Origins

Dining Out

by Dalya Goldberger

Miss Hoopty and Delilah get together for one of their favourite fall events — the International Wine and Food Festival. The aroma of sumptuous food fills the air and the venue is alight with sommeliers, gourmets, and people just out for a good time.

"Hoopty, did you buy your tickets yet?" asked Delilah. "You know you can’t just pay cash for the food and drinks."

"YES, I BOUGHT 100. IT’S NOT MY FIRST TIME HERE YOU KNOW."

"Gee, do you think you’ll have enough?" Delilah said sarcastically.

Miss Hoopty ignored the remark and walked ahead.

"OOH, LOOK!" cried Miss Hoopty "THERE’S A CANADIAN SECTION. I DIDN’T EVEN KNOW WE HAD OUR OWN KIND OF FOOD AND DRINK. LET’S CHECK IT OUT."

Laid out before them was food from every province and territory — a veritable nationwide tour of food and drink. Their first stop was the Maritimes section. The two exchanged tickets for a small plateful of dried, purple-coloured dulse.

"Whoa, that’s salty," exclaimed Delilah, her salivary glands working overtime.

"MMM, SALTY," said Miss Hoopty, eating some more.

"How’s ye gettin’ on de day, maids? Why don’t you wash dat down with a bit o’ screech," suggested a woman grinning at them from the neighbouring Newfoundland booth.

"Better than a bare-legged cup of tea, dat’s for sure," she said, proffering two glasses filled with a dark-brown liquid. Exchanging a quick look of apprehension, Miss Hoopty and Delilah clinked glasses and downed the formidable concoction.

Delilah’s face turned as purple as the dulse they had just eaten and she started to sputter. Sighing audibly and patting Delilah on the back, Miss Hoopty ushered her into a nearby chair.

"DON’T BE SUCH A BABY! STAY HERE. I’LL BE BACK WITH SOME REAL FOOD," scolded Miss Hoopty who stomped off toward the Quebec booth. In a minute or two she was back with some fèves au lard, pâté chinois, tourtière and tarte au sucre — all on one plate.

"This is like having dinner at your Oncle Gaetan’s," Delilah whispered hoarsely, her eyes still watering. She ate a forkful of the fèves au lard.

"Tastes like pablum," Delilah grumbled.

"OH, IT DOES NOT," dismissed Miss Hoopty. "YOUR TASTE BUDS ARE JUST DEADENED FROM THE SCREECH."

Their next stop was the Saskatchewan booth.

"CAN YOU BELIEVE THEY HAVE PEMMICAN! I REMEMBER LEARNING ABOUT IT IN SCHOOL" exclaimed a delighted Miss Hoopty. "I’VE ALWAYS WONDERED WHAT IT TASTES LIKE."

"Me too," concurred Delilah eagerly handing six tickets over to the vendor.

There was silence as the two women ate the pemmican, the smiles draining from their faces. They swallowed hard on the last mouthful.

Delilah was the first to speak. "Well, that’s the first and last time I eat pemmican."

"What you ladies really should try is the prairie oyster," said a voice from behind. A man dressed as a waiter and carrying a silver serving tray nodded and winked at them.

"I’ve heard of that. Isn’t that a cure for a hangover? Better give it to her." Delilah laughed and motioned to Miss Hoopty.

"Oh, no, ladies. This is a delicacy of a very different kind, straight from the Canadian prairies. Please take one."

They both selected one of the round, breaded and fried morsels from the platter, but before they could ask him what it was, he was gone, lost in the crowd.

As the evening wore on, Miss Hoopty and Delilah sampled other Canadian tidbits, such as fiddleheads, nettle soup, and boxty with a few glasses of wine and other spirits in between.

On their way out, nibbling on a Nanaimo bar, they spotted the prairie oyster man again.

"HEY, YOU NEVER TOLD US WHAT THAT STUFF WAS," charged Miss Hoopty.

With a smile that stretched from ear to ear, he replied "Why, they’re calves’ testicles, of course."

Screech was once a Newfie term for any cheap dark rum. It is now a brand name of a dark Caribbean rum.

Dulse is an edible seaweed also called "salt-leaf." Dulse grows along the coast of the Canadian Maritimes in the intertidal zone at the low-water mark, attached to rocks or other seaweeds.

A bare-legged cup of tea is a cup of black tea served without a biscuit or sandwich on the side.

A Quebec dish, fèves au lard or les binnes are pork and beans, flavoured with maple syrup.

Pâté chinois or shepherd’s pie is called "chinese pie" in Quebec. In the late 19th century, thousands of Quebecers migrated to the northeastern United States to work in mills. Some settled in a town in the state of Maine called China. Those who returned to Quebec returned with a recipe for shepherd’s pie, which they called pâté chinois.

Tourtière is a shallow meat pie with onions, various spices such as cinnamon and cloves, and sometimes potatoes. The food takes its name from the dish in which it was baked. In French print by 1573, a tourtière was a pie pan for baking tourtes — a round pastry pie with a pastry top often filled with meat and vegetables or fruit and cream. The word stems from Latin tortus panis or "a round of bread."

Tarte au sucre is a high-calorie brown-sugar pie.

Pablum is a wholesome though bland baby food made of wheat germ, alfalfa, oatmeal, cornmeal, wheatmeal, and other ingredients. Developed by three Ontario doctors — doctors Drake, Brown, and Tisdall — pablum was first sold in 1930. The name pablum is taken from the Latin word pabulum meaning "horse feed" or "animal fodder."

Pemmican is prepared by drying buffalo meat, brazing it over a fire, then beating it. Next it is put into a buffalo hide bag and mixed with the best quality tarrow or rendered buffalo fat, berries, and sometimes other plant parts. The contents were then set aside to cool and turned often so that the fat would not settle at the bottom. The bag was then sewn tightly. The mixture lasted forever and was a good source of protein and iron.

Prairie oysters, in the Canadian prairies, are calves’ testicles that have been washed, skinned, soaked in salt water for an hour, rinsed, breaded in seasoned flour and then fried.

Fiddleheads are the unfurled fronds of ostrich ferns that resemble the head of a fiddle. They are often eaten steamed or boiled with melted butter, or cooled and tossed with a light vinaigrette.

Nettle soup is soup made from the young leaves of a stinging nettle plant, a plant that is widespread over the northern hemisphere. The sting of the tiny hairs on the surface of the leaf is removed by boiling in water for a full minute.

Made from grated potatoes and flour, boxty is "poor man’s bread" brought over to the Canadian Maritimes by Irish immigrants. The first part of the word probably contains the Irish adjective "bocht," which means "poor," probably because it was made of potatoes instead of wheat.

A well-known baked treat across Canada, a Nanaimo bar is usually a baked square of biscuit with a sweet cream filling and chocolate on top. The tasty treat likely originated in the city of Nanaimo on Vancouver Island.

Dalya Goldberger is Managing Editor of Writer’s Block.

Sources: Canadian Food Words, by Bill Casselman