Listening to Ad Man Terry O'Reilly in Person

O'Reilly (left) with moderator Kathryn Gretsinger

This afternoon went to Granville Island again -- and had a nightmare of a time trying to find parking -- to get to another Vancouver Writers Festival event. I managed to find a spot in a nook by the water front, where a car was just pulling out to leave. What luck, though where I parked my car was at the opposite end of where I needed to go... can't have everything!

I got to Waterfront Theatre as the line was forming outside and was luckily sheltered from the rain. About 10 minutes later we were invited inside before the start of listening to Terry O'Reilly, who has written a new book called Against the Grain.

O'Reilly is well known among CBC listeners who have been tuning in every week for the past 20 years to his various iterations of his show that basically talks about marketing and advertising. It was first called O'Reilly on Advertising, then The Age of Persuasion, and now Under the Influence. 

His book is about mavericks

Each episode has a theme and in half an hour the professional ad man tells several stories around the topic, taking listeners behind the scenes of how campaigns are crafted.

It is quite ironic that a show about advertising is on the non-advertising station of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, but O'Reilly has a massive and loyal following for two decades, and archives that have been downloaded some 70 million times.

He told the sold-out audience how the show is produced, that while choosing the theme is easy, making them into reality is difficult. He has three researchers who are each assigned a show to work on, finding out more information on various campaigns. 

O'Reilly says they compile about 100 pages in notes, which he then writes into a script, records it and then he listens back, gives suggestions on corrections, then they listen again a few more times before it is sent to the CBC.

His whole family is involved in the business, his wife is his executive producer, and each of his three daughters work on the show too, though he didn't explain what they did, only that they have their own talents.

O'Reilly's fourth book talks about mavericks who forge their own paths to success. He talked about NHL hockey coach Roger Neilson, describing him as a devout Christian who never swore professionally, but was an avid reader of the rules of hockey and would "skate" around them. 

One example is that when he would take his goalie out, Neilson instructed him to leave their stick behind lying on the ice in front of the net so that opposing players would have a harder time flicking the puck into the net because there was no rule about that. But after Neilson did that, the rules changed.

O'Reilly also talked about his popular radio show

Another person he raves about is Taylor Swift, who he points out re-recorded all her albums -- usually a performer will only re-record a few hits. She produced a film about The Eras Tour and had it in the theatres while her tour was on simultaneously. 

Critics thought it would lead to weaker ticket sales for her concerts, but the result was the exact opposite. O'Reilly said he had to revise this chapter many times because Swift was doing something new every few weeks.

He also talked about former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's campaign in 2015, how the Liberals only had 36 seats, and managed to not only sweep the Liberals back to power, but with a massive majority at 184 seats -- with hardly any professional political experience. 

O'Reilly says he had done a lot of political advertising and it's usually negative attack ads on the opposition. O'Reilly wasn't involved in the campaign, but heard Trudeau insisted that his ads would be positive, which was completely unheard of at the time, and that helped propel him into power.

In 90 minutes it was great to get insight into how he produces his show every week, and learn more about his book, which I will definitely read at some point!

Pickling Chayotes

The chayote slices soaking in the brine

In the last few weeks we have received a lot of chayotes that people have harvested from their gardens. Luckily these vegetables keep for a while, but you have to eat them eventually.

These gourds are native to South American countries, but are also found in many other parts of the world like the Caribbean, the United States, Philippines, Jamaica, India, Australia, Indonesia, and southern China.

Using a cloth makes it easier to peel the chayote

We have stir-fried them many times, and they can be cooked in soups.

The other day I decided to pickle them in the same kind of brine for daikon, which involves vinegar, salt, sugar and water.

After peeling off the tough and prickly skin of two chayotes, I sliced them in half and then into quarters and slices about 1cm wide.

Then I took the chunks and put them in a bowl and took a liberal tablespoon of salt and mixed it with the vegetable to get the moisture out of the slices for about 20 minutes to half an hour. That way they will be more crunchy later.

In the meantime I made the brine:

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 cup boiling water

1/4 cup apple cider vinegar (can use white vinegar)

1/4 rice vinegar

Slices of chayote ready to be salted and pickled

After about half an hour, I rinsed the chayote pieces with water to wash off the salt and the arranged them in a clean jar before pouring in the brine.

I let it sit in the refrigerator overnight and about 24 hours later I tried the pickled chayote. It tasted great! Tangy sour flavour with a crunch. 

Previously I have pickled them with soy sauce and balsamic vinegar, but this clear brine works better. 'll be making another batch soon to use up these chayotes before they turn bad!

What is Enshittification and What to Do About It

Doctorow (right) at the Vancouver Writers Festival tonight

The Vancouver Writers Festival started earlier this week that features over 85 events talking books with authors, workshops for aspiring writers, and encouraging kids to read and write more.

I just came back from a book talk with Cory Doctorow, Canadian journalist, author of fiction and non-fiction and activist in the tech realm about his latest work called Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What To Do About It.

He is quite the prolific person, who says his anxiety keeps him up and so he channels that nervous energy into producing a lot of work. In 2020 alone he published four books. What was I doing in that same period?!

