Tourtière is a Québécois Christmas tradition. This bistro owner brought it south of the border | CBC Radio (2024)

Keena Alwahaidi · CBC Radio

· Posted: Dec 21, 2023 4:00 AM EST | Last Updated: December 21, 2023

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For this Quebec-born, New York bistro-owner, holiday magic comes in the form of 600 pies.

That's abouthow many pies, or tourtières, people have ordered from Hugue Dufour and his wife, Sarah Obraitis —the owners of a bistro in Queens, N.Y. —this Christmas.

Tourtières have a rich history in Quebec: the deep, flaky pie shell filled with chunks of wild game and potatoes dates back centuries ago, introduced during the colonizationby French settlers.

Around the holidays, sitting down for a piping hot tourtière is a Québécois tradition during Réveillon, a Christmas eve feast observed by French Canadians.

Tradition is partly why Dufour brought his French meat pie to New York. That, and the fact that it seems to have a fanbase south of the border.

Dufour,met his wife when he was a rising chef in Montreal, and Obraitis was a meat distributor in Queens — a match made in culinary heaven.

When she planted the first seed of interest in the pies through a small mailing list at her company, people began ordering them over the phone.

"I would fit fiveto sixmeat pies in my backpack and then go around town to deliver them," Dufour told The Current's guest host Mark Kelley. "Sometimes they would invite me over to drink and stuff, and tell my story."

That new culinary expedition was the beginning of something huge: in their little, Long Island, N.Y., kitchen, the couple made close to 200 pies during their first holiday season.

"We started around Thanksgiving," he said. "I was rolling dough on my little kitchen table all afternoon."

It was what led many New Yorkers to become part ofwhat he now calls"The Club."

And although some Americans expected other traditional Quebec meals from the duo, Dufour said he isn't about to put poutine on the menu.

That's because tourtièretypically "define Quebec at large," he said, but the beauty of it is that its recipe varies distinctly from region to region, and from family to family.

Its versatility is part ofwhy making tourtières for Americans "makes sense," he said. It works for everyone, no matter where you come from.

"You cut a slice, it holds in your hand. You can eat it with your fork, but you can hold [it] ... like you would a hamburger. It's something you can share."

A rich history

Canada's vast culinary history hasbeen long shaped by itspeople— whether from Indigenous people, throughcolonization, or the arrival of new immigrants.

But Quebec has a "distinct cuisine," according to author Lenore Newman, who wrote about tourtière inLost Feast: Culinary Extinction and the Future of Food.

She says Canada's first French colonizers, theAcadians andQuébécois,had a largeinfluence on the province's food.

"Tourtière is very much a Québécoisdish. And it came from rural French coming to Canada," she said.

"A lot of the urban French actually went to Acadia instead. And their cuisine is quite different —although they too have various pies that are a little similar.But they have nothing quite the same as the tourtière."

The pie is alsoone of the only foods from Canada's cuisine that draws on medieval spicing.

"You'll often find nutmegand cinnamon in tourtière, which are very medieval flavours. So it's a very bold preparation," she said. "I think that makes it quite popular."

She cites tourtièreas being a comfort food, and a cozy dish to gather around and eat.

But itmight havea hold on some New Yorkers because of one simple reason:Americans love pie,she says.

"Especially fruit pies," Newman said. "The pie is hard not to love."

Doing it his way

Eatingtourti èrewith ketchup is a classic favourite — but being a member of "The Club" means eating your pie with cranberry ketchup, an old magazinerecipe that Dufour serves with his pies.

"I don't even know if it could be traceable to the original one," he said."But more and more every year,even thoughit's cranberry based, it gets totaste more and more like Heinz ketchup for some strange reason."

There are a couple of secrets to goodtourtière, according to Dufour. But butter is key to gettingthat rich, salty dough.

While a popular method is to use lard in the crust, Dufour says butter will get consistency and flavour right every time.

"Itflakes up. It's delicious. So I do half and half —it's a pound of butter, fourpounds of flourbasically. With a little bit of water and a pinch of salt," he said.

"This is my dough. And everyone can make it."