Alberta Food Tours’ Favourite Eateries and Specialty Shops in Inglewood
The Inglewood neighbourhood is the birthplace of Calgary in 1875. Now, it’s home to the Music Mile and some of the city’s best eateries. We recently had the pleasure of sharing some of our favourite eateries and specialty shops in Inglewood with frontline tourism ambassadors from around the city. And now, we’re sharing them here with you.
Fine Dining in Inglewood
We started our tour just over the Elbow River from Confluence Historic Site and downtown Calgary at Deane House. This fully restored building was once the home of Calgary superintendent Richard Burton Deane. It made the cover of Popular Mechanics in 1929 when it was moved, completely intact, across the Elbow River to its current site through incredible engineering ingenuity. This is a place we love for brunch on the weekend with live jazz performances, cocktails at the cozy bar, high tea with friends, or a celebratory dinner feasting on their farm to table menu. The garden is Instagram friendly and while snapping selfies, you can also learn about Calgary’s oldest home, an 1876 Metis cabin, called Hunt House which is very happily situated there.
Another of Inglewood’s historic buildings is The Nash. This circa 1910 hotel is one of the few left in Alberta with its original livery still attached. Originally, a rough and tumble, belly to the bar, bourbon and beer drinking crowd of rebel-rousers hung out here. It is steps from the railway and workers spent their wages here and frequented the red light rooms up the back stairs. The outlaw, Sundance Kid, was known to shade the door. Mug shots of some of the patrons hang on the wall of The Nash’s Offcuts Bar. This is indeed a colourful place to visit but now the emphasis is on the succulent rotation of rotisserie meats executive chef Landon Schwarz serves up daily. More respectable folk also hung out here and one of them lived just down the street in what is now Rouge Restaurant.
Rouge Restaurant was the home of A.E. Cross. An early pioneer, his descendants still own the largest continuously family-owned ranch in Alberta. It’s just south of Calgary near Nanton and Rouge often serves beef from this place known as A7 ranch. Executive chef Paul Rogalski and chef de cuisine Dean Fast, guarantee there will be something fresh or preserved from Rouge’s own garden on every plate served. And, the Rouge team also sources from dozens of Alberta farms. Now, they also offer a foraged foods tasting menu. The latter is a celebration of Rogalski starring in Les Stroud’s Wild Harvest TV show. Most of Canada’s wild foods are foraged in Alberta’s boreal forests and this is a rare offer to experience those foods prepared with Rouge’s famous flourish. The original owner, A.E. Cross was not afraid to take a walk on the wild side.
Breweries in Inglewood
In 1892, he founded the Calgary Brewing and Malting Co – Alberta’s first brewery. While that brewery closed in 1994, Inglewood is home to several craft breweries including High Line, Ol’ Beautiful and Cold Garden. Plus, it’s only a hop (get it) away from Calgary’s Barley Belt with 14 more and a few distilleries to boot. Alberta barley is found in over 12 million bottles of beer worldwide and is highly sought after by the world’s leading distillers. For those that like to sample many beers, Raindog Bar is the perfect spot. Owned by Bill Bonnar, Calgary’s first and Canada’s ninth beer cicerone (beer sommelier), this cozy bar is the place to satisfy a curious palate with the best of Alberta’s beers (and the world’s) along with tasty gastropub quality food.
Inglewood Specialty Shops
Inglewood has lots of specialty stores and one of our favourites is loaded with spices.The Silk Road Spice Merchant is Canada’s leading purveyor of spices. They have a flagship store in Inglewood but also have shops in both Calgary Farmers’ Market South and West as well as one on Edmonton’s Whyte Ave. Visitors are relieved to learn that the Silk Road now ships anywhere in the world as well. Psst: The Silk Road Spice Merchant proudly sells Eat Alberta First, a Taste Canada Silver Medal winning cookbook by our founder Karen Anderson.
Across the street and down the way is Knifewear, where the culinary curious will find the world’s sharpest Japanese kitchen knives and likely the city’s best chefs hanging out while they dream of which knife to buy next. Neighbouring this destination store, is a destination lunch spot, Spolumbo’s.
Spolumbo’s was started in 1985 by three former Canadian Football Players, Mike Palumbo and Tom and Tony Spoletini. They combined their last names to form Spolumbo’s, opened this factory and restaurant in 1992, and they’ve been serving tasty, all-natural sausages and sandwiches in this 200+ seat deli ever since. Check out their daily specials. For us, it’s always a toss up between the spicy sausage or the meatball sub.
We like meat but we also enjoy plant-based meals. Vegans will also find Inglewood a great place to dine with Vegan Street and Canela as completely plant-based options. In fact, the cinnamon buns at Canela might even be our favourite in the city.
Inglewood’s Art Scene
Beyond food, Inglewood has its share of art as well. The Esker Foundation has a rotation of contemporary art exhibits and free admission. One of our all time favourite art galleries is a great place to end this post and any visit to the neighbourhood.
When you enter Moonstone Creation Native Art Gallery, the soft smell of tobacco and tanned hides greets you. Your eyes see walls covered in the art of over 60 Western Canadian Indigenous artists and you can touch and feel the softness of a bison fur, drums, or beaded jewelry. We never leave the shop without picking up some Mitshoh, Elder-approved bison pemmican sticks and some of their Prairie-berry teas.
We spent a few hours touring but as you can see, you could spend days exploring Inglewood’s diverse offerings. We haven’t even touched on the interesting boutiques, bookstores, world-famous record shop, and the original White Hat cowboy hat maker, Smithbilt Hats, that also calls this place home. Hopefully, we’ve piqued your interest and you’ll roam until you feel as at home here as we do.
And of course, Alberta Food Tours is always happy to provide guided tours for groups in Inglewood and throughout Calgary and Alberta. Please contact us at info@albertafoodtours.ca if you are interested.