ACE Bakery founder reacts to $110M sale of company

7:29 am

The founder of ACE Bakery couldn’t be happier, even though the company she sold two years ago was bought this week for a whopping $110 million.

"I think it’s wonderful that an iconic Canadian company has bought ACE," Linda Haynes told PostCity.com. "I’m sure they’ll do a fabulous job with it."

Haynes, along with her husband, Martin Connell, founded the company back in 1993 following a quest to create the perfect baguette.

The couple ran the bakery until 2008, when they sold it for an undisclosed amount.

"The people who bought it didn’t want it to be divulged," said Haynes, regarding the price.

Earlier this week, the bakery changed hands again after George Weston Ltd., the company behind Canada’s iconic grocer Loblaws, doled out $110 million for iconic bread brand.

A Quick Rise

After opening back in 1993, ACE Bakery quickly turned from a local experiment in West Toronto to a large bakery in North Toronto and finally to a national success story that saw loaves stocked on shelves across the country.

"We were very lucky in that we were able to make something that the food journalists and the public were really looking for," Haynes said. "We were the first people that were really doing that kind of bread in Toronto."

When they started ACE Bakery, the couple had three goals for the company.

"We wanted to be able to give a substantial amount of the profits away to our foundation, we wanted to have fun, and we wanted to turn out some good bread," Haynes said.

At the time, the couple had already formed Calmeadow, a microcredit company that included initiatives such as a First Nations lending program, and they used profits from the bakery to support their foundation.

Eventually, they managed to make Calmeadow a self-sustaining charity and were diverting their money to other causes.

"We specialized in food and nutrition programs for low income families and we also put some donations into organic farming and culinary scholarships."

Now, Haynes has been keeping busy writing cookbooks, the latest being Two Dishes — a double take on recipes, one by Haynes and one by her daughter.

"Basically she has a different lifestyle and a different budget," says Haynes, on why they developed two versions of each recipe — one for the financially-secure gourmand and the other catering to the time-and-budget-pressed eater.

Haynes also finds herself, from time to time, purchasing a fresh loaf of ACE bread and says she plans to continue the tradition.

Penn & Teller have something up their sleeves for Toronto

11:14 am

LAS VEGAS’S LEGENDARY magicians and comedians Penn & Teller have a penchant for clever pranks. Penn (Jillette) is the chatty one, whereas Teller, a former Latin teacher, generally employs mime during the act.

The duo got their start during the late ’70s in San Francisco. Things kind of took off from there with national tours, prime time TV, movies, off-Broadway shows and bestselling books. Penn & Teller hits the Massey Hall stage on Nov. 3. Post City Magazines talks to them about life, love and the art of magic.

Your show at Massey Hall is part audience Q & A. What’s the most shocking question you’ve been asked and what was your answer?

At Comicon this past summer, someone asked us about a show and a song we did over 30 years ago.We looked at each other surprised and, at the same exact time, sang the song in its entirety without forgetting a note. Don’t ask me to sing it now. I don’t remember it without starring at Teller’s face.

What Toronto-specific tricks are up your sleeve for your show in November at Toronto’s Massey Hall?

Well,Toronto will be in charge of that part.We do a lot of Q & A in this show, and the Qs have a lot to do with the As, so it’s up to ya’ll.We’ve packed a few new bits and a few classics.

You guys are celebrating 35 years of magic this year. How do you manage to keep the act fresh?

We always try to get better.We enjoy the Groundhog Day idea of trying to get better.We also write new stuff all the time and put it in. Just in Vegas over the past few years we’ve put in six hours of new material. One day, we want to do one long show of every trick we’ve ever developed.

Tell us about a time a magic trick went horribly, terribly wrong.

Things never go just the way we want.We’re always trying to get better. That having been said, we do stuff that’s supposed to look very dangerous and be very very safe.We have never had a serious injury of us, our crew or our audiences. That’s the way it should be. It’s a roller coaster: you should feel like you’re going to die and know you’re going to be safe.

If there were a fan Hockey Hall of Fame

10:50 am

On Nov. 5, the Hockey Hall of Fame honours its latest inductees. What if this year the Leaf faithful had a say?

THEY ARE THE energy guys, the brawlers, the checking defencemen and the less-than-perfect but totally memorable goaltenders. In a hockey town such as Toronto, fans fall in love with the most colourful of characters — the ones that hearken back to hockey’s heyday.

When talk turns to fan favourites, the name Wendel Clark is never far behind. One of the most popular Leafs,well, in history, Clark’s rugged play and penchant for the odd brouhaha, combined with a deft scoring touch, endeared him to Leafs fans for all time.

