I love the idea of this new online shopping site called Antidote Épicerie . Launched last month by Montrealers Ewelina Piasecka and Jadwiga Zakrzewska, the store lets Montreal-area shoppers choose from a host of healthy grocery products and have them delivered to their door. Many, though not all, of the products are organic and locally grown.

Piasecka and Zakrzewska moved to Montreal from Poland a few years ago. They immediately noticed that it was difficult to get fresh, local, organic produce here and that grocery shopping involves too much driving. 

"In Poland, agriculture is not so developed, but there are many small farms around where you can get fresh vegetables," she said. She noticed the difference in the taste and texture of vegetables here, where produce is often frozen and transported thousands of kilometres before it gets to our tables.

When Piasecka moved to Montreal West, she hunted around for organic and local foods, but found she would have to travel to farflung neighbourhoods like the Plateau for the kinds of products she was looking for. "I was working and going to school and did not have time to travel so far for local and organic food."

She and her friend decided to set up an online store and delivery service for health and environmentally conscious Montrealers. She says the prices are about the same as you would find in a regular grocery store, and sometimes lower because of the low overhead of their operation. For example, you can order organic brocoli for $2.99 a bunch, or regular brocoli for $1.99.

The two women contacted farmers, local businesses, restaurants and bakeries so they could choose quality items to save shoppers time and most importantly, reduce gas consumption.

"We are developing a logical delivery system so that instead of many people driving in different directions we have one truck that drops off the food," instead of many cars going to and from different grocery stores, she said.

Although fresh local produce is limited at this time of year, the team is committed to increasing their offerings with the seasons and as they grow. Their aim is to make 70 per cent of their offerings certified organic. "We read labels so you don't have to" is their motto.

The site offers a selection of Kosher foods, baby foods and other specialty items. If you order before 2 p.m. you will receive your delivery the next day between 6 and 10pm. If you order after 2 p.m. you will receive your delivery two days after placing your order.

-Michelle Lalonde

-photo courtesy of myantidote.ca

MONTREAL - In the last decade, as street food comes in from the cold, dishes that were once labelled ethnic, cheap and authentic are appearing in restaurants that could be called hip and high rent. It’s a welcome trend for several reasons, not just because it’s no longer necessary to schlep to Chinatown for a fix of steamed pork buns. As foods from around the world begin to get the wider culinary consideration they deserve, menus touting fusion sound about as relevant as light jazz from the ’80s, and multicultural milieus like Canada and America have to question just what their ideas of “national” cuisines are all about.

In New York City, chef David Chang has been turning the street food/fine food hierarchy on its head. It started with the opening of his Momofuku noodle bar in the East Village in 2003, where slurp-tastic ramen soups and steamed buns stuffed with Berkshire pork belly (actually a last-minute menu addition) garnered long lineups among a public ready for something different.

Now age 32, Chang runs five restaurants under the Momofuku banner, garnering critical attention for his blend of bold flavours, top-end ingredients and savvy French technique. There’s Ssam bar with its Asian burritos, a milk bar famous for its soft-serve ice cream, and the tiny Ko, which recently won two Michelin stars. In late 2009, the team made the move uptown with the launch of Ma Pêche at the Chambers hotel.

Born to Korean immigrants in the southern United States, Chang did stints at upscale New York kitchens and Tokyo ramen shops.

His power lies in coming up with creative dishes that don’t seem too conceptual, intelligent food that doesn’t distance diners with intellectualizations. Besides his witchy ways with pork fat, the man pickles anything from Asian pears to watermelon rind, proves that fried brussels sprouts do really well in a fish-sauce vinaigrette, and playfully pairs oysters with kimchi, Korea’s classic fermented cabbage.

His vision of American cuisine has him hailed “best new chef” by countless food mags, a GQ Man of the Year, and winner of several James Beard Awards. Martha Stewart is a fan; so is Anthony Bourdain.

The Gazette caught up with Chang over a pint of beer at Westmount’s Appetite for Books when he was in town promoting his new cookbook, simply titled Momofuku. If the name sounds in your face, it’s deliberately so, but it also means “lucky peach” in Japanese. The double-entendre is reflected in the guy himself, big and boyish, but with deep sensibilities and savoir-faire bubbling just below the surface.

