What do our chocolate, pastry and confectionery shops have in common? Throughout the province, the craftspeople who make them are proud to use local ingredients or ingredients processed in la Belle Province. 🍫 🍰
The term artisanal evokes the use of traditional methods, as opposed to the industrial process. Each stage is carried out with care to ensure that the finished product reflects the terroir of its main ingredients and the talent of the craftsman who created it. ☺️
Delicious chocolate!
In the art of chocolate making, for example, as well as growing the cocoa tree, the flavour profile is developed as soon as the cocoa beans are fermented. They are then roasted, just as coffee is at the roasting stage. Once crushed, then ground with sugar, cocoa butter and occasionally milk, the chocolate takes shape. 😍
But it’s at the conching stage, aka brewing, that the chocolate’s texture and flavour are refined and that chocolatiers can add ingredients that are specific to their image. They can also fill their chocolate bonbons at the moulding stage. This is the case for the artisan chocolatier at the helm of Julie Vachon Chocolats in Deschambault in the Capitale-Nationale region. She takes pleasure in adding aromatic herbs, as in the wintergreen chocolate bonbon, local spirits, and designing local and seasonal fruit pastes. 🫐 🍓
In her opinion, one of the reasons for crafting in her profession is passing on knowledge. It’s the beauty of the gesture and the sharing of knowledge between craftspeople and with customers,’ she explains. It’s also the importance of maintaining a human scale and focusing on the quality of ingredients and the stages of production.’
Like warm rolls
It’s similar in artisanal patisseries and bakeries, where everything is shaped by hand and contains only the basic ingredients, as if they were made at home. 🥖
Boulangerie Du Pain c’est tout, in La Pocatière in Bas-Saint-Laurent, even produces its own flour using local grains. ‘It gives us better contact with the wheat, a continuous link between the terroir and the finished product,’ says co-owner Charles Létang. He also deeply values his environment and the people around him. No less than 80% of our purchases are made in the region,’ he adds. In our breads and pastries, you can find blackcurrants in our danoise, cherries in our cruffin [a puff pastry muffin], local butter, garlic flowers transformed into pesto to make our famous foccacia, and charcuterie from neighbouring producers, for example.
Sweet treats from here
In the case of confectionery, although the main ingredient, sugar, is not produced here, a number of local artisans manage to add a local touch.
At the fine grocery shop Les Petits plaisirs du Roy in Bedford in the Eastern Townships, young owner and confectioner Alex Roy Jacques is setting an example. Our new apple caramel is made with apples from the Au cœur de la pomme ecological orchard in Frelighsburg,’ she says. I use Sel Saint-Laurent for the fleur de sel caramel, and Camélia Sinensis teas for the chai caramel. In addition to her caramels, she offers a whole range of local products in her boutique, including Équinox ciders from Farnham, wines from La Bauge, Val Caudalies and Les Bacchantes vineyards, and a whole range of sauces and condiments.
If there’s one thing Quebec artisans have in common, it’s their pride and love of their terroir and their know-how. With such a guarantee of flavour and quality, it’s the best way to bite into authenticity! 🩵🫶
Visit our repertory to discover other gourmet businesses in Quebec!
