ARTS & CULTURE
August 2, 2022
13
SWEET SPOT
SA RA WON G // PEAK ASSO CI ATE
PHOTO : Sarah Wong / The Peak
PHOTO: Sara Wong There’s no shortage of Chinese bakeries around Metro Vancouver, but Pine House — specifically, the one on Kingsway — will always have a special place in my heart. It’s my family’s go-to spot for gai mei bao (cocktail buns; also known as coconut buns) and char siu bao (barbecue pork buns). The quality is consistently good, with a fluffy milk bread base and rich fillings. I’ve also found Pine House more affordable than their competitors. You’ll find a good variety of classics here like cow ear cookies, swiss rolls, egg tarts, and apple turnovers. Part of the joy of going to a Chinese bakery is picking up a plastic tray and piling it with whatever piques your interest!
Kourosh Bakery
Heritage Baking
PHOTO: Heritage Baking
Dessert has always played a meaningful role in my life. Of course, there are special occasions like birthdays and holidays, but usually what I think of first are those “just because” moments. My parents often pick up pastries for me if they know I’ve had a tiresome day at work or school and our weekends are often full of spontaneous food adventures. For me, that’s what the four bakeries listed below represent — places you turn to on a whim because you know they’ll make your day sweeter.
At Kanadell, you’ll find an array of Japanese sweets, as well as western desserts with East Asian flavour profiles. I’m most obsessed with their melon pans and black sesame nanaimo bars. It’s been incredible to see Kanadell go from an online social media sensation (you’ve probably seen their “bear bread” on Instagram) to a brick and mortar shop. But the journey wasn’t exactly a cake walk. Keiko, Kanadell’s owner, recently appeared on the Food Network show Project Bakeover, which helps struggling bakeries redesign their space and streamline their menu. Now, Kanadell has seating for customers! The mix of wicker furniture and lush greenery creates a cozy, relaxing atmosphere. I love coming here for a late lunch, where I can take the time to indulge in a crispy, savoury kare pan (curry bread) and warm hojicha latte.
I first met Martha Naguiat-Ebro, chef and owner of Heritage, at a local farmer’s market. One taste of her “bad boy” ensaymada, a Filipinx bun tinted with activated charcoal and topped with pork floss, and I was hooked! The brioche was pillowy soft and packed with more umami than expected, thanks to a hidden sriracha togarashi smear. Heritage offers other traditional favourites, like sans rival cake and pandesal bread, but the ensaymadas are a mustorder. I’m also a huge fan of their pain au chocolat, which uses 70% dark chocolate from another small, local Filipinx business, Kasama Chocolate. This isn’t on the regular menu, but stay tuned for updates. Heritage operates out of Coho Commissary in East Vancouver, so the quickest way to get ahold of their treats is to order online and pickup at the commissary.
PHOTO: Sara Wong
You’ll find sugar and spice and everything nice here
PHOTO: Sara Wong
Four Asian bakeries for when you want to treat yourself
Pine House Bakery
Kanadell Japanese Bakery
Growing up, most of my figure skating practices were in North Vancouver, where I saw a number of Persian bakeries, including Kourosh. I recently returned to check them out and was delighted to see Kourosh’s display cases full of cookies and other delicious baked goods. When I visited with my parents, we got an assortment of just about everything. Our bakery boxes were stacked with chickpea cookies, rice cookies, and shortbread, alongside jalebi, baklava, coconut macaroons, doughnuts, and éclairs. The latter three items were quickly devoured (we didn’t even make it out of the parking lot). While everything was delicious, the coconut macaroons were on another level. Aside from the textbook qualities of good macaroons — golden on the outside, moist and chewy on the inside — these macaroons featured a sandwiched layer of pistachio cream, adding texture contrast and extra flavour. I also enjoyed the cookies, which all had that buttery, melt-inyour-mouth quality.
QUEER FUTURISMS
Re:Orientations is the diverse queer Asian documentary we needed Director Richard Fung explores the continued relevance of queer Asian issues ME E RA ERAGODA // F EATURES E D I TO R
On July 20, Love Intersections, a queer arts collective, hosted Yellow Peril: Reimagining Queer Asian Futures with sponsorship from Vancouver Pride Society and SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement. The event was named after Kendell Yan’s, aka Maiden China’s, film of the same name. The event also incorporated an hour-long documentary titled Re:Orientations which presented a diversity of Asians. In 1984, director Richard Fung filmed Orientations which followed 14 Asians in Toronto as they navigated their race and queer identity. Re:Orientations followed seven of those in the original film, 30 years later, to see how their experiences had changed. Fung and assistant Nathan Hoo also interviewed younger members of the queer community. Watching this, I was struck by how much this film captured Toronto’s diversity of Asians including brown Asians. I moved from Toronto to Vancouver when I was 14 and I remember implicitly understanding that I had gone from being Asian in Toronto to being “brown” in Vancouver. To this day, I still have to explain to people here that, yes, South Asians are indeed Asian. Seeing brown Asians being represented in Re:Orientations allowed me to feel seen in a way I haven’t in BC.
I haven’t watched Orientations, but Re:Orientations featured clips from it along with the reactions of participants watching their younger selves on screen. It also included more recent interviews with returning and new participants. In an article for CBC Arts, Fung wrote his purpose in making the film was to “represent contradictions and to open up questions that face our communities in the future.” This was reflected in the embarrassed and disbelieving reactions participants had about what their younger selves had been thinking. Many reflected on how much they’d grown in the intervening decades and how their opinions had become more nuanced.
Seeing brown Asians being represented in Re:Orientations allowed me to feel seen in a way I haven’t in BC.
The film explored issues such as the understanding that younger generations of queers don’t really recognize how difficult it was to be queer and Asian in the 1980s and how much fight had to be put in. One participant explained how even the activism around HIV/AIDS excluded Asian men who had to fight against the gatekeeping of access to treatment. Towards the end of the film, Re:Orientations paid tribute to four participants who had passed away as a result of the HIV/AIDS crisis of the 1980s. We now know that while HIV/AIDS was stigmatized as a gay disease and used to justify not providing treatment, it does not in actuality only target gay men. So it was surprising to me to see parallels to how monkeypox is being spoken about today, and while treatment is being provided this time, once again, an infection that does not see sexuality is being used to further antiqueer conservative beliefs.
The documentary returns to chronicle Queer Asian Narratives across generations. PHOTO: Richard Fung / Re:Orientations (2016)
The film covered lots of ground. A few of the other topics addressed were navigating dating and Asian stereotypes, marriage and the idea of homonormativity, the need for adequate supports for aging queers, and having conversations about queerness within Asian communities. This remake and the continuity of concerns the queer Asian community has to contend with makes Re:Orientations a film worthy of further discussion.
