Feast – A true Canadian inspiration.

It is not only the travel that I find exciting but having a trip to look forward to can be equally exhilarating.  Extensive reading about a new destination and shopping for the perfect new wardrobe for each vacation really adds to my excitement.  For a true foodie it is researching the food of different cultures and finding the best restaurants at your destination to experience it.  Countless times I have booked a vacation based on the food experiences available in a different country.  Hand rolling pasta at a villa in Tuscany.  Sharing plates of white anchovies and drinking the best sangria that I have ever had at a Tapas bar in Barcelona.  Most recently it was driving to every corner of Prince Edward Island, Canada, with Hubby to determine who makes the best lobster roll on the Island. An honor that we bestow to Richard’s Fresh Seafood. A fish stand situated on a wharf in Prince Edward Island’s National Park which I made Hubby drive hours to find but was definitely worth the side tour.  I almost always buy a cookbook on my vacation and love to recreate the meals and reminisce about my food experiences from my travels with my friends and family at home.

Christmas 2017, I received a cookbook as a gift that I have read cover to cover several times.  Feast reads like a novel.  The story of two friends who travel across Canada to experience the best food that each province has to offer.  A story shared with the reader through recipes and beautiful pictures.  After reading Feast I realized that I spend so much time travelling to far and exotic places in search of a unique food experience that I somehow forgot how amazing and diverse our own food culture is at home in Canada.

Feast helped me find the perfect bannock recipe to fry up on our back country camping trips here in Ontario.  It led me to Raspberry Point oysters in P.E.I.  Only one of several oyster farms on the small island cultivating what is in my opinion the best oysters in the world. Both of these foods are amazing but it is the campfire roasted salmon in the B.C. gulf islands that I have been obsessing about.  A dinner the authors experienced while on a 5-day sea kayak trip in Spring Island, a small island off the northern tip of Vancouver Island.  For over a year I secretly obsessed over this trip and the salmon dinner.  The ultimate Heather trip combining my two loves. New food experiences and kayaking.  I knew that I had to book this trip.

It is the first time that I have booked a trip after reading a cookbook rather than buying the cookbook as a souvenir from the trip.  The 5-day Sea Otter Kayak Tour with West Coast Expeditions is different than other sea kayak tours that I have taken.  Instead of setting up camp each day and packing up again each morning I look forward to the luxury of sleeping in a bed inside a platform tent at the company’s wilderness basecamp.  I believe this what is referred to as Glamping and it sounds fabulous.  I look forward to exploring the coast on day trips and finding sea otters, sea lions and hopefully whales in their natural environment.  And maybe bears which I prefer to admire from afar.  I also look forward to learning about the indigenous people and experiencing a cultural salmon dinner.

On the last evening of our trip, a cook from Kyuquot Checleset First Nations will join our group to help prepare our last evenings feast.  Wild BC salmon will be butterflied and secured with cedar stakes over our cooking fire.  In my opinion food always tastes better cooked outside over an open fire.  I could do this at home but I don’t think that you would get the same result from our Lake Ontario salmon.

I am really looking forward to sharing this feast with new friends around our campfire on Spring Island.  In the meantime I will be counting down the days, finding the perfect paddling attire for the chilly northern waters and researching the best BC wine to pair with this special dinner.  Any suggestions?