The crowd at the Arts Club Theatre in Granville Island was all excited to hear what he had to say and you really had to focus because he said so much because he added context and explanation to be able to answer questions or expand on an idea.

While he and the moderator sat on stage, above was a giant screen and on it were projected hilarious Photoshopped collages poking fun at the tech world, with lots of sh*t emojis, and how the world is going to sh*t.

Back in 2022 he coined the word enshittification, which was declared Macquarie Dictionary's word of the year in 2024. According to the dictionary, the definition is: "The gradual deterioration of a service or product brought about by a reduction in the quality of service provided, especially of an online platform, and as a consequence of profit-seeking."

Sound familiar? 

Twitter, or rather X is a good example, so is Facebook, Google, and Amazon.

On Facebook we used to see pictures our friends posted or their dogs or their trips and birthday parties, but now we see more ads from companies promoting products and services we don't want. Or how you look for something on Amazon and the first things it lists are items that aren't what you want but you have to keep scrolling down forever just to find something resembling what you want; meanwhile for the company selling on Amazon, they are constantly undercut by the behemoth making it less feasible to do business online.

This is enshittification.

Doctorow says part of it is due to monopolies these tech companies have on us; they suck us into buying their products and services and we're so invested it's hard to get out, or we can't gain more control over our gadgets like iPhones.

He says on the App Store there used to be an app where people could post information they had about ICE agents to warn others to avoid being "kidnapped and sent to a gulag", Doctorow says. But now Apple has removed this app, presumably to comply with Donald Trump...

Meanwhile Doctorow also talks about companies like John Deere that have agricultural machinery that practically all farmers use and fix themselves. But now these machines are so hi-tech that they can't be turned on or work again unless a John Deere technician goes to the farm to type in a special code to unlock it, and each visit costs thousands of dollars.

At one point Uber was toying with the idea of charging people more if their phone batteries were low on power. That's because Uber found that those customers were more willing to pay for surge pricing. It denied this and then later quietly dropped this extra charge all together.

The other problem is that Canada does not have enough competition nor regulation to rein in these companies. Doctorow personally blames former Conservative heritage minister James Moore for not doing enough to help consumers have more control over technology they use.

While Doctorow thinks we should have fixed things a decade ago, he says now is the time to act. The Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) is up for renewal and Canada should demand more instead of just rolling over to get any deal from the US. 

He says the average person can get off Twitter (or X), but are others going to join you on another platform? It's hard. But Doctorow says it's time to become an activist and join a movement to oppose enshittification of companies and demand that governments give us back control of the technology we use. Write to your Members of Parliament about this issue, and support the Canadian anti-monopoly project, Civic Open Media, and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, he says.

"The way you get rid of them [people like Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk] is by fixing the politics, not by reforming or replacing Elon Musk. The problem with Mark Zuckerberg isn't that the wrong person is the unelected social media czar for life of 4 billion people. The problem is that that job exists. We don't need to fix Zuck. We need to abolish Zuck," Doctorow said, to applause and cheers in the audience. 

Good Value Dessert Drink

"Mango ice cream" with puree and ice in a cup

This afternoon I was in Crystal Mall, a Chinese shopping mall in Burnaby. The mall has probably seen better days, as it now looks tired, with many shop spaces closed, or those that are open don't have much business.

However, head to the food court and it's a bustling place even though it's 2.30pm. Some people are grabbing a late lunch, others a snack or dessert.

I wandered around the stalls looking for inspiration. Paradise Juice was somewhat busy, with many people ordering papaya smoothies. 

On the menu there was "mango ice cream" and in Chinese 芒果雪糕 so I inquired about it.

The woman said it was more like a drink and pointed to a picture of a red bean ice drink, but said it was mango instead of red bean.

OK why not? It was $4.95.

Several minutes later I got my drink -- the bottom filled with crushed ice, next mango puree along with small chunks of mango, and then topped with some vanilla ice cream. She gave me a thick straw that wasn't necessary, and a spoon with a long neck.

I ate a bit of the mango and ice cream before mixing the three ingredients together and it was great! Cold, refreshing, and not too sweet. When they make drinks like papaya smoothies, they use whole milk or even cream which makes it very heavy and rich.

This combination with some vanilla ice cream made it creamy, but slightly diluted by the ice. If they used coconut milk it could be a vegan dessert and probably taste even better too!

Apparently mangos are now $12/lb so this drink/dessert is a good deal!

Paradise Juice

2/F, Crystal Mall

4500 Kingsway, Burnaby

604 438 8199

Trying to Entice Travel to the United States

Does this make you want to visit the US?

This morning with our newspaper came this magazine, Visit the USA, produced by visittheusa.com. 

It's a 168-page publication featuring all 50 states in a bid to entice Canadians to travel south... like they used to.

In 2024, Statistics Canada reported Canadian residents made 39 million trips across the border, representing 75 percent of all Canadian-resident travel abroad. In addition nearly 75 percent of that travel to the US was by land.

However, since January 2025, Canadian trips by car to the US have dropped five consecutive months. In May, trips by automobile fell 38.1 percent year on year, and a drop of 35.2 percent compared to April.

