Red Canoe

No market on Sunday as my partner-in-markets was working. So instead, I will review Red Canoe, where I took my niece Julia for lunch on Friday. If you don't know Red Canoe, it's a combination book store/cafe on Harford Road in Lauraville, just south of Cold Spring Lane/Moravia Road. My niece is just learning to cook, and to really understand what makes some things taste better than others. She had gotten a blueberry muffin at the Towson Farmers' Market on Thursday, and liked it a lot. But she'd read the rave review that Richard Gorelick had written about their muffins last week. So she was interested to try Red Canoe's and see if she could discern a difference. Julia ordered a blueberry muffin along with an Oreo latteand I ordered a cup of gazpacho and a spinach/cheddar muffin. At her first taste of the muffin, Julia raved about it. I asked her what the difference was and she pointed out that the Red Canoe muffin had some lemon zest in it that made the flavour brighter. My gazpacho was a little spicy, but cool and refreshing, and the spinach muffin had bits of melted cheddar and mustard seeds from the grainy Dijon they use. All in all, a very successful lunch outing for Julia and me!