♥ Spending quality time with Daigoro while her human mommy was away in Las Vegas

♥ A birthday dinner for my baby brother at Ulla / a beautiful mug made by my friend Renee Sala

♥  The best Royal Wedding mug I have ever seen, a gift from Tina Athena (bless my friends for buying me royalty knick knacks, but lawd, my collection is starting to verge on crazy)

♥  A package covered in cloth and stamps from India, containing tea, soap, a colourful scarf and Party Time natural hangover relief pills, via darling Julychka

♥  The fabulous cookie spread, hot spiced cider and complimentary bourbon at the Clarence House Christmas Party

♥  Guests at our Christmas party / singing at the Kingsgate Chorus Christmas concert

♥ Soaring over Vancouver like a boss (with Tony Parsons!!) on the Helijet en route to Victoria

♥ Cookie swap party at Natasha’s grand old James Bay apartment

♥ Art on the sidewalks of Victoria

♥ SANDWICHES!!!!

Here’s what I’ve been doing on the weekends in Victoria lately. Above, meeting a funny owl in a tree in the haunted cemetery park. (UPDATE: It is a Barred Owl or, more adorably, known as a HOOT OWL!!! Thanks to Karen for knowing a surprising amount about owls.)

Feeding the seals at Oak Bay Marina after a hearty brunch celebrating Katie’s birthday.

Autumn bike rides along the scenic ocean route with a visit to the Chinese cemetery.

Seeing Kathryn Calder play at her CD release party at Lucky Bar. Trying out the just opened Big Wheel Burger in Cook Street Village.

Taking in an all male dance revue of ill repute. My favourite was the cowboy, he lit an actual campfire on stage and “danced” in front of it.

I’m ready to delve into Cabin 2011. This is an annual event for me and my friends. We trek from the coast to the interior of British Columbia, to a lake called Tyee about 20 minutes outside of William’s Lake. Here’s some facts about William’s Lake: it has a population of around 12,000, it’s the home of the BC Cowboy Hall of Fame and Rick Hansen is from there.

Going to the Cabin is one of the highlights of my year. When I get there I can feel tension draining from my body and I’m so happy to be in the middle of (relatively) nowhere, surrounded by close friends. I have so many memories there, some of them really intense– happy ones, sad ones, ones that make me a little confused and ones that still make me laugh uncontrollably. There’s also some damn good food.

Here’s some moments from the first day and a half. The weather wasn’t the worst it’s ever been but it was pretty chilly at times! Expect to see a lot of sweaters even though it’s the last week of July. That’s Canada!

Upon review of these photos together, Cabin 2011 looks a lot like Melissa’s Gay Dance Recital (not an inaccurate description, actually).

When Jordan and I were planning our time in Los Angeles, we really wanted to stay in neighbourhood situation rather than in a hotel. We rented a cute apartment (for cheaper than a lot of hotels in the surrounding areas!) and ended up loving Silverlake. The lush, rolling hills,  chuby little bungalows and easy access to great restaurants and cafes was ideal. We were also right near the freeway so we could easily zip over to get in line with all the other cars stuck in traffic.

Our apartment was very close to the Silverlake Reservoir. Cresting the hill in the above photo was terrifying. It really looked like the car was going to drop into space. The outdoor succulents were a favourite of mine. I would love to have a little path in my yard lined with them someday.

Jordan was really taken with Intelligentsia Coffee. We also tried LAMILL  and while it was a beautiful space, it was also a little stuffy for sipping coffee. There were a lot of intimidatingly beautiful people there too. We went to Intelligentsia a few times and I bought a pair of Saltwater sandals at Driftwood, a cute boutique next door.

We made a stop at Food+Lab to get sandwiches for our day. Lucky us, they had Coolhaus ice cream sandwiches! Totally delicious. Later on in the trip we saw on the Coolhaus twitter that their ice cream sandwich truck was near us but we looked for it in vain.

I had me another grand weekend in Victoria, all of it basking in the late summer sun. I’m starting on Sunday, because Metchosin Day was too much fun to save for later. Metchosin is a rural community of about 5000, located just past Charles Xavier’s School for the Gifted. It’s seriously pretty, with fields of golden grass, Garry oak meadows, a little coastline with pebble beaches and winding pastoral roads.

The Metchosin Day country fair is an annual event celebrating this chuby little district. This year Duncan and Jordan decided to run a bannock stand. Don’t Panic Here Be Bannock served bannock, Miss Rebecca’s Famous Lemon Lime Lavender Lemonade, and deep fried “black & white” (that’s a battered oreo) and included delicious condiments such as Nutella, “brown & white” (that’s cinnamon and sugar), and fresh jam made by Tina and Sean.  I assumed that bannock was a fairly generic term, especially in British Columbia, but we had a lot of people ask about it. Basically it’s fried bread, also known as frybread, beaver tails, whale tails, elephant ears, etc. Here’s a provincial government sanctioned Bannock Awareness page, complete with recipes!