When it comes to travel by air, Canadian-resident return trips fell 14 percent year on year in April and 24.2 percent in May.

The drop in travel has severely affected businesses in border towns on each side, though the recent American League Championships Series between the Toronto Blue Jays and Seattle Mariners may have led to a slight increase in Canadians traveling to the US, and now the upcoming World Series starting Friday.

Nevertheless, perhaps the drop in tourists is why the American government is anxious to try to entice Canadians to come back. Brand USA is the nation's destination marketing association "dedicated to driving legitimate international inbound travel to strengthen the US economy, boost exports, create quality jobs, and foster community prosperity."

Flipping through this magazine, it's choc full of beautiful photography and blurbs on many cities, but nothing particularly specific that would inspire someone to want to immediately book a trip to the US...

The Jays are Going to the World Series

The Jays celebrate their win taking them to the World Series

Blue Jays fans never stopped believing and the team pulled through in Game 7 to beat the Seattle Mariners 4-3 to win the American League Championship Series and head to the World Series for the first time in 32 years.

Going into this game was a nail biter, with the Mariners and Jays with three games each and it was a question of who was going to blink first.

Seattle was first out of the gate, with 1-0 then 2-1 and 3-1 by the top of the seventh inning. It was not looking good for the Jays, with thousands of fans watching in Rogers Centre in Toronto.

Toronto beat the Mariners in Game 7

But then Toronto slugger George Springer hit a homer that brought in three runs to make it 4-3 at bottom of the seventh and the Jays hung on to win.

"There's probably not another person on planet Earth that I want up other than George Springer and his October magic," said Blue Jays manager John Schneider, remarking on the home run that was the game-changer tonight.

This series was not going well for the Jays either, as they were down 0-2 and had to claw their way back -- in Seattle -- to make it 2-2, then 3-2 before the Mariners tied it in the sixth game. Before Seattle, the Jays beat the New York Yankees.

Now the Jays will meet the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series -- with the formidable Shohei Ohtani to beat.

For now the fans -- across Canada -- are ecstatic and excited to see their Canadian team in the World Series.

When a Dish Keeps Giving

Braised duck with bamboo shoots, mushrooms, beancurd skin

Once a month my parents and their friends meet up for dinner for 12 people at a Chinese restaurant called Southern Delicacy in Vancouver's Kerrisdale. In the past year the dishes have been fantastic and there are some dishes we order again and again, like the pork liver, eggplant and rice rolls in hotpot, and steamed choi sum with minced pork and egg plant.

This time we tried the restaurant's signature dish, which is not on the menu -- braised duck with canned bamboo shoots, mushrooms, beancurd skin rolls, and napa cabbage. The giant pot arrives bubbling at the table, and the sauce is mesmerising, flavoured with ginger, star anise, soy sauce, oyster sauce, and probably duck fat too.

This time with sea cucumber, fresh bamboo shoots

The portion was so large that we couldn't finish it, and we took the leftovers home, but weren't able finish them in one sitting.

In order to finish the rest of it and to soak up the sauce, we rehydrated some sea cucumber and sliced some fresh bamboo shoots. I had bought some large bamboo shoots at T&T supermarket, though after removing the tough and rough outer layer, there wasn't much left!

Nevertheless, the end result was fantastic, both the sea cucumbers and bamboo shoots taking on the flavour of the sauce, and the latter adding a crunchy texture to the dish.

It's awesome when you have a leftover dish that keeps on giving!

Cantonese Humour on Show in Chinatown

Sio and Mahbubani answered questions from the audience

Two Cantonese-speaking stand-up comics came to Vancouver and I watched them perform this afternoon at the Chinatown Storytelling Centre and had a good laugh listening to their humour.

Vivek Mahbubani is South Asian and born and raised in Hong Kong. Several years ago he was an anomaly because he speaks fluent Cantonese, and not only that, he won in the Cantonese category for Hong Kong's funniest person in 2007, and then in English the following year.

His jokes are mainly inspired by his experiences and observations as a South Asian living in Hong Kong. He still gets a lot of shocked expressions from locals when he opens his mouth. In his routine he started off by saying he went to eat at a cha chaan teng, and because it was busy, he had to share a table with a young couple.

Watched the Cantonese version of the show

Mahbubani looked at the menu and said, "Waiter can you take my order?" in Cantonese, to which the young woman across from him pointed and exclaimed, "You can speak!"

Her boyfriend tried to shut her up. "If he can speak then he can understand what you're saying!"

Another time he got into the MTR carriage and saw there were three seats in a row that were empty. He sat in the middle one -- and adds no one sat next to him because of racism. Ouch! But probably true.

Then two girls who were friends entered the carriage chatting, and then sat on either side of him and continued talking to each other as if he wasn't there. 

Then one said, "Hey this guy has a beard and hasn't shaved."

It's then that Mahbubani says this is when he waits to find the right moment to reveal that he understands what they're saying.

So he waited and then pulled out his phone and said, "Wei?"

And then added, "Yes I'm going to buy a shaver today."

He also gives the usual Hong Kong observations of how everyone stands on the right of the escalator so that those who are in a hurry can walk up the on the left. But there's always someone who insists on standing on the left, holding up the person behind (usually him). Time is money, right?

