Local group introduces diners to area restaurants – and each other
by Emily Worts ❧ photography by Richard Galloway
Chris Keleher greets people at the door of the Stuffed Peasant restaurant in Collingwood, seating chart in hand. Keleher is not the owner, not the chef and not an employee of the Stuffed Peasant. He is part of the team of four behind Let’s Eat Collingwood – the hottest meal ticket in town. Once a month Keleher and his wife Terri, along with Paul and Amanda Casey, send out an email to a growing number of locals letting them know when and where the group will be stopping next. Let’s Eat Collingwood isn’t exactly a dinner club – it favours inclusivity over exclusivity – but you have to be in the know to get a seat.
Let’s Eat Collingwood’s dinner at the Stuffed Peasant sold out in a day. Together with Stuffed Peasant’s chef and owner, Scott Carter, Keleher introduced a second seating to accommodate Let’s Eat Collingwood’s increasing number of followers.
Diners move from seat to seat chatting with people they know or have met at previous dinners. Keleher does the same, checking in and making sure everyone is all right, just like a proper host. John Wilson and his wife DorRene have attended four of the seven Let’s Eat events. “We picked these restaurants (The Hungry Sumo, The Huron Club, The Tremont and The Stuffed Peasant) because we had never been there before,” says John. “We were looking for new experiences and this was all organized for us. It’s great.”
At the Hungry Sumo the Wilsons were happily seated with two couples they had never met and they were treated to several different courses for $15.
“Unless you eat off your wife’s plate you don’t get to experience all these different foods,” says Wilson. “I look at it as a social event as well as a dining experience.”
The idea for Let’s Eat Collingwood was born out of a shared respect for the Collingwood dining scene. For the Kelehers and Caseys, Let’s Eat Collingwood was a good way to attract business to the restaurants they have come to love in the area. The Kelehers lived in Asia for six years, and after discovering good Japanese food was available locally, they became friends with Hungry Sumo owners Chris Gordon and his wife Joanne You. The Let’s Eat team is consistently amazed to find the variety and quality of food on offer in Collingwood and is equally amazed at how many of their friends and acquaintances haven’t yet tried some of the area’s ethnic restaurants like the Hungry Sumo, Siamese Gecko and Tandoori House (now moving to Owen Sound).
“Collingwood is known for skiing,” says Keleher, “but you don’t have to drive to Blue to eat.”
Keleher is working on a Collingwood slogan to entice tourists to the downtown dining scene (something like “Come for the recreation. Stay for the food”).
“We like that it’s becoming so popular,” he says of Let’s Eat Collingwood. “We’re filling up right away and that bodes really well for the restaurants. It’s a friendly little group that’s come together.”
The first Let’s Eat event was hosted at the Hungry Sumo.
“It was interesting because we were the first,” says Hungry Sumo owner Chris Gordon. “We set some sort of a benchmark.”
For the Hungry Sumo team the night was a challenge, but a welcome one. “It was off-season on a slow night and we filled it,” says Gordon. “It was revenue we otherwise wouldn’t have.”
Gordon and his staff tried to ease clients into the Japanese food experience. “We kept it easy for timid palates,” says Gordon. “We kept most of the raw fish out until the end as a sampler. We want people to know we are more than sushi and a lot of our food is cooked.”
This is what Keleher encourages restaurants to do – highlight their specialties but also introduce items that are not as well known to potential clients.
For the Tremont, that meant focusing on its new Monday night tapas menu. The Tremont’s Let’s Eat event featured eight traditional tapas courses like Albondigas (meatballs), charcuterie, Spanish tortilla, seared scallops and a trio of desserts. Christophe Boivin, chef and owner of the Tremont, served 55 people in one seating. “Sending out 55 plates eight times is a bit challenging,” says Boivin, “but I think this is one of the things everyone has to do to get as much exposure as possible.”
The Tremont’s Boivin agrees. “Up here you get used to the two seasons,” he says of the Collingwood market. “It’s important to develop your local clientele. And for us being a new business it’s really important.”
Deborah McCurtain and her husband Steve Barss moved to Collingwood from Richmond Hill last October. Let’s Eat Collingwood was a perfect introduction to the Collingwood social scene. They went to the first event in November and met a group of people who they now socialize with outside of Let’s Eat events.
“It’s been really handy,” says McCurtain. “We requested to be seated with strangers and now a group of us actually get together to play poker.”
There is even a networking element to the events – McCurtain, who is in her late 40s, was offered a job at one of the Let’s Eat dinners by another guest. “I didn’t take it,” says McCurtain, “but it was nice to know that that is out there.”
However, social and networking perks aside, Let’s Eat Collingwood is first and foremost about sampling great food. “I’m not really one to try different restaurants, like the Hungry Sumo,” says McCurtain. “But after looking at the menus we thought we should come back. I think I’d go back to all the ones we’ve tried. It’s nice to know we are supporting local people and businesses.”
The dishes at The Stuffed Peasant keep coming. Grilled baguette with tapenade, duck liver terrine and mushroom paté, two salads, mussels, a sample of mushroom Agnolotti, pan roasted Muscovy duck, chicken Chasseur, steak and frites, and apple cider braised pork ribs. The price of tonight’s dinner is $20 and worth every penny. The plates are overflowing with chef Carter’s specialties, including his signature dessert, a rich ‘Whiskeylicious’ chocolate cake.
As people leave the Stuffed Peasant they thank Carter for an exceptional and abundant meal. They thank Keleher for the Let’s Eat invitation.
In the not-so-distant future look for Let’s Eat on the Road (the group hopes to travel to Thornbury and Creemore for a sampling of more of the region’s great restaurant cuisine).
To find out more about Let’s Eat Collingwood, including upcoming stops, email Chris at chriskeleher@me.com. You can also find Let’s Eat Collingwood on Facebook. ❧
