February Fork-Off 2012 - Uptown, Saint John

It may be a messy outside but today is beautiful for Saint John foodies inside our Uptown restaurants. Today the February Fork-Off kicks off!

It’s a winter food festival that brings all of us a fabulously tasty week …

“Participating restaurants in the uptown, including the City Market for lunch, welcome you to come out and experience fantastic food prepared by our talented chefs. Special pricing and menu options are available exclusively this week, as we are sure to spice up your winter.”

Urban Deli is open but not involved this year because we’re focused on the preparations for our upcoming Deli by Day, Italian by Night changes. (It’s going great!)

But a lot of our Uptown friends are taking part.

And you can be sure we’ll be slipping out from the prep work we’re doing to enjoy some of the great food in their restaurants.

We encourage you to do the same! Visit the Uptown this week and taste the best of Saint John.

Update: Tomorrow Today, January 29, is our last day serving Sunday Breakfast. Our reason is simple: we need a day off. Our staff need a day off. With the Deli, the catering and our upcoming changes (Deli by Day, Italian by Night), we need a chance to catch our breath and regroup.

We apologize to those of you who will be disappointed but to maintain the quality of food and service, we and our staff need to be at our best.

However, we will continue to serve breakfast on Saturdays with a revised breakfast menu. This is because we’ll also be opening our full lunch menu in the morning (something many have asked us to do).

Our Saturdays, then, will have our breakfast and lunch menus available from when we open at 9:00am until 3:00pm when the breakfast menu will no longer be available.

Meanwhile, we’re pretty pumped about our plans for Italian evenings. It will kick off on Valentine’s Day, which is already fully booked. However …

You can also book reservations for the 15th, 16th and 17th and any Wednesday, Thursday or Friday thereafter because we’ll be doing our Italian by Night in the evenings. Just call us at 652-3354 or contact us by email. Valentine’s Day is the launch. We hope you’re excited too!

You may have seen the odd tweet about something going on at Urban Deli. The answer is yes, we are going to be doing an Italian thing. This year, February will be all about change for us and we’re hopeful you like what we have planned.

If you have a subscription to the online Telegraph-Journal, you might have seen their story, “Tuscan restaurant to debut Valentine’s day” (subscription required).

Beginning February 14th, we’ll be a Deli by Day, Italian by Night. This means our evenings will be Italian, Tuscan style, Wednesday through Friday. Our launch, however, will be Valentine’s Day, the 14th.

We will continue to be a deli, but only during the day.

We’re launching this little venture on Valentine’s Day when we’ll have a single seating at 7:00pm and it will be all Italian!

If you’re planning to go out on Valentine’s Day with the special person or people in your life – spouse, partner, friends, family – call us and make a reservation (506-652-3354).

Menu will be disclosed a few days prior to Valentines Day.

Changes to weekend breakfasts

Our Sundays are going to be changing as well. January 29, the last Sunday of the month, will also be our last day serving Sunday Breakfast.

However, we will continue to serve breakfast on Saturdays with a revised breakfast menu. This is because we’ll also be opening our full lunch menu in the morning (something many have asked us to do).

This means that on Saturday our breakfast and lunch menus will be available from when we open at 9:00am until 3:00pm when the breakfast menu will no longer be available.

We’re pretty excited about these changes and hope you are too. Don’t forget, Valentine’s Day isn’t far off so if you plan to join us for our Italian launch on the 14th, call us at 652-3354. Valentine’s Day reservations can go pretty quickly.

Tonight is the debut of Food Network Canada’s latest show, You Gotta Eat Here! It’s all about comfort food and is hosted by John Catucci. It hits your big or little screen at 10:00pm Atlantic time (9:00pm ET/PT).

Having met John, the crew and other people behind the show, we’re particularly excited. They’re wonderful people and on March 23 they’ll feature Urban Deli.

We learned on Twitter yesterday that the other fine eating place from Saint John that they’ll feature, Saint John Ale House, will have their episode aired February 24.

For now, the show takes its initial steps into the broadcast waters with its launch at 10:00pm Atlantic time. If you get a chance, catch it on the Food Network.

Best of luck to everyone at You Gotta Eat Here! (Find them on Facebook here.) We’re convinced it will be a hit!

Host of Off the Beaten Palate, Michael-Ann Rowe

If you’ve been in Urban Deli you may have noticed our owner Liz is often a whirlwind of activity. However, she is almost zen-like when compared with her sister, Michael-Ann (aka Mikey, aka MA), who lives in New York City when she’s not traveling the globe or coming back to New Brunswick.

Each sister has her own distinct characteristics but they also have many in common. Not the least of these is a passion for food. Where Liz opened her own restaurant, Urban Deli, Michael-Ann created her own television show, Off the Beaten Palate.

You’ve probably seen Mikey in the Deli as she brings her energy back home to New Brunswick every chance she gets. In fact, the first show of Off the Beaten Palate showcases our great province.

Now Michael-Ann’s show is nominated in the 2012 Taste Awards (aka the Tasty Awards). If you’re unfamiliar with them, here is how they describe themselves.