The other comedian is Joanna Sio, who grew up in Hong Kong too, went to UBC and is married to a Czech husband with two kids.

Both comedians are from Hong Kong

She started off by saying the couple decided early on not to learn their spouse's native language because you never know if you're going to divorce soon. But since they moved to the Czech Republic a few years ago she has learned for a year or so.

But most of her routine was about her growing up in a 400 sq ft flat with eight people in the family. Sio talked about how her father had a terrible temper and would take it out on... a watermelon.

"He knew kungfu -- from watching TV -- and would use his hand like a knife to chop the watermelon in half. We would watch and not say a word," she recalled.

Then one time he was really angry and took out a watermelon and Sio said they watched as his hand went down on the watermelon, but it didn't chop in half like usual. His hand was sore and retreated into his bedroom for hours.

"I was the only person who knew why he couldn't chop the watermelon in half. That's because I had put it in the freezer earlier."

She also talked about how they bought live chicken at the market, but didn't kill it right away. They waited a day or two to see if it was healthy. It was her grandmother who did the dirty deed. She would cradle the chicken in her left arm tightly and then cover its eyes before she used the cleaver to chop its neck and let the blood drain so that they could use it later for other dishes.

After several years, her grandmother was too old to kill chickens, so the task fell to Sio's mother -- who had never done it before. So she grabbed the chicken in her left arm, held it tight and covered its eyes. But she couldn't bring herself to kill it. "She said, "Kids we're not eating chicken tonight."

But because she was holding the chicken so tightly, it had died.

Many people in the audience were second generation Chinese-Canadian and told the comedians they could understand most of what they said, which was heartening for them to hear. One asked how Mahbubani got into comedy and he said it was because of the show Seinfeld.

He said the show opens with Jerry Seinfeld on a stage telling jokes and Mahbubani wondered what that was and how he could do that. He got into it in 2007, but had to do a lot of odd jobs to keep his dream alive. Now he can pick and choose which gigs he'd like to do.

Someone asked about the differences between comedy in English and Chinese. Mahbubani says in Chinese because of the fear of losing face, he never singles out people in the audience. Instead he talks about "we" or "I" when telling stories.

Sio says if people don't get her jokes she takes it personally and will rewrite them to try to improve. She admitted that she has a fear of speaking in front of an audience which is why she went into improv and then stand-up to build confidence. When her routine goes well it makes her very happy and gives her more confidence to speak in front of people! 

Remembering a Macanese Chef

Coelho when we filmed our interview with him in 2018

A culinary legend in Macau has died. Portuguese native Antonio Coelho was the chef and founder of Antonio's who died October 12 at the age of 77. He is remembered for his food that was cooked with many dollops of butter, and the convivial atmosphere he created in his cosy restaurant.

His wife Mercy made the announcement on social media.

Antonio's sauteed clams in white wine sauce

"Our family is deeply saddened to inform you that my beloved husband, Antonio, passed away last Sunday," she wrote. "I cannot express the grief that we are feeling at the loss of such a great man in the family and to everyone else."

Coelho opened his restaurant in 2007, which was known for such dishes as sauteed clams with garlic and white wine sauce, sauteed fresh prawns with garlic, grilled sardines, Portuguese duck rice, and "Portuguese" style steak that was panfried in a lot of butter and served with a fried egg, pickles and potato slices.

Born and raised in Portugal, Coelho did many different jobs from a stint in the army where he was posted in Macau for two years, to working for the government and in a clinical lab before learning about food through his then boss. He would take Coelho to different restaurants, where the young man developed his palate and tried to recreate the dishes for his friends on the weekends.

Coelho enjoyed the media attention

Four years later he started working in a restaurant where he really learned how to cook. After three years there Coelho opened his own place.

In 1997 following his divorce, Coelho decided it was time for a change of scenery and moved to Macau to start fresh. He worked in several restaurants in the former Portuguese enclave and Hong Kong, before opening Antonio's in 2007.

I interviewed him in 2018, an assignment from one of my bosses, as it was his favourite Macanese restaurant. We tracked down Coelho who didn't seem to take our interview request too seriously. But when he saw we showed up with a video camera and keen to shoot, he went all out and allowed us to film him in the kitchen and stay for dinner.

Watching him cook in the kitchen he wasn't particularly meticulous, measuring out things exactly. Instead he cooked with instinct (and a lot of butter), which is probably why he had so many fans who could taste his love in the dishes.

Interviewing him, Coelho talked in tangents, not quite answering the question and would fall into his favourite topic of food and cooking.

The infamous Portuguese duck rice

At the time he also had a roving guitarist who would serenade diners with songs. It was definitely a unique and memorable experience. 

He told our cameraman at the time to come back anytime, and he took him up on his word, bringing his wife for a romantic weekend.

But when they walked into Antonio's again, Coelho didn't remember my colleague at all -- leaving him flustered despite explaining he had filmed him a few weeks earlier...

Picture of the Day: Japanese Chicken Curry

Japanese chicken curry rice in Chinatown the other day

Chinatown eats this week at The Boss Bakery & Restaurant: Japanese chicken curry.

