LCBO Food & Drink Summer 2017

STAPLES CANADIAN CLASSICS

PEAMEAL BACON

Peameal bacon is an Ontario thing. True, in recent years glo- balization has made it available in other provinces, and its dis- tinctively salty-sweet taste has also encouraged visitors from the U.S. to take it home for a Canadian treat. Peameal bacon starts as boned pork loin, trimmed of all but a thin layer of fat, and wet-cured in a salt and sweet brine. Unlike ham or side bacon strips, it is not smoked, so to give the meat longer shelf life, butchers roll the cured loin in corn meal (up to the end of the Second World War, it was rolled in crushed yellow peas, hence the name). This coating wicks up the moisture and gives peameal bacon its distinctive look and texture. Credit for popularizing this method of curing pork goes to the entrepreneurial English-born Toronto meat curer and butcher, William Davies. Starting in Toronto’s St. Lawrence Market selling his cured hams and bacon, he took advantage of the late-19th-century British demand for bacon, and made a fortune selling a superior leaner pork to Britain. Of late, peameal bacon has earned the reputation as the signature dish of the St. Lawrence Market, where shoppers line up at Carousel Bakery for a stack of griddled peameal doused with honey mustard and tucked into a soft kaiser bun. At the market, and increasingly in supermarkets, peameal ba- con is available as a roast. The 2-lb (1-kg) size called for in our recipe is easy to cook on the grill or in the oven and slices eas- ily with a mustard and maple glaze—ideal for your celebration of peameal bacon.

MAPLE MUSTARD-GLAZED PEAMEAL BACON BARBECUE ROAST recipe on page 146

MAPLE

TOURTIÈRE

If you ask anyone what’s the most Ca- nadian food, the answer is bound to be maple syrup. Maple is so much part of our symbolism—the flag, “The Maple Leaf Forever,” the hockey team… In the maple belt (what’s now Ontario, Que- bec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia), First Nations watched for the sugar moon,

There’s more to tourtière, Quebec’s Christmas Eve dish, than pork and flaky pastry. Named for the ves- sel in which it bakes, tour- tière comes in different regional styles. In Montreal, tourtière tends

to mean ground pork, sometimes beef or veal as well, seasoned with savoury (eastern Canada’s signature herb) and always sweet spices, cinnamon and cloves, plus, at times, nutmeg. The thickener that binds the meat, making the pie easy to cut, varies—maybe mashed potatoes, bread crumbs or, revealing past Scottish influence, rolled oats. Heading to the Lac St. Jean-Saguenay region, tourtière gets heartier. Cubed meat, onions and potatoes are conveniently sold in supermarkets, to be layered deep-dish-style in a pastry-lined casse- role. There’s chicken in the mix, and often game; it’s rich and needs a tart-sweet condiment: pickled beets are popular, as is ketchup aux fruits, a chunky chili sauce with peaches and pears.

the start of maple season, and gathered to celebrate, collecting sap into birchbark containers and reducing it to syrup and sugar in clay vessels. Aside from today’s usual products—syrup and sugar—there’s tire à l’érable , or maple taffy, beloved in Quebec’s cabanes à sucre (sugar shacks). Commercial sugar shacks in other provinces, nota- bly Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Ontario, are now catching on. It’s so easy to create this crowd pleaser—all you need is fresh clean snow packed down into troughs or pans, wooden sticks (tongue depressors will do fine) and maple syrup. On-site dentist optional.

FOOD & DRI NK SUMMER