Off the Beaten Palate

The Annual TASTE AWARDS (aka the TASTY Awards) is the premier broadcast awards show to celebrate the best in food, fashion, and home lifestyle programs on TV, in Film, Online, and on Radio. The goal is to recognize and acknowledge outstanding excellence in video and film content focused on food, drink, fashion, design, and home lifestyle.

The awards are a pretty big deal in the world of food. Other people up for awards in various categories are the likes of Gordon Ramsay and Jamie Oliver with shows like Kitchen Nightmares and Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution.

MA’s show finds itself in the Best Food Travel Series: Web (there are five shows nominated in the category).

Mikey will go just about anywhere to explore culinary delicacies from their roots.

What is Off the Beaten Palate?

Host and narrator, Michael-Ann Rowe, is a food lover, restaurateur, and TV personality, who takes an unabashed and inquisitive approach, as she travels the globe disclosing culinary delicacies from their roots.

We’re all pretty excited about Mikey’s nomination given that the show has not yet launched. But keep with us at Urban Deli for news of a PBS airing date in March, 2012! Canadians everywhere will have a chance to see it.

She’ll be heading to Hollywood soon for the January 12 Tasty Awards show (and we’re pretty envious because it sounds like it will be a snazzy red carpet affair).

We’re wishing her all the best as her culinary adventure takes her to Tinsel Town to hobnob with celebrity foodies and others as they celebrate the best in food television.

If you’re curious about Off the Beaten Palate have a look at the the trailer. You can also read about the Tasty Awards and Michael-Ann in this Huffington Post article.

Off the Beaten Palate:

• Facebook
• Twitter

Michael-Ann Rowe, host of Off the Beaten Palate, takes a break while shooting an episode back home in New Brunswick.

Actually, we were back at it yesterday although we weren’t open. It was inventory time. Today, however, our doors are open and we’re pumped up for the adventure of 2012.

We think it will be a good year and hope you agree.

We’re eager to see our regular customers, all the new people we met over last year and all the new people this year will bring our way.

And on our horizon is the Food Network’s new show (all about comfort food, of which we’re very fond), You Gotta Eat Here! It debuts this Friday, January 6 at 9:00pm ET on the Food Network Canada (that would be 10:00pm in Atlantic Canada).

We’re even more eager for the show that airs on March 23rd at 9:00 ET (10:00pm in Atlantic Canada). That’s when we’ll be featured! Now that’s something to look forward to! Saint John Ale House will also be featured, though in another episode set to air earlier than ours (not sure what their date is).

We hope to see you today, later in the week and throughout this 2012. It’ll be a good one!

We’ll be closing at 3:00pm today (New Year’s Eve) and reopening Wednesday, January 4th at 11:30am. Yes, on the Wednesday because Tuesday, the 3rd, we’ll be closed as we do inventory.

We hope you welcome 2012 with a fabulous night and wish you all the best in the New Year. We think it will be a great one!

In the latest Here NB they have their Best of 2011 – A&E/Style/Music and that includes their Top restos of 2011. They look at our little triangle of Saint John, Moncton and Fredericton. In Saint John, they had four restaurants on their best list — including Urban Deli. To put it mildly, we were elated!

A lot of our friends made the lists. For restaurants, there was Urban Deli as well as our friends at:

• Saint John Ale House
• Opera Bistro
• Alley Gria

You’ll also see in the list for “What’s Hot,” our friends at Happinez Wine Bar.

Back in the restaurants category, up river a bit in Freddy Beach we see our friends at Isaac’s Way are listed. If you haven’t seen the issue yet, pick up a copy or pay a visit to Here NB online and have a look at the incredible variety and wonderful arts, crafts, foods, style and everything else we’re doing here in New Brunswick, especially in our tri-city area of Saint John, Moncton and Fredericton.

This is a helluva great province!

We have an update on our Christmas Eve fun where we had customers and friends taking over server duties and all of the day’s tips were going to the Saint John SPCA Animal Rescue. The results are in and …

Together we managed to raise $667.00 for the SPCA!

A huge thank you goes out to all our customers for their generosity and to the great gang that acted as our servers (giving our regular servers the day off to prep for their Christmas).

And one more reminder … We’re back to our regular hours now, opening today at 11:30am.

Those regular hours are until New Year’s Eve, when we close at 3:00pm (December 31). Then we’ll reopen on Wednesday, January 4, back once again to our regular hours. (We’ll be closed on Tuesday, January 3, as we do inventory.)

Thanks again to everyone!

Our Christmas went beautifully. We hope yours was just as fantastic. It always feels like it comes and goes too quickly.

We’re back to our regular hours now, opening today at 11:30am.

Those regular hours are until New Year’s Eve, when we close at 3:00pm (December 31). Then we’ll reopen on Wednesday, January 4, back once again to our regular hours. (We’ll be closed on Tuesday, January 3, as we do inventory.)

But we’re open today and would love to see you and hear how your Christmas went, so please drop in. After a few days off, we’re feeling re-energized. How about you?