As Farmfair International and the Canadian Finals Rodeo approach, Alberta’s agricultural sector, I am sad to report, is in about as good shape as the province’s oil and gas industry.
The price of Alberta beef on-the-hoof has crashed hard, from a record peak 16 months ago of almost $200 per 100 lbs. to $135 per 100 lbs. today.
Hogs have been much cheaper for a long time. Pork producers have found their profits even further eroded since June. The price per 100 lbs. has dropped from $90 to $75. (The consumer mystery remains: If beef wholesale prices have dropped like a rock, why is premium beef still selling at the grocery stores for $30 a kilogram? Then again, the usual highlow cycles of livestock production appear out of whack.)
By late summer, grain growers were dancing a jig. Despite later-than-usual planting, crops were growing to beat the band, thanks to plentiful rain. But October’s snow in Central and Northern Alberta hit just as the late harvest had begun. Twothirds of the cro ...
Read the rest of entry »
Café Linnea
Holland Plaza, 10934 119 St.
780-758-1160
cafelinnea.ca
Mon. Thurs. Fri. Sat. - 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Sun. 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., high tea 3 p.m. and 3:30 p.m.
Closed Tues. and Wed.
No reservations other than Sunday tea sittings
Lunch for two (without tip or beverages): Basic, $25; fully loaded, $45
Food: 4 of 5 Suns
Ambience: 5 of 5 Suns
Service: 4 of 5 Suns
Located in a former autobody shop, gutted and completely reconstructed, the new Café Linnea is presenting the dining experience at its highest possible level.
“Look at the quality of the glassware,” marvelled a friend more adept than I at analyzing beauty, “the quality of the natural light here, its interaction with the interior lighting, the really healthy plants, the air quality, the acoustics … and everything is impeccably clean. I am so impressed with this place … this is my seventh visit!”
No detail has been overlooked at Café Linnea – Its design, a cat ...
Read the rest of entry »
The Red King’s Dream
Shadow Theatre production on the Varscona Theatre stage
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Oct. 26 to Nov. 13, 2016
Review by GRAHAM HICKS, Hicks biz.com
Prolific Edmonton playwright David Belke has written plays encompassing modern farce, introspection, historic figures mixed into the contemporary world, humour, confusion and much more.
He, with Shadow Theatre artistic director John Hudson, chose to re-mount one of Belke’s most introspective and serious plays, 1996’s The Red King’s Dream, for the opening play of Shadow Theatre’s 2016/17 season in the new Varscona Theatre.
The Red King’s Dream is a quiet play – a two-hour introspective meditation on the nature of romantic love and infatuation. An awkward, intellectual loner, buried in books, is kindled by passion as he falls in love with a woman with similar tastes who happens to live in the apartment building.
While The Red King’s Dream is an interesting tre ...
Read the rest of entry »
Million Dollar Quartet
Citadel Theatre, Shoctor Stage, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Oct. 22 to Nov. 6, 2016
Review by GRAHAM HICKS, hicksbiz.com
Tickets
Holy moly, Lord have mercy, great balls of fire, it’s a miracle!
Well, not quite. But damn near.
Somehow, the Citadel Theatre found the perfect four actors for its production of Million Dollar Quartet, running through November 13, 2016 on the Shoctor Stage.
Piano virtuoso, singer and madcap actor Christo Graham embodies the spirit, cheekiness and looks of Jerry Lee Lewis.
Guitarist, singer and actor Kale Penny plays every complex Carl Perkins’ guitar lick as if were his own.
Singer/actor Christopher Fordinal’s reincarnation of the young Elvis Presley will be a life-long meal ticket.
Singer/actor Greg Gale impersonates (in the best sense of the word) Johnny Cash’s mannerisms plus possesses a melodious baritone that is uncannily Cash-like.
The context of the ...
Read the rest of entry »
* * *
In the Alberta government’s climate change/carbon tax/phase out coal/renewable energy debate, I have never seen an objective analysis of how Alberta could meet its lower greenhouse gas (GHG) goals as cheaply as possible with the least possible damage to the province economy.
We know the New Democrats’ end goal. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has committed Canada to reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by one-third, from 2013’s 726 Mt (million tonnes) to 523 Mt by 2030. So must Premier Rachel Notley do the same, reducing Alberta’s GHG emissions by approximately a third from 2013’s 267 Mt to 193 Mt by 2030.
We know however, that this New Democrat government is in love with renewables, regards coal as the face of evil, dislikes oil, and only grudgingly puts up with natural gas.
But the question to be asked – the logical, rational question – is this: What combination of coal, natural gas, oil, renewables and conservation would reduce provincial GHG ...
Read the rest of entry »
Sloppy Hoggs Roed Hus
9563-118 Ave.
