First Nations traditions meet fine dining

This story is part of a week-long series exploring how we as Canadians define "Canadian food," and how it has evolved in modern Canada.

There has been renewed interest in the emergence of First Nations traditional foods in the restaurant business, in no small part thanks to Canadian TV celebrity chef David Wolfman on APTN’s Cooking with the Wolfman and his drool-worthy food truck, which graced the streets of Toronto during this summer’s Pan Am Games.

But now that the games are over, where can you turn for a taste of traditional First Nations food? While options may be restricted to Canada’s largest cities, chefs are finding innovative ways to bring their favourite foods to those who know where to find them.

Johl Ringuette, Anishnawbe chef at Nish Dish Marketeria and Catering, has taken on traditional-inspired banquet and boutique food service in Toronto. “Food and gathering together to share is our most important and enjoyed way as Anishnawbe people. I was raised in the country outside of and north of North Bay, Ontario,” Ringuette explains of his inspiration. “My father was a hunter and fisher and loved to be outdoors up at the two camps he had built as a teenager… Later in life I moved to Toronto to pursue post secondary education,” but despite all his best efforts to keep up with family tradition, he said, he “never found our food anywhere.”

When he began to work more closely with the Toronto aboriginal community, he realized he wasn’t the only one lamenting the lack of traditional food. “Years later I worked at Aboriginal Legal Services and several other Aboriginal agencies and discovered that everyone in my community had the same challenge. There just wasn't our food available unless you could attend the summer pow wow events, which they are only 2 in the central city.”

The desire to fill this need drove him to learn more. “I had worked in the food industry in many capacities for many years. So with the support of my Traditional teacher Mark Thompson I began a part-time catering business in May 2005. During the years I've been taught by many community members of food and recipes that they grew up with.”

Trying to bring traditions into the business of food isn’t easy. Profit margins in the restaurant and catering industry are already slim. As Ringuette points out, the foods specific to native traditions can be prohibitively expensive. The most common ingredients used at Nish Dish - venison, wild rice, berries and lake fish - are not only costly but can even be difficult to find.

And economics isn’t the only hurdle. Ringuette brings up an important and perhaps contentious point about what we take for tradition. He believes we need to start “changing our idea of what is traditional food, because it’s not bannock.” Bannock, the fried bread which is one of the most popular traditional foods in Canadian indigenous restaurants, is actually Scottish.

“We had no choice but to make it,” Ringuette explains, “as fishing and hunting were made illegal and leaving the reservations was not allowed. Rations of flour, sugar and salt were provided by the government so that was how we began to make the bread and fry it too.”

Ringuette prefers to focus on traditional foods from pre-colonization times: greens, berries, roots, beans, squash and corn. “The crops for our traditional Three Sisters Stew,” one of their most popular dishes, Ringuette adds, “butternut squash, green beans and corn were grown together and all three assist each other in the growth process. This regenerates the soil rather than depleting. It's something that my ancestors learned through working with the land and nature.”

Despite its tenuous position as a traditional food, bannock is probably the most popular item on the menu among First Nations restaurants. In Vancouver, Salmon and Bannock Bistro owners Inez Cook and Remi Caudron are bringing Nuxalk Nation traditions to life with a modern twist.

The bistro opened in 2010 just ahead of the winter Olympics when, Cook says, they “realized the whole world was coming here and there was not a First Nations restaurant in Vancouver anymore.” But like Ringuette, they have faced their share of challenges, between the difficulties of sourcing foraged wild plants, the restrictions on purchasing from commercial buyers with limited selection, and the expense and seasonal availability of quality game meats.

“It’s so terribly expensive [to source ingredients],” Cook says, but that isn’t stopping them. They do what they can. “We are a bistro that wants everyone to feel welcome and keep prices for every budget on our menu.”

If budget is less of a concern for you than authenticity and experience, the immersive tours hosted by Haida House at Tllaal, Graham Island, B.C. brings the cultural explorer into the homes of local chefs. Haida Gwaii is also known as “the Galapagos of the North” for its incredible biodiversity and unique ecology, making Haida House tours a truly unique experience, and not just for food.

“In order to have our guests experience a true, traditional Haida dinner, we always encourage them to take in some of the local chefs who offer dinner in their homes,” says Joelle Rabu, General Manager for Haida House. “Those dinners are steeped in tradition and usually include a song or some storytelling during the evening with dinner served Tapas style with many dishes to try.”

But for Haida House, their biggest challenge is keeping up with demand. During high season, both tour organizers and those with whom they arrange for visitors to share a table are booked solid. For traditional chefs, this means a great deal of time spent hunting, gathering and preparing in the traditional methods. Each of the tours offered at Haida House - both four day and seven day getaways - include at least one trip to experience such a meal.

The rest of the time, Haida House serves a mix of modern and traditionally-inspire fare. They aim for fresh and local, employing both local Haida chefs and Continental chefs from off the island.

“We work with the local farms also to provide fresh greens, berries and seasonal vegetables,” says Rabu. “The fusion seems to work in our favour. Our menus feature fresh Halibut, Coho or Spring Salmon, Fresh Prawns, Scallops, K’aaw (herring roe on kelp), Naaw (octopus), Candied or Lox smoked Salmon, prepared in a contemporary fashion. The traditional way of preparing these foods, we leave to the local Haida Chefs who offer meals in their homes.”

This perhaps speaks to the struggles faced by those trying to bring traditional foods into a contemporary restaurant environment. But more and more we are seeing examples like the chefs at Nish Dish, Salmon & Bannock, and on Haida House tours trying new ways to explore native foods and share them with a hungry public.