It’s one of the interesting items that they have over at T&T supermarket that I’ve gawked at, and wondered about (I keep thinking of doing something with duck tongues, too).

When Sandy, Betty & I visited Susan in Roslin,  Betty was reading something about them. About what they looked like, what they taste like. She mused that it was something I should experiment with, and invite them over for dinner to try. It stuck in my head.

I have reverted to not springing new dishes on people — I have to try them first.

This just felt like the week to try a silkie chicken. After bird-watching for a little over 3 hours this morning, I hopped on my bike and rode over to T&T, bought a chicken and a container of garlic cloves (I never do that! I always buy full buds. But I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with the chicken when I got home, and wanted to consider silkie on 40 cloves of garlic). Back home, did a little reading on the internet, and decided to put it in the crockpot.

Here’s the video of my experience. Warning: if you are of a delicate constitution or a vegetarian or a vegan, you will not like this. It is recognizably a bird.

The trees are almost all out in full leaf. The cottonwood hasn’t leafed out yet, but pretty much everything else has. Sand cherry and elderberry have finished flowering, as has the sour cherry tree, and the purple lilacs are now blossoming. My bleeding hearts have grown so well that I’ve had to do a trim to see the birdbath for picture taking purposes.

I should be upstairs working on photos, but when there is a fallout of birds — how can I resist?

It’s now also available on Diesel eBooks.

And, NEWS FLASH!! finally, it’s on iTunes!

We’re definitely about 3 weeks ahead of where we usually are. Usually at this time, I’m hauling a big block of ice out of my backyard water thingie for the birds. This year, there was no ice. Daffodils and yellow things: another sign. In 2006, my King Alfreds opened around April 24th. My previous mention of an early spring that surprised me was April 5, 2010, when I noticed the forsythia in Ray’s yard in bloom. My King Alfreds are all open, and the forsythia has started opening: Ray thinks it will be in full bloom for his mother’s 103rd birthday on the weekend.

As a kind of diary to record what’s going on, here are some pictures of various shrubs and bulbs in my gardens from Sunday. Today was cold, tomorrow’s supposed to be, too: let’s hope nothing dies back. Actually, I’m more concerned with food growers than my little garden.

King Alfred daffodils

New shoot on David Austin’s “the Faerie” florabunda rose

Honeysuckle vine that twines around the wrought iron fence surrounding the garden

In the back garden, the elderberry called “Sutherland Gold”

Clematis. Good lord, the Jackmanii clematis is out already. I remember growing up in Montreal, and it seemed Art Drysdale was always on about how difficult it was to grow clematis. But that was Montreal, and this is now.

Lilac is coming into leaf, too.

Globe alliums are really mature already. They usually bloom first week of June. We’ll see this year.

Hans Christian Andersen florabunda in the back garden.

We’re a couple of weeks ahead of my earliest spring. We’ll see what happens this year. I’ll keep taking pictures.

Oh — and I’ve applied (and gotten onto the waiting list) for an allotment garden at the base of Leslie Street again. We’ll see if I get it. Usually, one only finds out in June, and there’s a fair bit of weeding to do. I’ve got my fingers crossed.

Sunday was clear and warm. There was a fairly strong wind from the southwest, which meant working on the way out to the lighthouse and almost (not quite) coasting home.

Here are some photos I took on Sunday. It was definitely the earliest in the year that I’ve gone out there.

Nice view from about half-way out: the red osier dogwood provides some foreground colour. There have really been huge changes to the Toronto skyline since I moved here in ‘87:

I liked this view of the cormorant nests. After a few years of them nesting in the trees, the trees die because of the bird lime. They look ghostly and out of place in the summer. In winter, before trees have started leafing out, they don’t seem quite as unusual. They almost look like stalks of broom, except the scale is four to six times greater.

 One of my favourite winter-time ducks in Toronto is the long-tailed duck. Soon they’ll be leaving, heading north and east. Unlike mallards, they’re relatively fearful of people and keep their distance. Very cute little diving ducks — they’ll suddenly disappear, and reappear on the surface 10 or 15 feet away after a minute.

 I was really surprised to see a few woolly bear caterpillars on the move, but I guess the soil has warmed up enough that it woke them up. Hope they survived the onslaught of cyclists and joggers! If they make it, they’ll grow up to be Isabella tiger moths, and they’re not considered pests in either form, so don’t kill them, please.

But some wildlife seems more of a pest than other types. Some of the gulls are back, and setting up house on the spit, preparatory to mating and laying eggs and rearing their young. There are three or four different types that nest out here (and some terns, too). It’s why UNESCO has declared it a significant bird sanctuary.

There was one fellow off to the left of my picture with a big wooly microphone, recording the raucous keening of them.

