The Week in Yum Oct 23-30 Pukka and Chiptole's Boorito to Benefit Second Harvest.

Tandoori Calamari from Pukka

Saturday night was the first cooking demo in my "Not Your Grandmother's Rutabaga" Series at The Kingston Social

Mumbai Sour

My week started off the way I like my week to start off - with dinner at Pukka. Along with a gaggle of food bloggers, I was invited to have dinner there to sample a couple of old favourites and a bunch of new menu items, just in time for fall.  In case you have forgotten, you can refresh your memory here, when I gave the restaurant a full review after my first visit. I was super excited about the place then and nothing has changed. I LOVE this place.

The first dish we tried was a Tandoori Calamari served with Coconut Chutney and Citrus Slaw, which everyone at the table loved. We had all eaten the Herb Infused Chicken Tikka before but that didn't prevent a fork fight over the last, tender morsels. Pretty, bright green chicken that is soft enough to cut with a spoon is served with a smear of Tamarind Chutney - this is not a spicy dish but it is brimming with bright, herbaceous goodness.

String Chat also made my heart sing - almost a salad full of apple, crispy, puffed rice, pomegranate seeds, sprouts, yogurt and chutney - I can't believe this was the first time I was trying this as they say that it is one of their most popular dishes.  

Boatman's Fish and Prawn Curry, Punjabi Chicken and spicy Beef Short Ribs with Black Cumin, Garlic and Ginger Masala were all more traditional Indian dishes and all were fabulous. The one dish that took everyone by surprise was the Pumpkin Curry. A rich, creamy vegetarian curry made with Kashmiri Chili, Curry Leaves and Tomato, everyone was pleasantly surprised  and more than one person decided that this was their favourite dish of the night. I will admit that the name does not do this particular dish justice and they might want to come up with something with a little more panache.

Cocktails were great (I had the Mumbai Sour - Bombay Sapphire Gin, Aperol, grapefruit, cardamom  bitters with a frothy, egg white cap) but the real star at Pukka is the wine list.  Rock Star sommelier, Peter Boyd, never fails to thrill with his risk taking wine pairings.

Yes, it was a media dinner so it was all free but Pukka is one of my absolute favourite restaurants in the city and its most certainly my very favourite Indian restaurant and i eat there as often as I can and  you should too.

On a personal note, Trish, a hair magician from Textur Studio in East End Toronto managed to get me from faded out purple with grey roots to THIS in one afternoon and for this, I will love her forever and if I weren't too old to have a baby, I would give her my second born.

We closed out the week with a visit to our home away from home, The Wren.

For those of you who will be out boozing around in costume, hopping from party to party, Chipotle is going to donate some of the the proceeds from the sale of $3 burritos and other menu items to Second Harvest.

This year’s BooRito event theme is centered around the “unnecessary” to bring awareness to how unnecessary additives are so just add something unnecessary to your costume to score a $3 burrito, like that dinosaur with a pirate hat over there. 

This will all be happening from 5pm to close at all Toronto area Chipotles. 

Pin of the week: I am pining for a trip to Havana to see it one more time before it changes forever

Instagram of the week: 

Today at Lynnie Daycare B and I made some spooky cookies!!

A photo posted by lc (@lynleabinly) on Oct 26, 2015 at 1:44pm PDT

Tweet of the week: because I am a politics geek

Like him or not, Ben Carson has forced us to ask some tough questions like "Have we been overestimating the intelligence of brain surgeons?"

— Danny Zuker (@DannyZuker) October 8, 2015

when a wine writer is forced to drink Jager in the Mud at a heavy metal festival...it happened lolhttps://t.co/5WJ4mrX8Br
Posted by The Yum Yum Factor on Tuesday, October 27, 2015

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