Globetrotting Musician Dave Bidini Eats Bone Marrow in Harbin and Goulash in Transylvania

With the looming threat of a Trump presidency, many of my friends have been talking about moving to Canada. Apparently it’s not just my friends — after Super Tuesday, Google searches for “how can I move to Canada” rose 350 percent.
There’s also that hunky feminist Prime Minister to consider.
Maybe now is a good time to become better acquainted with our future Canadian friends and neighbors. Let’s start with writer, musician, and recreational hockey player Dave Bidini.
Bidini is a versatile and productive artist who could be profiled in any number of the sections of this magazine. He’s a founding member of the Rheostatics (an influential Canadian band active from 1980-2007, who are scheduled to play a few reunion shows this year), has published twelve books, made two documentaries, wrote a play that was produced and a book that is being developed for the screen, and writes a weekly column for the Saturday Post. He’s the only person to have been nominated for a Canadian Gemini award for television, Genie award for film, and Juno award for music.
I wanted to talk with Bidini about food, and I knew he’d have plenty to say. After all, he’s a world traveler, both as a rock musician and as a writer. His book Around the World in 57 ½ Gigs (2008) describes his tour of England, Finland, Russia, China, Sierra Leone, and Ghana. Another book, Baseballissimo (2005), documents his time following an Italian baseball team. Paste chatted with Bidini about global culinary adventures such as these, as well as the virtues of on-stage gin and tonics, the dangers of pre-gig falafel, and the surprising difference between the perfect post-hockey game meal and the perfect post-rock show meal.
From the sound of it, we’re all gonna eat just fine in our new northern home.
Paste: You’re at a truck stop, you’re starving, and you have five minutes to assemble a meal. Please describe that meal, and how you feel about it.
Dave Bidini: I think, in its own way, a clubhouse sandwich can be quietly artisanal, or just plan good, so that’s always my default plan, especially if the turkey is real and off-the-bone, which it usually, surprisingly, is. I’ve always thought it’s a utilitarian way for a short order cook to prove that he or she can assemble with lightness and care. Burgers and fries are hatchet work, but the clubhouse requires some order and poetry. I’ve rarely been disappointed, even in the furthest outpost. And then maybe some pie. Pie is good, right?
Paste: Have you noticed any differences between a truck stop meal in Canada and one in the U.S.?
DB: As for Canadian versus America truck stops, it’s the same for both places: you have to know where and how to look. News of good truck stops are passed from word of mouth by bands the same way we talk, inversely, about shitty sound engineers, horrible club washrooms, rip-off promoters. News travels fast when there’s an oasis off this highway or that one: wild rice in Blind River, pierogies in Brandon, herring and eggs in Thunder Bay at The Hoito, the Finnish breakfast place.
Paste: When you’re traveling, what food from home do you crave?