Recent Photos:

Friday, February 20, 2009

What happens when Twitter decides to host an online telethon to raise money to provide clean water to children in Kenya?

Karmacake shows up and drops some truth bombs.

Standard sources of electricity pollutes more than your average car. Therefore considering the Twitter HQ is in San Francisco, chances are, for every dollar they raised, it's been negated by the amount of pollution generated.

I also think is disappointing when fundraising efforts are being concentrated on areas outside the immediate needs of their own home. The US has poverty, drugs, street youth, gang violence, shanty towns, and people who don't even have enough money to have running water in their homes, yet Twitter proposes to raise funds for Kenya?!

Shameful.

The entire exercise is embarrassing, while I appreciate the enthusiasm that Twitter users are showing for important causes, the complete disregard for the local issues that are prevalent in their own country is a little embarrassing - and it has not gone unnoticed. See the above image.

I'm no saint, obviously I use electricity and I am responsible for my own fair share of pollution, regardless of how small I attempt to keep my footprint. But, I'm not oblivious to the end result of my usage.

Twitter apparently is.

Popularity does not mean intelligent.

Tuesday, February 17, 2009


Matchstick is looking for feedback from anyone who may have seen my posting about Ketel One Vodka.

If you click on the link below and complete the survey, you will be helping them by donating $2.00 to the Redwood Women’s Shelter, please Click Here to take their short feedback survey.

For every survey that is completed, Matchstick will make a $2 donation to the Redwood Women’s Shelter (theredwood.com).

Your time and feedback is greatly appreciated!!

The link for the survey is:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=Viqdeczb3_2bg5by6yXJvyBg_3d_3d

Thursday, February 05, 2009


I'm in deadline week for Dine.TO and I'm proofing and copy editing like a little demon. I adore my writers, I think each one of them has a history with food that is unmatched by many of the food writers in the city.

I just wish that the food community took us more seriously.

I can see where lots of the city's foodies can think we're off, we make it clear to the restaurants that we are going in to cover the restaurant. And, since we operate relatively autonomously from the rest of Dine.TO, we don't have expense accounts or even the cash to pony up for the meals ourselves - we are devout food enthusiasts and I think that's where our true merit lies. Occasionally, some of the writers have to cash out themselves, but I make every effort to ensure that is avoided. Easiest way to do that, is to have the restaurant comp us.

At the end of the day, I don't care who pays for the meal, because if my opinion can be bought for nothing more than a few hundred dollars in free food - then I am a poor excuse for a journalist.

However, to be fair, we are food writers. We are people who go in and learn about the history of the restaurant, the people, the food and drink - we aim to give a balanced opinion on each establishment to the best of our abilities. I encourage all the writers to be objective when they write and to make note of items that underwhelm or, even disappoint. This is obviously the hardest to do, these restaurants are people's livelihoods and who are we to judge.

Judge, no. Report, yes.

The hardest thing is to be objective. Although, I don't see any reason in forcing anyone to be negative about an experience simply for the sake of it, or should I say, for the sake of gaining credibility within the food community.

Such a ridiculous thought. To lie to gain credibility.

Sometimes it's a hard road to success, but there are meals that I have eaten that raise the bar a little higher than before. The tasting menu like flow of Folco's special's in Markham, the pear still life at FRANK, the skate at Forte (now removed from the menu), the wings at Sky Lounge and Bar, the gnocchi at La Bruschetta and finally the steak at STEAK.

There are meals, that I've eaten that weren't particularly good, but they weren't notably bad either. Truthfully, if a restaurant doesn't want us to cover their restaurant, they won't have us in. To be fair, they are also the exceptionally bad restaurants in the city - they won't invite criticism on their own dollar and trust me, I trust that they understand that we will write a bad review if need be. Just because we hide behind the Dine.TO moniker doesn't mean that we have been bought.

I love food, I have ever since I was a child. I melted my set of Fisher Price cookware when I was too young to understand, in an effort to cook scrambled eggs for my mother. Years later, I went so far as to enroll into Culinary School, but opted out in order to go into a government subsidized program for not for profit fundraising and marketing.

Food is my first love.
I know what a noisette is.
I know how to perfectly poach an egg
I've seen chicken's slaughtered
And, I've mastered cooking in a hearth.
I've cooked bread in a wood burning oven
I've helped MacGuiver cheese presses, oyster shucking boards, smokers and have sliced my finger on a mandolin in an effort to work faster.
I've been yelled at in a professional kitchen, yelled in my own and have never expected anything less than perfect.

Just because I was a beauty queen, doesn't mean that I can't wield a cleaver.

At the end of the day, people can say what they want about me, but those who know me know that I know food. Anyone who wants to dispute that, or the abilities of any of my writers... well... I'll see you in the kitchen.

Sunday, February 01, 2009

Hallelujah! Mama Madge has gone away and Madonna is back in between the sheets again! The man is young, a model and looks a lot like an oddly nubile yet still manly 70's underwear model.

ROUND 1

Being Mom is totally out and being a coug is totally in. So while adopting her little Malawian baby wasn't going to unsettle Jolie's reign as mom of the century, dating the "adopted child that got away" might as well tip the scales to make Madonna the hottest single mom on the planet.

Only way Jolie could return that punch is if she can shelter the entire of Tibet in her back yard or break up with Pitt (heaven forbid).

Madonna 1
Jolie 0

Madonna makes cougarism look hot. While Cameron Diaz got points for being the cutest cougar, while Demi Moore gets default points for being a cougar in love - because if she's not with Ashton for love then frankly that whole relationship is a confusing one.

ROUND 2

Jolie may be a UN Ambassador but Madonna's dating Jesus.

Madonna 2

Jolie TKO

The end