Summer is Vancouver is a funny thing. I always hear that it is too hot, too cold, too rainy, too dry… it seems like summer can never truly assuage Vancouverites. Personally, I don’t mind the mix of conditions… definitely keeps things interesting!

Although my favourite season is Fall (the colours, hockey starts, snowboarding starts, and there’s still surfing!)… it’s impossible to not love summer in Vancouver. That small slice of sun and warmth that we get is irresistible!

My favourite things about summer:

- Surfing
- Enjoying sun on the beach
- The gorgeous sunsets
- BBQing
- Parties with friends
- Summer blockbuster movies
- The humidity
- Fresh, local, organic berries
- The vegetables and fruits that come out of our garden
- Golf
- Summer dresses
- Vacation!
- Wearing flip flops 24/7

I’ve been playing golf for a couple years now, but I usually only go 5-6 times a year or so. Each year, I find myself having more and more fun playing golf… even though I’m terrible at it!

Aside from Costa Rica, I’ve never really played a full golf course… my experience is pretty limited to the driving range, pitch and putt, and executive (academy) courses.

This was taken at the Academy at Westwood Plateau… their 9 hole course. My best shot of the day, right onto the green! I seem to be improving, albeit slowly.

Allan, Kim and Dave on the course at Westwood. What a beautiful view of the city from up there! The course, even though it’s an executive course, is very challenging… tight fairways and tricky greens… lots of elevation changes too. It’s on the side of a mountain!

I’ve decided that this summer I want to play my first real full-length golf course in Vancouver. So Allan and I headed over to Golf Town in Richmond several weeks ago and I tried about 20 different Ladies drivers.

No surprise of course, that my favourite and the one I ended up buying was the Callaway FT-9 Ladies Driver. My iron set is already Callaway Ladies so it was fitting. I am completely terrified of my driver. I feel pretty comfortable hitting my irons, but the driver is just a whole ‘nother story. It is very intimidating. I need a lot more practice and time with it, but hopefully it will come around. It’s a great club.

The head cover that comes with it is also pretty swanky! Looks like it is from the future.

The Fujikura shaft and the Winn grip are just icing on the cake. I love love love the grip.

At Golf Town, with the purchase of my FT-9, I also got $250 free credit to spend on any Callaway goods. So I bought Allan a nice free Callaway Men’s Driver, some Callaway golf balls, and a glove for myself. Great deal!

Tonight I’ll be trying out a full golf course, so I’m pretty nervous. My first time ever in Vancouver! I’ve had my new driver for a couple weeks now and I’m feeling a bit more comfortable with it. My game is improving but nowhere near where I’d like it to be. Hopefully all goes well today!

Other things I love about the summer… definitely BBQing!

Here’s a tray of food about to go out to the BBQ. The trick for good BBQing… a good grill, good BBQ sauce, lots of seasoning, good quality meat, a smoky rub…

… and hickory wood chips for extra smoky flavour! We soaked these first and then put them in aluminum foil and placed these under the grill.

Surf and Turf! Yum! Alberta aged AAA beef steak with smoky rub, and Halibut grilled over a Maple plank for extra flavour. SO GOOD! Can’t recommend the wood planks enough for grilling. I also made a side of Orzo with veggies to go along with it, and we grilled some peppers.

I also caved in and bought my Jimmy Choo sunglasses before I left for Costa Rica. I haven’t had a chance to post pics yet, so here you go. They are kind of big and silly but I like them.

Also, to end this post, Allan takes silly photos of me. This time I’m not swatting bugs away. We were just being silly.

What do you love about summer?

After a couple months of basically being a recluse and feeling rather cooped up, we finally threw a small party. My skin has mostly cleared up now, and things are looking much brighter for the future. I’m feeling very happy these days. Plus, in 4 days I’ll be in Costa Rica!

It was Allan’s birthday on Sunday so we decided to have a little get-together over at our place on Saturday night.

Allan likes beer, so we stocked the fridge full of his favourite beers for the party.

There was barely any room in the fridge for food, including the fridge door!

Allan got a new BBQ for his birthday and we finally made use of our new patio. We got the Weber Q300 barbecue and we LOVE it! It heats up really hot, really fast and evenly distributes the heat no matter how high or low. It’s also really portable, and has a good-sized cooking surface. Good value, too! (Despite us looking all over town and them being sold out EVERYWHERE we finally found it in a small independent and I haggled till the bitter end for a good price)

We provided some small appies for the party. I made up some cheese and bread spreads. Pictured here is the double cream brie and red pepper jelly, fig spread with parmigiano reggiano, smoked mozzarella and ham, and cheddar.

