While some people dread the end of summer, we look forward to the arrival of national fairs like the Canadian National Exhibition (CNE) and the Pacific National Exhibition (PNE) and the culinary offerings that come with it. Last year, we discovered the Thanksgiving Waffle by Fran’s Restaurants at the CNE – a combination of Canadian tradition and comfort food. This year, we hear they’ve got Poutine Balls and a Baonana Split that reminded us of something we discovered in Japan called “B-kyu gurume.” Learn more about the inexpensive delicious trend that’s taken the world one bite at a time.
Japanese cuisine is changing. Here in Canada, long gone are the days when “Japanese cuisine” was just a synonym for sushi. And in Japan, the culinary scene seems to have finally escaped the looming shadow of Michelin stars and traditional, multi-course “kaiseki” dinners. But that doesn’t mean a country renowned for its cuisine has taken a gastronomic nosedive – quite the contrary, in fact.
The last several years have seen the rise of “B-kyu gurume” – literally, “B-grade gourmet.” The translation is a bit of a misnomer as B-kyu does not denote low quality. However, it certainly renounces fancy mood lighting and stuck-up waiters. Furthermore, a large part of the appeal of B-kyu gurume is how it counters the pretentious notions of the high-end A-kyu cuisine, liberating food lovers from the golden shackles that Japan essentially built its dining reputation on. Its popularity has grown to include dedicated magazine guides and TV shows. There are even major food festivals surrounding the movement.
So what is it, exactly?
The Japan Times defines B-kyu as “inexpensive, down-home cooking that reflects local culinary traditions.” “Everyone describes it differently, but for me B-kyu is a soulful food. It has to be delicious, cheap and made with quality ingredients,” says Koji Yamamoto, owner of Yakko Izakaya in Osaka. “My favourite thing about B-kyu is how we mix in other cultural foods with our traditional cuisine to create something new. It’s a dish made up of different countries.”
At its heart, B-kyu looks a lot like the same food craze that has swept Canada in recent years: slightly elevated, blessedly cheap, and cheerful comfort food. For Shinji Yamaguchi, who spent years eating his way through Japan and now runs Toronto’s Gushi street food stall, it’s about fun and sheer enjoyment: “B-kyu gurume is not fancy, you can eat it aggressively, and it looks good and tastes good – like junk food.”
Written by Nelson Tam. B-Kyu Gurume was featured in Issue 7 of Scion Magazine. To read more, visit scion.ca/magazine
For the third round of Formula Drift Canada, the team and I travelled to the famous streets of Trois-Rivières, where people have been racing since 1967! Held over two weeks in August, the Grand Prix Trois-Rivières plays host to multiple series race events that include NASCAR and World RallycrossRX, and for the first time a drifting competition with FD Canada.
The streets of Monaco inspired the track and while on paper it appears to be two turns, it’s actually quite difficult. To start, the track is entirely lined with concrete walls so there is really no margin for error. Secondly, we were only given two 30-minute practice sessions which really didn’t give us any time to make set-up changes so everything had to be pretty good right from the get-go. Luckily, we were able to walk the track the night before the competition, so I was able to get an idea of what I was going to need to do to make every lap of practice count.
My first practice run went great! I felt really comfortable right away with the track, placed the car where it needed to be, and felt really fast throughout the course! We only got one lap in on that 30 minute session because there was a crash, but I felt good about how I did. Next session out I was able to get in two good laps, and I was feeling confident going into the top 16 competition.
Unlike the other FD Canada events this year, there was no qualifying. Instead, they used the championship points to decide the order of the top 16. Also, due to the time constraints of GP3R, there would be no “one more time” calls from the judges so every run really needed to sway the judges in your favour. The top 16 battle was spread out over two days, with the first half held on Friday and the rest of the competition on Saturday.
With me leading the board on championship points, I qualified in first and was paired up with Jo Thiffault. I led first with a good clean lap, but while Jo kept up, he made a few mistakes. On my follow lap, Jo slowed down way more than I expected on entry, causing me to straighten up for a second but I managed to keep up with him for the rest of the run. It was a close call, but the judges gave me the win!
My next battle was against Tomy Boisvert-bellamare. We’ve battled against one another every round of FD Canada so far. Knowing Tom, I knew he was going to give it his all and this was not going to be an easy fight. I led first and did a near perfect run! Tom hung with about two car lengths back but couldn’t close in on me. On my follow lap, I was able to close the gap between him and I and was awarded the win.
On to the final 4! I was up against Martin Langlois, a really good driver that’s pretty aggressive. I led first, did a great lap and Martin stuck with me by about three car lengths only making some minor mistakes. Which meant that my follow lap would have to be perfect. We took off down the straight into the first corner and I mis-shifted, putting it in fifth gear instead of third. Right away Martin gaped me by four car lengths. I tried to make it up but just couldn't close that gap and Martin took the win. I heard that many of you were saying “one more time” on Periscope! I spoke with the judges afterwards and they agree that had it not been for the circumstances, they would have called for one more time.
In the end with my first place qualifying position, I finished the event in third overall! But the day wasn’t done just yet. With the competition out of the way, the top 3 drivers of the event got to do demo runs Vaughn Gittin Jr. and Dean Kearny. Even better, I was lucky enough to take Yves Levesque, the Mayor of Trois-Rivières along for the ride! We had some great tight runs, the Mayor loved it and the crowd went wild!
