Results tagged “stlawrencemarket”

WORDS: Coach House Books and This Is Not A Reading Series present the launch of tantalizing Toronto treats-and-eats book The Edible City. The book (which Books@Torontoist has been featuring excerpts from) contains essays and tidbits on everything food related, so long as it relates to the food of Toronto—and we love food. The book’s launch includes a panel discussion with The Edible City contributors who chew the fat about the food we eat. Further food-themed fodder will be served up in the guise of food-related music and cookie-decorating from Wanda’s Pie-in-the-Sky. Gladstone Hotel, Ballroom (1214 Queen Street West), Sunday 2 p.m., $5 (FREE with book purchase).

Harlan Clark was one of those small, quiet, essential Toronto institutions. He and his wife Norine started a Port Perry chicken farm in 1946; one year later they began selling eggs at St. Lawrence Market. According to a profile of the couple in the Toronto Star last year, one or both have them have been at the market every single Saturday since. That's sixty-two years' worth of providing us with sustenance, and not just of the physical variety. The Clarks were known for selling some of the freshest eggs in the city, from some of the most carefully tended chickens, and their smiles every Saturday conveyed the essence of thoughtful, local farming long before it was trendy to care about such things. Mr. Clark passed away unexpectedly yesterday, at the age of eighty-seven. Even by near-strangers, the ones who wandered by the market stall on an occasional weekend morning, Mr. Clark will be missed.

CELEBRATION: St. Lawrence Market has been a culinary hub of our city since even before we were a city (talk about putting the cart before the horse). This year, while the City of Toronto is celebrating its 175th anniversary, St. Lawrence Market is celebrating 205 years of food and freshness. It won’t be your usual Saturday at the market with live music, buskers, cooking demonstrations, children’s activities, and guided tours of the building. In honour of the city’s birthday, many farmers, merchants, and artisans will be featuring products for the special prices of $1.75 and $11.75. St. Lawrence Market (93 Front Street East), Saturday 9 a.m.–4 p.m., FREE.

Though the smell is more grilled sausage than ham and some of the lettuce may be shipped in from faraway destinations, the atmosphere evoked by this description of St. Lawrence Market from a 1976 Toronto Star profile still rings true. At the time those words were written, the market neared the end of a decade of rehabilitation that reflected changes in attitude towards historic properties in the city. The north side saw the old knock-it-down attitude at play, while the south was spared a date with a wrecking ball in favour of renovation. Otherwise, you might have enjoyed this morning’s mustard sample or peameal bacon sandwich in a building that lacked more than 150 years of history.

Winter, as you may have noticed, has set in.

FESTIVAL: The Scotiabank BuskerFest is back for its ninth year. This year's line-up includes over forty of the world's best buskers from Canada, the United States, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan. BuskerFest is free with an optional donation to Epilepsy Toronto; since its inception, BuskerFest has raised over half of a million dollars for the organization. Come out to enjoy the circus performers, magic shows, and artistic spectacles, and leave knowing it's all for a good cause. St. Lawrence Market (92 Front Street East), 10 a.m.–8 p.m., FREE.

Contributor Tony Makepeace is taking us for some spins around our city with his fantastic VR panoramas. You can look up, down, side to side, in and out—pretty much every direction but back at yourself, which would be kind of creepy. Say hello to Panoramaist: the Toronto shoe-gazer's worst enemy. Click the preview image above to launch the QuickTime VR panorama in a separate full-screen browser window. Panoramaist (and no, we don't get tired of...