RIVERFRONT PLAYS HOST TO ELEGANT PIER DINING
Overhead trucks don’t detract from fine food under Ambassador Bridge
The setting sun was a ball of fire on the horizon, tinting the sky pink. The breeze was balmy. The waves lapped against the pier.
And the food kept coming, dish after dish of Spanish-inspired tapas, from dates stuffed with smoked blue cheese to steak with charred scallions and red pepper sauce.
“It’s like you’re on vacation,” said Radha Patel, in a dress and heels, with a group of 30-somethings.
They were under the Ambassador Bridge. Seriously. They were beneath an international trade corridor known for its stream of noisy, diesel-spewing trucks.
And they were sitting at a long table covered with a white linen tablecloth and set with china.
It was Dinner on a Pier, by WindsorEats, a four-course Spanish dinner featuring 16 dishes on the city pier east of the bridge.
It was the bridge like you’ve never seen it.
“It’s taking a unique space in the city and reimagining it,” said host Adriano Ciotoli, who operates the food and drink company with his sister Pina.
They saw a dinner on a pier in Vancouver and thought, Why can’t we do that? Windsor has a beautiful riverfront and an iconic bridge.
“We want you to experience it a little differently than you normally would,” said Pina.
“I want (diners) to feel they’re in a really neat environment.” They did. “This should be every weekend,” enthused diner Andrew Gruening, who came with a group of running colleagues.
“It reminded me of something you’d do in Europe,” said John DeMarco, who brought his 82-year-old mother Agnes.
That’s not what people thought when WindsorEats proposed the first dinner last year.
“Everybody was, ‘Why on Earth would I want to eat under the Ambassador Bridge?’ ” Adriano remembered.
“We thought it was totally bizarre,” said Sherry Boxall, who went last year and returned this year. The company was the first ever to ask the city if it could book the pier for an event.
‘What about the steady rumble of trucks?,’ some diners wondered. There was conversation and laughter. Manu Sehgal and Anthony Ruggirello from the band Transeo played guitars. Last year, there were two peregrine falcons calling to each other. And only occasionally, there’s a clang overhead.
“It’s part of what Windsor is,” said Adriano.
Then there’s the weather. Don’t even ask Adriano about that. It’s too stressful. Last year, it rained until 5:30 p.m. Chef Johnny Oran couldn’t set up his kitchen.
WindsorEats called, emailed and texted all 50 diners to tell them the dinner had been postponed an hour. Then Adriano and Pina called all their relatives and friends to help in the lastminute dash to get ready.
Their dinner at Sandpoint Beach in May, a seafood boil, was under a tent. It rained until 9 p.m. “It was very East Coast,” said Pina.
They have an array of weather apps, and they checked them every half hour all week before the dinner Thursday. Every half hour, the forecast changed. And the logistics? “It’s a nightmare,” laughed Pina.
A generator powers most of the pop-up kitchen, which includes a small, refrigerated truck, a warmer the size of a fridge, a large grill and a deep fryer. They bring in the tables, chairs, linen, plates, glassware, cutlery — everything for the 55 diners this year. They started at 9 a.m. Last year, Pina was there until 4 a.m. packing everything up again.
But the diners, who paid $135 per ticket, were oblivious to all this. The tables were pushed together to create one, long, communal table, and all along it people passed dishes back and forth, raised their forks and glasses, talked and laughed and took pictures with their phones.
They were intrigued by the meal by Oran, who trained at the respected Stratford Chefs School, worked around the country and returned to Windsor to open Licia Ruby Food Company, named after his two grandmothers.
They debated the cotija cheese on the charred corn with lime and garlic chili aioli.
It’s like feta, some concluded. What’s seared morcilla with cherry mostarda? they asked. It’s Spanish blood sausage.
Adriano and Pina wanted that sense of community, of gathering that comes from sharing one long table. Last year, some diners exchanged phone numbers before leaving.
A barge passed as the mushroom toast with manchego, a Spanish cheese made from sheeps’ milk, was served. A freighter with its rails lit up and a tour boat followed, along with the grilled fish with fennel, lemon, saffron and gremolata.
“I like that events like this are happening in Windsor,” said 25-year-old Adam El-Dika, there with five friends who described themselves as foodies.
“People say there’s nothing to do in Windsor, but this is a great event.”