Sick of the everyday? Pick up a copy of rebar modern food cookbook and experience new culinary delights fresh from Canada's West Coast.
I received rebar modern food cookbook several years ago as a Christmas gift from my aunt. As I was digesting the flurry of activity and colour on the front cover, my aunt winked at me and said “It’s my favourite”. After trying a few recipes, I could see why.
The Book
Written by Audrey Alsterberg and Wanda Urbanowicz, the rebar modern food cookbook is based on its namesake restaurant located in Victoria, British Columbia. Open since 1989, the restaurant offers up breakfast, lunch, dinner, juices and desserts to those lucky enough to be local. Thanks to this little neon book, however, everyone can now enjoy the quirky cuisine that makes rebar stand out.
Rebar is a self-published gem, available from brick-and-mortar and online bookstores, as well as from the rebarmodernfood website. The cookbook itself is written is a friendly and inviting style, which obviously comes naturally to rebar. Visitors to the website are greeted with the message,
“Although we're not yet taking credit card numbers online, just fill out this handy form and one of the authors, Audrey or Wanda, will call you back to get the info. Wouldn't you rather speak to a real person anyway?”.
It’s just a hint of the attention to detail Wanda and Audrey have put into the recipes, helpful sidebar tips (“Galangal is a root related to ginger…”) and anecdotes contained in rebar.
The Angle
Rebar modern food cookbook is a compilation of upscale mostly vegetarian cuisine, with about 25% of its recipes vegan and some additional recipes easily made vegan. The book does contain several fish recipes, which can be conveniently ignored for a vegetarian menu, or included for a pescivorous plan.
The recipes lend themselves to fresh, seasonal cooking. Nutrition and nourishing are obviously important as well. rebar practices what it preaches by using healthy whole food ingredients, including some more obscure items like wheat grass. Recipes for from-scratch basics (that most home cooks stopped preparing with the advent of the ice box) provide a base for more involved recipes.
But don’t be fooled – rebar is definitely not an old-school vegetarian hangout. In fact, it has risen above the stereotypical vegetarian fare (so, so, far above) to include modern delicacies such as rebar Caesar salad (p. 18, no anchovies!) and yam and pepita quesadillas (p. 102). Its gourmet brunch recipes are fantastic - check out Cranberry Hazelnut Granola if you don't believe me.
The Audience
Rebar is not a cookbook for beginners; though its scope is broad. Some recipes (such as kung pao noodles, p. 167) have ingredient listings as long as your arm - and heaven forbid one doesn’t read the entire recipe first, only to discover halfway into cooking that one “ingredient” is actually a separate recipe found in the “basics” section. Other recipes are shorter and sweeter (such as brie bagel melt, p. 89). For the more experienced cook, rebar provides opportunities to experiment with new flavours and exotic ingredient like sui choi, sambal oelek, and wild mushrooms.
For most of us that fall between these extremes there are plenty of everyday gourmet recipes interspersed with dinner party-worthy fare.
The Bonus
Wandy and Audrey are not the types to forget dessert. Did I mention rebar has a sister bakery called Cascadia? Sweet tooths are in for a treat indeed. Brownies and tortes and cakes, oh my! There are enough recipes here to keep friends and family happy for quite a while. Most of these desserts are too decadent for your child’s bake sale – save them for special occasions.
Beyond the dessert section lies the chapter on juicing, complete with cleverly-named recipes like diabloatomic glow. Perhaps that’s the secret to keep people reading to the end of the book.
The Bottom Line
Rebar is not a beginner’s cookbook, but for intermediate and experienced chefs it provides an array of new experiences and ingredients, with helpful guidance along the way. With recipes perfect for dinner parties and for making every day feel special, you can judge rebar modern food cookbook by its spunky, colourful cover.
Reference: Alsterberg, A and Urbanowicz W. (2000). Rebar modern food cookbook. Big Ideas Publishing Inc.: Victoria, B.C. Used with permission.
