I am writing this installment of the Three Very Good Things series from Canada, where I’ve been for a week now, as the Gastronomic Writer in Residence for the Stratford Chefs School. I’m having a wonderful time, the weather is unseasonably balmy, squirrels are running around everywhere, and I am eating very well. Here are a few highlights from this past week:

~ A salad of shaved fennel, frisée, and slim artichoke wedges, topped with fresh herbs and crispy prosciutto.

This exceptionally well-balanced and well-dressed salad was served at the “restaurant lab”, where second-year students of the chef school cook and serve dinner every weeknight. It was served as an appetizer-sized portion, but I could have eaten a bucket of it.

~ Kale, kale, and more kale. Kale is an elusive ingredient in France: it is grown essentially as an ornamental plant (I’m told the name is chou vert demi-nain) and not commonly sold as a vegetable. So I took the opportunity of being in Canada, and having access to a well-equipped kitchen in Stratford, to get organic dino kale from The Gentle Rain, the local health food store.

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Maple leaves photographed by William Warby.

I am writing to you from Canada, where I am spending two weeks at the Stratford Chefs School outside of Toronto: I’ve been invited as their Gastronomic Writer In Residence (I know, right?), and I’ll be devoting my time to working with the students on various assignments to hone their food writing skills.

I will also be hosting a few public lectures and events in Stratford and Toronto; please see the full details here. I hope to meet some of you then!

And although I have a full schedule with little free time, I’m hoping to explore my surroundings a bit, and I’d like to ask for your best recommendations: what are some of your favorite places in Stratford and Toronto, and what’s not to miss? Thanks in advance for your insights!

{This is part of a new series in which I share three delicious things from the past week. Please feel free to tell me about your own 3VGT in the comments below, or to post them on your blog.}

My three very good things for the week are as follows:

~ Color-coded sandwiches from Gontran Cherrier’s bakery. I’ve already told you about Gontran, who’s both a talented baker and a friend of ours, and who runs a wonderful bakery in my neighborhood.

Every time Maxence and I go, we have to restrain ourselves and pick up just a few of the items that are calling our names, but we can never resist the sandwiches, assembled on house-made black (squid ink), green (arugula juice) or red (paprika) buns, and garnished with super fresh and cleverly combined ingredients. We eat them perched on stools by the tall windows before we go off and run the rest of our errands.

~ My first persimmon of the season. Although I only discovered persimmons in my early twenties — thanks to the loveliest of coworkers in California — I am absolutely enamored with them and their intensely aromatic, bright orange, slippery flesh. They’ve just started to appear on produce stalls in Paris, and we ate our first over the weekend. (You do know to make a wish whenever you eat a fruit for the first time in the season, right?)

~ Gianduja sablés from La Pâtisserie des Rêves. Thanks to Louise, who runs the excellent blog Raids Pâtisseries, I am now hopelessly hooked on these crisp butter cookies, topped with a layer of soft hazelnut and chocolate paste, and thinly coated with bittersweet chocolate.

I am of the mind that the process of learning how to cook should always begin with learning how to shop.

If you know how to select the highest-quality, freshest ingredients you can afford, and if you can organize your life so there’s time to stock your fridge and pantry with those, you’ve really won half the battle.

First in terms of cooking motivation — we all know the magical inspirational powers of vibrant produce — but also in terms of results: the exact same recipe and skills will yield an incomparably tastier dish if you’re working with the good stuff. (And in truth, the good stuff barely needs your intervention to shine.)

This is why I was thrilled when I received a copy of the just-released Bi-Rite Market’s Eat Good Food book, co-written by Sam Mogannam, who runs the popular independent grocery store near Dolores Park in San Francisco, and food writer Dabney Gough.

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