Canadian cuisine

A spectacular honour came my way in May when the invitation arrived to Rideau Hall and the Investiture into The Order of Canada.   There are no words to describe the emotions that well up when, seated amongst some of the people I admire the most, my name was called.  

Hearings into the "Northern Gateway" pipeline are underway.   I would hope that this article, originally published in my last book, Anita Stewart's CANADA, will shed a little more light onto the discussion.  

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From the boreal forest to the tundra; from the Prairie grasslands to Ontario’s Carolinian woodlands, Canada is stunningly rich with flora and fauna. Bio-diversity is our most valuable heritage. With 71,000 species which have been scientifically described and another estimated 69,000 * species yet to be named and classified, it becomes crystalline that the protection of our ecological heritage is absolutely paramount.  These raw materials are the building blocks of future crops, both food and medicinal.  As plant breeders head to the original cradles for the landraces of the particular crops with which they are working, so too, will future biologists come to Canada.

For the First Nations, the rhythm of life was in the harvest and the attitudes towards it.  The notion of ‘oneness’ with the earth and its gifts was embedded in Aboriginal belief long before contact, predating the modern concept of “eco-systems by millennia. For the Nuu-Chah-Nulth people of coastal B.C their physical reality was transposed into their culture. “All things are related and interconnected.  All things are sacred.”

 It’s hard to know where to begin when writing about such an incredible event.  Let’s begin with ‘why’.

Melancthon is a township which has a major claim to fame.  Officially it is Class 1 farmland! It grows tons of magnificent potatoes not to mention some great cole crops like brussels sprouts.  It’s high, too, and its from its rollinggravel-filled hills that the magnificent Grand and Nottawasaga Rivers rise. Here in Ontario we don’t have glacier run off  upon which many cities in the west depend, we have rainfall and winter and generous aquifers that water our land and our people.

It may be the  Flying Monkey Hoptical Illusion…or one of the other 18 beers/ales on tap at the new Kitchener location of Borealis.  Or it may be the Barrie Brothers asparagus-corn chips with house made salsa or my absolute Borealis favourite, their BBQ’d pulled pork sandwich.   But last year,  after only a week of unlocking the doors for business, there are a whole cadre of ‘regulars’.  And that was even before the grand opening.

This little piggy really DID go to market … then this little piggy came home to the farm…Max and Vicki Lass’s Church Hill Farm, near Stratford, Ontario.   They raise heritage breeds including Large English Black pigs, which are known for their talent as mothers. WIth origins in the 16th and 17th century England, they were used to clean upthe windfalls in the apple orchards which flourished across the countryside.

This chocolate bark, the recipe developed by Chef Paul Stewart of Salt Spring Island’s Harbour House Hotel, is one of the easiest candies to make.

At Niagara College Teaching Winery, students not only learn to make wine, they create their own charcuterie – great with the Dean’s List Pinot Noir.