The allure of fresh eggs daily and natural pest control is too much for some Toronto locavores, and despite the city's prohibition, some residents are quietly keeping chickens in their backyard. One midtown woman, we'll call her Toronto Chicken, has started an online petition to change that bylaw.

Toronto Chicken is not alone, in Toronto and elsewhere. As eating local food becomes more and more popular, urban dwellers are increasingly looking to their governments to loosen regulations regarding backyard non-commercial livestock.

Although the annonymous chicken keeper has quietly kept her birds for a year, she feel like it is time to go public and change the bylaws, making her chickens - Clucky, Sally and Hybie - legal residents of Toronto.

Things are heating up at Centennial Park, where the annual Toronto Ribfest is well underway. The opportunity to stuff your gut with slow cooked pork, kettle corn and funnel cakes runs through Tuesday, 11am to 11pm daily.

Just about any ribfest is on my short list of summer festivals, and this year's cookout certainly didn't disappoint on its opening night.

Toronto's roti scene is about as good as it gets outside of the West Indies, and I'd heard plenty of good things about Vena's Roti in particular, so it was with excitement that I headed to the self-proclaimed best roti shop in town. Turns out Vena's is short on decor and long on great food.

Read my full review of Vena's Roti in the Restaurants section.

City planners have nixed the Berkeley Playing Fields, a sustainable design meets Toronto condo development project. The striking and imaginative design would have offered a modern counterpoint to the historic Berkeley Church, which was to remain standing (and protected!) under the new building.

"Make no little plans," celebrated Chicago architect and planner Daniel Burnham once remarked, "they have no magic to stir men's blood and probably will not themselves be realized."

Apparently the opposite is true in Toronto, where un-magical condo after condo goes up - I can hardly tell one from another - and a stunning project like this only stirs the ire of city planners.

Fresh Ontario strawberries are taking centre stage in several of Toronto's best restaurants this month. The First Fruits of Spring festival is happening this month, with weekend strawberry-focused events and the restaurant program kicking in next week, June 23-29.

"Anticipation is a beautiful thing," says chef Jamie Kennedy, "When you eat strawberries in late June, courtesy of our local growers, you are rewarded with a perfume and sweetness that defines the season."

Although I may not have said it like Chef JK, I eagerly anticipate Ontario strawberry season each year and love it when I can make it out to a farm to pick my own.

The familiar theme to Hockey Night in Canada will live on, but on a different network for different programming. CTV made a surprise announcement today that they have secured exclusive rights to The Hockey Theme, in perpetuity. CBC's popular sports program will still broadcast the games, but to a much different tune.

As a relative newcomer to Toronto, I didn't have the opportunity to grow up with Hockey Night in Canada. To me, the only national anthem has been O Canada. But I knew for many (millions of?) Canadians, a different song symbolized their country. And once I became a resident, and certainly as recently as the latest playoff cycle, I found myself feeling a little bit better when that catchy beat came on the air.

Listen to the iconic tune after the jump.