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A DELICIOUS COUNTRY DRIVE

By CINDA CHAVICH

(Ile d’Orleans, Quebec) - We had our guidebooks and instructions – tips scribbled on napkins by tour guides, ideas pulled from the binders of concierge desks, even some real insider information, scrawled on an order pad by the affable maitre ’d of the Chateau Frontenac, still sticky from the strawberries he’d flambéed for our dessert the night before.

But what happened on our little culinary tour of the Ile d’Orleans on one spring Saturday, far exceeded the sum of those well-meaning suggestions – for the gems of the day were those people we met, not by planning, but by pure luck.

The island is only 15 minutes from Quebec City – just upstream in the St. Lawrence River - but it’s really a world away, a quiet bucolic place where rural life passes relatively slowly. The region’s major monuments - the waterfalls and canyons and Basilicas – are still visible across the water, but this is a less-traveled tour route.

We’ve come to the island to experience local food, from the ground up, and our to-do list includes cheese makers, wineries, maple sugar shacks or cabane au sucre, bakeries and rural restaurants.

The late May morning is grey when we leave the city and head across the Island Bridge. Our first stop, the local information booth, is closed, as is our next recommended spot, a popular sugar shack.

This is not looking good. The culinary tour was my idea so I’m worried that my two friends will lose interest if we don’t meet success soon.

But before long, the road leads us to Domaine Steinbach, a farm specializing in organic apple cider, iced cider and duck pates. It’s barely 9 a.m. when we pull into the yard, and while they’re not actually open yet, and the owner is busy dealing with a small crisis (the farm’s malfunctioning water supply), they quickly unlock the shop, turn on the lights and warmly invite us into their tasting room.

Things are looking up. The sun has barely made its morning appearance and already we’re sipping iced cider, Quebec’s answer to ice wine. This is a local treat – pressed from frozen cider apples and fermented into the kind of sweet aperitif that perfectly compliments the rich pates which are also offered here. Soon we are sampling more of the farm’s specialties, robust apple cider and black currant vinegars, duck confit and fruit chutney. I am struck by the natural affinities of the terroir – how the creamy duck pate, subtly flavored with local black currants and cloves, is heightened by a dab of their sweet onion and maple conserve – and soon I am filling my bags with gourmet goodies from the gift shop.

Ile D’Orleans sits close to the north shore of the St. Lawrence River and the narrow highway that hugs its perimeter is dotted with small farms and villages.

There are apple orchards and towering stands of old sugar maples, pretty stone churches, and flocks of sheep and geese in the fields. It is as if we’ve been transported to the rural version of the Old Quebec we’ve experienced in the historic capital city, the Nouvelle-France which flourished here after Samuel de Champlain arrived in 1608. By 1685 there were 1,205 settlers on the island – most from the Normandy region of France – and today it is populated with 7,000 of their descendants.

The farmers of this fertile island have literally been growing food here for centuries, and today the best Quebec City chefs include artisan products from island farms in their cuisine – whether it’s artisan cheese, organic vegetables or local wine.

As the road dips and winds toward the historic parish of Sainte-Famille (founded in 1661), we are overwhelmed by the views. The morning sun is hitting the steeples of spectacular Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupre Basilica across the river, and we pull off the road into an apple orchard to take a picture. Almost immediately, we see a man coming through the trees on a tractor, but before we can apologize for our spontaneous trespass, he is waving us to his house.

“The view is much better from my yard,” he says, directing us further down the road where we can see the white granite cathedral gleaming beyond a sea of apple blossoms.

Friendly Pierre Sampson offers another local specialty – a tractor ride – and soon we are bumping along through the orchards and scribbling down directions to his neighbor Joseph Paquet’s fish store and smokehouse.

Here, the island’s last commercial fisherman and his young grandson are manning the shop, a tiny red and white building by the roadside proclaiming “Poissonnerie.” While we speak halting French at best, and

Monsieur Paquet’s English is limited, with the help of our tiny translator and some crude drawings, we struggle through a hilarious game of charades, enough to learn about the local fish we are sampling. When Paquet passes me a transluscent sliver of eel, sliced from a meter-long fillet that has been cured with maple syrup and smoked in his smokehouse, it is a culinary revelation, as is the ethereal sturgeon mousse, shot with ground nuts and creamy cheese.

