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Food & Drink

Beet it at Caplansky’s

Following a series of cook-offs featuring latkes, matzoh balls and gefilte fish, Caplansky’s Deli (356 College, at Brunswick, 416-500-3852) will be hosting a culinary smackdown on Sunday April 22 at 5 pm to find the tastiest borsht in town.

“I love doing these competitions because they’re a celebration of Jewish food culture as well as a way of introducing new people to the deliciousness of my people’s food,” says the retro resto’s Zane Caplansky. “Plus I love to eat.”

Good thing he likes borscht as 10 contestants will face-off on the day using an arsenal of root vegetables including cabbage, potatoes and optional beets. They’re still looking for participants so you have until April 19th to enter here (kristen@caplanskys.com). Instead of a commemorative borsht belt, the winner gets a trophy and “bragging rights.”

Not one to blow his own horn, Caplansky has also just filmed his second appearance on CBC’s mega-popular Dragon’s Den. The episode airs in September. First time round, the smoked meat maven’s sure-fire concept for a fleet of food trucks was famously shot down by Kevin Leary and company. Were the dragons wrong?

“Last year the truck was an idea. Now its reality and just about all of my big talk has come true,” says Caplansky who’s sworn to secrecy on the latest outcome. “It’s done great business and we’ve had significant interest to franchise. But we need a commissary kitchen to support them.”

Speaking of Thundering Thelma, the last we heard, the City had put the kibosh on her doing business in the privately owned parking lot at Queen East and Dalhousie.

“It’s very confusing,” he sighs. “They say we’re doing nothing wrong in the parking lot but they say the parking lot owner’s not supposed to have us there. They told us they’d be informing the landlord that he can’t do this but we haven’t heard a thing from him. In fact, I just got an invoice for next month’s rent so, as far as we’re concerned, we’re still in business.”

Have you ever considered contacting the mayor’s office? You’d think this would be just the kind of crowd-pleasing cause that His Honour – an alleged champion of the little guy and a connaisseur of such haute cuisine haunts as the drive-thru at Tim Horton’s – would rally behind.

“I’ve called him a number of times and I’m completely shocked that he’s never replied,” says an exasperated Caplansky. “No phone call, no e-mail. Nothing.

“Same thing with Cesar Palacio, the Licensing and Standards chair,” Caplansky continues. “Neither of them has taken any steps to have a meeting with us, take a look, have a sandwich. I don’t understand why they’re not interested. Tens of thousands of people show up for these food truck festivals. It’s a win-win situation for them. It’s small business versus big government. It’s good for tourism and foot traffic.

And after the black eye the City got for the failure of David Miller’s A La Cart street-food program, this could be a marquee decision for the Rob Ford administration but they won’t even return a phone call.”

The Caplansky empire doesn’t stop with food trucks. He’s also planning on launching a wholesale/retail bagel shop come summer. Somewhere nearby, we trust?

“My heart’s in Kensington Market so that’s where we’ll be.”

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