So after three exciting rounds of FD Canada, I ended up being the top qualified driver going into the final World Round in September back in St-Eustache! I’ve also been told that I am officially FD Canada’s “Drifter of the Year.”
Up next for us is FD Pro2 in Texas. We will be making some changes to our transmission that will hopefully prevent mis-shifts from happening and do a few other little things but overall I have been extremely happy with how my Scion FR-S has been performing this season!
We’ve just returned from the second round of Formula Drift Canada and what a round it was! It took place at one of my favourite tracks – the Autodrome in Montmagny.
Held over a weekend, practice and qualifying were done on Saturday with the main competition happening on Sunday. The good thing about a 2-day event is that you have plenty of time to find the ideal setup to get your car just right.
Autodrome Montmagny is your basic stock car style oval with a switch back in the center section of the track. The most difficult part of the course is coming off of the first bank before going into the infield. With such a tight turn, you have to slow down from probably 100 km/h down to 50 km/h to hit inner clip 1. When done correctly, you could carry lots of speed into the second bank, and during practice I nailed it every time! No other car that followed my FR-S could keep up with us after inner clip 1. As soon as we would get past that point, I would put the car in fourth gear and rocket into the second bank, billowing Yokohama smoke from the back of the FR-S! Despite the weather, the practice went very well. We made some changes to the car and found some new ways to develop more grip out of the chassis, so the car was very fast in wet or dry conditions.
Qualifying was to take place on a wet track, but we were prepared for it and I was feeling very comfortable drifting in the slippery conditions. As the points leader, I was the last to go. I did my run with good speed, hit all the clips and placed the car in all the right zones and qualified second. On a side note, I'm very happy with how my qualifying has been going this season, I've made top 3 at every event!
On Sunday, we had about 3 hours of practice before the competition started. We used the better part of the morning to adjust our set up to match the dry conditions. We made a few changes and overall I was pretty happy with the car. The only thing we lacked was a bit more gear ratio in the first bank, as I was on the rev limiter through most it, but our gearing was perfect for the rest of the track and the FR-S was extremely fast and had a ton of grip!
We entered the Top 16 against Tomy Boisvert-bellemare. Tomy and I have battled many times, he's a very smooth and consistent driver, and is also very good at doing tight tandem. I was first to lead, and pretty much did the same consistent lap I had been doing all weekend. Tomy ran a decent lap behind me, but just couldn't match my speed in the second sector of the track. On my follow lap, I stuck close to him all the way around the course and had a good feeling when we pulled up in front of the crowd to wait for judging. The moment I stopped the car, one of the officials noticed some flames through my bumper – my car was on fire! Before I could get out of my car, Tomy had already jumped out, fire extinguisher in hand, and he quickly put out the fire. If you were watching the live stream on Periscope, I’m sure you were as impressed as I was and it really demonstrates the spirit and sportsmanship of drifting. I can't thank Tomy enough for his help! With the fire out, we learned I had won the round, which left us about 25 minutes to tow the car back to the pits, figure out what happened and to fix it. Turns out that the oil drain line on the turbo had come loose, causing oil to leak onto the manifold, resulting in fire. We tightened it up, threw on a fresh set of Yokohama Advan's and lined up for the next battle.
In the great 8 I was to go against Marin Guilbault. Marin is a decent driver from Ontario that has been in the Pro-Am scene now for about 4 years and has been trying to go pro for the last 2 years. I had a feeling going into this battle that it was going to get ugly. I led first and once again followed my qualifying line. Unfortunately, while I slowed down in the braking zone, Marin bashed into me causing quite a bit of body damage to the side of my FR-S. I managed to save the car from spinning and continued my run. On my follow lap, Marin had missed a shift real bad, and after running his car into the dirt on the top of the bank, I shut it down behind me since I knew I had won that battle. On to the final 4…
We had about 10 minutes to check the car over and fix what we could after the contact with Marin. Something in the rear suspension was definitely effected as we could see the alignment didn't look right on the left rear wheel, but our next run was coming up fast and we didn’t have time to start replacing arms and realign the car. So we did the best we could and lined up for the next run against Alex Gosselin. He was looking good all weekend so we knew it was going to be a fight. I led first, initiated at the same point I had done all weekend but this time my FR-S didn’t slow down the way I expected it to and I washed out into the gravel on the top of the bank, zeroing out on that run. For my follow lap, we pushed hard to get a ''one more time" call from the judges. I initiated right on him, and stuck about a foot off his door the entire way around the first bank! We came into the braking zone and I was right on him, but he slowed down a bit more than I anticipated, which bogged my car down. I tried to spool the 2J back up by clutch kicking hard but on the third kick one of the rear axles snapped, causing the car to be one wheel drive and pretty much ending our weekend.
Overall it was one wild weekend, and at the end of it all, I'm still in first place with respect to the championship points race. We'll fix our Scion FR-S up and come back strong at Round 3 of Formula Drift Canada in Trois Rivieres!
Thanks for the support!
Didn't make it to Round 2 of Formula Drift Canada? The team @ScionCanada has been streaming the race live on Periscope. Check out the replay of the Top 16 below.
