Caron Prins in her chip shack.
From royal fries to championship seafood The Charlottetown Food + Fact Tour STORY AND PHOTOS BY DARCY RHYNO
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t’s the breakfast of champions,” quips Heather Carver, our guide on the Taste the Town Food + Facts Tour in Charlottetown, PEI. She’s holding out a tray of oysters, ready for slurping from the half shell. It’s only mid morning, and we’re at MacKinnon’s Seafood Market, the first stop on the 3.5-hour walking tour around the historic downtown, so yes, raw oysters dressed with a dash of hot sauce and a squeeze of lemon are breakfast. Whatever the time of day, PEI oysters PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND
are champions in their own right. In 1900, oysters from Malpeque Bay on the north coast travelled to Paris for the World’s Fair, Carver tells us, where they were named the best on the planet. Ever since, “Malpeque” has been synonymous with the world’s finest oysters. In many an inlet around the island, countless shellfish farmers string their oyster cages in straight rows marked by black buoys. Raspberry Point Oysters (started by the creator of Cow’s Ice Cream, another
famous and favourite PEI food) ships half a dozen varieties such as Lucky Lime, Pickle Point, and Shiny Sea across the country and around the world. Known equally for their sense of humour reflected in their cheeky slogan—eat oysters, get Lucky—and the quality of their shellfish, Raspberry Point and other PEI growers operate some of the most northerly farms in North America. Their oysters take from four to six years to mature, allowing those briny flavours to fully develop.
