The Champagne Lady

Real Name:

Helcat

Location:

Ontario, Canada

Blog:

http://didn't cook a thing until I was 23. I'm nearly 70 and haven't stopped -- I "create" something every day of my life.

Best meal I ever ate:

At Whispers in Elora, ON -- the fresh Lake Erie pickerel, summer of 2009

My current drink of choice:

red wine

I really wish I could:

go back and live my life over -- I'd be a chef and then have my own restaurant -- or run a lodge with a dining room in Algonquin Park area

My "Go-to" dinner party dish:

Tomato pie (It's really an eggless quiche-type dish with lots of fresh tomatoes).

My favorite comfort food:

pasta - but creamy, not tomato-y

My top 5 favorite restaurants:

Troisgros (I haven't been there since 1972!) Uplamoor in Scotland. La Maquette in Toronto. Langdon Hall & The Millcroft Inn

My most tattered cookbooks:

James Beard's Menu Cookbook; all three Podleski sisters' books and about a dozen Weight Watchers ones