The Great Pork Roast Adventure

I bought a new cookbook a few weeks ago. I had been eyeing "Donna Hay: Seasons" since Christmas when I received my most coveted of Christmas gifts: a Chapters gift card. I stood in front of it for a long time, but since it cost twice the amount of the card I had, I decided not to purchase it. But LO! Fate smiled upon the Brenna Bear! Where should this cookbook reappear but in the Winners, at half the original price! Huzzah! And though I was unemployed at the time, I could not just walk away from Fate.

As my sister-in-law remarked upon inspecting my purchase, "It's food porn!" And it really is. The food in each picture is highly styled, and the photography has a smoky, dreamy quality to it. It is interspersed with photos of landscapes and picnic set-ups. This is the kind of cookbook that inspires in me a desire to cook something more amazing than I have ever cooked before. And while some people buy cookbooks in order to be deliberately instructed, I buy cookbooks to fan into flames the burning embers of my culinary passions.

Okay, so my metaphors are a tad melodramatic.

After buying this book, I became employed again; a cash-earning, cash-spending member of society once more! I invited my brother and sister-in-law over for dinner to celebrate the end of my poverty, and so I could try out some recipes from my new book.

I got off work at 5:00 pm Saturday and walked home slowly. It was sweat-drippingly hot (a temperature I do NOT agree with) and when I got home, I spent some time sitting on my balcony reading and eating grapes and feeling very decadent and urban and sweaty. Eventually I put together a menu. In attempting to search for arugula salad recipes in a different cookbook, I stumbled across a Pork Roast recipe from David Tanis' book, "A Platter of Figs" that could not be ignored, and added it to my menu.

List complete, I looked up the hours for the Italian Centre on the south side, since the 52 bus stop is directly in front of my apartment building and the bus goes just past the Centre. Also, because their cheese is awesome. They were open until 9 and it was only 7. "Perfect," I thought to myself. Except that when I got downstairs and checked the bus schedule, the 52 bus was not going to arrive until 7:33. "Well, screw that," I thought, "I'll just walk down to the Save-On-Foods."

As I walked, I decided that if the Save-On didn't have the pork roast I was looking for, I would leave immediately and walk to the next 52 bus stop.

Save-On had nothing but chops and ribs. But, on the plus side, it was beautifully air conditioned in the store.

I waited for the bus, and made it to the Italian Centre at 8:15 pm.  And while they had most of what I was looking for, they did not have the elusive pork roast. "Don't fret, Brenna Bear! There was a sign for a Sobey's in the parking lot directly east of this building! Maybe the Sobey's will have your roast!" Now, laden down with fruits and veggies and cheeses and cans of coconut milk, I wandered over to the next parking lot, only to find that the Sobey's was actually a Sobey's liquor store, with no associated grocery store. "Wait, is that an M&M meat shop across the parking lot?" Yes, it was, but it was closed.

Now 8:45, I went to catch my bus back home, thinking I would drop off my loot and then make a bike run to the Safeway, or the actual Sobey's nearest my place. But, upon calling Buslink, I learned that the 52 bus was on an hourly rotation, and would not be there until 9:33 pm.  "Curse the heavens!" I decided to walk the three blocks east to see if there was another bus line that might take me home sooner. But what did I see on the corner of whatever avenue I was on and 104th Street? THE GREAT CANADIAN SUPERSTORE!

"They will have a pork roast!" I thought. And they did. HAL-LE-FREAKING-LU-JAH! By the time I left Superstore, I was carrying six bags of groceries and was more than a little tired. I got approached in the parking lot by a homeless man asking for money, and when I responded that I don't carry cash, he responded jovially, "Hey! We've got that in common!" I would have offered him food, but I didn't think raw pork or frozen phyllo pastry would be particularly appetizing to, well, anyone...

Instead of walking all the way back to my bus stop, I sat down at the nearest stop and learned that the number 6 to Millgate Transit Centre would be there in 15 minutes. I have no earthly idea where Millgate is, but I assumed that the transit centre would have a bus that headed north. At that point, I just didn't want to be on my feet anymore. I didn't even care how many transfers I would have to make.

I got on the bus, awkwardly pushing through with all my bags until I was across from the back doors. The bus moved two blocks. Two. And stopped at a red light. A red light that never turned green. Because the street we were on was blocked just past the intersection by a train that was moving unbelievably slowly. A train that eventually stopped on the tracks. The bus driver opened the doors so that we might not suffocate in the heat. Once again, "Screw this," I thought to myself. I hopped out and booked it back the five blocks to the 52 bus stop. It was now 10:15. The bus came at 10:33. I was desperately thirsty, but didn't want to risk missing the bus and being stuck there until 11:33. The closest thing I had to liquid among my groceries was Greek yoghurt or fresh lemons. I suffered through.

Eventually the bus came, and with only one random stop (for the bus driver to get coffee from the Starbucks on Whyte and 104th) I made it home.

Now, the whole reason for me shopping the night before this dinner, after an 8 hour workday and the start of a disgusting heat wave, was to be able to season the pork roast overnight. So after this miserable grocery excursion, I still had to put together this dish. I got finished at 1 am.

Late night Pork Roast Assembly

The next morning, I invited my friend and her husband to join us for supper, since I thought I had, maybe, just slightly, gone overboard by buying a 6-pound roast for three people.

In the end:

Arugula Salad with Tomatoes, Fennel, and Parmesan chips, with a Balsamic Vinaigrette

 Fennel and Rosemary Pork Roast

Spinach and Goat Feta Phyllo Pies with Tzatziki

Poached Peaches and Nectarines over Coconut Risotto with Vanilla Bean-Infused Honey

All of this with copious amounts of homemade Iced Tea.

I spent all day Sunday making this. And despite the sore feet and the pile of dishes (that I still have not gotten to), it was the best day I've had in a while.

I love cooking. There is a freedom that runs through my whole body when I cook. I cannot cook without music, and I frequently pause in my chopping, shredding, stirring, to twirl around in circles with my arms in the air. My heart feels lighter when I run my fingers through a pile of washed spinach, or grab a handful of velvet soft flour out of the bag. I massaged olive oil into the roast for an indecent amount of time. My feet are light, my hands are gentle, my face is relaxed when I waft a hand over a saucepan of poaching peaches. All my senses are ignited, lit up, dancing.

When I cook a menu derived from a cookbook or cookbooks, I marry together the part of me that is obsessed with timing and punctuality and order and measurement (and it's no small part: I blame my German heritage) with the looser, more creative and spontaneous side of myself.

There is no other act in this world that expresses so perfectly the person that I aim to be. There is no other act that shows so clearly my love for this world and the things in it. There is no other act that can transmit from me to you how much I love you.

And for that love, I will sacrifice my time and my dignity in search of Pork Roasts.