And so our day proceeds with bits and bites, sips and sights, as we loop around the island following the historic Chemin Royal route.

Up the road we pass La Ferme d’Oc where ducks and geese are fattened for foie gras, and Les Fromages de l’Isle d’Orleans, creating traditional island cheeses, just as North America’s first commercial cheesemakers did here more than 350 years ago, and frying them into warm cheese galettes, another unique island specialty.

When we happen upon Nicole Gosselin at Erabliere Richard Boily, she happily tours us through the family’s sugar bush of 6,000 trees, explaining how the sweet maple sap begins to run in March when the daytime temperatures rise above freezing. Quebec producers supply 80 per cent of the world’s maple syrup, she says, and many of the tall trees here have been producing the sweet specialty for generations.

“It is hard work but every spring it is our passion,” she says, describing slogging through the bush on snowshoes, then boiling 50 liters of sap down to make each litre of syrup.

I leave with a big can of her top grade and a bag of maple sugar to sprinkle on my toast back at home.

We see passion for creating good food everywhere on this island. From the chewy artisan loaves of La Boulange in Saint-Jean to the luxe ice cream at Chocolaterie de l’Isle d’Orleans, or a plate of roadside poutine (French fries and gravy topped with real squeaky fresh cheese curds), there was barely a moment on our island tour when there wasn’t a place to indulge in something special. Many of the island artisans don’t open their shops and tasting rooms until June, so some of our suggested stops didn’t materialize, but our plate was brimming with delicious discoveries nonetheless.

It’s a lesson I might well remember for future food forays into unknown territory. Often the best way to explore is to simply go, see, talk and taste, wherever the road takes you - no reservations required.

IF YOU GO:

The Quebec region publishes information about several gourmet routes in the area featuring farms, vineyards, sugar bushes and other artisan food producers who welcome visitors (www.gourmetroute.com). You can enjoy local ingredients at many Quebec City restaurants including Le Champlain, Le Saint-Amour, Panache and Le Patriarche.

To plan a tour of l’Ile d’Orleans visit the island tourist office, just east of the bridge on Highway 368, or their website at www.iledorleans.com

TOURING AND TASTING:

Domaine Steinbach: Taste ice cider, duck pates and terrines, vinegars, preserves

2205 Chemin Royal, Saint-Pierre

418-828-0000

www.domainesteinbach.com

Poissonnerie Joseph Paquet: Taste smoked local sturgeon, eel and dore with the last remaining commercial fisherman on the island.

2705 Chemin Royal, Saint-Pierre

418-828-2670

La Ferme d’Oc: Geese and ducks are fattened here the traditional way to create the rich liver we know as foie gras and you can buy the lobes fresh or cooked into terrines, along with duck confit and other products.

4495 Chemin Royal, Sainte-Famille

418-829-2646

Les Fromages de l’Ile d’Orleans: Taste artisan cheese on the terrace of this 17th-century-inspired dairy, made according to local recipes.

4696 Chemin Royal, Sainte-Famille

418-829-2693

La Boulange: Stop at this artisan bakery across from the parish church for Louis Marchand’s perfect chewy baguette and flaky croissant.

2001 Chemin Royal, Saint-Jean

418-829-3162

Vignoble Sainte-Petronille: Taste the local grapes at this small winery just west of the island bridge.

1A, Chemin du Bout-de-l’Ile, Sainte-Petronille

418-828-9554

www.vignobleorleans.com

DINING:

Auberge Le Canard Huppe, a country inn with a notable dining room. One night stay, including gourmet breakfast and gastronomic supper, $90 pp.

2198 Chemin Royal, St-Laurent

1-800-838-2292

www.canardhuppe.com

Crepe Cochon for main dish or dessert crepes, breakfast through dinner.

3963 Chemin Royal, Sainte-Famille

418-829-3656

Have ice cream in the garden and take away their handmade chocolates at Café Resto Chocolaterie de l’Ile D’Orleans

148 Chemin du Bout-de-l’Ile

418-828-0382

(this story first appeared in Canadian Geographic Travel magazine)

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Food Tourism: Quebec’s garden island

You’ll find orchards, cider makers, foie gras, artisan bakeries and towering sugar maples on bucolic Ile d’Orleans.

photos by Cinda Chavich