I was expecting the sweet and slightly spicy curry sauce with potato and carrots, but not the chicken being similar to a weiner schnitzel, but covered in panko and deep-fried.

The presentation of the randomly placed chicken strips looked like an octopus with fuzzy arms!

Portuguese-style egg tarts for a sweet finish

For dessert we had Portuguese-style egg tarts with flaky layered pastry and an egg custard that wasn't cloyingly sweet.

Showcasing Local Cuisine in Canada

The screening was held at Silver City Riverport in Steveston

Went to another screening this evening -- this time for a TV series on CBC called Locals Welcome. There are 10 episodes in this inaugural season featuring host Suresh Doss. He's a food writer in Toronto who has a regular column on CBC Radio Toronto's Metro Morning.

Doss, originally from Sri Lanka and moved to Toronto when he was 12 years old, could probably be best described as the South Asian version of the late Jonathan Gold, who championed the mom-and-pop shops serving ethnic foods.

Chef May Chau at Golden Paramount

While there is a big mix of ethnicities in Toronto, the show also wanted to spread out across to Vancouver, and Richmond was chosen as a place to showcase the best in Chinese cuisine.

In the episode entitled Seafood and Tradition, Doss meets up with Lee Man, a congenial foodie, a judge for the Vancouver Magazine Restaurant Awards, and founding judge of the Chinese Restaurant Awards. 

Lee takes his foodie buddy to Golden Paramount Seafood Restaurant to have dim sum that included dumplings with large morel mushrooms on top, and the signature fun guo, or Chiu Chow steamed dumplings stuffed with pork, chives, peanuts, preserved radish. 

Chef May Chau Siu-may explains on screen that her family was in the restaurant business and she learned at a very young age how to make dumplings thanks to her dextrous fingers. She is now in her early 60s. 

Man, Doss and host Lien Yeung

Golden Paramount is our go-to for dinner, but haven't eaten here for dim sum...

Doss and Lee also visit "Eat Street" on Alexandra Road, where there are restaurants representing an array of regional Chinese cuisines. They also check out a Taiwanese place serving tomato beef noodles, and Yuan's Garden that doesn't only have Shanghainese dishes, but also Nanjing ones too.

Apparently Nanjing cuisine has more of a sour and sweet combination of flavours, and soupy dishes with noodles. I ate here over the summer, but was not aware of the Nanjing specialties!

The episode ends with Doss eating at Fish Man restaurant with fishmonger Jenice Yu and an influencer. Chef Li Bo presents enticing dishes like geoduck two ways -- sashimi slices and wok-fried typhoon shelter style with chillis and chilli flakes.

He also used fresh ling cod, de-boned it, sliced it up and then put them in a sour and spicy broth with pickled vegetables (or Chinese sauerkraut) and topped with a lot of red chillis. I have had this dish here and chef Bo is very talented. When I ate here over two years ago, he presented almost 20 different ways of eating sablefish!

Chef Bo is originally from northern China, came to Vancouver via Winnipeg and not only is adept in Chinese cooking techniques, but also has learned Japanese knife skills to cut sashimi, and make Cantonese seafood dishes too.

A panel discussion with Doss, Man and Yu

The episode left viewers salivating over the food. After the screening, an audience member asked Doss if they finish all the food during filming. He explained while he had a fast metabolism, he had a rabid film crew who helped eat everything as soon as shooting wrapped.

Doss said he hopes to do an expanded series on food courts, as well as Chinese diners across the country, some of which are closing as the next generation are not taking over. There was also the suggestion that he check out Surrey for the South Asian dishes there.

So many possibilities! More importantly, there are so many food stories in Metro Vancouver that need to be covered!

Culinary Chops Tested in Top Chef Canada

Gochujang lobster tail, crab and miso custard

This evening was the kick off of season 12 of Top Chef Canada, with 10 professional chefs competing for the top prize of bragging rights and a cool $100,000.

I attended the screening party for the first episode tonight at Five Sails in the Pan Pacific Hotel, where chef Alex Kim is the executive chef and one of the competitors.

Chef Kim of Five Sails

Before the show aired he welcomed the assembled crowd of food journalists, influencers and fellow chefs like Chanthy Yen, who won last season's Top Chef Canada, and Warren Chow, who was awarded the Michelin Young Chef title in 2023. Even one of the judges, Mijune Pak arrived a few weeks after giving birth to her daughter Amelie. Baby was carried into the noisy restaurant by Pak's husband Romain.

The episode was set in Toronto's St Lawrence Market, and the challenge was for the 10 chefs to collaborate to present a 10-course dinner that would be served at Linny's, a steakhouse opened by chef David Schwartz. The dishes they made had to reflect their heritage and when they wanted to become a chef.

For Kim, he has always talked about his childhood of being born in Seoul, but spending holidays with his grandparents on their farm. His grandmother taught him how to cook, particularly pickling and fermenting. He decided to use gochujang, or red chilli paste incorporated into a lobster, crab and miso custard topped with lobster tail and crispy mushroom.