This was also the case with Dave “Tiger” Williams, who was a record setter in the penalty-minutes category (he still holds the all-time mark for career penalty minutes), but despite his time in the box, he managed to pot quite a few goals, as well. Williams’s enthusiasm for the game is legendary, and despite being traded to those bums in Vancouver, he is still considered one of the most popular Maple Leafs. These guys might take their playing style from another legendary Leaf by the name of Eddie Shack.

The novelty song “Clear the Track, Here Comes Shack” was entitled in his honour. Shack spent five seasons as the Leafs chief agitator and won a Stanley Cup with the team in 1967.

And who can forget goaltender Mike Palmateer — the born-and-bred Torontonian was unlike any other goalie in the league, and that wasn’t always a good thing: nicknamed the Popcorn Kid, Palmateer was cocky, colourful and always entertaining — or even a Leafs legend such as Bill Barilko, immortalized in song by the Tragically Hip. Despite being a checking defencemen, he ended up scoring a Stanley Cup winning goal in 1951, then promptly disappeared. His body was found 11 years later.

The list goes on and on. Steve “Stumpy” Thomas quickly endeared himself to Leafs fans, as did Darcy Tucker. Other fan favourites include scoring machine Rick Vaive as well as spark plugs such as Peter Zezel and Bill Derlago. If there were an NHL hall of fame for fan favourites, surely it would be plastered with Leafs’ blue and white.

Waging the great homework war

9:33 am

IT’S FUNNY HOW many people I know who are really good at Grade 3 math. It’s all the practice that does it. First you do it yourself. Then you do it with your first child.

By the time you do it with your second child, you’re really good at Grade 3 math.

By doing the homework, you have avoided the homework wars.

Avoidance is an oft-chosen parenting strategy. As parents we choose avoidance when the alternative is too ugly to face.

The homework wars are the school-age version of the supermarket candy battle. Before we became parents, did we ever imagine that an apparently simple matter like going shopping for food or doing homework would become battlegrounds that make trench warfare look pretty?

It sounds like “I can’t do it.… I don’t understand.” At that point your child is either whining or crying. When you ask if the teacher taught the material at school they say, “Yes but I didn’t understand.”

This kicks off Battle #1 in the homework wars. Who does the homework, you or them? In theory, of course, they should do it. In practice when you have a freaking child it’s so difficult not to run a rescue operation and do the dratted Grade 3 math.

The perils of that approach are several. By running the homework rescue operation, we message our children that we’re not really sure they can do it. We reduce their confidence.We deprive them of an opportunity to learn both Grade 3 math and the courage and skills to deal with challenges. A corollary to these downsides is the one I often hear from teachers: Do you think they’re fooled when you do the homework? Not when they see the kid in class every day!

Battle #2 in the homework wars is simply getting them to do it. If your child won’t do his or her homework, you have two choices: You can sit and do the homework with them, you can nag and cajole and threaten and bribe them to do their homework — then you’re making it our homework.

Which is fine if you need some more practice at Grade 3 math. Go for it. But if your goal is something different — like raising a resourceful, independent, competent child — is making it our homework going to get your child there? Try letting them do own their homework.

Do some research: If your child is chronically saying that they can’t do their homework because they don’t understand the work, talk to the teacher and find out if your child is having learning issues … in that classroom with that teacher. Is he understanding (and demonstrating it) in class?

If no, then your child needs some help with learning skills or some extra tutoring in that subject to get up to grade level. If the teacher says your kid is clearly demonstrating comprehension of the material in question, then you have a compliance problem. Nothing you do will change that — until you start doing nothing.

Until your child owns her homework, she will not take responsibility for it. As long as she can manipulate you into making it our homework, she won’t step up — because she doesn’t have to. You’ve given her a great free ride. Let it be 100 per cent theirs — which means they own 100 per cent of the success and 100 per cent of the failure. Failure is a logical consequence they may need to experience in order to decide to actually DO their homework.

Absent of that experience, how do they get motivated? By you? I haven’t seen it work that way.

Low-tech bar throws dice with 1,500 vintage board games

8:56 am

IS COMMUNAL SCRABBLE an underrated icebreaker? Ben Castanie thinks so. He and his partner, Aurelia Peynet, are the latest to stock their newly opened eatery — Snakes and Lattes, 600 Bloor St.W. — with a wall of classic board games for customer use.

