...that's why hubby and I always find a Trader Joe's when we head to the States.
We do hit a T&T asian supermarket from time to time (Markham, Calgary), but like most asian markets, many items are grossly mislabeled. I found a "vegetarian" fake crab meat once, but when we got it home, it was indeed full of fish and fish juice. The label claimed it was only soy and water and oil, but it was clear that it was not that.
We've found the Loblaw section (and the Great Canadian SuperStore in Ajax) pretty good for some of the stuff I like.
We recently found Ryza, which is a Rice Milk
http://www.ryza.ca/ made from brown rice and water, pretty much. Our Loblaws in Pickering stocks it only in the "health food" section, not with the other milks and soymilks. None of the gross out levels of fillers, vanilla and sugars that soymilk has. It even has fibre. I found that it has a bit of a bitter after taste, though, so I'm working on how to over come that. Adding fresh fruit or a bit of sugar seems to help, but most of the time I just try not to the think about it.
I also find that No Frills has the best deals on large bags of brown rice, beans, lentils, and such.
And we shop at Bulk Barn for things like dried beans, spices, etc.
Costco has a nice wild rice/red rice/brown rice blend in a square plastic container. It's mildly expensive, but convenient. We love reusing the square container to hold our beans and rices -- maximum space efficiency in our cupboards.
Finally, we shop at a lot of small, local Indian stores for ideas and variety.
Since we stopped buying isolated soy stuff, we've almost completely given up schlepping Boca and Morning Star Farms stuff back over the border. We do occasionally indulge in Yves' "skewers" (we don't know what they actually call them". I find they are the tastiest veggie meat product (mostly gluten-based) I've ever had.
We used to go once a year to a Vegetarian Chinese place in Markham - Lotus Pond, maybe, but there's almost no English spoken there and it is heavy on isolated soy protein (what they call vegetable fibre) products and tonnes of fat. Just haven't made it back.
Have made a trip or two to Whole Foods, but I find that they don't really carry anything special in Canada. In the States, that's a whole other story.
Love the tips, keep them coming.
