Five Dishes You've Gotta Try from Tadoussac to Bonavista

An iconic Québécois dish served on Christmas Eve, tourtière has a rich and flavourful history. Some food historians claim that a version of this savoury meat pie dates back to a fifth-century French pastry filled with the meat of the tourte (passenger pigeon). Others insist tourtière made with wild game dates back to 1700s New France.

Today, tourtière is usually made with a filling of ground beef, veal, and pork, as well as potatoes, onion, savoury, cloves, allspice, and cinnamon, all tucked between two deliciously flakey blankets of pastry. Green tomato relish, traditionally served alongside tourtière, is the perfect foil for its richness. Gravy and ketchup are other popular accoutrements. But don’t wait until Christmas Eve—tourtière is too delicious to eat only once a year!

The Perfect Pairing:

Before you walk into that charming Québécois café with the scrumptious tourtière in the window, make sure they have the perfect pairing: a full-bodied pinot noir. Choose a pinot noir that has those light notes of star anise, ripe fruit, and dark cherries to complement the rich meat pie.

Sustainably farmed and Ocean Wise-certified, Prince Edward Island blue mussels are steamed over open fires at the beach, eaten around kitchen tables, and featured on restaurant menus all around Canada’s beloved island province. The demand for mussels has skyrocketed in recent years, making PEI the largest producer of cultured mussels in North America, highly sought after by Canadian chefs.

Cultivated in longline nets in the clean, cool meroir of the island’s inlets and bays, PEI mussels are plump and sweet and easy to prepare. While the possibilities are endless, we sure love a steaming bowl of mussels bathed in a garlicky, white wine broth with a side of crispy, thin frites—marrying PEI’s darling of the sea with her darling of the soil.

The Perfect Pairing:

White wine not only in the broth—but to pair with the dish—is a match made in heaven. What’s the best white wine for the job? The white wine that you’ve used to cook the mussels, of course!

It’s not often you hear a good news story about species extinction, so when we learned of the revival of two sturgeon species, we definitely danced a jig. This prehistoric fish has changed little in the past 200 million years, but it sure has a storied past. Fished heavily in North America in the 1880s, its caviar was so plentiful that tavern keepers comped dishes of the salty salver to keep their patrons thirsting for more beer. Atlantic caviar shipped to Europe in the early 1900s gained a regal reputation, fetching an enormous sum and bringing the mighty sturgeon to the brink of extinction.

Fast forward about a hundred years and you’ll find both Atlantic and shortnose sturgeon species making a comeback, thanks to the efforts of Acadian Sturgeon and Caviar Inc. and their Ocean Wise certified sustainable wild sturgeon fishery in New Brunswick. The good news: the savoury meat and rich roe of the sturgeon are making a healthy comeback. The bad: don’t expect a freebie the next time you pop into your local pub any time soon!

The Perfect Pairing:

A rich fish like this deserves a strong cocktail to pair, with champagne to celebrate, and citrus to tie it all together—a French 75.

Mix:
1 oz. gin
1⁄2 oz. simple syrup
1⁄2 oz. lemon juice
Shake it all over ice, top it off with champagne, and enjoy!

At one time, when lobster sandwiches were sent to school in a child’s lunchbox, they were seen as punishment, not prize. Why? Lobster was considered a poor man’s food. Yet simultaneously, Atlantic lobster held star status at posh restaurants everywhere, with diners tucking into high priced classics like lobster Thermidor. More recently, the humble lobster was at the centre of a legal contradiction when Nova Scotia provincial law forbade Mi’kmaw lobster harvesters to sell their catch—while their treaty rights, established in the 1700s and affirmed by the Supreme Court of Canada in 1999, permitted them to legally trap those same lobsters for a moderate livelihood.

Atlantic lobster is Canada’s most lucrative seafood and the Maritime provinces’ most valuable tourist draw, attracting thousands of visitors every year to feast on its sweet, succulent meat. Whatever side of the proverbial lobster coin you are on, one thing is for sure: there’s nothing like a lobster roll washed down with a cold beer in the salty Atlantic breeze.

The Perfect Pairing:

Whether in a bottle, pint, or can, you want that beer to be cold, crisp, and filled with citrus. First pick would be a citrus-forward India Pale Ale. Next up could be a citrusy blonde. And as a last (but still delicious!) resort, try a saison brew.

The annual moose hunt in Newfoundland is about more than just getting meat for the winter. It’s about time spent with fellow hunters, family, and friends passing on tradition, culture, and craft—and cultivating the next generation of hunters. Traditionally the meat is ground, turned into sausages, cut into steaks and roasts, or even bottled. (Yes, that’s one huge bottle, or many, many small ones!) The preserved bottled moose finds itself heated over the fire in the woods during rabbit hunting season and made into delicious stews for the family table. Served up with lots of thickly sliced homemade bread slathered with butter, it’s a taste of home and a treasured meal.

In recent years in the Newfoundland culinary scene, this beautiful wild game has risen to great heights. The province allows the meat to be prepared and served in restaurants under strict regulations, taking it from subsistence eating to culinary centre stage. Today you can find it turned into dry-cured bresaola, delicious ragu, ravioli, carpaccio, and tartare—a taste of the old made new.

The Perfect Pairing:

Wild game, rich dumplings, root vegetables—in many ways, moose stew is like the Newfoundland version of a beef bourguignon. So what do you pair with a bourguignon? You know: a deep, luscious Bordeaux. Those left bank of Bordeaux notes will deepen the flavours of the stew and elevate any of its hidden flavours.