Giddy for seafood in Lisbon

March 17, 2019March 17, 2019 / Greg / 1 Comment

I’ll set the stage. It was early afternoon and we were standing in Sintra and at that point were making our plans on the fly for the rest of our day. Rather than having a late lunch there, we decided to hop an earlier train back to Lisbon to make a beeline to a restaurant that was on our “must visit” list.

In my mind, Cervejaria Ramiro, a down to earth seafood restaurant, had reached almost mythical proportions. As a former coastal dweller now landlocked in Saskatchewan, I was drooling at suddenly having unfettered access to fresh seafood for the first time in ages. I had read reviews of this place and had seen it on a Netflix special about six months earlier. It was love before first sight.

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New and old favourites

April 14, 2018April 14, 2018 / Greg / Leave a comment

Vancouver has become a favourite city of mine, especially now that it is a relatively painless direct flight away. A number of trips there over the past few years created an interesting, and delicious dilemma for my most recent visit – do I retrace my past steps for favourite foods or do I explore some new restaurants and tastes in hopes of adding to my list of favourites? Of course, balance is everything, so in the spirit of “a little from column A and a little from column B” I did both.

There was no doubt that a visit to Vancouver would have to include some seafood, and in particular, sushi. There are a couple of reasonable sushi places in Saskatoon, but arriving at Sushi Itoga on Robson Street reminded me just how amazing truly great sushi can be. I placed my order at the counter, sat down at one of the long communal tables, and a few minutes later, this amazing spread was placed in front of me.

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Missing a taste of the sea

January 18, 2018January 13, 2018 / Greg / 1 Comment

All I could think about was “lobster roll”.

My trip to Boston in November for work didn’t allow much sightseeing time, but everyone has to eat, right? And since you have to eat, you may as well make good choices. As a landlocked Saskatonian, my eating plans whenever I get near a coast involve unholy amounts of seafood. And on the east coast, my mind turns to lobster, and in particular, lobster rolls.

You can imagine my glee when I discovered one of Boston’s best lobster rolls was a short two block walk from my hotel in the Back Bay. I strolled into Luke’s Lobster and after being momentarily distracted in noticing that their in-season crab was from New Brunswick (yea Atlantic Canada!), I ordered a lobster roll and with the tiny bit of restraint I had, took time to snap this picture of it in all its crustacean beauty…

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Favourites and firsts

September 18, 2017September 16, 2017 / Greg / Leave a comment

A lot can change in fifteen months. And a lot can stay the same.

Back in Halifax for a couple of days after my sister’s wedding in the Annapolis Valley this past summer, my wife and I hit a few favourite haunts in our former neighbourhood. We also took some time to experience a few new things in a city that means a lot to both of us. Not surprisingly, one of the first places we revisited was the central library downtown. We had lived two blocks from here and we both used it as a second living room. The view of the city and the harbour from the library is something we both miss.

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A hankering for seafood

January 12, 2017January 12, 2017 / Greg / Leave a comment

Living in a landlocked city, I have been missing the previously under appreciated access I had to wonderful seafood back in Halifax. On my first grocery shopping trip in Saskatoon back in April, I looked at a frozen Atlantic lobster tail for sale and just shook my head in disbelief. Now, when I’m traveling to a coastal area, my food radar tunes into the seafood selections so I can make up for lost time. My trip to Seattle in November was all about the seafood.

After I dropped my bags at the hotel on arrival, I immediately walked to the Pike Place Market and to the counter of the Market Grill. I was on a mission… it was lunch time, and I had a hankering for their specialty – the grilled salmon sandwich. I closed my eyes for the first bite so I could savour the long overdue taste of the sea. Delicious!