Fans of Stephen Soderbergh’s  film The Limey might recognize the line, “more like a vibe,” which the very young girlfriend of Valentine, played by Peter Fonda, uses to describe his personality.

You might use the same four words to explain what the famed former Toronto restaurant, The Depanneur – named for the scrappy little Montreal convenience stores offering late-night smokes and beer – was to its followers. It was truly “A Place Where Interesting Food Things Happen,” as its front window announced in the distinctive hand-lettered style of Dougie Kerr, the man who gave Honest Ed’s department store its graphic appeal.

For 10 years, founder and guiding light Len Senater played host to a rotating series of dinners, talks and events in a tiny converted variety store in west-end Toronto. Its style was shabby chic, with “an emphasis on the shabby,” says Senater, who hails from Montreal, but was raised in Toronto. The Depanneur, prompted by slim finances, dispensed with the tired concept of matching plates, cups and cutlery.  The whole idea was to showcase “all of this remarkable culinary talent sitting in the city.”

 

 

Inspired by the pop-up dining phenomenon, Senater created a place where everyone could try their hand at cooking for others: from people who were “curious and enthusiastic, like me,” he says, “or immigrants [who were] trying to find an on-ramp to participate in food” to “students or even professional chefs who didn’t necessarily have the creative freedom to do the food that really interested them.” For 300 days a year, The Depanneur let them loose in the kitchen. 

Indeed, many people who got their start there went on to establish businesses, notably the sister-in-law team of Seema and Amreen Omar. United in grief after the death of Seema’s husband, they began cooking together. The Depanneur gave them an outlet and set them on a path that resulted in the opening Bombay Street Food Co. in Toronto.

Then, due to COVID-19, successive rent hikes and its founder’s exhaustion, The Depanneur called it a day in 2022. Even as he was winding it down, though, Senater, 53, was working on what might be called its memorial, The Depanneur Cookbook.

 

 

Creating the book was “definitely challenging,” says Senater. “For anyone who does want to make their own cookbook,” he points out, producing “an anthology [with] 100 contributors who have never written recipes or who perhaps don’t speak English as a first language is not necessarily the easiest way to start.”

If the place is gone, its spirit certainly lives on in these pages. Senater rounded up 100 recipes from 100 cooks who did time at The Depanneur.  Eclectic doesn’t quite cut it; let’s go with tasty. And surprising. There’s Newfoundland Cod Chowder and Persian Herb Frittata for appetizers, Burmese Fermented Tea Salad and Vegan Chopped Liver for sides, and Squid Ink Gnocchi with Calamari, Cherry Tomatoes and Arugula and Tibetan Dumplings for mains (or “stars” as the book puts it). For dessert, there’s that Brazilian Chocolate Caramel No-Bake Cake. 

The photography by Ksenija Hotic is marvellous; each recipe features a brief description of the dish, its origins and (in all but one case), a biography of the person or people who prepared the dish – with a brief on their relationship to the cuisine in question. In a nod to the style of the original establishment, there’s a judicious use of colour and that Kerr-like hand-lettered font in the book, designed largely by Senater (drawing on 15 years’ experience in digital design, teaching design technology and developing a graphic design career).

However, Senater had to deal with a lot of cooks who “don’t even use recipes,” and even, if they had them, “there was this wild mix of metric and imperial.” The chefs might tell him that a dish served four. “I’m like, it makes six litres! This is not for four people.” The photo might show carrots in the dish that weren’t mentioned in the recipe. So, a template was designed for each recipe and then the dishes were tested. “We also interviewed all 100 people to get quotes for each recipe and that in itself was a major project.”

Furthermore, he says, “I quickly discovered that the only business model worse than the one I had was Canadian cookbook publishing.” The photography, the interviewing and the recipe testing cost a lot. And paying  contributors – which connected with how The Dep had originally done business – mattered to Senater, even if “it was only an honorarium.” What he had was an enthusiastic community of all the people who had eaten there or connected with the Dep over the years. He turned to them in November 2020, inviting his supporters to contribute to a Kickstarter campaign. In a short time, he had raised $60,000. That’s when publishers became responsive; Simon & Schuster Canada published it on March 5.

These days Senater keeps busy promoting food events, which “showed me I could host a big event and I didn’t need my own venue” and of course, promoting The Depanneur Cookbook. Ultimately, what he has produced is not necessarily “a chef book. It’s not a celebrity book. It’s not a cuisine book.” So, what is it? “It’s a book about, you know, the culinary life of Toronto.”

Well, really, “more of a vibe.”