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Homage to Toronto's Yorkville Landmarks the Coffee Mill and Le Trou Normand

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Homage to Toronto's Yorkville Landmarks the Coffee Mill  and  Le Trou Normand U p until just a few months ago, Le Trou Normand remained the oldest operating fine dining restaurant in Yorkville. Coincidentally, The Coffee Mill a venerated European-style cafe which recently celebrated 51 years in business closed earlier this month. Martha von Heczey’s Coffee Mill opened in May, 1963, in the now-demolished Lothian Mews, on Bloor Street. In 1973 , von Herczey  moved two blocks north to a mini-mall with Yorkville Avenue on one side, Cumberland Street on the other. There was a secluded terrace with an expandable awning in the event of rain. The Coffee Mill was practically right across the street from Le Trou Normand and it was one of my Yorkville haunts for over 30 years. Ms. von Heczey’s late husband Laci, a well-known wrestling champion, liked to wander around Yorkville with a tame cheetah on a leash.    Interestingly, in 19...
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Remembering Ann McColl's Kitchen Shop

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Ann McColl Lindsay and David Lindsay: A Brief History of a Road Less Traveled Hospitality and the culinary arts have always gone hand in hand. In London, Ontario, we have a history of exceptional restaurateurs, chefs and culinary retailers. Among the latter are Ann McColl Lindsay and David Lindsay, the former proprietors of the legendary Ann McColl’s Kitchen Shop, one of Canada’s finest cookware shops. Ann and David met, married and taught school in Windsor, Ontario from 1961 to 1968. They resigned their positions, sold their red brick bungalow, and embarked on a year-long food pilgrimage across Europe while camping in a Volkswagen van. Travelling in the van with a gas burner allowed them to truly enjoy the local terroir. The first six months of their trip , which ended at the French border, is described in Ann’s memoir Hungry Hearts – A Food Odyssey across Britain and Spain . The second volume, Hearts Forever Young, includes their travels in France, Italy, Austria...
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Thaifoon - London’s Premiere Upscale Go-To Thai Restaurant

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Manisay Visouvath and Fouzan (Rafael) Beg are the proprietors of Thaifoon, downtown London’s upmarket Thai restaurant. The restaurant remains a family affair. Visouvath is the youngest sister of Eddy and Alex Phimprhrachanh’s mother, Arounvaty, who is the head chef at Thaifoon and the matriarch of a Thai food dynasty in the city. Several of Arounvaty’s sisters have opened successful Thai restaurants in the city after being mentored in the kitchen by her.   Visouvath was born in the Southeast Asian country and came to Canada with her parents in 1980. Rafael is from Hyderabad India.  (Hyderabadi cuisine comprises a broad repertoire of rice, grains and meat dishes and the skilled use of various spices –  Indian cuisine has a longer, slower burn, rather than the sharper, built-up spiciness of Thai cuisine .)  Thaifoon’s with-it and tasteful take on the ancient Thai culture, with a décor that honours the past while embracing modernit...
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