“It’s a different way to interact,” he says, of the nearly 1,500 vintage games he and Peynet have scrounged over the years. He says customers swing by the low-tech locale for a game or two for different reasons, socialization and nostalgia being a couple.

At the Holy Oak Café (1241 Bloor St. W.), Wednesdays are reserved for game prime time. Justin Oliver, co-owner, says dozens of people come in to socialize and play throughout the evening, swigging pints and battling it out over Scrabble, Cathedral and Blokus.

Other hideouts that serve up Boggle with their brew include the Bishop and the Belcher (175 Bloor St.E.), Paully’s Pub (1240 Yonge St.), Disgraceland (965 Bloor St. W.) and Kilgour’s Bar Meets Grill (509 Bloor St.W.).

Andrew Kilgour, owner of Kilgour’s, and a Scrabble enthusiast, has designated Mondays as the bar’s official Scrabble night.

“All kinds of people come in,” he says, noting that players sometimes compete until the wee hours of the morning. “From kids to professionals, I mean, we’re talking top ranked.” There is only one rule: no clocks.

“This way a less-advanced player can come up to two professionals and talk to them. If a clock’s ticking away, they might be less inclined to chat.”

Kilgour says Scrabble players — sometimes up to 40 on a Monday night — come for the social aspect, too, especially in the summer when the patio begs for a cold drink and an outdoor Scrabble match.

At the Pie Shack (2305 Queen St. E.), decks of cards get so much use owner Tim McConvey has to replace them almost every week. For Snakes and Lattes, which boasts the largest board game selection of any café in Toronto, are there plans to have organized tournaments?

“Well, we’ve thought about it,” says Castanie. “But we’ve just opened, so we haven’t made any definite plans. For the moment, people just seem happy to come in on their own time.”

Caplansky's new menu: Veggie-loaded ratatouille, maple-dipped fried chicken, and the leaning tower of Caplansky

12:24 pm

The man – Zane Caplansky – who made his mark with his house-smoked, hand-cut meat, is warming up to herbivores.

Not that Caplansky’s Delicatessen is getting rid of old favourites. Slow-cooked barbeque beef brisket still graces the menu, as do meaty lunch standards like hot deli sandwiches with smoked turkey and the smoked meat poutine.

But Caplansky himself decided to turn the menu on its head recently, in hopes of attracting meatless fanatics to the door of his College street deli.

New additions to the menu include veggie-loaded ratatouille and rice, Ontario trout (baked or pan-seared, your choice) and dinner-sized Greek salad.

The lunchtime crowd now has the option of an egg salad or a roasted vegetable and goat cheese sandwich.

Caplansky has added a few other items too, keeping with his classic meat theme. A ten-ounce meatloaf is available for dinner and as a sandwich for lunch. The new maple-dipped fried chicken has been a hit, he says, along with the smoked lamb kebob, served with rice and creamy dill sauce.

What else?

"The Leaning Tower of Caplansky has been a good seller," he says. "Like crazy-good."

And what in the world is that?

Three slices of stacked french toast, he says, with layers of cream cheese, blueberry jam and bacon. Topped with maple syrup and fresh fruit, the ambitious breakfast goes for $12.

356 College Street , (416) 500-3852

Local dancer and survivor organizes a moving fundraiser

3:42 pm

MARC KIMELMAN WAS on his way to becoming a successful choreographer in New York City when he was diagnosed with cancer. Within weeks, he was back in the GTA, living with his parents and undergoing chemotherapy.

Coming home helped the area resident to focus his energy on getting better, he says.

“I was able to give my body the proper time it needed to heal,” says Kimelman.

Not everyone he encountered was so fortunate, which is why Kimelman recently put together I Move Forward, a performance event designed to raise money for artists affected by cancer. So far, more than $23,000 will go to support the Actors’ Fund of Canada.

The event brought together choreographers, dancers, musicians and singers to perform six segments. Each segment reflected a theme from Lance Armstrong’s acronym for cancer, the first being courage.

For Kimelman, it was important to give back. He was touched by the stories he heard while he was undergoing treatment.

“I was very heartbroken in the hospital,” he says. “Not so much by my situation, but more so from meeting my fellow patients, who were unable to have the luck that I had.”

Of all the people Kimelman met during his treatment, he remembers one man in particular — a single father of two.

The man had only begun chemotherapy a few weeks earlier, and after a rigorous day of treatment, he drove from Sunnybrook Hospital to a Newmarket farm to do hard labour.