We cooked up some 3-night marinaded Maui-style ribs from Granville Island, along with homemade hamburgers, ribeye steak and beef filet mignons. Sides were risotto and grilled veggies.

There weren’t many leftovers!

I also found THE BEST rum EVER in the liquor store the other day. I’ve never had expensive rum before and wow, is it ever worth it. It’s called Zaya Gran Reserva, aged 12 years and handcrafted in Trinidad & Tobago. 5 times distilled. It is really, REALLY good. We made some mojitos from it, although some people preferred to just sip it.

Shelley McArthur, AWESOME Communications Director from Top Table Restaurants (some of my fave restaurants in BC) sent me this incredible mojito recipe from Keith Trusler, Bar Manager at Blue Water Cafe. Top Table has some of the best bartenders in BC so definitely check out Araxi, Blue Water Cafe, West, or Cin Cin for divine drinks. The taste is all in the careful preparation! We used the Zaya Rum, but the Havana Club rum still tastes great for this recipe:

Blue Water Cafe Mojito, by Keith Trusler

1/2 lime, divided into 8ths
10 mint leaves, bruised to release flavour (roll into a ball and clap with your hands)
1 1/2 ounces Havana Club Anejo Reserva Rum
Club Soda and Crushed Ice

In a tall glass, muddle lime and mint with the simple syrup. Top with crushed ice. Pour in rum and stir together. Top with club soda. Enjoy!

Sooo good.

After mixing drinks for a while, I decided to sit down and believe it or not the BOYS got into the kitchen and started mixing up their own drinks.

One of the best ones was the watermelon martini made with Grey Goose, Sourz and Simple Syrup. Yum!

Other not-so-good drinks the boys made was mixes of beer and gin and gatorade. Not so good.

Believe it or not, there are THREE people on this chair, haha.

Here they are mixing up more drinks.

Here we are outside, after inspecting a huge beetle that was on the porch.

It was a great night! Lots of food, drinks, and fun. It was great to have some of our friends over too, since it had been a while

What did you do this weekend?

Happy Canada Day everyone! I hope you all had a good one.

Sadly, I have had to return back from Tofino early. Yes, I had a crazy surfboard incident. 11 stitches on my forehead. If you’d like to see the stitches, click here. Don’t say I didn’t warn you! So it’s back to work for me.

Pictures from Tofino coming up soon.

So yesterday, instead of surfing and being on the beach, I spent the day with Allan and my Dad in the garden and in the kitchen for Canada Day. We made hamburgers, garden vegetables, spring salmon, and potatoes. Yum!

My Dad has been meticulously taking care of a garden for as long as I can remember. When we lived in Australia for several years, I remember eating oranges right out of our garden. It’s been a long struggle for our family to make ends meet, but somehow my Dad has always found time to take care of the garden in the morning before work and after working 12 hours a day. I remember helping out in the garden when I was growing up, and eating fresh vegetables and fruits throughout the year.

Here’s just a sampling of pictures from our garden from yesterday, and the meal that we cooked up:

Freshly picked veggies and fruits from the garden: HUGE raspberries (my favourite), boysenberries (they are basically large and juicy blackberries), new potatoes, peas, basil, mint, and cilantro.

A view from one side of our garden, click to see where everything is located. Click All Sizes to see the large size.

The view from the other side of our garden, again, click to zoom in.

I used to have a rooftop patio in the west end but had to move all my planters to my family’s house when I moved into Allan’s apartment with no patio for a couple years. Fortunately, our new place has a patio so I’m planning on moving my planters over soon so I can start gardening again.

Lilies…

The blueberries starting to come out…

The plum tree, still green… but they will be ripe and juicy soon!

Fuji apples starting to ripen…

Tomatoes starting to get ready!

Garden-grown garlic drying out (shame I didn’t get that bug in focus!)

Green grapes starting to form on the vine…

Dill! I love eating herbs straight from the garden.

Flowers in the garden…

Our family’s secret recipe for hamburgers! Lots of fresh herbs and onions from the garden, and lean organic beef.

Hamburgers all cooked up from the charcoal BBQ with hickory smoked chips.

New potatoes and fresh garden vegetables (all except the broccoli)..

Grilled spring salmon (just caught last week) on the BBQ and grilled zucchini from the garden! Yum!

Yes, we definitely enjoyed some home grown and home cooked food yesterday!

How did you spend your Canada Day?