The Expo '86 Cookbook

T. Arleigh Crawford was a graduate student living in Potsdam, New York.

Susan Mendelson is part-owner of The Lazy Gourmet, a popular Vancouver take-out and catering business. In The Expo ‘86 Cookbook she presents Vancouver to the world through its recipes. They vary in style and origin, reflecting both traditional ethnic cuisines and second-generation hybrids generated in the ethnic mix of cities such as Vancouver.

Recipes are presented for everything from a healthy vegetarian nutburger to a sinful triple-layer raspberry torte. They can be as simple as a wheel of camembert baked in puff pastry or as pretentious as a gourmet pizza topped with sun-dried tomatoes, chanterelles, yellow bell peppers and chèvre. This latter is described as “the trendiest you’ll find anywhere” and trendiness is a dominant theme.

Mendelson is a restaurateur and her recipes reflect this. The style is one appropriate for entertaining and all that that implies. One would not likely prepare fresh B.C. salmon stuffed with oysters and Pernod for Wednesday night supper as a change from meatloaf. Hand in hand with this is a pretentiousness that some may find hard to swallow. But the book is full of the excitement of staying on top in the restaurant business. It includes an extensive section of favorite recipes from popular Vancouver area restaurants. Just as half the fun of dining at a fashionable restaurant is just looking, half the fun of The Expo ‘86 Cookbook is just reading the recipes and looking at Derik Murray’s beautiful photography.