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After a week of hard exercise, healthy eating and clean living in general, I decided to blow off some steam by having brunch. Brunch is a great meal that I seldom get to have because I can’t stand lineups, waiting, excessively busy restaurants and waking up early. But I couldn’t help and be seduced by better than average sounding offerings at AKA Bistro as deftly profiled by are you gonna eat that? a local Calgary blogger. So I recruited my younger brother as a partner in crime, and off we went on an adventure across town.
I may have mentioned once or twice that I’m not a morning person. Sunday was no different, and we arrived at the bistro at the *ahem*early hour of 2 pm, which worked out to a great advantage since we were the only ones there, and they serve brunch till three p.m.
Although it’s not much to look at from the outside, (are they going to finish that?)
The interior is simple and lovely with warm neutral colors and lots of wood. Since we arrived so late we were able to snag a prime seat by the window and watch the world drive by.
After ordering the mandatory, necessary and obligatory elixir of life coffee, which was nice and strong and came with cute wee spoons, we browsed the short and sweet menu. Neither of us have much of a sweet tooth, so waffles and french toast were out, and in the end we chose the filling but comforting eggs benedict for John and truffled omelet for myself.
I gotta tell you right now, the omelet was a revelation. Tender, soft and chock full of goodies it was everything that an omelet tries to be, and in my kitchen fails. I’ve never made an omelet that was much more than scrambled eggs, but this one was divine. Full of mushrooms, green onions, truffles, well seasoned, it was a symphony of flavors on par with the best omelet I’ve ever had. The pork belly, grilled tomato, toast and hash browns were simply gilding the lily. I’m craving that omelet just thinking about it.
John’s eggs benedict were very good, but not as good as my omelet. The eggs were softly poached, but the sauce seemed weaker and blander compared to what great eggs benny achieve. The brioche was a fantastic foil and the pork belly provided a much needed salty note, it was a solid dish, but not achieving full greatness.
The only two minor complaints we had was that the hash browns could’ve used a hint more salt too. Not to sound like a salt fiend, but they were very well cooked, crispy in the corners and soft on the inside, flecked with herbs and looked great, but potatoes take a good deal of salt to bring out their flavor, and these ones just lacked a bit. Salt shakers were not provided at the table, and the ketchup offered was housemade and waaaay too sweet. Breakfast places should not mess with Heinz, it’s a gold standard for a reason, and I’ve only tasted a couple of house ketchups that rivaled it.
Minor quibbles aside, we had a great, filling, satisfying breakfast. The service was great, the coffee was flowing, and all was right with the world.
4.5/5
AKA Winebar
709 Edmonton Trail NE
403-984-7534
Tuesday to Thursday & Sunday 4-11 p.m.
Friday & Saturday 4 p.m.-1 a.m.
Weekend brunch Saturday and Sunday 9 a.m.-3 p.m.
The rest of the dinner proceeded in a lovely, ranching carnivorous fashion. For my main I opted for the Mackay Place Flatiron Steak with beefy fries, shallot herb butter and artisan salad. It looked like this:
And it was slightly inconsistent. The steak was tender and perfectly done, with great beef flavor, but it lacked an ingredient I consider crucial to well prepared meat: salt. There was none, not a hint of salt on the steak, nor in the herb butter. This is so odd, that I’m chalking it up to a mistake on the kitchen’s part, perhaps, rather than a deliberate omission. The potatoes however, were divine. Perfectly roasted, seasoned, creamy on the inside, they were an awesome dish.
My girlfriend ordered the winner of the bunch, the Alberta Bison Meatloaf wrapped in smoked bacon with mashed potatoes and mushroom pan jus. It was an awesome meatloaf, flavorful and moist, with the bacon a perfect foil. The mashed potatoes were about as good as they come, and it was a hearty comforting meal.
The restaurant ran out of smoked and barbecue glazed pork ribs with mini mac and cheese and coleslaw, so they subbed bison ribs in the dish, which was a mixed success. The bison ribs were simply too lean, and remained way too chewy despite the long smoking time. The reason pork ribs work so well is due to the high fat content which is slowly cooked out of the meat leaving it moist and succulent. The bison didn’t have that luxury. The flavor was outstanding though, with a decent pink smoke ring and a tasty glaze, and the portion was huge owing to the size of bison ribs. The mac and cheese was also awesome, with the crispy top that to me is the best part. The coleslaw was fresh and quite decent.
For dessert we managed to practice uncommon restraint, and only got one dish to share – the panna cotta. Soft and creamy it was not overly sweet, and the berry sauce added a great fresh touch. The oatmeal cookies were quite dense and crumbly, more like granola cookies, if you like that sort of thing.
The restaurant was slowly wrapping up for the night as we finished our coffees, so grabbing the camera we explored the house while we could.
