Epicurean Island

In the Garden of the Gulf, ANITA DRAYCOTT follows the P.E.I. food trail from Rustico Harbour to the Victorian-era streets where Confederation was conceived… and sips a little moonshine along the way

“You can go to Charlottetown, see Anne of Green Gables and then have a lobster supper, or you can have a lobster supper and then go see Anne of Green Gables,” quipped The Royal Canadian Air Farce’s Roger Abbott a few decades ago in a CBC show roasting Prince Edward Island.

On my most recent visit to what’s been dubbed Canada’s Food Island, I must confess that I did devour lobster every day and I took in a performance of Anne at the Confederation Centre. But how times have changed. When it comes to fabulous food and novel experiences, Canada’s tiniest province is (pardon the pun), no small potato.

For the most part, the P.E.I. landscape defines the word bucolic: contented cows graze in rolling emerald pastures, fishing boats bob in rustic harbours, iconic lighthouses dot the coastline and the red mineral-rich earth imparts flavour to everything that grows here, including the famous spuds. Imagine a big green farm floating in a sea full of fish.

Whether you’ve got a craving for some freshly harvested Malpeque oysters, locally made moonshine or Canada’s best ice cream, you will never be far from a culinary treat on this 224-kilometre-long slice of bliss.

My husband and I begin our epicurean romp in New London, near P.E.I.’s north shore, where chef Derrick Hoare and his partner Christine Morgan have transformed a United Church into The Table Culinary Studio. Where the choir used to sing, we now gather at individual workstations to make lunch. During our “Bounty of the Sea” session we prepare several seafood dishes, plus we learned how to shuck oysters, de-beard mussels and attack lobsters.

After all the slicing and dicing, we sit down to a lunch of seafood chowder, lobster tails broiled with lime/chili butter, scallops with bacon jam, lobster and blue potato salad and lemon mousse. At the end of the meal, Christine hands out “fortune cookies” in the shape of clams, each holding a typical P.E.I. expression. One example: “If I was any happier, there’d be two of me.”

After lunch we meander along the region of Queen’s County that’s aptly dubbed Anne’s Land. At Cavendish, home of the red-headed orphan’s famous Green Gables, the “Anne” thing does get a little out of control. Cavendish is littered with shopping strips selling Anne souvenirs: dolls, straw hats with fake red pigtails… you name it. We turn off the tourist track and head to North Rustico, a more authentic community known for its Acadian culture, where we rent a kayak from Outside Expeditions and paddle off a few pounds around the harbour.

P.E.I. is full of foodie entrepreneurs, none very far from the others. Across a bridge and following along Hunter River, we make a quick stop at Glasgow Glen Farm where Jeff McCourt produces intriguing cheeses, including blouda, a winning combo of gouda and blue. Just a little further along the river, at the Prince Edward Island Preserve Company, kilted owner Bruce MacNaughton leads us straight to the sampling counter laden with such delights as strawberry and Grand Marnier jam and Shuckin’ Delicious oyster sauce.

We soon arrive at the ultimate P.E.I. experience, New Glasgow Lobster Suppers, a no-frills, family-run island institution since 1958 that might have been the catalyst for the Air Farce joke. All-you-can-eat hot bread, brimming bowls of chowder, mounds of mussels and crisp salads precede the queen of the crustaceans—you choose the size. We finish off with a mile-high wedge of lemon meringue pie.

Later, at Dalvay by the Sea, we crash for the night. Built as a summer cottage in 1896 by the president of Standard Oil, the grand Victorian summer cottage, located inside the national park, still feels more like a home than a hotel. A pre-breakfast brisk jaunt along the beach restore our appetites—must be that briny air.

Islanders have been brewing moonshine since Prohibition, which lasted here until 1948 (most provinces relented in the 1920s). Now the hooch is being legally produced at Myriad View Artisan Distillery Inc., which opened in 2007 in Rollo Bay. So unaccustomed were Islanders to having a distiller in their midst that when the company first started advertising, someone told cofounder Ken Mill: “You’re just begging to get arrested.” It was more common to sell it in Mason jars out of the trunk of a car. Knowing they have their permits, we pop in for a dram of Strait Shine. Prohibition-era moonshine was unaged—it’s too hard to hide barrels from law enforcement—and Strait Shine maintains that tradition with its clear and potent elixir.

Next stop: the hottest meal ticket on P.E.I. In 2015 chef Michael Smith and his wife Chastity purchased The Inn at Bay Fortune where chef Smith had worked back in the 1990s. Every evening chef Smith and his “Fire Brigade”orchestrate Feast at FireWorks, using ingredients from their organic farm as well as from a roster of local farmers, fisher folk, foragers and culinary artisans. Before dinner, guests mingle and slurp freshly shucked oysters, hors d’oeuvres and cocktails served in the historic kitchen, location of chef Smith’s first cooking show The Inn Chef. At food stations throughout the garden, chefs use every form of live-fire cooking known to man, including a smokehouse, open hearth, grill, rotisserie, plancha and oven. No dials, no switches, just old-school cooking, which is served family-style at long butcher-block tables overlooking Bay Fortune.

We wind up our foodie road trip in Charlottetown. Canada’s teeniest capital proved to be chock full of tasty treats. Bill and Mary Kendrick have created a number of authentic P.E.I. experiences so you can meet islanders and learn a thing or two. Highlights of their Charlottetown Taste the Town walking tour include hot and crispy fries at the Chip Shack, where spud queen Caron Prins proclaims she is vying to have her chips named Best in the World. She gets my vote.

By the time we finished the tour we had sampled oysters, mussels, craft beer, Scottish oatcakes and lobster rolls. We also met some fascinating characters who know how to spin a yarn or two.

I never leave Charlottetown without getting in my licks at Cows, named by some as “Canada’s best ice cream.” My favourite flavour is Wowie Cowie—vanilla ice cream chock full of English toffee, dark chocolate and caramel bits. With cone in hand, I wish farewell to P.E.I.; the diet starts tomorrow.