While most shops were closed Saturday evening in Leslieville, the Steeped and Infused tea shop housed a rowdy dinner hosted by Chef Matt Kantor’s Secret Pickle Supper Club. Consider it as a supper club for people who can’t drink seven glasses of wine in one sitting or care to rub shoulders with Toronto’s who’s-who (whoever they are).
Alright, the $125 price tag for the evening isn’t exactly a bargain for most (full disclosure: I got a media invite), but even those too intimidated to attend a secret supper club should check out SPSC. There weren’t a hundred different wine pairings (one red, one white, that’s it), no memberships involved, no one wore a suit or a fancy dress and conversations for the night included politics, localvorism and S&M. We were also encouraged to tweet, photograph and blog to our heart’s content throughout the night (if that floats your gravy boat). The crowd may be casual but the food was inventive and delicious.
Kantor struck the deal with Steeped and Infused owner Jennifer Best around two months ago, after the chef did a coffee-themed dinner at the nearby Te Aro, where co-owner Jessie Wilkins suggested that he should pair up with Best.
The challenge to cook with tea wasn’t too hard, says Kantor. For example, he used a lemon tea to replace lemons in a dish and paired a strong tea with meat that had a milder flavour. After a few experimentations (he lost track, but thinks he went through 12 to 20 teas from the store), Kantor’s tea-inspired seven-course dinner (eight, if the amuse bouche is included) went like this:
First course: asparagus, mushroom, potato, Manchego (sheep’s milk cheese from the La Mancha region in Spain) with custard made of gunpowder green tea.
Second: Salmon with spruce tips (from Forbes Wild Foods) and grapefruit in a cold watercress soup infused with lapsang souchong black tea. Officially, the tea is described as having a strong, tobacco and scotch scent but when I smelled it, smoked salmon was the first thing that came to mind, which is why the pairing worked so well.
Third: Scallop with yogurt, peanuts and Monks Blend sauce. Kantor marinated the scallop in milk for six hours to give a smooth taste and texture. Monks Blend is a desert-smelling mix of Ceylon black tea, vanilla and grenadine.
Fourth: Veal osso bucco, fava beans, spaetzle, dill, ricotta and Canadian spring maple tea (Yunnan silver-tipped and Chun Mee green teas mixed with safflower, calendula and maple flavouring).
Fifth: Pork loin, capers, fennel, sun-dried tomato and a pudding made of lemon chiffon rooibos tea (red rooibos, lemongrass, calendula petal, lemon flavour). The loin was cooked sous vide (i.e., by submerging in hot water) since the teashop had no kitchen or space to plug in a grill. Sounds weird, but cooking it sous vide gives the pork a mellower flavour so it doesn’t overpower the creamy and fruity tea.
Sixth: Sorbet made of Spring Iced Tea Mix (ceylon black tea, ginger, cinnamon, pink pepper, cardamom, sunflower, black currants). It probably would have also worked well in a popsicle format.
Seven: Chocolate and jasmine pearl ganache, cookie crumbs, cucumber and lemon. Presentation aside (I wasn’t the only one at the table making juvenile jokes), it was a weird but surprisingly tasty combination. The chocolate’s richness was lightened by the springy cucumber flavour.
Good food and company aside, this was a pretty ingenious cross-promotion. Storeowner Best gave a 15 per cent store-wide discount to all the attendees—some of whom were shopping after a few glasses of wine well past midnight. Alcohol + shopping at night = smart business move.
