ottawa foodies

On a recent trip to Massine's I noticed that they are offering a lot of local products. I noticed they have a couple of shelving units near the meat section showcasing some of them. Products include sauces from East India Company, jams and pickles from Top Shelf Preserves, and soap from Purple Urchin. The also have in-store roasted meats in the deli section although most Your Independant/Loblaws stores seem to be doing this now. All in all it is nice to see them including local products in the store.

Found at Hartman's: 'Paesana' brand (www.paesana.com/) sauces.

Their marinara is outstanding. Not the cheapest, at $6.39 for a 750mL jar, but worth it. It's got a lovely fresh taste, and is somewhat reminiscent of the stuff used at Fettucine's on Elgin Street.

No sugar, dehydrated anything, etc, and it tastes like it.

Edited to add: pass on their pesto, though. The basil seems to've been dried first. Yuk!

Edited to further add: A+ on their vodka sauce, though.

In the deli section (packs of two sausages), this is the closest thing to authentic Spanish chorizo that I have found. Plus, it's rather cheap!

Massine's is now offering cooking classes. They have three chefs on staff: Chef Michael who specializes in European cuisine, Chef Ken who specializes in Asian cuisine, and Chef Gilles (not sure what his area of specialization is in). I think they have been offering cooking classes since David Massine bought the franchise a couple of years ago but I just started taking classes there since last May. So far I have taken three Italian cooking classes and a Chinese cooking class and I have been very happy with the ones I have taken. They are mostly demo classes although they will occasionally offer a hands on cooking class. We had only one issue in one class and it was the only hands on class I have taken so far. I had recently taken a hands on pasta class which was to be three hours in length and four courses were to be prepared. It took us two hours to make the first course with only one hour left to prepare the other three courses then eat the fruits of our labour. Our first dish involved making linguine from scratch however the chef went into great detail on types of flour that would work best, different methods of cutting pasta, etc. There was a rush at the end to complete the remaining dishes so the chef ended up making them himself which brought us right to the end of the scheduled three hours. We stayed on an extra half hour to eat. Other than that one experience I have been enjoying the classes there and it is a great addition to the store.