Filipino eatery shut down by Toronto Public Health

PopGoesTheNews.com A Filipino restaurant in Toronto that opened only eight months ago was ordered shut down on May 15 by public health officials.

An inspector hit FV Foods on Wilson at Bathurst with 12 infractions, including a “significant” failure to maintain adequate pest control and “crucial” failures to maintain hazardous foods at 60 degrees C or hotter and to thoroughly re-heat hazardous foods.

But the restaurant was issued a summons and ordered closed for a “crucial” failure to prevent “gross unsanitary conditions.”

The list of infractions also includes failures to protect food from contamination.

The closure order comes after the restaurant failed two previous random inspections.

On Jan. 16, FV Foods received a Conditional Pass due to 11 infractions, including “crucial” failures to ensure food “is not contaminated/adulterated” and to maintain hazardous foods at 60 degrees C or hotter.

Its first inspection, on Oct. 16, 2012, found nine infractions and resulted in a Conditional Pass. Toronto Public Health cited an employee for failing to wash hands and a “crucial” failure to maintain foods at the proper temperature.

The FV Foods at Wilson and Bathurst – one of six locations across the city – opened on Sept. 8, 2012 with a blessing by Rev. Fr. Albert Macalipay. It can re-open for business if it passes a follow-up inspection by Toronto Public Health.

On its website, the restaurant promises “a complete dining experience that includes outstanding service, wonderful food items, and a nice and cozy ambiance.”

Spoilers! Cameras roll on 'Amazing Race Canada'

Host Jon Montgomery

PopGoesTheNews Production of The Amazing Race Canada is well underway, as teams make their way across Canada in hopes of winning $250,000, Air Canada flights for a year and a pair of Chevrolet Corvette Stingrays.

Host Jon Montgomery -- who won a gold medal in the men's skeleton event at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver -- kicked off the race early on May 3 from the park on River Road at the foot of Clifton Hill in Niagara Falls, Ont.

The three-week race will wrap up May 24 in Toronto, where the final teams are scheduled to rappel the west tower of City Hall as one of their challenges.

The Canadian version of the reality series, which was first reported here, will stay within the country's borders.

Nine teams of two people are taking part in the inaugural Amazing Race Canada, including a competitor with two artificial legs.

In Niagara Falls, camera crews on the ground and a hovering helicopter followed the teams as they ran to get their first clue and their bags before getting into waiting cars.

Competitors drove themselves to Toronto Pearson airport to catch flights to Vancouver.

There, teams hit Canada Place, Chinatown (where they had to do a lion dance in the Chinese Garden), Gastown and the Richmond Olympic Oval before getting flights to Kelowna.

On May 8, teams were in Calgary, where stops included Fifth Avenue Place and Ranchman's Cookhouse & Dancehall for some line-dancing and bull-riding.

The week ended with seven teams in Yellowknife, where they were spotted at Pilot's Monument and in Old Town.

Last Monday, teams were in Regina, where they were challenged to Ukrainian dancing in front of City Hall and football drills at Mosaic Stadium -- home to the Saskatchewan Rough Riders.

At the RCMP Academy, competitors were escorted by Mounties in golf carts to their challenges.

Teams then flew to Quebec City – with a stopover at Toronto Pearson – and took on challenges involving ice carving in Old Quebec and lacrosse on the Plains of Abraham.

Teams hit the nation’s capital on Friday and cameras were rolling when the minor earthquake hit.

The Amazing Race Canada will debut July 15 on CTV.

The hypocrisy behind those Dove billboards

One of two billboards at Bloor and Church Streets in Toronto.

PopGoesTheNews.com Walk by the corner of Bloor and Church Streets in Toronto and you’re bound to notice billboards covered with bathing suits and soccer shoes – and people on the sidewalk snapping photos of them.

The eye-catching billboards are for Dove and its Real Beauty campaign, which aims to boost the self-esteem of women. The brand is owned by Unilever (located in the office tower on the opposite corner).

According to one of the Dove billboards, “50,405 Canadian girls will quit swimming because they feel bad in a bathing suit.”

Why do girls feel bad in bathing suits? Perhaps, in part, because they see commercials like this one (and this one, and this one) for AXE with skinny female models in bikinis.

Who makes AXE? That’s right, Unilever.

The second billboard reads: “112,670 Canadian girls will quit soccer because they’re unhappy with their bodies.”

Why are girls unhappy with their bodies? Perhaps, in part, because they’re told that they need products like Slim-Fast to obtain the perfect weight.

Who makes Slim-Fast? Yup, Unilever.

One of two billboards at Bloor and Church Streets in Toronto.

While it’s commendable that Dove is encouraging young women to feel better about their bodies, those young women should know the company is also partly responsible for making them feel badly about their bodies in the first place.

(Never mind the hundreds of children in low-income communities only blocks away from the corner of Bloor and Church who would love to have those swimsuits and soccer cleats.)

Unilever doesn’t use a lot of average- or plus-size women in its campaigns for beauty brands like St. Ives, Ponds, Noxzema, Trésemme, Vaseline, Sunsilk, Lever 2000 or Degree.

Nor does it see anything wrong with promoting Becel as a healthy alternative to butter while peddling Breyer's, Ben & Jerry's and Klondike. When Unilever sponsors the Becel Ride for Heart in support of the Heart & Stroke Foundation (part of its pledge to "to inspire women to take better care of that particular vital organ”), it hopes people won’t think too much about the damage to heart health caused by fatty frozen snacks and ice cream.