What’s rotting in your home fridge right now?

A garlic clove that’s sprouting seven times over.

What snack food can you not live without?

I can live without snack food. I like pork rinds and beef jerky.

What did you eat growing up?

Lots of Korean food, and weird Southern food. I grew up in north Virginia, but my dad had a business in Richmond. We mostly ate Korean food, from fermented blue crab to lots of noodles. My mom was more of the cook, and my mom’s father taught me a lot about Japanese food.

How would you describe your style of cooking?

At home it’s called delivery. At the restaurants, we’re just trying to make delicious food.

How do you feel about the term Asian fusion?

I used to loathe it. I’m on the revivalist mode now; fusion got a bad rap. It’s in the vernacular now. What’s not Asian fusion? Vietnamese food is fusion. People want to categorize food because it helps them understand it, when creating categories is the most nonsensical way of looking at food. Is French food not fusion? Is what Ducasse is doing in Monte Carlo fusion? No one says Swiss is fusion, but it’s got German, French and Italian in there. It’s like, is it authentic? You don’t ask that question in Thailand, where you’ll eat off the back of a motorcycle whose engine is cooking your food, or in an alley in China where street food is as good as any you’ll find in the world.

If you could have dinner with three people from any time in history, who would they be?

Jesus, Buddha and Mohammed. And I’d have them play rochambeau (digital rock-paper-scissors).

The chef you find most inspiring is?

There are so many … René Redzepi of Noma in Copenhagen has created a cuisine that never existed before. He has distilled a lot of things from different chefs and made it his own, a Nordic cuisine that’s going to influence a lot of restaurants.

What’s your thing with peaches? There’s the cover of the cookbook, there’s Ma Pêche at the Chambers …

I love the Allman Brothers’ Eat a Peach.

Where and what was your last great meal?

In Barcelona, at Albert Adrià’s tapas bar (Inopia Classic Bar).

What ingredient to you despise?

Trumpet mushrooms. We serve them under duress. Swordfish, I hate. Fiddleheads. And I really don’t like Rocky Mountain oysters.

And ingredient you rely on the most?

Soy sauce. I like Yamasa, because the Usukuchi is light soy, but it’s not low-sodium.

Favourite kitchen tools?

A spoon for tasting, sharp Japanese knives, my combi ovens, water circulator … there’s lots of stuff I can’t live without.

What was the toughest part of doing a cookbook?

Trying to take credit for stuff I didn’t do. Peter Meehan (co-author) and the Momofuku team deserve the credit.

Best music to cook to?

Wu-Tang Clan.

What’s your weakness as a cook?

Too many to count. Patience, lack thereof.

And your strength?

Knowing my weaknesses.

Your favourite food city and why?

Tokyo. Because it just is the best. I mean, I can’t live there ever again, but I could do some serious damage there. I think it could have 100 three-star Michelin restaurants. There are so many restaurants that nobody could ever get to all of them, and it’s hard to find a bad restaurant.

If you could dine anywhere in the world tomorrow night and price is no object, where would that be?

Extebarri, right outside San Sebastián (Basque Spain), where everything is cooked over charcoal. He (chef/owner Victor Arguinzoniz) makes his own charcoal.

What Montreal restaurant do you get cravings for?

Any of Fred Morin’s restaurants.

When dining out, chances are you’ll order …

Most things. Actually, everything! I always have a problem with over-ordering.

The next big food trend is …

I don’t think there is a next big food trend: more hamburgers, steakhouses, pizza for the next decade, more of the same, a continued lack of creativity.

What annoys you in the kitchen?

Most things annoy me! Someone not treating food with respect. Dirty bain-maries. Not cooking clean. Not tasting the food. Bad staff meals

drive me through the roof.

Biggest service no-nos?

“Chef recommends …” or “our signature dish …” Just not being professional.

What’s the oddest special request you’ve ever received?

Chop a salad. Really. By the time it was done, there was no cellulose structure left, it was a soup.

Final words: Any advice on making kimchi?

Don’t be afraid of the funk.