“He probably hadn’t felt the full side effects yet,” Kimelman says. “I just remember thinking how hard it is for me to get up the stairs to my bedroom after chemo, and even just focusing to read a book can be difficult, let alone work.”

The father didn’t really have a choice though, says Kimelman. He was doing it to support his sons in university.

The inspiration for the event came from Kimelman’s friends, who brought up the idea of putting a performance together to raise money for the charity of his choosing.

Kimelman worked on organizing it from his hospital bed.

“This has been an amazing creative outlet for me,” he says. “It gave me something to think about other than the illness, and it really energized me and inspired me to keep moving forward.”

The physical toll of Kimelman’s illness was tough. He couldn’t do the thing he loved for about five months.

“Dance is what drives my life, and it’s the means of expression that most satisfies me,” he says. “Just knowing that there were other people dancing their hearts out for me during that time gave me hope to just keep getting stronger.”

Kimelman finished his treatment a few weeks ago, and he’s doing well. Donations can continue to be made at www.imoveforward.ca.

Leslieville's Joy Bistro closed for a facelift

3:05 pm

Joy Bistro is about to be upgraded and in more ways than one. After 11 years in business, the brunch staple in the Queen Street East area has shut down for renovations.

Owner Steven Pelton says he wants to change people’s impressions of the place.

"With the neighbourhood changing, there are a lot of people my age, 36 years old, moving into this area," he says. "In short, we want to be Leslieville’s favourite place to hang out."

Pelton says he felt the old space offered more of a "formal dinner" type atmosphere. He is changing that by renovating the main and upper level of the restaurant. On the first floor will be the bar area, which Pelton hopes will draw more people during the week for a casual “catch-up” type drink.

On the second floor will be the expanded 80-seat dining room area. The floors will be reclaimed wood and there will be wooded accents throughout the restaurant.

"We want to really give it a warm and cozy feel," he says.

Joy Bistro is set to reopen on November 11.

(884 Queen St E, 416-465-8855)

Haisai named best new restaurant in Canada

3:16 pm

After sending their food critic to more than 200 restaurants across Canada, enRoute Magazine has named celebrated chef Michael Stadtländer’s Haisai as the best new restaurant of 2010.

Haisai, located about two hours northwest of Toronto in the village of Singhampton, is nearby Stadtländer’s famed Eigensinn Farm.

"Dinner here is a fairy tale, the kind with a very happy ending," food writer Sarah Musgrave said Thursday in a press release.

Two Toronto restaurants, Local Kitchen and Wine Bar and Buca, also made the cut.

Musgrave praised Local Kitchen and Wine Bar for its "post-pretentious" attitude and from-scratch menu offerings and said Buca’s funghi pie, served with a dandelion salad with figs and crispy pig ears, was "superlative."

Here’s the full list from enRoute, which is published by Air Canada:

1. Haisai, Singhampton, Ontario
2. Bao Bei Vancouver
3. Cava Montreal
4. Local Kitchen & Wine Bar Toronto
5. Stone Soup Inn Cowichan Valley, B.C.
6. Charcut Roast House, Calgary.
7. Quatrefoil Dundas, Ontario
8. EdGe Sooke, B.C.
9. Buca, Toronto
10. Le Quartier Général, Montréal

The grand design

Andrew Mannsbach

2:31 pm

DEBBIE TRAVIS IS widely regarded as a pioneering home decorator: she created one of the first decorating shows to air in North America.

The British-born former model — along with her business partner and husband, Hans Rosenstein — now calls Toronto home. The designing duo essentially began their courtship with marriage. Debbie shares their story.

How they met

It was 1985 and I had been invited to a party in Cannes, and of course, I was doing what everyone does in Cannes: behaving badly. I was actually there with another date, when I saw this cute guy across the room. He asked me to dance, and I said, “Sure,” but then my date came over, tapped me on the shoulder, and he actually picked me up and threw me into the pond.

So here I am, soaking wet, and I have to get changed and everything. It was just a big mess. So that’s how [Hans and I] met initially, and three weeks later, we were married.

The proposal

Well, I don’t really remember. We tend to remember how we met, more so than the proposal.

I guess it was when we were stuck in traffic in a tunnel, and he sort of said, “Well, I’m going back to Montreal, so if you don’t come now, you’ll never see me again.” And I said, “Well OK then. Yes.” And I moved to Montreal. Yes, he already lived in Montreal. He was working in television production.

The Wedding

We got married in the Whalley- Abbey Church [in Yorkshire, England), which has very steep, old steps. I remember that.