Also competing from Vancouver is Katy Cheung, who is sous-chef at Michelin-starred Burdock & Co. Originally from Hong Kong, Cheung was inspired by fish balls to made a fish mousseline that looked flawless in execution.

Chef Cheung of Burdock & Co

She also held a viewing party at Bar Gobo, where Cheung encouraged gathered guests to drink alcohol if she is running; swears, says "Let's go!"; Hong Kong and Burdock & Co.

In the end the judges were very impressed by Kim's dish and he won the challenge handily. Lo and behold -- we were served a portion each to try! It really was balanced, not too spicy, smooth texture, fresh lobster and the bisque flavour was infused in the custard.

Exciting first episode, but we'll have to see who eventually wins as no one on the show is allowed to reveal anything!

Picture of the Day: Fall Colours

Leaves are changing their colours now

After several days of rain and overcast skies, today we had a brilliant burst of sunshine and blue skies.

The leaves are changing colour and when the wind blows, they fall off their branches, drifting like snow.

It's not a fun task raking up leaves, especially when the trees aren't completely bare yet!

But I can't help but admire the trees looking radiant against the blue sky. 

Review: Cover-Up

Hersh talked to a lot of people to get tips that led to stories

Journalism students idolise people like Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, Washington Post reporters who broke the Watergate scandal in 1972. 

But there's another journalist they should look up to too -- Seymour Hersh.

Poitras and Obenhaus who directed Cover-Up

His life and career is covered in the fascinating 117-minute documentary, Cover-Up, by directors Laura Poitras and Mark Obenhaus. She is best known for her documentaries on Edward Snowden and the Sackler family.

In 2005 Poitras approached Hersh about doing a documentary about him, but it took him 20 years to finally agree.

He's a prickly character, and Hersh is filmed in his office, with piles of files all around him, files filled with faded yellow note pads filled with illegible handwriting, and a Rolodex on his desk. But hey, he uses an iPhone and Macbook to keep reporting.

During the Vietnam War Hersh was a freelancer -- a freelancer(!) when he uncovered American soldiers had shot and killed up to 500 civilian men, women, children and babies in a remote Vietnamese village.

Hersh says the US military officials were angry their soldiers were being killed and to up the numbers of Vietnamese deaths, they randomly killed innocent people. He managed to get a tip on the soldier charged with killing 109 people, tracked him down and spoke to him.

He then managed to interview other soldiers who were eyewitnesses or participated in the massacre. 

Hersh's reporting gave more ammunition to those opposed to the war.

Hersh is still his prickly self, trusting no one

It was his ability to track down and talk to people that made Hersh either praised or feared. US President Nixon and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger were caught on tape calling the journalist "a son of a bitch", angered that he was able to find out so much information.

Is it no wonder Hersh was either praised or feared.

After Woodward and Bernstein broke the Watergate story, Hersh, who was then at the New York Times, was told to go find stories, and he managed to find out the burglars who broke into the Democratic National Committee headquarters were still being paid hush money. 

This story helped keep the story alive and bring more information to the public about the scandal, that eventually led to Nixon's resignation. Hersh wrote over 40 stories about Watergate, that were mostly published on the front page.

Hersh also reported on how the CIA spent millions to destabilise the socialist government of Chilean President Salvador Allende and after a coup d'etat, installed a military dictatorship under Augusto Pinochet.

The documentary also gets Hersh to talk about his father, a Jewish immigrant from Lithuania who played the violin. He says his family was very short on words and he never knew his father had escaped the horrors of the Nazis and wished he had known before so he could ask.

He still has lots of files all over his office

His family had two sets of twins -- Hersh had two twin older sisters, and he and his brother were twins too. His father had a dry cleaning business, and expected Hersh to take over. He didn't like the work but did what was expected of him. He had to quit school to look after his ailing father and on the side Hersh read a lot of books. But when his father died of cancer, this gives Hersh the opportunity to get a college education and the instructor felt he was more qualified for university and got him enrolled into the University of Chicago.

He randomly met a reporter and thought the job was so exciting that he started as a copyboy and a month later became a crime reporter.

Cover-Up also recounts the torture in the prisoners in Abu Ghraib in Iraq from 2004-2007. When he was able to get the photographs of prisoners tortured by US soldiers, and obtained a report by a general that listed all the things that were done to prisoners, Hersh was able to write the story that put Secretary for Defense Donald Rumsfeld in the hot seat.

Rumsfeld even tried to explain the difference between abuse and torture in a bid to disclaim the article.

But Hersh didn't get everything right. When he was researching into US President John F Kennedy's alleged romance with Marilyn Monroe, he claimed to have letters between the two, but they turned out to be fabricated by a known forger. That put a big dent into Hersh's reputation, but he looks back at it as dodging a bullet, as those so-called letters did not make it into his book, The Dark Side of Camelot.

Strangely he also felt Syrian President Bashir al-Assad couldn't have used chemical warfare on his own people...

Nevertheless, Hersh is still kicking and writing on his Substack account. During the filming he is shown talking to a source on the phone, getting information about Israeli attacks on Gaza.

Cover-Up was intense to watch, with a few sarcastic moments sprinkled throughout, but also eye-opening for someone like myself who is not familiar with Hersh's work. It's people like him who inspire younger journalists to try to find the truth. What he did was just talk to people and you never know -- they might just slip some information that could lead to something big.

