Lots of Ladies lunching in Canada !!!

Actually we were dining, at the top of the CN Tower in Toronto in the first picture, and at Look Out Point Cafe in Vancouver in the second.

Some of us Ladies were lucky enough to do an amazing tour of Canada in August 2001.  We went from seeing most of the East Coast Cities to The Rockies, Vancouver & then finished off with an Alaska cruise.  It was a very successful trip, all aspects of which were very enjoyable, but of course the food is very important to us!  It did not disappoint as we found an extremely high standard wherever we went.

This is just a general report because we ate at so many different places it would have been impossible to remember them all!

 One of the things that impressed us most was how delicious, varied, and cheap take away food is.  I just wish we had the same standard here.  The weather was wonderful for the whole holiday and so we often bought take away  so that we could eat outside or, at the end of a long day touring, we bought it to eat in our room.  In Montreal we found the underground market at the railway station ( but it was pristinely clean), and it was heaven!  As the city is so French there were mouth watering patisseries, but also lots crisp fresh salads and fruit.  Baguettes, panini and sandwiches, hot or cold, were available with an incredible choice of fillings.  The salad bars charged you according to the weight of your purchase.  Such a good idea!  Ottawa had a wonderful outdoor market, everything, especially the fruit, looked so gorgeous.   In Vancouver the displays of meat, shell fish, & fish were beautifully done.  We found these markets all over the country, why cant we have them here?  The only similar quality I have seen in U.K. is in Harrods Food Hall and I am not exaggerating!  In the Rockies I bought a massive prawn salad for £3 & a fresh fruit salad (really fresh, with no syrup) £1 !!  At a Wendy's, which is like a McDonalds, we had a chicken salad which was crisp and seemed to go on for ever for £3.50, have you ever seen how disgusting an English McDonalds salad is?

There is also a chain of coffee houses called Tim Horton's which everyone on the tour became very fond of.  They sell an amazing variety of coffees  and not enough visits to try them all!  I loved the French Vanilla and the frozen Mocha.  The doughnuts were very tempting especially as you could buy a 20 variety box for about £1 !!!

The service in all the restaurants was excellent.  In Quebec we ate at a very French restaurant with a  reasonable set menu, £5 a head for their speciality, pea soup, a casserole and fresh raspberry tart, yummy!  Near to Quebec on L'ile D'Oleans we visited a lovely  restaurant in an old mill.  The atmosphere was as good as the food.  The pudding we had is a speciality of the area, Maple Sugar on Country Bread, with God knows how many calories.  The restaurant at the top of the CN tower was of a very high standard and expensive but worth it.  Apart from the food being excellent the view from our table in the revolving restaurant was fantastic.  In Banff we went to a Spaghetti Factory.  There's a chain of them and they are excellent value at about £6 a head for  soup, salad and a main course.  Another Banff favourite was The Timberline Inn where we had a buffet meal.  Again excellent as it included both steak, freshly cooked on a bar-b-que, and salmon.  In Sun Peaks there was gourmet restaurant in our hotel and so as usual we enjoyed it fully along with a few bottles of vino!  That was one thing that is better value over here, we did find  house wine was more expensive.  In Vancouver, in Gas Town, we ate at a fun place called Brothers where the waiters are dressed as Monks!

Our cruise was on Holland America Line's Volendam and  I am sure you all know it is possible to eat delicious food 24 hours a day on a cruise and we did!!  Highly recommended!!

We definitely award Canada & Volendam 

Report by C.J. many pounds heavier than in July!!