Kathleen and Ted take us aon a tour of Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Brittany, Galacia, and Cape Breton to introduce us to Celtic food and drink.
I have been writing about the world of food and drink for more than 25 years, lots of newspaper and magazine articles, reviewing restaurants, travelling as much as time would allow. Research for one of my books, Simply the Best: Food and Wine from Ontario's Finest Inns (Whitecap Books) brought my husband and I to the village of Bayfield, Ontario, a lovely historic village perched on the shores of magnificent Lake Huron. We fell in love with an old building (circa 1850) situated on the main street of this town - and grew very excited when we learned it was for sale. Throwing caution and words of advice from family and friends to the wind, we sold our Toronto house and, after a few months of renos and refurbishment (no Restaurant Makeover crew!), we opened our doors and introduced the town and the world to The Black Dog Village Pub & Bistro. Having written about chefs, restaurants and the industry for many years, I then found myself working "the line" pumping out dishes, making soups, baking cakes, vinaigrettes and much more. Nothing new there -- I had been cooking forever for family and friends, for TV demos and cookbook photos. What was new was preparing food within a busy restaurant environment. These days, while my husband oversees the "front of house" and all that entails, I am the executive chef of our very popular establishment, revamping the menu each season, working with our kitchen staff to make sure they interpret my passion for good food, carefully and respectfully prepared. I enjoy passing on the knowledge gleaned from many years of, well, eating (!) and cooking, travelling and experimenting. We are now five years old and going strong. Who knows, there may be a Black Dog cookbook in the works one day!
In the meantime look out for my latest book, 300 Best Potato Recipes to be published by Robert Rose in Fall 2011. A fantastic collection of recipes including many that are firm favourites at the Black Dog.
