Saturday, March 29, 2008

Sage -- Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

Ok, I know it has been a while. I have no excuses. I would to tell you that I literally have just not eaten since my last post, but that would be a lie. A lot has changed since that last post. Barack has a chance, the snow in Chicago has melted and I have put on 15 lbs. Good weight I think. I was working out less, eating less and traveling more. Thus the loss of weight.

Anyways, I was in Edmonton, Canada earlier this week to cover a pre-study visit for a colleague. I stayed at the Marriott Cree River Resort. It was located on an Indian Reservation and to be honest, there was not much around there (I was about 7 miles from downtown Edmonton (it was actually Kilometers that they used, but I had no clue regarding conversion). There was a casino with plenty of white trash, older people looking to get out of the trailer they lived in and of course, Native American (or I guess it would be Native Indian Canadians, is that correct?). I don't know if they were native but they were Indian. I saw a lot of fanny packs, lots of missing teeth and to be honest this was a very nice hotel, nice looking casino with good restaurants located right there.

One of those restaurants was Sage. I saw I could get some Open Table points and not eve have to leave in my car so I jumped at it. There clearly had to have been some sort of convention at the Marriott that day because (1) I have never seen so many trucks in my entire life (I mean Ford F-150, Dodge (whatever they call their "big truck"), etc) and I have never seen so many mustaches. I am guessing a plumbing convention. No offense to plumbers but, they are relatively easy to pick out of a crowd, kind of similar to prostitutes.

Sage was fantastic. I decided I wanted to go only with Canadian wine. I started with a local Pinot Noir and opted out of an appetizer and did some work. The restaurant was very nice. My only negative was that it was essentially fully open to the casino so there were some distracting noises which I felt took away from the ambiance. Don't get me wrong, if Thelma at the electronic slot machine closest to my table hits it big, I want to see her dance around, her fanny pack bouncing (among other things) and the incestual, southern twang shouting of "I'm rich biatch" just as much as anyone else. Alas, Thelma did not win.

I did win though. I ordered the Chilean Sea Bass. It was served seared in a ginger soy broth, in a bowl. This was such a different presentation. I had never seen this. I loved it though. There was literally about a ladles worth of "broth" (consistency of chicken broth) floating over the bottom of the large bowl. It was just the right amount as well.

The fish was set atop a bed of bok choy, a few spears of asparagus (just enough to make the pee smell), chantrelle mushrooms, baby bella mushrooms and a few edamame. The reason I said the broth was just the right amount for my bowl is because it did not drown the fish. It just sat therewith just enough vegetables to keep it afloat. However, the broth was easily accessible to coat the crisply seared fish. I had a Pinot Gris from near Vancouver. The food was fantastic.

I really don't know how much my dinner cost. They use those crazy Canadian dollars (or pesos or something). I think the exchange rate was $1 for 1.08 Canadian yen. So, the meal ended up being $65 shillings and it was well worth it.

The scenery was not the best, but the super long elevator ride from floor 9 to floor 1 was well worth it.

2 comments:

Peggy said...

Ahhhhh - welcome back, Jimmy Watson - how in the world can I live vicariously through you when you wait months and months between posts! And today, I got two posts in one reading - sigh - life is good! Aunt Peggy

Anonymous said...

Keep up the good work.