Their lives today

We have two sons, who are 20 and 21 years old, and they’re both in university. One is in London, and the other one is in Paris. At least I hope they’re in university — God knows what they’re doing over there. Yes, we both handle our production company, Whalley-Abbey Media — yes, named after the church we got married in.

Working together

Yes, we do work in the same office. My husband handles mostly the business side of things, and I work on more of the creative side of everything.

At first we didn’t tell people we were married, but we do now. I remember being at this breakfast meeting — and I hate breakfast meetings; I can’t stand trying to eat and talk at the same time.

And Hans was eating a croissant, and of course he was getting croissanty crumbs all over his lips. And without thinking, I reached over and wiped them off, and everyone’s eyes popped out of their head.

And we’re very different, personality-wise. He is sort of very calm. He gets things done. In many ways, it’s almost easier [to work with your spouse]. I mean, we both have the same goals, at the end of the day. In a lot of workplaces, it can be disheartening — I mean, if everyone is going off on vacation for a holiday or something and you can’t afford it. When you’re married and you’re working together with your partner, if you don’t have the money for a holiday, you don’t go!

Relationship advice

I think you really have to admire each other. You have to admire the way that person speaks,the way they laugh, and admire what they’re interested in.

I mean, I don’t care how slim you are and how much Botox you’ve had, you’re still 45. And in the end, that admiration is what is going to keep him from straying. I think it’s the little things, too. I mean, if you hate the way he sneezes on the first date, 20 years later, you’re still going to hate the way the bastard sneezes. Also, I think we both have the same goals, when it comes to our children, when it comes to creativity.

Home sweep home

2:24 pm

SIOBHAN MURPHY WAS a self-described “non-athlete” during her days at North Toronto Collegiate Institute.This summer, when she and her castmates on the set of the new CBC series Men with Brooms hit the ice for some curling lessons, little had changed.

“You’re on a massive sheet of ice with funny shoes, and you’re hucking rocks at each other. It’s sort of a recipe for disaster if you don’t know what you’re doing,” says Murphy.

“Suddenly I have mad respect for all the middle-aged men I see doing it on television because you have to be very limber and strong.” Murphy’s character, April, is a new arrival to the curling-mad town of Long Bay and knows nothing about the game, until she strikes up a will-they-won’t-they dalliance with the captain of the local curling team, played by Toronto actor Brendan Gall.

The series follows on the 2002 film of the same name starring Paul Gross. For this TV incarnation, Gross is executive producer, narrator and sometime cameo star. Having the acting veteran Gross on set was a comforting experience for Murphy, who starred in the W Network sitcom The Smart Woman Survival Guide and had small roles on The Bridge and Across the River to Motor City before landing Brooms.

“We’re all nervous little actors trying to do the best we can and prove our worth,and he breezed in with a lovely openness and had fun and got people loose, and that was a great thing to see, especially because he’s Paul Gross and our executive producer and the big boss,” says Murphy.

Long before she could credit Gross as her acting role model, her strongest source of advice was Ms. Kate Boutillier, her drama teacher at North Toronto. “She said, ‘You’re good at this. You should do this. This is something you have inside of you,’”says Murphy.“It was maybe the first and only time a teacher singled me out on something that I felt really excited about but was unsure about. Because what do you know when you’re 17? You’re not sure you’re good at anything.”

During auditions,Murphy felt an unusual connection to the role of April and to auditionmate Gall.“We’re Canadians, and we’re all very modest and humble, and you’re supposed to say, ‘I hoped they would choose me,’ but I was like,‘No. Eff this. I’m the girl, and we’re supposed to be the guy and the girl in the show. We’re funny together. We make sense together.’”

Luckily, the producers saw the same things in the young actor and signed her on. As for her ability to portray a terrible curler, that came naturally.

Big Ben’s Little Chile

2:10 pm

DON’T GET ME wrong, I like a feel-good news story as much as the next man, but I don’t understand why a wave of civic pride spread among the world’s Chileans just because some of its salt of the earth got stuck in some dirt.

“You’re an idiot,” says my friend Nicolas Araya, whose family is Chilean and who promised to be my tour guide on a journey to the heart of Toronto’s hidden Chilean world.

Apparently,there are three places in the city where Chileans en masse are found: Scarborough, Jane and Finch and Kensington Market. It didn’t take us long to choose Kensington to explore.

