Author Archives: bcorbett907

Unknown's avatar

About bcorbett907

I'm a Calgary-based writer who enjoys exploring the landscapes, and menus, of western U.S./Canada

Give It Up

4 Replies

After railing last week about unhealthy restaurant breakfasts, I wondered what food and drink “vices” would be the toughest for me to give up.

Coffee jumpstarts my every morning

Number one, with a bullet, is coffee. A super-sized, super intense black coffee, produced with an Aeropress, jumpstarts my every morning, usually while I’m perusing the online news. Green tea would never be a replacement. And, it turns out, coffee is pretty good for you.

Number two is a tall can of beer, specifically a hoppy India Pale Ale, especially towards the end of a hot summer’s afternoon and most enjoyably shared on a patio with good friends. But I’ve discovered I can go several weeks without a brew. Just don’t see myself ever giving it up entirely.

The cure for whatever ales me

There’s nothing like a health scare to motivate a change in dietary habits. I used to polish off two or three bowls of ice cream in a single sitting, no problem. But when I was diagnosed with type two diabetes, I almost immediately dumped that binging habit. Haven’t had more than a few tastes of ice cream in the 20-plus years since. Same with desserts, chocolate, anything sweet. Don’t miss them.

Could you give up ice cream?

Enough about me. What would be the hardest “unhealthy” things for you to give up? A venti caramel macchiato? A pint of lager? A bottle of red? Two fingers of single malt? Dark chocolate? Eggs benedict?

Or artery-clogging eggs benedict?

Poutine? A Double Whopper? BBQ potato chips? THC gummies?  Pepperoni sticks? A can of Pepsi? Peach pie with a scoop of vanilla? A stack of pancakes, dusted in icing sugar and swimming in butter and maple syrup?

Or a slab of mile-high pie?

Or maybe you have no intention of giving up these simple pleasures.

Either way, let me know.

Bacon, Eggs and a Whack of Carbs

Leave a reply

Typical restaurant breakfast

I recently had a prototypical restaurant breakfast of bacon, eggs and toast, mostly because of the $5 price. It was probably the first such breakfast I’d ordered in a couple of years.

The reason? This standard breakfast is typically a carbohydrate bomb, much more so if you throw some hash browns, potatoes or pancakes onto the groaning plate. This combination totals about 100 grams of carbs, which as a Type 2 diabetic would send my blood sugar levels surging to unhealthy levels. That’s how many carbs I consume in a week!

How about a gut-busting stack of pancakes?

But who cares, if you’re not diabetic? Here are some stats to consider. The carb-laden breakfast I described adds up to 1,200 calories (about half my daily needs), 80 grams of fat (95% of daily needs), 525 milligrams of cholesterol and 1,860 milligrams of salt. Believe me, not healthy numbers.

Yet when I peruse breakfast menus at reputable restaurants, the overwhelming emphasis is on platters of carb-heavy food. Banana cream pie French toast anyone?

Eggs benny with all the carbo trimmings

Admittedly, there are some recent concessions to healthier breakfasts, such as morning bowls that might remove toast from the equation. If you’re prepared to scour their menus, Denny’s offers a Fit Slam (450 calories and 59 grams of carbs, which could be further trimmed if the English muffin was eliminated), while IHOP provides an egg-white omelette totalling 480 calories and 26 grams of carbs. (My hack is to order a two-egg omelette with spinach, mushrooms and cheddar cheese—hold the toast, hold the hash browns—for only 200 calories and 4 grams of carbs.)

A much healthier breakfast bowl

But overall, healthy breakfasts seem like token concessions in a world still dominated by the carb-cal tag team. Don’t know why that is. Nostalgia? An occasional treat? Tastes so damn good?

Breakfast comfort food?

Methinks, there’s an unexploited niche for restaurants that want to go whole hog, so to speak, into healthier breakfasts. Until then, it’s carb bombs away… and curl up in the fetal position.

P.S. I haven’t forgotten you, burgers and fries. But I can only tackle one vice at a time.

Do I Exit?

3 Replies

Would you drive 15 minutes to wait in this breakfast line?

An enduring premise of Marathon Mouth is encouraging people to get off the highway and into the towns and cities that harbour the great independent eateries of western North America.

Yet I increasingly find myself not wanting to exit the highway and navigate to said eatery, especially if it’s upwards of a 10-minute drive to reach, and miles to go before I sleep. A second deterrent is busy roads leading to the destination café or bakery and lineups when I get there.

Often, it’s easier to grab a coffee and snack at a highway-side gas emporium or fast-food joint, despite all that’s wrong with such fare. To say nothing of travel companions unwilling to go a block out of their way to hit an In-N-Out Burger.

When I’m doing a long road trip west of Calgary to, say, the Okanagan or the coast, I never stop for sustenance in Canmore or Banff. It’s too close (about one hour) to the start of my journey and too much of a hassle to exit the Trans-Canada Highway and handle the tourist mobs.

Typically, I instead drive three hours to Golden, B.C. and take the 5-minute detour to pick up a coffee and warm muffin from Bacchus Cafe. Don’t know why, but I couldn’t be bothered on a recent trip.

