This year Marie and I visited the Bellavance sugar camp in Sainte-Cecile-de-Whitton, near Lac Megantic, an early spring thaw bringing out the maple sap and a rush to the local sugar shacks. Maple seems to be the dominant tree in our neck of the woods and part of the reason why Quebec produces 70% of the world's supply. And of course it's a cultural thing here in La Belle Province and a Canadian tradition. So we gathered early with a hundred or so hungry diners eager to partake in this very French Canadian feast. It had been raining when we first arrived and the parking lot in the woods was a sea of mud as we made our way to the main lodge, stopping first to pet the old Percheron horse, still used to haul buckets from the sugarbush. This sap is boiled down in a sugarhouse next to the main lodge, a common site on the roads around our place this time of year, billows of steam coming out of the chimneys to give away what is going on inside. We followed the crowd inside the lodge, the walls covered with pictures of bygone times in sepia and various old tools - a sickle, a scythe, a two man whipsaw - where we were invited to take a wooden paddle and sample "tire sur la neige"- maple syrup taffy made by boiling down the clear amber sap and dribbling it onto fresh snow. We scooped up more than we probably should of but still had room for what was to come!
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| boiling fresh maple syrup |
Right at noon the dining room doors opened and we filed in, sitting down on long wooden tables covered in either red or green and white checked oilskin cloths, munching on celery sticks, radishes, sour pickles, rings of fried pork, home made ketchup and fresh salad while we waited for the main course to be served. About fifteen minutes later after everybody had settled in a large trolley was rolled in, laden with delicious sights that we were soon piling onto our plates - omelets, boiled and fried potatoes, baked beans, fried eggs, meat pies, ham and fresh rolls and butter.
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| pork rinds (Oreilles de Christ) |
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| From this... |
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| un peu de tout! (a little of everything) |
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| ....to this! |
I don't know how but we managed to save room for desert - maple syrup crepes, "grand-peres dans le sirop", a pudding cake soaked in maple syrup, and of course the popular maple syrup pie! Pots of hot tea and coffee were passed around as we patted our bellies and sighed contentedly...
gws
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| grand-peres dans le syrup |
