going over the top, we came up with peanut butter, banana and bacon French toast sandwiches. I topped it off with pure Quebec maple syrup. I think that pretty much sums it up.

It was amazing to be a part of the supper club and to work so closely with ky and our other staffers including former executive chef at McEwan’s, Ivana Raca and former head chef at five doors north, Matt Griffiths.

Everyone worked very hard to make the night happen and I was extremely proud of everything we sent out. I think now having done this type of event, we showed that not only can FG do a sit down dinner but as a team we fully understand how to embrace a food experience. Combining the stories of the dishes, with live popup energy, integrating social media throughout, capturing the moments with photography and keeping it on brand with my true food passion… street food.

Viva la revolucion!

I know its been a while, my apologies. To be fair, I’ve a busy bee working on this not so little venture called the INSIGHT Project. With that said, I have neglected a big passion of mine – food photography, and thought I would treat you with this post! Enjoy!

I snagged a ticket to the second edition of From Bosnia With Love II hosted by the talented Ksenija Hotic at the The Depanneur. I was totally blown away by the labor of love Ksenija and her family put into the meal, from the cured and smoked meats she prepared with her father to their families’ garden vegetables pickled by her and her mother. What was most impressive of the meal was the true craft and artisanal care that went into every item on the menu. Here are some pics from the evening!

Ksenija’s friends, family and food-lovers alike gathered for a traditional five course meal featuring some Bosnia’s culinary delights

This was a huge winner with my fellow dinner guests Matt Basile and Ivana Raca. Ksenija and her father smoke and cure their meats themselves, bake their own bread… and to top it all off pickle vegetables from their garden!

Chef Ksenija Hotic

These were some of the yummiest cabbage rolls I’ve ever had! Stuffed with rice and beef in a pickled cabbage wrapping, Sarme is served with a traditional Balkan bread called Maslenica. Maslenica is baked in a round, and pulled apart at the table for sharing.

By the time the Cevapi came around, we were stuffed! But knew we couldn’t miss out on this traditional (often dubbed as the Bosnian national dish) meal of minced lamb meat, stuffed in a pita served with cottage cheese and red pepper and eggplant spread called Ajvar.

Zeljanica – phyllo pastry with five cheeses and spinach

The loveliest dinner companions – Matt and Ivana – chat with Ksenija before dessert is served

enough said.

Big congrats to The Depanneur, Ksenija, her family and culinary team for organizing this fantastic evening.

 
Meet the North South Taco !

Here some pics of our (FG and I teamed up for this one) taco for the Harbourfront Taco Challenge! Enjoy.