Our volunteers will be making two runs FROM Blue Mountain to the Congress on SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 21 at 10:00 am and 11:00 am. Return shuttles to the Blue Mountain Resort will run in the evening at around 11:30 pm (To Be Arranged details will be announced at the congress.)
On MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 22 we will be running the shuttles at 8:00 am, in time for your presence at the breakfast. A shuttle will run at the end of the event for those of you who need to get back to the Blue Mountain Resort. (To Be Arranged details will be announced at the congress.)
All schedules of shuttles are subject to change!
4 comments:
Thanks to the organizers and all the participants for a fantastic event!
I'm looking forward to seeing the Flickr photo pool -- in the meantime, you can check out some of the photos from Sunday on the CRFA blog.
Cheers,
-- Jeni
Thanks so much to all the hard-working organizers, volunteers & cooks! My pictures are posted here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/lesleyprovost/CanadianChefSCongress2008#
Thanks to everyone who was involved in putting together the first Canadian Chefs’ Congress, to the vision of Michael for conceiving the idea, and to Nobuyo for ensuring its smooth flowing organization. The location on this truly unique and inspiring farm was perfect, as was the weather we were blessed with. The organization of the event was top notch and the volunteers did a phenomenal job of making things run smoothly for the participants – not least of which was the effort that went in to building the amazing structure that would become a magical bonfire. The food was fantastic and the effort put in by the chefs and their helpers was much appreciated, providing more great food than one could have expected over such a short period of time.
The event’s length, however, was somewhat on the short side and this made it difficult to have more than quick and fleeting exchanges with people in many cases. There were also an awful lot of apprentices and not as many actual chefs as I had thought there might be at a chefs’ congress. While providing good exposure to some aspects of the industry and food issues for younger cooks, as well as the high school students who came from Stratford for a field trip on Monday, there wasn’t really a sense that the event achieved the goal of a serious discussion amongst chefs about what a Canadian cuisine is. Many of the speakers were from Ontario, and there was an Ontario-centric feel that predominated many discussions. I had personally hoped to come away with more of a sense about what was happening in other parts of the country in this industry. Some of the talks did provide insight into a range of different ideas and approaches being used in various parts of the country, such as aquaculture alternatives and the oyster industry on the west coast, but there was not much discussion beyond this about what unique ingredients, regional dishes, issues and challenges chefs face across the country as a whole. For example, I gained little insight as to what is happening on the east coast. How does Newfoundland differ from the other maritime provinces, for example, in terms of products, local food systems and supply networks, cultural attitudes toward local food movements etc.? What is happening in Quebec, and why were so many chefs from Quebec reluctant to participate in this event? How is the food scene on the prairies similar/different than that of Alberta and B.C., or that of the North? What is the state of the industry in the North? Is there a local food scene within the restaurant industry in this area? What is the state of the labour pool of food service workers to draw from? What kind of challenges does this present to food service operators?
With the talks being scheduled over three consecutive hours on Monday with no time in between sessions, the result was a feeling of being rushed to get to the next talk If there were any lingering questions one wanted to stay around after a session to ask, it meant missing a good chunk of the following session. I had driven to the event from Ottawa, which required a fair bit of travel time and as great a time as I did have, I did feel it would have been nice to have had at least another half day to digest things, get to talk to more people in more depth, and to walk around the farm a few more times to take in all of the inspired art work. On the ride back, a few other things struck me about the event. The first was that, while there were many female cooks and helpers, there were no female chefs who were representatives of their province or territory (or at least it was not clear if there were, and their numbers were quite low). Is this a reflection of one aspect of Canadian Cuisine, and the industry? There was also a fairly low level of ethnic diversity represented in terms of the chefs in attendance. While some did exist, it is still a relative minority that doesn’t reflect the ethnic diversity of the make up of the labour force within the industry more broadly in many restaurants, particularly on the kitchen side of the operation. A third observation was that for an event that was supposed to be discussing food issues and the state of what Canadian cuisine is, there was a fair amount of alcohol consumption over a very short period of just over a day. If the event were longer, it might provide the time to indulge a bit, as well as to partake in more in-depth and focused discussions.
One idea that might have been helpful in this respect would have been to have had a round-table panel at the end of the event where all attendees could sit in on a discussion/question and answer session where a chef from each region of the country was at the round table panel and had the opportunity to talk about what is happening in their respective region; what products are unique to it; what their distribution systems are like with local suppliers; what the labour pool is like to draw from; what the gender make up of the labour pool is, and other issues and challenges of interest. With this kind of discussion, it would be much easier to come away from the event with more of a sense of the state of Canadian cuisine and food issues than was the case this time. Hopefully at future congresses the time needed to consider some of these issues will be available. Thanks again, however, for a very fun and memorable first Congress!
Rob M.
Excellent comments Rob, Thanks for the suggestion about the round table, it's a definite for the 2010 edition.
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