Great muffins at Bacchus Cafe usually enough to get me off the highway in Golden, B.C.

But I did pull off where I always do, 90 minutes later in Revelstoke, to visit fabulous bakery La Baguette. But there was a line of about eight people just to buy baked goods. Not doing that.

Revelstoke’s La Baguette is generally well worth the wait

So, I headed over to nearby, farm-to-table Terravita Kitchen to meet a local friend for lunch. But by the time she cycled down, there was a line out the door.

A quiet moment at Terravita Kitchen, a welcome addition to the Revelstoke food scene

She confessed the summer tourist hordes are such that she rarely ventures downtown. So we ended up going to her house for a quiet, refreshing lunch.

After all the turmoil restaurants everywhere endured during the pandemic, I certainly don’t begrudge those who have done well in the ensuing tourism boom. But even residents are not all happy with the influx of visitors; see anti-tourism protests in Barcelona and elsewhere.

My typical response to beating restaurant crowds is to visit during off-peak hours. But that’s not always possible during longer road trips. Packing a lunch is an option but one that doesn’t help small, local cafes.

What’s your solution?

Bonus coverage on lineups

Here’s a highly entertaining New York Times story about how the “bazillion” options available when ordering a customized coffee at Starbucks is hurting business. To say nothing of creating long lines when the guy ahead of you is ordering six coffees, “each of which involves some combination of tall venti grande double-pump, one to four shots of espresso, half-caf, oat milk, nonfat milk, soy milk, milk milk, whipped cream, syrup, brown sugar, white sugar, no sugar and mocha drizzle.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/25/opinion/starbucks-order-app-third-place.html?unlocked_article_code=1.Fk4.Pi-j.NbrGk8lugKgZ&smid=url-share

Calgary Breakfast For Only $5

Leave a reply

Sushi is just the start of Kinjo’s culinary diversity

Kinjo Sushi & Grill is a little regional empire, serving reasonable, affordable fare at its seven Calgary locations. It’s got the Japanese standards covered: sushi, tempura, teriyaki, tempura.

But then Kinjo takes a sharp, unanticipated culinary detour, offering Korean fried chicken, bacon-lettuce-tomato sandwiches for $3 and… wait for it, Bolognese spaghetti at $5 a plate.

What really catches my eye is a standard Canadian breakfast—two eggs, a strip of bacon, a nice little sausage, sourdough toast and a wee mixed salad—all for $5.

Bacon and eggs breakfast for only $5

I won’t pretend it can touch a $15 or $20 chef-produced breakfast; the plastic serving plate screams of fast food. But it hits the spot for a pocket full of change, a strategy that, on the day I visit, attracts a reasonable morning crowd to this large, bright restaurant.

Kinjo is a bright, spacious space

Sit down for breakfast here, and you can truly circle the culinary globe.

Kinjo Sushi and Grill
120 Stewart Green SW (Westhills) and six other Calgary locations
Breakfast served daily 8 am-noon
587-864-8523

Coco Brooks Keeps Delivering Great Little Pizzas

Leave a reply

Coco Brooks Produces One-Person Pizzas that Feed Two

It’s been more than 20 years since I discovered Coco Brooks, the little personal pizza-in-a-box joint in southeast Calgary. Each time I go (about every two years), I order the same thing: a marvelously fluffy egg ‘n bacon pie hot from the oven. Trust me, it works.

The only problem, for the purpose of this under-$10 survey, is the price has glided up from $9 three years ago to $10.70 today. Still, a bargain for four thick slices that can easily keep me going for two meals.

There is a solution—a short list of simpler pizzas, including peperoni and “cheese burger”, for only $8.80. But when I get to the counter, I break down and, once again, order the egg ‘n bacon. Rules be damned.

A no-frills, efficient operation

Coco Brooks
640 42 Avenue SE, and two other Calgary locations
Monday to Saturday 9 am-7:30 pm
403-243-2677

Costco’s $1.50 Hot Dog Approaches its Fifth Decade

Leave a reply

You can’t beat Costco’s enduring $1.50 hot dog

Talk about a lingering loss leader. Since Costco introduced a 1/4-pound hot dog to its food courts in 1985, the price has not budged from $1.50. And this includes a 20-ounce soda and refill, if you’re into that much sugar.

Still, where else can you find an enduring bargain of an all-beef or polish sausage dog, lathered with all the trimmings, for a handful of change? While the price of a meal out has risen 20 or 30 per cent at most places in recent years, the Costco hot dog price has survived pandemics and high inflation unscathed.

The only thing that’s changed is the self-serve kiosk

My Costco food court in southwest Calgary has seen a few recent changes, most noticeably a self-serve kiosk and a smaller menu. But you can still find hunger-busting bargains like chicken strips and fries ($6.99), poutine ($5.99) or pepperoni pizza slices ($2.59). No salads or vegetables that I could see.

But every now and then, I like to indulge in nostalgia and a little meal that costs me all of $1.50. Even if its consumed mere minutes after I’ve dropped $150 or $200 on all those Costco deals. As I like to say, you can go broke saving money here.