Metchosin Day was a classic country fair. Local artists, farmers and producers sold fresh food, flowers and homemade goods while an amusing roster of community events took place. Live music was played, including the high school jazz band, Morris dancers shook their bells and, in what might be the greatest hour of my life, a community pet parade took place.

These girls named their chickens the Sedin Sisters, as they were born during the Vancouver Canucks’ fateful bout in the Stanley Cup playoff finals. They showed me where larger chickens had plucked feathers off the sisters– bullied just like the real Sedins! (That hockey joke was for Julia.)

Chicken shit bingo! The chicken walks around the board until it poops on a number. In this case 32 was the lucky winner! Pretty funny cheering for a chicken dropping a d. Also, wilderness survival tips from the local elementary school: “If you see a cougar, act like Tricky Dick Nixon.”

Mega giant props to everyone who came out and either had bannock or helped out. For example, Kim and her supes dramat sign (just Persed that sentence in honour of Kim) and Masako for destroying a rush in the middle of refueling. While I popped in and out to help with cash or making lemonades, Jordan, Duncan and Rebecca rocked the stand all day long.

Oh look! It’s Rupert! His infectious dancing to the undeniably creepy Baby Lily is officially my favourite thing at the moment.

Now it’s time to talk about the pet show. All types of pets were encouraged and every pet got a specially customized title and ribbon, such as “Cutest Pet”, “Longest Tail”, “Happiest Pet”. I am not joking when I said this was one of the most joyous hours I have ever experienced.

For example: THIS DOG. She sat, unmoving except for her head, in this dump truck, wearing this outfit, for an HOUR. Chillest, most tolerant dog award. In case you were wondering, her name is Taya and she won “Best Braids”. I want to start her Fan Club.

Chillest, most tolerant pet in the Cat division goes to this feline. It just chilled in its owner’s arms for the entire event. Also, it was gigantic and adorably fluffy.

This handsome fellow won “Softest Fur.” I petted him myself and I can confirm the award is well deserved.

By the end, we are all exhausted and starving, having eaten little but bannock and oreos in what felt like one of the hottest days of the summer. I even snuck off for a swim at Matheson Lake. Luckily Metchosin Day is traditionally capped off with a lamb and salmon BBQ, all cooked on site over an open fire. The salmon was perfectly smoked and flavourful. The lamb was cooked like we were at some sort of pagan viking feast. I’m linking this picture of it cooking because it’s totally disgusting but damn, it was delicious.

Look for Don’t Panic Here Be Bannock at Metchosin Day 2012! This post is dedicated to all the Metchosin boys in my life. You know who you are– you’ve driven the highway of tears.

Consider this the launch of a record of me and Jordan’s roadtrip, hereby dubbed South by Pilau* West (SXPW). We hit the road August 5th and landed back in Canada on August 14th — not exactly a long haul, but enough time to cram in all the southwest scenery we could handle.

We started our trip in Las Vegas, but buffets aside, I find that city pretty useless in terms of my personal interests (I don’t gamble, I hate nightclubs for the most part and I can never be bothered to go to shows) and so our time spent there was limited to a brief cruise down the strip.

It was our goal to try and avoid eating at typical fast food places when on the road, so we installed the Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives app and, while en route from Vegas to Los Angeles, we ended up at the Mad Greek Cafe. It was pretty tasty, but mostly hilarious.

* A pilau is a rice dish cooked in seasoned broth, but when pronounced “pie-loo” it becomes a nauseating nickname for your s/o.

For the final installment of a series recalling my Epic Weekend, I’ll let the lovely Kimberli (above) present to you the Island Chefs’ Foodfest. This annual event celebrating local food, drink and farms is put on by the Island Chefs’ Collaborative, a “community based, social profit organization dedicated to supporting sustainable food and agriculture on Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands.” The fest had the feel of an all-day, all-you-can-eat-and-drink picnic catered by my favourite restaurants and breweries, filled with good friends, great live music and beautiful views. Foodfest took place at Fort Rodd Hill and Fisgard Lighthouse, a National Historic Site and all around scenic locale. Here’s a recap of some of the things that made the day feel like a great start to an amazing summer:

1. BIKE ARMADA! I want to give huge props to Shane from Habit Coffee (our favourite place for coffee in Victoria) for organizing a bike gang to ride from downtown to Fort Rodd Hill. It was a blast cruising down the Galloping Goose trail with 35-40 happy bikers, ringing our bells in tunnels and generally holding up traffic, in a good natured way. Here’s a hint for next year: the bike gang got first admission to the fest, while everyone else had to wait for the gates to open! Just be careful on the way home, a few friends (after some of that “all you can drink”) drove their tandem bike into a fence and ended their day with a broken hand and a bum knee.

