Culinary Night Market Launches CIBC AirCanada Prepaid Visa

Torontonicity was invited to attend a culinary night market to taste and explore international cuisine from Toronto’s globally-inspired restaurants. Foreign Exchange: A Night Market introduced CIBC and Air Canada’s new prepaid Visa, which makes travelling with multiple foreign currencies so easy!

We travelled the world, or at least our taste buds did, with cuisine from Latin America, Europe, South Asia, the Middle East, Australia and Canada. Participating restaurants and caterers included The Cheese Boutique, Bestellen, The Burger’s Priest, Hawksworth, Blowfish, Tabülè, The Oxley, En Ville Catering, Kanga and Mr. Corn.

Chef David Hawksworth of Vancouver’s Hawksworth Restaurant, made a guest appearance. Maclean’s named Hawksworth the “Restaurant of the Year” in 2012.

I began the evening by trying Tabülè’s falafel and hummus. The falafel was crispy, which is the way I like it, and tasted wonderful dipped in the creamy hummus.

I then tried Blowfish’s selection of sushi. First up was a vegetarian sushi with brown rice, snow peas, asparagus, sesame seed and kewpie. These flavours blended so well. I then tried a salmon sushi that was equally good with salmon, mango, cucumber, pine nuts and sesame seed.

I’ve never been super crazy about dumplings. I don’t dislike them, but I sometimes don’t know what all the fuss is about. En Ville Catering’s chicken and vegetarian dumplings changed my mind. The dumplings were not too doughy and the fillings were incredibly flavourful.

Next, I tried Chef David Hawksworth’s Lightly Smoked Wild B.C. Salmon. The salmon was incredibly delicate and paired wonderfully with fresh watercress and finely chopped vegetables.

Bestellen offered a Euro meat tray that was a feast for the eyes!

I had to stop by The Cheese Boutique, which was one of my favourite shops to visit when I lived in Bloor West Village, to try some of their Swiss cheese. Their Swiss cheese was mild, with a nutty taste. One of my favourite cheeses!

Back to the reason for this evening’s food extravaganza: The prepaid Visa, which allows you to load it with up to $20,000 CDN, which can then be converted to up to 10 currencies. So when you are travelling beyond our borders, there is no need to visit banks or foreign currency outlets, since you’ll have your foreign currency loaded on your Visa card. So simple! You can manage your card on your smartphone or tablet and if the card is stolen, CIBC will send you emergency money. It’s definitely worth checking out if you are planning on overseas travel.

I didn’t try one of the Mexican Street Corn from Mr. Corn, but they sure looked good!

I have a confession to make: I have never tried burgers from The Burger’s Priest. The Burger’s Priest chef asked me, “Where have you been?” I agree. I don’t know why it has taken me so long to try their burgers considering that I have heard such good things about them. In any case, I was eager to finally be sinking my teeth into one. The burger from The Burger’s Priest was so delicious and tasty, probably because it doesn’t contain the filler ingredients that you get in burgers from fast food joints or standard pub fare. I wanted to leave enough room to try the other dishes so I put the remaining half of my burger in my handbag to have at home. Yes, I am that girl! And yes, the remaining half of the burger still tasted amazing when I heated it up in the microwave at home.

Here are the dishes that were offered at Foreign Exchange: A Night Market:

Vegetarian and non-vegetarian sushi from Blowfish
Hummus and Falafel from Tabülè
Lightly Smoked Wild B.C. Salmon from Hawksworth
Swiss cheese from The Cheese Boutique
Sausage rolls from Kanga
Sticky Toffee Pudding from The Oxley
Euro Meat Tray from Bestellen
Mexican Street Corn from Mr. Corn

This culinary night market was a great success and a fabulous way to introduce CIBC and Air Canada’s prepaid Visa. Read here for more details about the prepaid Visa.