How packaged foods vary from their Canadian versions

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.

It was, in effect, like finding the pre-packaged food version of the Holy Grail. After months of dining on the finest artisanal baguettes, Normandy oysters and the freshest of fresh tartare in Paris, we needed to quench our Canadian palates with a back-home favourite – fajita night.

Having already lived in France now for two months, my fiancée and I had become well acquainted with the French’s predilection towards plated pretension, so the looks of disappointment from fellow shoppers as we blew the layer off dust of the Old El Paso fajita kit hidden on the exotic food shelf and marched to the cash register excitedly, hardly fazed us.

We sang our own made up version of the Old El Paso theme-song as we stirred the local chicken around in the powdered fajita dust, mixing water preciously, leaving the stove fan off so as to proudly steam the scent into our clothes for hours of enjoyment. And when it came time to dine, it was glorious.

But it felt different.

What was it? More peppery? A light chipotle on the nose? A dash of some foreign, unrecognizable paprika? Pray-tell Old El Paso, why does the familiar flavor enjoyed on the cozy fajita nights back home in Toronto elude us here in Paris?

According to Jason Doolan, director of marketing at Old El Paso, our fine-tuned palates weren’t betraying us; the fajita powder of Paris is different from the fajita powder of Canada. And while access to ingredients and regulations surrounding importing certain products play a part, the main catalyst for the flavour switcheroo in pre-packaged food from region to region is local palate.

“A lot of this comes from food heritage, the history of food and what people relate to,” Doolan says.

He points to the U.S. compared to Canada as a prime example; two regions often looked at from overhead as the North American market but each with its own unique palate. For Old El Paso, the cultural difference is the key to tantilizing consumers’ taste buds. While Americans were introduced to Mexican cuisine through Mexico, Canadians are more familiar with the Tex-Mex stylings.

“Our research development team out of the U.S. tends to look for sweeter and saltier tastes in their products versus Canada,” he says. “Canadians tend to like more complexity like black pepper and other spicy notes.”

Extra mild offerings also sell better in Europe and Canada but not as well stateside.

But it’s not just about national tastes; flavour profiles vary regionally too, explains Doolan.

“While in English Canada, it’s all about tacos, as we dove into Quebec a bit more we realized the main Mexican food dish for them is fajitas,” he says. “There’s so much more engagement with fresh produce because it does take more to prepare and that fits with the food cultures of Quebec.”

Old El Paso wasn’t the only one to discover the discrepancies between English and French Canada. When Quebecois rotisserie chicken chain St. Hubert made the push into Ontario it had to face-off against English Canada darling Swiss Chalet.

“People in Ontario love their Swiss Chalet sauce and St. Hubert had what they regarded as a better sauce in Quebec – they saw it as more natural,” explains Alan Middleton, assistant professor of marketing and director of the Schulich Executive Education Centre at York University. “But the Ontarians didn’t like it and St. Hubert refused to adapt it, this is why St. Hubert no longer competes in Ontario.”

He notes that for packaged food, there’s always a need to balance what it will cost to adapt a product and how strong the taste preference is.

“If you’re trying to attract the Indo-Canadian market with a curry sauce then you’ll probably want it to be spicier than if you’re dealing with the general mass public,” says Middleton, who’s spent a good portion of his career working with global food corporations. “All of this has a cost to it – you’re making things in more than one batch and depending on where you’re making it, you may source different ingredients.”

Regulation for what type of ingredients can be used and at what level also changes from market to market.

“A classic example that varies one country to the next is the concept of calorie-reduced or fat-reduced,” he adds.

In the U.S. or Canada for example, a food can be labelled “Reduced Calories” if it has at least 25 per cent fewer calories per serving then it’s standard version. In Europe a comparable “Reduced Energy” food must have at least 30 per cent fewer calories.

“Therefore, what you use as ingredients to help (reduce) those calories will also vary,” he adds.

But palate-tailoring has proved a useful skillset for flexible distributors – like Wal-Mart or Loblaw’s – looking to break into regional markets, says Sylvain Charlebois, a professor at the University of Guelph’s Food Institute.

While multinationals often have to split their findings and research and development resources amongst the head offices and regional divisions, distributors can test their products in real time on their store shelves.

“In Loblaw’s case they have President’s Choice, No Name, and Black Label – they are in the product development space,” he says. “In order to come up with the best product possible for the market they are aiming for, they have labs and facilities and they invite their consumers to taste their product in store.”

Wal-Mart has also recently built a food lab to do the same thing. 

“It depends on the culture of the company – sometimes they decide to decentralize their influence and allow chapters to develop their own products or support their own projects,” he says. “There’s no cookie cutter approach to this, but at the end of the day consumers shouldn’t be surprised if they buy one product and it tastes different.”

And as for the Parisians turning their nose up at my Old El Paso purchase, they should know; this fajita kit isn’t for my fine Canadian palate – it’s for theirs.