2. Discovering new food, drink and products, all from local producers. The mushroom tart on greens, quince sorbet served in an adorable cone (using fruit courtesy of Lifecycles, an organization that collects and uses excess fruit from backyard trees) and the dry, refreshing Pippins Cider from Sea Cider in Saanichton were my favourite tastes of the day. Pippins Cider will definitely make an appearance in some backyard bbqs this summer.

3. Picnic party! We ended up part of a group spread over multiple blankets. People mingled, played cards, hopped from stall to stall collecting wine and snacks, or just relaxed on the grass in the wonderfully warm June sun. I made some new friends (like Rebecca, in the cute straw hat) and got to spend some quality time with some of my favourite Victoria people too. I even brought along my little brother Jeremy (in the yellow shirt), to further encourage his developing love of local food.

4. First lake swim of the summer. My friend Duncan is hardcore and has already been swimming for a month now, but this was the first time I’ve jumped in a lake thus far this season. Sure, Prior Lake was totally cold, but it felt great after a long bike ride and was the best way to end the day. (Actually, we ended the day seeing X-Men First Class, which was pretty entertaining. James McAvoy, wow.)

The second installment in an Epic Weekend series:

I had worked up a huge appetite after Saturday morning garage sailing and, afterwards, checking out the bike polo tournament at the Victoria International Cycling Festival with Jordan. Lucky for me Tina and Sean had prepared a wonderful dinner in an unusual setting. Tina works at Cook Culture, a local kitchen ware and cooking school, with wonderful facilities to host classes of all different kinds. Once the doors had closed for the day, we gathered for an amazing feast beginning with kale chips (kale from Tina and Sean’s garden!) and roast veg, followed by lamb meatballs and eggs cooked in a tagine and ending with meringue, strawberries and rhubarb cream. And plenty of red wine. (Kim and I were possessed that night. So fun.) The group finished the night at our apartment, where we drank, bullshitted and my brother did card tricks. I love it when my friends cook for me and this meal will certainly stand out for years to come.

A confession: I hate eggs. I cannot for the life of me fathom how people can eat eggs like any other type of food. Sure, I can handle an eggy crepe or egg cooked in stir fry. But the smell and sight of a hard boiled egg makes me gag something fierce. A plain fried egg? Disgusting.

I’m making teeny tiny baby steps into the world of eating eggs. It started with eggs benedict (what better way to learn to enjoy eggs than covered in hollandaise?) and I discovered that maybe, just maybe, I can do a poached egg. Jordan has learned to perfectly poach an egg and I’ve learned that eggs, fresh salsa and toast can be a surprisingly delicious combination.

On the other hand, loving rock operas has always come easy to me and that is why I am still so blown away by the production of Jesus Christ Superstar I saw last night. The entire show was basically a group of friends (including members of local bands such as Slam Dunk, Immaculate Machine and Aquitania) who thought “Hey, let’s put on a play” and next thing you know, two sold out shows. I can’t get over how talented my friends are — the singing, the incredible live band, the dancing, the costumes — it was amazing. Not to mention Jesus Christ Superstar is just a rockin’ musical in general.

If you are in Victoria, see if you can get tickets to their closing night at the Event Centre tonight. The tickets are all screen printed and the program folds out into a poster — there’s three different ones, so it’s fun to see which one you get.

(Listening to “The Hazards of Love” to sate my thirst for more rock opera now!)

Recently I got together with my Auntie and Cousin to delve deep into our Doukhobor roots and make pirahi. If you don’t know what a Doukhobor is, in a nutshell: of Russian descent and largely concentrated in the Kootenays region of British Columbia (though you might meet some in Saskatchewan too). Some day I will post more about my Doukhobor heritage and my involvement with the community. For now, the important thing is FOOD! Pirahi is a simple baked pastry made with basic dough and a variety of filling. We made cottage cheese, pea and sauerkraut pirahi. My aunt’s dough braiding skills were off the hook! Mine were exceptionally pathetic but after making 100 of the damn things, I was braiding like a Babushka.

My cousin made rising dough and we also made a batch of our Baba’s simple dough recipe. Guess which was better? Obviously Baba’s. On the right are little bird trinkets watching over the kitchen.

Pirahi is best served dripping with melted butter, with a side of melted butter for further pouring. Baba was always very particular about having melted butter on hand. Chase the dog was particular about watching our every move from her spot on the kitchen floor.

A hug for all the hard work! My cousin has a really beautiful house in East Van. I was really taken with her sweet living room and its cute collections and the kitchen’s sizable deck overlooking a little garden with a view of downtown Vancouver.