Cover-Up

Directed by Laura Poitras and Mark Obenhaus

117 minutes

Local Produce Showcased at The Botanist

Precisely presented scallop crudo with black apple and celery

The other day we were invited to dinner at The Botanist, described as a modern Canadian restaurant located in the Fairmont Pacific Rim in downtown Vancouver. 

I have eaten here a handful of times for lunch and really enjoy the atmosphere, as it's not stuffy, but not casual either, the food is always memorable, and service is friendly.

Earthy snails and mushrooms under the basil pasta

We were there to try chef Hector Laguna's latest menu featuring the fresh organic produce of Local Harvest, a farm in Chilliwack.

Dan Oostenbrink and his wife own the farm and their sons help out on this family-run operation. They bought it in 2013, assuming they would need to use pesticides and fertilizers and for the first year they did that. But the following year they brought in a different consultant who advised they use less of their land in the beginning and grow organic produce. 

At first Oostenbrink was skeptical, but recalls when his son harvested a perfectly round cauliflower with no imperfections, he was heartened and encouraged that it was possible. Since then they have expanded to use the 37 acres and use regenerative farming like composting and increased biodiversity to keep the soil fertile.

Steamed sablefish with squash compote

They grow all kinds of herbs, root vegetables, legumes, squashes, cucumbers, tomatoes, garlic, onions, cabbage, bok choy, kale and spinach.

So we were excited to try chef Hector's menu that featured lots of Local Harvest's produce.

A trio of amuse bouche began the meal: an oyster tartare of compressed vegetable roots and citrus topped with some caviar served in an edible oyster shell; chicken wingettes with mojo de ajo and smoked salmon roe; and side striped sope, or thick corn tortilla with vegan XO sauce, shellfish emulsion and salicornia, or sea asparagus.

These amuse bouche were beautifully presented and tasted delicious, but they were messy to pick up, and my fingers were coated in too much sauce.

Very tender wagyu with an onion tart

Nevertheless things picked up immensely with the scallop crudo, slices of the meaty seafood interspersed with slices of black apple, together with celery, ginger and more caviar. It was a delicate presentation that tasted refreshing and light.

The next dish moved from the water to the ground with the earthy tasting grilled Burgundy snails cooked together with foraged mushrooms, and pickled garlic scapes hidden under a sheet of basil-flavoured fresh pasta with madeira jus.

We went back into the water again with steamed sablefish provided by EatFish.ca. the fillet was finished with a red kuri and carnival squash compote, with epazote, a leafy herb, and salsa macha to give it a subtle spicy kick. This dish was artfully presented with an intricate leafy design made of squash.

Creative pear and squash verrine

The final savoury dish was also memorable -- roasted wagyu zabuton, or marbled steak that was cooked to have a very tender taste and texture, with some clarified bone marrow drops. The dish came with a small onion tart and grainy mustard. We savoured each bite of the wagyu.

For dessert, an intriguing finish using kabocha squash to make a light cremeux, which is between a cream and a custard that was accompanied with Anjou pear compote, and intriguingly, candy cap mushroom ice cream! 

The Botanist

1038 Canada Place

Vancouver, BC

V6C 0B9

+1 604 695 5300

Review: The Shadow Scholars

Kingori is a professor at Oxford University

University students desperate to get a research paper completed can pay a few hundred dollars for a ghostwriter to write it for them -- sometimes in hours. These are "shadow scholars", but who are they?

They are the subject of a documentary by Eloise King, who uses the research of Professor Patricia Kingori, a sociologist and the youngest female black professor at Oxford University. King follows the academic as she discovers these online essay mills are a $15 billion industry, with 72 percent of writers coming from her home country, Kenya. Some 40,000 of them live in Nairobi alone.

She goes to Nairobi to meet Kenyan ghost writers

She goes to the Kenyan capital city to meet these shadow scholars to find out who they are and why they are churning out these papers. Kingori discovers they are bright, hardworking, but also desperate for work. They have all graduated from university, but can't find any decent jobs except ghostwrite someone else's research papers.

There's Mercy who has to support not only herself but also her daughter in kindergarten; Chege has made enough money to not only support his sister through tertiary education, but also built his parents' a house, and bought himself a car. There's also a married couple who also write essays for a fee.

Not only do they have to write these papers, but also bid for the work too. After the film was screened, King explained the writers only get 30 percent of the fee -- the lion's share goes to the online platform advertising these writers. They also get fined if they don't make the deadline, or don't make revisions ot the client's requirements.

And the writers can't even promote themselves -- they give themselves Western names and white profiles otherwise no one would believe someone from Kenya is able to write their papers to ensure they can graduate and get a degree.

Kenyan grads have difficulty finding jobs

For Kingori this is infuriating: why can't these Kenyans show their true identity and be credited for the work that they do? But these shadow scholars don't seem to mind. For them this is a decent job and in the process of writing these papers they also gain more knowledge.