Continuing my meander out to the lighthouse, I came across a woman feeding a pair of mute swans:

Within sight of the lighthouse, I heard an early spring territorial call. A male red wing blackbird had set himself a guard tower in a tree. This is definitely the earliest I can recall hearing one.

Out at the end, I saw a para-surfer (para-sailor?) wrestling with his sail in the strong wind.

 For the bike ride home, I rode along the eastern path. Although rougher and more pot-holed, it doesn’t have all the speedbumps they’ve felt necessary to install on the harbour-side path. Oh, I’m sure they’ll get there.

I stopped to look at the beaver dam to see if there was any action. I didn’t see any beavers, but I did watch three robins flitting about.

I also saw some canvasback ducks in another of the internal ponds, but they were too far away to photograph.

Sure, I’ll get myself a 500mm prime to do that. I’ll get right on it.

Well, maybe I’ll rent one for a bit. My 120-400mm zoom is a bit of a soft focus.

I went to the University of Waterloo. For a while, I lived in Waterloo Co-operative Residence Inc (WCRI)… and was Division Manager (organizing people, setting job lists, making sure stuff got done) for two terms, starting in fall ‘79. The first of those two terms, two young women moved in for their first term at university. They were almost directly across the hall from me. One of them became my close friend and room-mate in the apartment division, Sandy Kemsley. We never lost touch. Her room-mate was Gail Cowling, with whom I did lose touch, then found again, briefly, when Ash and I were living in live/work warehouse space on St. Nicholas, and then I lost touch with again… until there was an article about my photo exhibit at Barrio in the Riverdale/Beach Mirror around six years ago. I got an email from Gail, who happened to be living less than a kilometer from me in Leslieville. Our connections were re-established. Now the three of us get together when we can to eat good food, enjoy each other’s company, and catch up on what’s going on in our lives.

Gail and Sandy took me out for dinner on Thursday to celebrate my birthday. We started at my place with some wine and organic salsa & corn chips, then took a walk along Queen to Table 17. Table 17 is owned by the same folks as Ascari Enoteca, the Italian restaurant with fresh pasta that they make at the corner of Queen & Caroline.

Sandy scored right off the bat with a glass of Cava, because it was her first time there and she checked in using FourSquare. OK, OK, there are benefits to FourSquare. I’m not there yet

We ordered wine.

Really nice Niagara regional blend of Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon and other varietals, brought out delicious notes. They decanted it for us to help oxidize the tannins (a good thing), but I was able to reach around and grab the bottle for a photo.

We thought we had our decisions made until we heard what the specials were. Hmm, some awesome salads. We placed our orders, sipped our wine, and talked. Then the salads arrived. I had the kale, walnut and crab. It came with a light vinaigrette. The kale was raw, but was chiffonaded, so it was easy to eat. Very flavourful: the cabbagey kale worked well with the bitterness of the walnuts and the sweetness of the crabmeat.

Gail ordered the Table 17 salad, a delight of pine nuts, baby greens, and piave cheese:

Sandy had the boccancini with frisée and pumpkin gnocci that were crunchy, like they had been deep fried:

They were wonderful and could be habit-forming. Should come with a warning label.

We all went for meat for our mains.

Sandy had the short ribs, a rich delight on a purée of parsnips, served with confit cipollini onion and roasted vegetables:

Gail had a truly beautiful confit of duck, served on du Puy lentils and with some fresh greens (I recognize bloody dock in the foreground).

I had the steak et frites. I couldn’t resist. A top sirloin steak, Belgian-style frites the way they should be, bearnaise sauce for the steak and a lemony mayonnaise for the fries. I am kicking myself that I didn’t eat the rosemary. I thought it was just a stalk of rosemary. A couple of the leaves fell onto the table, and I ate them after the plates were cleared. They deep fried it! Rosemary leaves are really pungent when fresh, but when deep fried, the flavour mellows, and it actually is something I regret not having eaten.

Ah well. We were all too full to consider dessert, so we ended the night with a digestif. Sandy and Gail both had the Calvados; I had a grappa. We played with the arrangement for quite a while, and this is the last of about a dozen pictures I took of our efforts.

Really enjoyable dinner with excellent company. Thanks, Table 17!

However, I was alerted that it was published when someone mentioned it on Twitter, and used my @Digiteyes handle.

So here it is, the bottom half of page 3.

If you’d like to read it online (which you can magnify), go here and click Launch Edition.

We started at Sandy’s, with some truffled hummous from Leslieville Cheese, which Sandy served up attractively with endive spears:

And because it was cocktail hour, Sandy made wonderful Negronis: gin, sweet vermouth, Campari, twist of lemon and a splash of soda. She’s so talented: mixing cocktails while on a conference call Great way to start the evening.

