In all my years of road-trip dining across western North America, I can only remember ordering crepes a handful of times. The most memorable occasion was Crepes of Brittany in Monterey, California, followed by Amazing Crepes in Whitefish, Montana.
Crepes of Brittany, in Monterey California, is my crepe gold standard
Well, I think I’ve discovered a third fabulous crepe stop: EPI, in an industrial district of Canmore, Alberta. It’s a charming bakery and café that specializes in organic sourdough breads, pastries, and sweet and savoury crepes, using locally grown and milled grains and ancient methods of fermentation.
EPI’s superb sourdough breads
Before ordering food, I snagged a Viking sourdough loaf; the breads tend to disappear by early afternoon. Then it was on to the main attraction— a fine pork loin galette, served open faced and best tackled with a knife and fork—washed down with a nice coffee and a fruit brioche.
An elegant pork loin galette
Yes, it was truly EPIc.
EPI Canmore 4, 102 Boulder Crescent, Canmore, Alberta Tuesday to Saturday 7:30 am-4 pm. Closed Sunday and Monday 825-909-0815
I don’t order soup much at lunch, other than at my Calgary favourite Primal Grounds Cafe, a few blocks down the road. A bowl of soup is generally not enough food for me, and I seem to encounter fewer places that offer the old standby soup and sandwich combo.
But I recently travelled to Cadence Coffee, a longtime hangout in Calgary’s Bowness neighbourhood, for a bowl of its Friday soup special Manhattan clam chowder ($9). It was a nice-sized, tasty serving, along with four slices of buttered sourdough toast. I’d also recommend the oversized breakfast bagel ($9.95).
Cadence Coffee offers a nice Manhattan chowder Fridays
The other reason for my visit was to support Bowness establishments hammered by months-long street closures and detours because of a major water main break. All of Calgary was affected by the resulting water-use restrictions, but none felt it more than the residents and businesses of Bowness.
It’s not often that me drinking beer is good for the world. Most of the time, I’m not even sure if I’m drinking to forget or forgetting to drink.
It’s an infinitesimally small step, but every time I sip a Fire Bloom lager from Calgary’s Best of Kin brewery, a portion of the sale goes to help regenerate wildfire-ravaged landscapes like the recent mountains around Jasper. Indeed, flowers from colourful fireweed that emerges from wildfire ashes were used to produce the honey that goes into the seasonal Fire Bloom beer.
Of course, this unique lager tastes pretty damn good, too. We enjoyed a couple of pints, along with a Big Hat hazy IPA, at Best of Kin’s taproom in the close-to-downtown neighbourhood of Sunalta.
It’s liquid honey, not fiery, going down the hatch
Unbeknownst to us, the Best of Kin owners (featuring brothers Ryan and Collin), staff and friends were celebrating the brewery’s second birthday when we visited. It was also happy hour, so a couple of tasty snacks—triple-cooked Kennebec fries and spicy parmesan popcorn—didn’t add much to our already reasonable tab.
The Fire Bloom pairs nicely with triple-cooked Kennebec potato fries
In all, a rather festive way to help the planet.
Best of Kin 1059 14 Street SW, Calgary Tuesday to Sunday, most days 11:30 am to 11 pm 825-413-4233
There’s nothing like sharing Happy Hour appetizers
There’s one thing residents and visitors can agree on: Canmore is seriously overcrowded.
For a mountain town of 17,000 residents, that means traffic jams, wandering pedestrians, bewildering parking fees and lineups pretty much any time of day, any season of the year. God forbid if you head into town on a sunny summer weekend.
The good news is there’s a commensurate number of first-class, diversified places to eat and drink. Indeed, I would argue Canmore boasts more such places, on a per capita basis, than any town or city in Alberta.
Of course, most of these establishments charge mountain tourist prices for their fare. But there’s one way residents and visitors can snag a deal: Happy hour.
Big deal, you might argue. Happy hours are a dime a dozen in almost every municipality, big and small, in North America.
But here’s where Canmore is different. Given the large number of eateries, there’s a lot of competition amongst them, especially during the dead, late afternoon dining hours of happy hour. And that’s when a growing number of Canmorites (Canmorons?) venture out for a bargain burger and pint or pizza.
Here are a few to get you started.
Bridgette Bar is a mini, chef-driven chain (also Calgary and Toronto locations) that seems to have jumpstarted the recent interest in Canmore’s happy-hour scene. On a recent mid-week afternoon, more than 50 patrons were enjoying the fine subsidized fares. Its so-called matinee happy hour starts at 2 pm and offers generous deals of half off on all beverages and excellent pizzas, including wild mushroom ($13) and fennel salami ($12).
Fabulous chicken pizza at Bridgette’s happy hour
The nearby Mineshaft Tavern is a unique setup, sharing a kitchen with an attached seniors’ living facility in the newish, rundle-rock community of Spring Creek. When I saw residents, in comfy chairs, sipping happy hour glasses of red wine, I wondered where do I sign up for my own sunset years?
Mineshaft Tavern offers good pub fare, including a diversity of happy hour deals: $6 drinks 2-6 pm and daily specials such as $3 tacos Monday and $13 burger and fries Thursday. Plus there’s a daily $10 soup and sandwich deal.
An immense, delicious happy-hour burger and fries at Mineshaft Tavern
Elsewhere Crazy Weed and its sophisticated, casual menu offers 50% off “doughs” daily from 2-5 pm. Tavern 1883 boasts Canmore’s biggest “mountain” hour, with 40% off all food and drink from 2-5 pm every day. Finally, The Georgetown Inn has weekly pub specials, highlighted by fish and chips deals ($15 for one piece of cod) every Tuesday.
Mineshaft Tavern 808 Spring Creek Drive Daily 11:30 am-9 pm 403-678-2288
Bridgette Bar Canmore 1030 Spring Creek Drive Happy Hour 2-5 pm Text 403-493-5643 “We don’t have a telephone”
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.
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.
Marathon Mouth 