Chicken, splake, stools and Wilford—bringing the farm inspiration to Toronto

I spent the weekend at the farm, smoking chickens for an upcoming dinner—I dry cure them first and smoke them for a day and then barbecue them. They come out looking like Peking chicken, country style. Those smoky, sweet birds are going to be a staple at Union, along with elk tempura sliders, mirin-glazed sardines and some classics, like steak frites and maybe even red veal tartare (something I picked up in Piedmont). But we will see how that goes over. I am also talking to a few bread makers, trying to figure out how to make my own yeast from the apples at the farm; specifically, I want to make a sourdough starter, so that Union can have its own unique bread that gets better and better as the restaurant grows. While the birds were smoking, I went out to do the rounds. I picked up some splake to smoke from Collingwood Fisheries and hit the hundred-mile market to get some lamb, then made a date for the farmers’ dinner. I went into Owen Sound to Wilford and Hanna’s place to pick up the ’50s cigarette stools for the horseshoe bar at Union. Wilford is the man. He’s got a barn full of everything: boats, old broken Mercedes, stoves, cast iron pots and pans, big-ass fans and radios, pine floors, mirrors and pretty much everything else. His wife, Hanna, has a vintage clothing store in Clarksburg, and when I told her some of the design ideas for Union, she told me to go see Wilford. We spent a couple of hours together in his garage—he is a cool old guy who, like me, likes to bust out the double denim. He looks like Paul Newman in Cool Hand Luke. I left with a beautiful double-barrel stainless sink and square-top storage cabinet for the kitchen, as well as an old diner-style hot water heater. It was a great country afternoon with Wilford—he’s got a peaceful sparkle to him, like he is doing exactly what he wants to be doing. Attached to the barn is a broken-down roofless stone house that he dreams of living in. It’s a long shot, though. As he put it, it’s good to wake up with dreams, because if you don’t, you just have a pain in your side all day long. Amen to that.”