“We were screaming, crying, ‘Oh my God!’”says Irene Morales,the 55-year-old owner of Jumbo Empanadas in the heart of Toronto’s Little Chile neighbourhood on the slice of Augusta Avenue that’s closest to Dundas Street. During the rescue of the miners, CBC was reporting live from her storefront, and Morales, who was hosting a meeting of the Chilean Women’s Association at the time, says there wasn’t a dry eye in the room.

Morales, who moved to Toronto in 1985 and opened her restaurant in 1990, bakes something like 3,300 beef, chicken and vegetable empanadas each week and says she sat riveted to her television watching her 33 countrymen be rescued from their underground tomb.

“Chilean people are always connected to tragedy, but when this happened, there was a national sense of solidarity,” says Morales, whose daughter works the cash register in her bonita restaurante, its walls emblazoned with Chilean maps,flags and stickers that read, “Fuerza Chile,” which translates roughly to “Don’t mess with Chile or we’ll kick your ass.”

“Chile is a long and narrow country at the end of the continent, and somehow I think that connects us,”says Morales,who wears the Chilean flag on her apron and headband. She has big muscles and a big sense of humour and says she felt a spiritual link to the trapped men.

“I always had a feeling that the miners were alive,” says Morales, who has five children, three in Toronto and two that still call Santiago, Chile, home. “I think what makes Chileans so proud of the experience with the miners is that our government didn’t forget them. How would you feel if your country forgot about you?”

I would hate it if my country forgot me in a mine, I’m telling Nic over Morales’s jumbo empanadas and a $30 bottle of good Chilean red wine,but then again,I’d hate it if I were a miner. Nic says he’s proud of his countrymen’s sense of style.

“Not only did the miners insist on having cigarettes lowered to them during their capture, but they also asked for combs,”says Nic,refilling his glass.“These guys are Latin. You’re not going to go on TV all disheveled, even if you are stuck in a mine.”

That Latin machismo and spirit of “Fuerza Chile”is perhaps best represented across the street from Jumbo Empanadas on Augusta Avenue, at Segovia Meat Market Ltd., whose owner, Leonardo S. Segovia,has tattoos of the Chilean islands on his beefy shoulders.

“Irene’s empanadas are good,” says Segovia — who is a butcher and chef and makes 17 different types of sausages, using his grandmother’s recipes. “I know they’re good; [Irene] learned everything she knows from us.”

Indeed, Morales used to work for Segovia. The butcher, who wears his hair pushed back in a tight ponytail and has that dangerous twinkle in his eye of a Miami drug lord, says there’s no animosity in Toronto’s Little Chile. Besides, cheering for the miners unified his block.

“Personally, I felt a sense of national pride,” says Segovia, whose elegantly named Brazilian wife, Graziela, makes a wicked version of Chilean chili where, for three dollars, she combines three types of spicy sausage with three types of tangy beans.

A feel-good news story usually encourages people to let bygones be bygones,but in Little Chile,some rivalries remain.When asked about the quality of El Gordo Fine Foods, the Chilean butcher shop and restaurant located next door, Segovia laughs.

“That dude’s not Chilean. He’s a gringo,”says Segovia.“That dude’s white.” Ouch! But Graziela helps clarify. “Don’t listen to my husband,” she says, smiling. “It’s his brother that he’s talking about.”

Inside El Gordo Fine Foods, I ask Alfonso Segovia what he makes of his brother’s comments.

“My brother and I both left Chile together with our parents. He was three and I was 10, and now he’s more Chilean than I am?” asks Alfonso, who sells 60 different types of empanadas. “You want to see my flag? This is my flag,” he says, pointing to his floor-to-ceiling, red and white Canadian Maple Leaf banner.“My brother can talk all he wants about Chile, but even he knows that I’m the better chef.”

That the Chilean chefs in Kensington Market are as competitive as they are is good news for the empanada-eating rest of us.El Gordo Fine Foods makes a lamb empanada that’s just as fresh and delicious as the beef empanada I had from Morales and the chili that Leonardo makes with his wife at Segovia Meat Market Ltd.

A miracle happened last month in Chile, and for the Chilean community that lives and works in Kensington Market, it could signal a new day. Alfonso Segovia says he used to live in a condo at Yonge and King Streets, but a divorce settlement forced him to move into the Little Chile section of Kensington Market.Where does Alfonso live now? Above his little brother’s butcher shop.

“I used to have a pool and a Jacuzzi — I had everything — but I guess that’s just life,” says Alfonso, smiling. “I’m Chilean, though, and my fortunes will change because today everyone knows what it means to be Chilean: that miracles can happen. We all saw that when those people escaped from the mine.”

Ben Kaplan is a feature writer for the National Post.

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