From there, we walked out to Queen Street, to grab a taxi. Where were we going? I didn’t know. It was only when we got out of the cab and crossed the street that I knew we were eating at Ici Bistro.

Coats removed to be hung up in the back, we were seated, had menus to review… and we started with another cocktail. I didn’t document them, but they were delicious. Sandy’s was bourbon based, Betty’s … I forget, Betty, please comment! And mine had green chartreuse.

We were presented with absolutely delicious little amuse gueles: caramelized onion and goat cheese tartlets. A few bites of wonderful contrasts with the sweet onion flavour, the rich creamy goat cheese, and a little sparkle of acid, all wrapped in a tender buttery pastry.

While sipping and eating, we started looking at the menu. Everything is offered in two sizes. Because we love sharing foods, we went for the smaller sized plates, and shared everything.  Bread and butter were next at the table. All in-house breads.

The wine came and was decanted (missed getting a picture of the label). That was followed by the steak tartare and croquettes. The tartare was traditionally prepared, with all of the ingredients chopped and mixed together, shaped into quenelles for us to eat. Croquettes were of mashed potato, fried crispy on the outside, deliciously soft and creamy on the inside.

Next came the meant-for-sharing charcuterie plate, which had a couple of types of sausage, some pork belly, a paté de campagne, and (out of range of the camera) three slices of paté de foie gras that went down like the most amazing butter. Cornichons and twists of delicious bread sticks rounded out the plate.

We followed that up with a fowl dish: magret of duck breast a l’orange, which had a delightful anise flavour (I think it was probably provided by the traditional ingredient for the dish, which is oil of anise, plus a hint of sweetness of orange. The other meat on the plate is thigh and leg of squab — young pigeon that hasn’t fledged, so it’s very tender, and rich. These were accompanied by melt-in-your-mouth scalloped potatoes and white asparagus.

Next up (good thing we were sharing all of this) was foie gras au naturel. It came with a delicious batonne of black trumpet mushrooms that had been cooked, then shaped into this large french-fry shape, then fried. Excellent accompaniment to the liver. We fell on it so quickly that I missed getting its picture. I seem to do that once per dinner.

Final meat dish was lamb two ways: pulled leg of lamb inside a cannelloni, and a couple of rib chops from a rack of lamb. A mushroom truffle ragout, a cipollini onion. Amazing sauces. Wow. Wonderful, fragrant, rich, tender, delicious.

Next came a little birthday surprise! A platter decorated with chocolate script and three white chocolate thimbles, each containing a cherry that had been soaking in kirsch for a long time. Total change of direction, and absolutely yummy. If those big Cherry Blossoms tasted anything like this, I’d be a candy addict. Just the right proportions of ingredients.

Next, we got port and cheese.

Taylor Fladgate 20-year-old tawny. It’s got legs!

And the plateau of cheese gave us a wonderful end to the dinner: 5 types of cheeses, ranging from a very soft and runny brie type, through to harder cheeses, one of which had some of that nuttyness that Oka used to have before Agropur bought them out and blanded everything, and a soft cambazola-like blue — but with more blue! Add slices of Gala apple for acid, and some more of those delicious and crisp bread sticks.

Good night, Ici! See you again.

Good thing we walked back to Sandy’s.

But the walk back to Sandy’s meant passing this place…

So we brought back a few pastries and shared them with Damir and a bottle of bubbly! What a great dinner. Thanks, Sandy & Betty!

What’s it about? It’s about the plants that George Leslie was growing in his Nurseries here in Leslieville. It’s got all the plants listed that he had in two catalogues — I’ve marvelled at the number of apple varieties (over 100), pears (over 80) and roses (over 120) that he was growing.

We’ve lost so much: I’m hoping that when people read this, they’ll be prompted to help spread around and continue growing some of the rarer varieties of fruit. Did you know that George sold six different types of rhubarb? Wow, imagine that!

Unfortunately, I don’t have a list of the different type of seeds he was selling: if I do manage to find that, I’ll create a new edition of the book.

Here’s the cover I designed for it:

I’ve applied for a membership with CISS so I’ll get an ISBN number, and that will enable me to get the book published… Oh, but it can take over 2 weeks for CISS just to get back to me about being a member so… I’m going to go with the ISBN option on SmashWords instead.

I wasn’t sure how long it would take to publish: SmashWords has a PDF booklet about how to format for them, and I messed up initially (had all the plant lists in tables, which SmashWords can’t interpret). Fixed that, tried to make sure I did everything correctly — but one never knows. Sometimes uploading something for translation is an iterative process: get errors, fix something, upload again, etc., etc.

I didn’t have any errors, so it was pretty painless.

Onward and upward. Now I need to send out press releases.