On the other side of the world, professors and educators are sounding the alarm of these essay mills and politicians start cracking down on them. There are hundreds of thousands of students who have been able to graduate because they paid someone to write their essays or tests for them. Are there people who are now doctors, nurses and lawyers really qualified for their jobs?

One student in the United States talks about how desperate she is to graduate from university because it's what her parents want and have poured their savings into her education. Meanwhile she saves up money for a shadow scholar to write a research paper for her by selling nudes of herself online.

However, now with the advent of artificial intelligence, students are turning to ChatGPT, which scrapes all the research papers online -- some of which were written by these ghostwriters... how is that any better?

King was inspired by Kingori's research

The Shadow Scholars asks many ethical questions, like who is taking advantage of who, why isn't the Kenyan government supporting this generation of young bright graduates, how have essay mills been allowed to exist and how can the message be sent across to students that they should do their own work?

King explained after the screening that The Shadow Scholars was originally supposed to focus on these writers and shine a spotlight on them, but as countries like the United Kingdom and Australia were cracking down on these ghostwriters, the director could not specifically focus on them anymore, and so she had to turn to AI generated digital disguises to protect these writers. 

Instead King focused more on Kingori, how her mother drilled it into her head to do better than her by studying harder. For a long time people believed getting a good education would lead to good jobs, but that isn't the case anymore. The system of education is broken, so what can fresh graduates do now?

It's a fascinating documentary that makes viewers sympathetic to these writers, and how they are caught up in the system. In the end they just want to make money, but at what cost?

The Shadow Scholars

Directed by Eloise King

Starring Dr Patricia Kingori

98 minutes

Review: Clan of the Painted Lady

Chiu at the age of three with her Indian nanny in Kolkata, India

Hakka culture is not widely known, as there isn't much academic study of it, and not many Hakka families preserve much of the language. They were nomadic people that are believed to have originated from the north of China and migrated south due to famines and war. From Hong Kong they spread out across the globe to places like Mauritius, India, Canada and the United States.

Vancouver filmmaker Jennifer Chiu is Hakka, originally from Kolkata, India where her parents were born. Even though they got married in Vancouver, they moved back to India where Chiu was born, though when she was very young, she moved back to Vancouver with her mother and siblings; her father stayed behind. He would come back once a year, and then there were years where he didn't come back at all.

The butterfly motif is used through the film

Chiu wanted to find out where she was from and in 2009 went back to Kolkata with her parents. It sparked her interest in finding out more about her Hakka identity, and about four years ago embarked on this very personal documentary called Clan of the Painted Lady. It made its world premiere at the Vancouver International Film Festival.

The Painted Lady refers to the butterfly, also known as Vanessa cardui, which is the most widespread of all the butterflies, and found on every continent except Antarctica and South America. This butterfly is the motif that is woven throughout the film, from caterpillar to larvae to chrysalis and then butterfly.

Meanwhile Chiu examines what it means to be Hakka, and what others are doing to preserve this culture. She asks her parents, and visits her uncle and other Hakka families in Toronto, goes back to Kolkata and Tangra, where her family had a tannery, and Mui Yan in Guangdong.

For the most part, many of the younger generation don't seem interested or as passionate about learning more about their Hakka culture, much to the disappointment of their parents. In one scene, a son, helping his mother make wontons, says the preservation exercise is focused on the past, whereas he'd rather look forward; he doesn't seem to think Hakka is very useful.

Chiu shot in Canada, India and China

Meanwhile two sisters take over their parents' Chindian (Chinese-Indian) restaurant after their chef father had a stroke in Toronto. Their mother tearfully recounts how she would take the street car to the restaurant at lunchtime and help out for 45 minutes before returning to her work in time, and look after five children. One of the daughters, also tearful, admires her mother's work ethic and wants to be like her.

Chiu gives good insight into the Chinese-Indian community. There's a scene of three elderly Indian women who recall looking after Chiu's family. She told the audience afterwards that three generations of these Indian women's families and looked after her family's three generations.

Her family did well with a tannery business in Tangra, as Hindus believed cows were sacred, so it was only non-Hindus who could handle leather. Tanning leather means using a lot of chemicals to treat the leather, and the waterways near the factories were polluted.

The Indian government cracked down on these factories, ordering them to either shut down or move into a designated industrial area. At this point her father retired and moved back to Vancouver for good. The factory space is still there, but is deserted, while relatives who have stayed behind believe it's better to continue in India than start from scratch in Canada.

Chiu learned more about her family

There's an interesting scene of a Chinese man teaching Indians how to do Chinese lion dancing. He says people ask him why he teaches Indians, but he says they are the only ones interested -- no young Chinese people are keen on learning. He feels lion dancing will always be Chinese, and believes it's more important to pass it down to someone than to let the art form die off.

After the film Chiu asked how many people in the audience were of Hakka heritage and she was thrilled to see so many hands go up. When asked how she felt about her identity after making the film, Chiu said it was not the end as she had hoped, but really the beginning.

What was also thought-provoking was, why are they called Hakka (guest family) by other people -- what did they call themselves? And where were they originally from? Chiu believes that what ties Hakka people together is their stories of migration, how they got to where they are now.

Clan of the Painted Lady

Directed by Jennifer Chiu

101 minutes