Of the original structure the living room, kitchen, two bedrooms and a verandah remain, with the other few rooms being added on by subsequent owners. Wandering the house I was struck anew by how much more space we now think we require. Our modern oversized houses could easily fit two smallish ones of a century ago, and yet those small ones housed more people. Everything’s expanded in the process, the bedrooms are larger, the closets huge in comparison with the cupboards of years past, the common rooms the size of modern dens. The only exceptions I typically see are the kitchens, which were often large in comparison, with the amount of effort and materials it took to cook making it a necessity. Which makes sense given that much of the food was grown, produced, canned and saved right at home.
Here’s a photo tour of the house:
 The living room  Wall shelf
 Little table
 Kitchen
 The original stove!  Old buffet in the kitchen
 Buffet detail
 Scarred but solid door
 Doorknob
It was great fun wandering around the house, peeking into old narrow closets, imagining lighting that stove, and it definitely added to a lovely supper. All in all this was an awesome experience - a bit of local history, mixed with a great drive and great food. This is definitely going on the repeat list.
4/5
This post got so unwieldy that I’m splitting it into 2 parts, so bear with me.
Ever since I heard of The Mackay Place I wanted to go there. I was sold on the entire idea of a renovated farm house re-purposed as a restaurant, plus the house ketchup and steak they served at the Millarville Market were absolutely delicious. All summer long I drove around with their brochure in the car, and when a girlfriend suggested a Saturday night supper I and another friend jumped at the chance.
The farm house was built by a Scottish homesteader J.A. Turner 123 years ago, which for this neck of the woods is a very long time ago indeed. He raised a family and imported Clydesdale horses from Scotland, got a valley named after him, and shortly after oil was found on the land, he sold the property. In 1916 the Mackay family bought the homestead and held it until 1988. Since then the property has underwent a couple of incarnations, becoming a tea house, a pub, a bed and breakfast, and most recently a restaurant, dubbed simply The Mackay Place.
Old buildings and places have a certain fascination for me that is at times hard to explain. There is a palpable mystery to inhabiting the same space as the people that came before us. Perhaps it is because so much of history is lost to us, the people that built those things and walked those same floors are unknowable in a way that their modern descendants will never be. Our lives are documented with tapes, movies, books and blogs in unprecedented ways. We record too much and those before us not nearly enough. So we imagine what life must have been like back then, how it would feel to actually use those museum-looking pieces of furniture, wear different clothing, feel a different rhythm to life. Or perhaps we react to the energy of the place, getting shivers in an abandoned asylum or dungeon, and walking straighter in a cathedral or theater. Suffice it to say, that visiting a restored homestead was incredibly appealing to me.
The property is nestled behind tall trees just off highway 549, and contains the main house, a small cabin and some neat decorative touches with a country motif.
A wheelbarrow of flowers:
A rooster in a rim:
And a cabin, which if I’m not mistaken dates back to the original settler’s time:
The restaurant itself is a well maintained farmhouse, where it looks like as little as possible was done, which kept many details alive. The original layout of the rooms was preserved, with the original kitchen, living room, master bedroom, and what was apparently Jenny’s bedroom – one of the four Mackay children’s room, where we dined.
The menu is very much in keeping with the ranching theme befitting the area, ranging from a lamb burger to bison meatloaf, with a couple of choices of fish, wild salmon and halibut. All the meats are local and the farm or place of origin is specified, which is great since very few restaurants in the Calgary area make the effort. We each ordered an appetizer and an entrée so we got to sample a decent selection of the menu.
I started with a loaded spinach salad that’s served with house smoked pork-belly bacon, herbed goat’s cheese, marinated portabella’s and crunchy fried onions, which is the only way to eat spinach in my opinion. It was fabulous. The bacon was absolutely outstanding, with a depth of flavor that store bacon will never have, golden crunchy, savory onions and (travesty) almost too much goat cheese. But it was a salty flavorful work of art and I enjoyed it thoroughly.
My friend ordered the house-smoked steelhead trout antipasto with pickled asparagus and caper aioli, which for some reason I only got a crappy picture of, likely because I was drooling over my salad… It was an absolutely generous portion of tender trout, tangy greens and a dollop of sour cream.
My other friend got the soup of the day, which happened to be a mushroom soup. It was a lovely creamy soup, although not the best version I’ve had. The mushroom flavor was mild, and the mushrooms themselves were pureed a bit too fine for me, I personally prefer a more assertive soup with some mushroom bits. This was pureed more than Campbells, which should tell you something about its texture.
With our appetizers we had a very decent Caesar and house wine, but since I know nothing about wine, all I can tell you is that it was a bit thin bodied but with a fine flavor. I know, I suck.
Stay tuned for entrees and a tour of the house tomorrow…
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