780-477-2408
sloppyhoggsbbq.com
Tuesday to Wednesday 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.
Thursday to Saturday 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.
Sunday 11 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Closed Mondays
Dinner for two (without tip or beverages): Basic, $24; fully loaded, $50
Food: 4 of 5 Suns
Ambience: 3.5 of 5 Suns
Service: 3.5 of 5 Suns
When a top-notch independent restaurant changes ownership, as happened earlier this year with the popular southern barbecue Sloppy Hoggs Roed Hus on 118th Avenue, you worry.
Will quality drop? Will the ribs be as expected?
The good news is the new owners recognized a good thing when they saw it. The sale included everything down to the meat smokers and Sloppy Hoggs’ BBQ recipes. Nothing has changed other than a few more additions to the menu.
Six of us descended on Sloppy Hoggs this past weekend, hungry and ready to chow down. The first impression was promising – the restaurant was bustling on a Sunday evening with several birthday parties in pro ...
Read the rest of entry »
Wednesday evening I am sitting in one of my favourite downtown spots, Bodega Tapas & Wine Bar at Sabor.
It’s an hour before the Oilers’ first game of the season in the spanking-new Rogers Place just up the street.
I have sat in this same chair many an evening, with its fine view of a massive concrete wall that is the west end of the Edmonton City Centre.
Tonight is different.
Instead of a pedestrian passing by every 10 minutes, as often staggering as walking, the sidewalks are alive with people who have packed nearby taverns and eateries and are now walking to Rogers Place.
For once, the down ’n’ outers do not dominate the downtown come nightfall. For once, there are far more “normal people”.
For at least 30 years, the reality of the downtown after dark has been at best uninviting and at worse downright scary.
It’s been a ratio game. Less–fortunate Edmontonians – the panhandlers, the intoxicated and generally tough-looking characte ...
Read the rest of entry »
Clementine
11957 Jasper Ave.
barclementine.ca
5 p.m. to midnight, 1 a.m. Friday and Saturday
Closed Sundays and Mondays
(No reservations. no phone)
Food: 4.5 of 5 stars
Ambience: 4 of 5 stars
Service: 4 of 5 stars
Dinner for two (without tip or beverages): Basic, $40; fully loaded, $70
It’s far too early to tell – like declaring a Stanley Cup winner two weeks into the season - but Chef Roger Letourneau at the newly opened Clementine has the potential to be the next culinary star to come out of Edmonton.
On the storefront street level of the new 35-story Pearl Tower on Jasper Avenue West, Clementine (or Bar Clementine, the name goes back and forth) is a jewel in the pearl.
Through a winter-proof vestibule, one enters a time-warp, magically transported to a classic European bar circa the 1930s – all dark polished woods, sturdy tables and counters, dominated by a massive curved bar behind which stands rows of spirits of every colour and hue.
Co ...
Read the rest of entry »
No matter that Canada’s contribution to global warming is negligible.
No matter that China, India and the USA are the culprits, not Canada.
No matter the consequences, the carbon tax is going to happen in Alberta.
On January 1, the carbon tax will bump up the cost of gasoline by 4.5 cents a litre, diesel by 5.4 cents a litre, home heating costs by $1 a gigajoule. In winter, my 2,100 sq. ft. home burns eight to 10 gigajoules of natural gas per month.
The carbon tax will add to most of your purchases. Municipalities will pass on carbon taxes in higher property taxes. Grocery stores will pass on the added cost of transporting food.
Carbon taxes won’t go away. Those two great world saviors Rachel Notley and Justin Trudeau will keep raising the carbon tax every year for the next six years. By rough calculation, the carbon tax on gasoline will be around 17 cents a litre by 2022.
This tax grab is the equivalent, respected Calgary economist Jack Mintz says, of a 3% provincial sales tax.
...
Read the rest of entry »
“It smells of grainy and metallic caramel malt, a twinge of earthy yeast, ethereal oily nuts, leafy, herbal, and floral hop bitters. The taste is bready and moderately biscuity caramel malt, a dark orchard fruitiness, earthy yeast notes, and laid-back weedy, herbal, hay-like hoppiness.”
We may not be in Coors country anymore, Toto.
These wondrous if unintelligible words from Brady White of thebeerdiaries.tv are not in praise of a fancy French wine, but are a tribute to Rale Yard Red Ale, a specialty beer brewed by the Olds College brewmaster program. Rale Yard is made in the heart of ranching country, its barley grown on the hard-scrabble prairie.
Beer is the new wine. Different kinds of beer are being “paired” with food at multi-course dinners in better restaurants.
Beer is a new food group, being considered a food flavour unto itself.
In 2003, seven craft breweries were producing beer in Alberta, including Edmonton’s venerable micro-brewery Alley Kat and Calgary& ...
Read the rest of entry »