Homey and humble Acadian classics
Homey comfort food sustained Canada’s earliest settlers, Laura Brehaut discovers.
“I’ve often joked about the fact that Acadian cuisine is very homey and occasionally, a little homely,” Simon Thibault says.
Essential dishes such as râpure (rappie pie) — a casserole made with potatoes, meat, onions and stock — are comforting and humble.
From salting green onions to create a fresh and bright condiment that could be relied on during harsh winters to slaughtering pigs each fall for boudin (blood sausage), these are timehonoured techniques that arose out of necessity, Thibault writes, and represent “a larder that is small, but mighty.”
In his first book, Pantry and Palate, the Halifax-based writer documents Acadian food traditions.
Thibault says that in doing so, he felt a keen sense of responsibility to encourage both the continuation and preservation of the foodways of some of Canada’s earliest settlers.
He recalls a speaking engagement in his hometown of Pointe-de-l’Église, N.S., where he asked for a show of hands: how many remembered eating boudin as a staple? How many still ate it? How many knew how to make it?
“There was maybe one hand left … And that’s fine (if you don’t want to eat blood pudding), but you’re looking at your heritage, first and foremost, disappearing,” Thibault says. “And it’s not just a highfalutin kind of fun thing of, ‘Well, we grew up eating this.’ No, this is really your heritage.”
In the book, he showcases 50 recipes for well-loved Acadian classics — chicken fricot, seafood chowder, fring frangs (potato pancakes) and molasses cakes — and provides context on how these dishes originated and evolved over time.
From the French settlers of the 17th and 18th centuries, exchanges with Indigenous populations, to le grand dérangement (17551764) and the resulting Acadian diaspora, he started with his own family’s kitchen notebooks and expanded outward.
“More than anything, everyone has a family member who made something and that we want to recreate,” Thibault says.
“The core of our lives is based around food. The things that sustain us the most are the things that chase us back to our past.”