SURREY — As sisters who grew up in the family fishing business, Katherine Hamill and Ainsley Denike know their way around a ship’s galley.
In particular, they’ve learned to make plenty of meals and snacks with the products of their family’s Sundance Seafoods business, launched in a Ladner garage in 1990 and now located on 56th Avenue in Cloverdale.
Now, the siblings’ love of cooking has been taken to the next level in a related business enterprise.
They’ve become the Loxy Ladies, a cooking-demo duo that makes appearances at events locally and across Canada.
Both sisters also work at Sundance in different jobs – Katherine in sales and Ainsley as a personal assistant for their dad, Mike Denike, the company boss.
“While working here we noticed that so many people have limited knowledge about what to do with smoked salmon other than, like, a cheese-and-cracker kind of thing,” Katherine said. “So we put together an Instagram account with most of our recipes, and then it blossomed from there.
“We got invited to do quite a few food demonstrations, a lot at trade shows where we’re selling the product,” she added. “Here in B.C., we literally have the best salmon in the world, so we’re just trying to give people more knowledge about what to do with it, how to entertain with it.”
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This week, the Loxy Ladies will demo at the Vancouver International Boat Show, which begins today (Wednesday, Jan. 18) and continues until Sunday (Jan. 22) at BC Place Stadium and Granville Island.
Posted to their Instagram.com/loxy_ladies account are photos and recipes for items like West Coast Select Smoked Salmon BLT Pizza and Super Spicy Salmon with Crispy Brussels Sprouts, along with “Sunday simplicity” appetizers made of toasted sourdough baguette, organic cream cheese, wild smoked salmon, fresh cracked pepper and capers.
If you’re fond of smoked salmon and other seafood, it’s a good place to get hungry.
On social media and in person, it’s a whole new world for the sisters, who plan to take things to another level in 2017 by doing more demo events.
“We’re pretty busy with our positions at work, so this is just a side hobby that we have fun with, but it’s gone above and beyond what we thought it might be,” Katherine explained.
“It’s fun, and more modern,” she added. “If dad had his way it’d be all pen and paper, but this is more about social media and newer aspects of doing business.”
At the boat show, The Loxy Ladies will do boat-related cooking demos – that is, food that people can make for themselves and guests while aboard their boat.
“We’ll focus on happy hour and those times of having guests pop in, because that’s what happens when you own a boat,” Katherine said with a laugh.
“And our dad is coming on Friday to do a special, quick course about how to properly fillet a salmon, with some tips and tricks, which we didn’t do last year. Yes, Mike Denike will be making a special appearance.”
The “Loxy Ladies” will be at the boat show’s cooking demo stage daily from 2 to 4 p.m. More event details are posted at Vancouverboatshow.ca.
tom.zillich@thenownewspaper.com
