The author and comedian Bernard Assiniwi wrote in 1972 Leméac typical Indian recipes. Forty years later, Manuel Kak'wa Kurtness publishes PachaMama: Kitchen First Nations. And last year, Martin Gagné, executive chef at La Traite Wendake went there Gastronomy First Nations: rites of passage. 30 km to Quebec, Aboriginal cuisine makes sense. Kwe ... hello and welcome in Wendat territory.


Martin Gagné has been there since the beginning of the Hôtel-Musée Premières Nations, ie since 2008. To be worthy of this institution that made the reputation of the Huron-Wendat community, the former deputy head of Manoir Hovey made many quasi ethnographic research on Native American cuisine. The result is a menu which is obviously an important place game: deer, elk and caribou Nunavut compete for public favor in a place where rivals wooded interior with a splendid terrace.




In discussion, the young chief deplores that caribou meat is not more available in the south. "There are 40 to 40 caribou carcasses leaders in Quebec City. "So much so that he is open to the band council. "I was told that the meat sent to the North is very expensive. For some time, Inuit have decided to keep more for themselves they hunt caribou. "




The menu boreal unsuspected discoveries




Beaver on the menu? Martin Gagné would be the first to put his card. Trafficking is a reserve, it is within Canadian jurisdiction. So he cooks the meat must be inspected in a federal slaughter. "Inspectors are not used to inspect what type of meat. "Too complicated for the government. Having no one to check it, the menu will be found sadly lacking.




Fortunately, that does not stop Martin Gagné have imagined a map where creativity and enhancement of natural products await you. Of course, no great surprise we find there the famous soup of the three sisters so typical cooking First Nations, or corn, squash and beans. But at what point can we, for example, enjoy foie gras foam pad elderberry jelly on toasted bannock or snails with cream of cattails and garlic flowers? And that is only for input.

Making smoke his salmon almost every other day, the chef, whose indigenous origins date back to the fourth generation, this particular cold smoked salmon, accompanied by a jam of sea buckthorn on a tender green leaves.





How would you like to try the sea bass? Grilled salicornia mustard, flat "very popular with the customers," assures the chief. One can also have a soft spot for smoked sturgeon threaded, accompanied by sea dulce (a kind of seaweed) and a matching apple butter and pomegranate pearls.




As is becoming customary for the good tables, Martin Gagné is also used from the garden of the hotel. Jerusalem artichoke, wild mint, elderflower or fennel Boreal happily grow in the shade of the hotel-museum.




And for spring?




The culinary artist and native of Sherbrooke does not sit on its laurels. For the spring season, it offers bison, lobster from Îles-de-la-Madeleine, rabbit, deer coast. An invitation is also for cheese proposed in which the Trafficking The Algonquian, a smoked goat cheese The cheese caper.




And although the native cuisine, except for maple syrup of course, is not known for its desserts, the fact remains that we managed to find on the menu of recipes made from berries as a pudding wild fruit or pulp jelly fruit whatsoever from the raspberry or serviceberry.



A visit to The Treaty, whether it be for lunch, dinner or the famous Sunday brunch, will break down prejudices in the words of the late Bernard justly Assiniwi. "Do not think that we knew the cauldron that since the arrival of Jacques Cartier! We had previously dishes and terracotta pots. "And an assortment of spices!