I scream, you scream, we all scream for ... butter chicken?
On a beautiful, sunny summer afternoon, Burnaby NOW photographer Larry Wright and I were all set to end our day of breaking news stories in the hot sun with a well-deserved ice cream at the ICP or Ice Cream Parlour at Burnaby Village Museum.
Our favourite villager, marketing maven Nancy Stagg, was joining us and introducing us to the person who makes everything work at the ICP: main cook and the effortlessly energetic Mai Dossa.
"You can't just have ice cream," Dossa tells us as we sit down at a reserved table. "You have to try some of the dishes we create here."
I look up at the menu and notice a jumbo hot dog for $3.50 and macaroni and cheese for $5.50. There's also fish and chips and the daily special of meat or vegetarian lasagna, and the dishes are all less than $10.
There's no sign of butter chicken, but Dossa, originally from Tanzania and now a 12-year-veteran at the Ice Cream Parlour, says we have to try her butter chicken.
I'm still all a bit mystified, as I had my heart set on a large $4 espresso flake ice cream cone. That will have to wait, as Wright, Stagg and I prepare to be wowed by Dossa's work.
"Mai never sits down," said Stagg. "She's got so much energy."
That energy translated into not one, not two, not three, but five different dishes that suddenly appear before us.
"This is my special butter chicken recipe," Dossa says as she places the heaping serving of chicken down alongside a full plate of rice and another of naan bread. "Dip the bread in the sauce and put some sauce on the rice as well."
We do as we're told, and we're rewarded, as the butter chicken is as good as any I've tried in the city. It's spicy without being hot, and Dossa is 100 per cent right when she says naan bread dipped in the sauce can be a meal in and of itself.
While Wright and Stagg compare photography
continued from page 20 notes, I'm left to work on the chicken tenders and fish and chips.
Both dishes are cooked to perfection, with the fish so fresh that I think I'm on a pier somewhere on the Fraser River. I could have dipped the chicken tenders in the honey mustard sauce, but they were so tasty no additional flavouring was needed.
Wright stops just long enough to try some of the lasagna, and the mix of noodles, cheese and sauce is surprisingly refreshing on a hot summer day. The garden salad, complete with egg, cheese and table grapes as a garnish, is also a nice change of pace.
"That's the secret of this place," Stagg tells us. "They have a full kitchen, and Mai can cook so many different things."
"We can seat 60 people comfortably for a wedding reception or a party," said Dossa. "We also host seniors' lunches. We also do a lot of the cooking for catering orders."
Stagg said one of her marketing challenges is to get people to realize that the Burnaby Village Museum Ice Cream Parlour serves a whole lot more than just ice cream.
"We started offering free admission to the museum this year, and that means when a kid sees the ice cream parlour sign, we're getting more people buying ice cream.
. We are trying to get people to try some of Mai's dishes because they are very good."
We make a pretty sizeable dent in the five dishes, and Dossa won't let us take a doggy bag home until she knows that we're headed straight home.
"If you're stopping and not getting home right away, that won't be good for the food," said Dossa.
After Dossa packs up my late-night snack and next day's lunch, we get to the real reason we came: the ice cream.
"It's been so busy," said Dossa. "We've got 12 different flavours, and we keep on opening new buckets of ice cream."
Our options include maple nut, wildberry yogurt, chocolate, vanilla, cookies and cream, butterscotch marble, mango and espresso flake.
Stagg is too full from lunch and passes on her usual favourite - vanilla - but that doesn't stop Wright from getting his favourite, chocolate, and me from finally tasting the espresso flake I'd been thinking about for several hours.
There are no words to describe how divine ice cream is at the end of a long day of work, but who knew that I would also have enjoyed butter chicken, fish and chips, chicken tenders, lasagna and salad at a place called the Ice Cream Parlour?
The Ice Cream Parlour at Burnaby Village Museum is open from 11 a.m. to 4: 30 p.m. Tuesday to Saturday. (There's no truth to the rumour that the place will soon be renamed the Butter Chicken Parlour.)
