We went to Culina Millcreek last night. From reading local blogs, anyone who seems to be remotely interested in food, goes to Culina. We found out why.

It’s an intimate little place. Tables squished together, knowledgeable and friendly staff. Non-pretentious atmosphere heavily weighed with the sounds of University people talking about University stuff. The man beside us, a University person, seemed to have tax issues, and we couldn’t help but overhear these problems since he was nearly sitting at our table for the coziness of the place. The closeness of the tables is excellent to observe what people are eating, however, and I’m sure they were not impressed with me studying their choices and then declaring whether or not I would eat it myself.

All day I was psyching myself up to try the duck. I’ve never had duck, and it seems a foodie sort of food, so I thought I would try it. However, by the time it came around to ordering all I could picture was a lovely mallard quack quacking in a pond, and decided then and there that I’ll stick to birds that go buck-buck-brrrrrr-buck or gobble gobble. Instead, I ordered the cod, since they don’t make endearing sounds underwater. It was a stretch for me, because I have NEVER ordered fish in a restaurant (fish and chips and sashimi doen’t count).

The cod was delicious. It had truffle in it somewhere, but I have never had truffle on it’s own to be able to identify the taste. But something in the sauce was amazing, and I wonder if it wasn’t that? Since I am a seasoned sashimi eater, I do think the cod was slightly on this side of underdone, but I didn’t want to part with my plate, so didn’t complain.

Michael, my brave hero, did have the duck. I tried his duck. I fell in love. Duck is amazing. I was warned it was fatty, but then, so is bacon, and who doesn’t love bacon? It was devine, crispy and tender and, and, and I will just have to go back and have a duck to myself one day. Would tonight be too soon? Our server suggested I look for a duck confit, because it is, according to her, the epitome of duck. And so Santa, I ask, if you have a duck confit in your bag, please drop it off at our place. Thank you.

Honourable mention must go to our wine selection. Never recall having an Argentinian wine before, and last night we had a bottle of Luigi Bosca Reserva Syra. After a year long hiatus from red wines on account of headaches, I thought the time was ripe to see if I could ease back into the world of reds that I have dearly missed. It was delicious, and no headache (so of course I wonder if my headaches of yore were caused by the amount of wine I consumed, and not so much the colour?). We’ll have to see.