We met in the opulent Fairmont Chateau Frontenac’s Le Champlain dining room where the windows open out over the ice-filled St. Lawrence River. “I’m sorry I was late,” Executive Chef Jean Soulard, the culinary guide of Quebec’s most important hotel, TV star, radio personality and best-selling cookbook author said as he extended his hand in greeting. After climbing a narrow staircase and making several turns, we ducked into his small office where he directs a kitchen empire that serves more than 3,000 meals daily. Outside the office window, stainless steel sinks and long prep tables stretched opposite a bank of metallic refrigerator doors.
Jean Soulard, decked out in his chef’s whites with a shock of salt-and-pepper hair, is surprisingly unpretentious and engaging. He casually offered me a cup of coffee while I pulled a chair to the front of his cluttered desk. After having wandered through the impressive tables set with glistening wine glasses, sparkling silverware and gleaming plates, and making a point to study the inlaid ceiling woodwork and intricately carved coats of arms of the families that settled Quebec City, I expected a head chef as affected and proper as the restaurant he runs. Instead, as we began our discussions, it was as though I was getting together with an old friend.
As the son and grandson of bakers and innkeepers, Jean Soulard has gastronomy in his blood. He jokes that his home village had more ducks than people. After discussions about the evolving flavor of red peppers as they sauté over time and the pleasures of seasonal cooking with cuisine de terroir and produits regionaux, Soulard spoke of his first months and years at the Chateau Frontenac when locally-grown artisan produce, provincial cheeses and even regional bakeries were rare.
“When I first come to Quebec City and visited the local market, I could only find three kinds of local vegetables,” Soulard says. “Imagine trying to cook with only broccoli, cauliflower and small potatoes. Imagine my dismay as the son of a baker that I could not find a local baker large enough to make the fresh baguettes I needed for the hotel dining rooms.” He laughs, “Even our local cheese was limited to three different kinds – white, yellow and orange cheddar.”
“For me, one of the secrets to great cooking is finding wonderful ingredients,” Soulard intones, “and the best ingredients are the freshest and, hence, local.” Pointing up to the ceiling, he adds, “To this day, I still have a small herb garden on the rooftop of the chateau where I grow special herbs I just can’t seem to find elsewhere.”
From that beginning, our discussions focused on the difficult road to developing local sources for vegetables, fowl, meats, cheeses and breads. Soulard explains that creating a relationship with suppliers for regional ingredients is a long slow process, “It can’t be done in two to four years. Chefs need to be there a while and they need patience.”
Soulard tells a story of his search, 15 years ago, for local city bakeries to provide fresh rolls for the Chateau Frontenac. The first local baker he approached protested that he could not possibly bake the amount bread that the hotel restaurants needed. So, Soulard asked, “How many baguettes can you give me?” The answer was 10. Soulard agreed and placed his order for 10 baguettes a day. Two weeks later, he asked if it would be possible for the baker to give him 15 baguettes a day.
The story was repeated with other bakers. Soulard drove around town with a van collecting baguettes a dozen here and a dozen there from local bakers. He still had to augment the local bread with baked goods from further afar.
Slowly, the bakers learned how to increase their baking without losing the artesian flavor. A delicate balance needs to be maintained between keeping the baking local and keeping it from becoming indistinguishable from commercial bakers. Today all of his breads come from the city region.
A friend of mine, Al Capone of Capone Foods in Somerville, Mass., who makes fresh pasta and sauces, is facing a similar problem attempting to balance artisan passion with commercial expansion. As his pastas and sauces become more popular and his wholesale operations expand, it becomes more difficult to keep the handmade quality that has created his faithful customers. Rather than simply creating bigger batches, he has found that the only solution is to add shifts or cooking lines and maintain his small batch state of mind.
Al Capone states, “The difference between mass market spaghetti sauces and my Plum Tomato and Basil sauce is that they start with a tanker truck full of ground tomatoes, heat it and can it – I keep the batches smaller in order to control the heat and maintain the integrity of the ingredients.”
Another of Soulard’s stories recounts discussions with farmers in the local markets where broccoli and cauliflower were in abundance, but little else. Soulard suggested that if they could grow such good broccoli they could probably experiment with carrots, spinach, swiss chard and other vegetables. The local farmers responded with new vegetables, a few each year as the growing seasons progressed. Soulard smiles broadly and proudly declares, “Today we have almost every kind of vegetable I need from five kinds of carrots, to broccoli rabe, to mini fennels…even crosne and Jerusalem artichokes.”
The change in the food market surrounding Quebec City has enhanced far more than only vegetables and breads. Cheeses that were once limited to various cheddars are some of the most diverse on the continent. Pre-salted lamb graze beside the St. Lawrence River. Cattle raised on the Iles de la Madelaine produce distinctively flavored milk. Ducks fed with local corn run free and result in not only delicate waterfowl but also wonderful foie gras.
Jean Soulard notes, “Anyone who has recently visited Quebec City recognizes that it has become one of the culinary capitals of North America.” He pauses and his eyes widen, “It is hard to believe how far we have come in the past 15 years.”
