Mardi Gras on Davie
From Thursday to Saturday (February 21 to 23), break out the boas, glitter, and beads and celebrate Davie Village’s third boffo Mardi Gras in high style. This year, your $10 wristband—available at Little Sister’s bookstore, Priape Vancouver, and participating bars—gets you discounts at many bars, eateries, and shops, and eliminates cover charges and lineups. Proceeds benefit the LGTB Centre at 1170 Bute Street.

Indian express
Newly opened at 955 West Broadway, Saravanaa Bhavan is part of a South Indian restaurant chain with about 50 outlets worldwide. It serves finely rendered vegetarian dishes (the rassam lentil soup for $2.50 is simply terrific), many of which feature in the daily 20-item, $9.40 lunch buffet.

Slow italia
Mark your calendar for 6 to 8 p.m. on Wednesday (February 27) and March 13, to take in the Italian Chamber of Commerce’s Taste of Italy seminar at the 39th and Cambie LDB store. This free two-part event explores the slow-food movement that’s rooted in Italy, and features Italian wines paired with samples from Lilikoi Specialty Food’s line of Italian organic nonprocessed gourmet foods. For registration information, see www.iccbc.com/ .

Bottled Royalty
On March 11, a remarkable gala dinner at the Four Seasons Hotel will see a gathering of winery royalty, the Primum Familiae Vini (Leading Wine Families, www.pfv.org/). This international association of some of the world’s finest wine-producing families from France, Germany, Italy, Portugal, and Spain includes Pol Roger, Rothschild, and Antinori among others. Seats at this rarified event are $350, to benefit the B.C. Mental Health Foundation. Contact bingram@bcmhs.bc.ca.

A Hardt-racing sale
The Once a Year Sale at Meinhardt Fine Foods (3002 Granville Street) starts Friday (February 22) and ends on March 2. Stock up on Bonne Maman jam from France (regularly $5.49, now $3.49 for a 250-millilitre jar), pecan-fruit crisps from Terra Breads (now $4.99, regularly $6.49), and the company’s granola is $11.99 per kilogram, down from $16.49.

Let it seed
One of spring’s first signs is Seedy Saturday at VanDusen Botanical Garden (5251 Oak Street). This year’s is on February 23 (10 a.m. to 4 p.m). Stock up on heirloom veggie seeds, sit in on seed seminars, and, if you were prescient enough to save seeds from last year’s organic eggplants, bring ’em along and play swapsies.

School of Fish
Two chances to bait your hook at Cookshop & Cookschool (3–555 West 12th Avenue). On Monday (February 25), executive chef Karen Barnaby from The Fish House in Stanley Park will demo a West Coast menu: think crispy pan-roasted sablefish with Cantonese ginger-and-green-onion relish. Or on February 29, cook alongside executive chef Romy Prasad of Savory Coast while he makes shellfish cioppino and other Mediterranean dishes. Sign up at 604-873-5683 or visit www.cookshop.ca/ ; sessions cost $79 singly or $129 for two. Check out the store’s “leftovers” sale, too, and get up to 75 percent off discontinued or dinged tools and equipment.