– by Doreen Marion Gee –
This is the second in a six-part series of profiles on some of the Saanich Peninsula’s wonderful restaurants and pubs.
Sadly, today’s kids may never know what it means to enjoy truly good healthy food full of flavour. With grocery aisles full of additive-laden, processed and genetically-modified food, and produce that comes from half way around the globe, something important has been lost. Susan McCarten of Tonolli’s Deli & Café is bringing back the old recipes from Europe passed down through generations. Her eatery offers the savoury healthy food that pleased palates for centuries, and she wants people to enjoy eating again as a treasured experience, not just a necessary task in between board meetings and conference calls.
Tonolli’s opened for business in November 2011. From Hungarian roots, Susan and her sister always wanted to open a deli with food from many European cultures. A warm and likable person, Susan shares some interesting history behind her delicious food. Centuries ago in central European countries, local people survived on regional foods that they grew themselves. In Hungary they had pork and grew potatoes and onions – so they made cabbage rolls from those ingredients. Susan prepares them the same way in 2014.
“Those flavours are what we are losing now,” laments Susan. “People shop at the Big Box stores and they buy all these processed foods and they have no idea what the original foods even tasted like.” They miss all that beautiful flavour of being cooked from scratch. Susan worries that the delectable flavours of rich cultural food are dying along with the original European immigrants who brought them here. “If their children didn’t learn those recipes from them, those recipes have been lost and are gone forever!” Susan definitely sees her Deli and Café as a way to bring those old recipes back so people can enjoy them: “My goal is to bring Nana’s food back, with those flavours and traditions that make it a little bit of Europe.”
“Many people do not know what real bread tastes like.” According to Susan, the bread that European peasants ate hundreds of years ago was full of nutrition and whole wheat grains, unlike its white counterpart reserved for royalty. Russian loaves were the size of tables and lasted a month because of natural preservatives: “It was amazing, unbelievable bread.” Susan loves the pure grain taste of rye bread. Her husband makes it by hand so that their Deli customers can relish the extraordinary taste and health benefits.
“Soup was huge in Hungary,” and Susan makes a variety of hearty ones without flour or fillers; she freezes them ready for take-out for a memorable dinner. Everything at Tonolli’s is made from scratch. Susan cooks; her sister bakes. The miracles start with good basic ingredients: butter, real lemon, different kinds of nuts, ground nut flour and nothing processed. They offer succulent breakfasts and lunches and prepare beautiful main courses that are frozen and available for a dinner take-out.
Tonolli’s offers many flashbacks to a time of magnificent flavourful food: Hungarian crepes stuffed with ricotta cheese and lemon and covered with sour cream and vanilla sugar; French baked eggs: two fresh eggs baked with white truffle cream, brie cheese and ham; or a Vienna panini with rye bread, Montreal smoked beef, cheese and sauerkraut.
Susan wants to reignite the joy of food: “We have lost the culture of sitting down together.” The team at Tonolli’s want their patrons to check out everything in the Deli, converse with them and enjoy the whole experience of having a meal and loving every bite. Tonolli’s Deli & Café sits quietly on a hill at the intersection of East Saanich and Island View Roads. You would never know that behind those walls lies a treasure chest of mouth-watering culinary delights.
Go inside and taste what real food is all about.
Address/contact: 778.426.2822; hungariansistersdeli@gmail.com; 6991 East Saanich Road.
