November TUM!

For the past 2 months the Toronto Underground Market (aka TUM) has eluded me.   Back in September I made the mistake of thinking I had plenty of time to buy my $5 ticket to this very intriguing event.  By the time I was ready to buy they were all sold out. And then I was too swamped to go in October and then I was in Italy when the November tickets went on sale. Damn! But I solved that problem by getting involved and volunteering, which I will come back to.

For those of you who have never heard of TUM this amazing celebration of food was the idea of founder Hassel Aviles who experienced a similar market in San Fransisco and wanted to bring this to Toronto.  TUM  celebrates the foods of budding entrepreneurs, many of which do not have exposure to the masses, giving them a fantastic opportunity to share their awesome creations like Egyptian street foods, homemade samosas, Filipino specialties and so much more.   There was even a high school (Thistletown High School Chefs) team raising money to send themselves to Italy (ahhh Italy…).  Oh and its also held at the very cool, very green, very beautiful space that is the Evergreen Brick Works.  It may be a pain in the arse to get there, but once you’re there, it’s totally worth it.

So back to volunteering.  Just by volunteering to set up, which is something that I actually really enjoy doing (it satisfies the Type A in me), I was able to attend the event afterwards at no cost! Helping out beforehand also gave me a sneak peek at what some of the vendors were preparing, giving me the inside scoop.   I’ve learned from attending other similar events that you’ve got to do an overview first otherwise you’ll be full before you’ve even gotten to the best stuff.  The exception to this rule is if you know right away that one vendor will be the highlight of the evening you get your a** there first!

Plates and ’samples’ were priced between $3-8 and the vendors represented the diversity of our city. Favorites of the evening included the AMAZING fish taco from La Carnita which started out as a pop up taco stand in downtown Toronto (I think they primarily sell art? check out the cool video on their website), a plate of nacho perogies (plain cheese perogies smothered in a home-made cheese sauce, ground beef, jalapeno, scallions and cilantro – holy sh*t YUM!) and a wickedly good banana bacon spring roll.  Wine, beer  and liquor vendors were also present and I discovered my new favourite winter drink in my apple cider spiked with Proof whisky.

I had an amazing time and met some incredible people who definitely made my night much more enjoyable than I had anticipated.  There is no doubt in my mind that I will be volunteering again and only hope to become more involved in this event.   For those of you who hope to attend, my advice would be to follow them on Twitter (@Toundrgroundmkt) or the blog or checking the website frequently.  You basically have 24 hours to buy a ticket or you can say good-bye to the yum-in-your-tum food!  I can’t wait until next time…