THUNDER BAY -- Goods & Co. Market hosted Feast On: A Taste of Thunder Bay on Saturday evening, inviting the city's culinary community to celebrate Northern Ontario's many ingredients and flavours.

The interactive event featured seven chef stations, showcasing dishes crafted from Ontario-grown ingredients by six chefs -- one visiting chef, originally from the city and owner of Richmond Station in Toronto, Ont. -- and a bakery that is also Feast On certified.

It also offered local entertainment and Feast On-certified Ontario-craft beverages from Sleeping Giant Brewing Co. and Woodside Bar, as well as Vintners Quality Alliance wine, sponsored and provided by Wines of Ontario, for people to taste and see what's truly available in the province.

Aakash Rathod, a Goods & Co. Catering head chef and owner of Creative Cooking, was promoting the city's foraging culture around the fall season.

Goods & Co Market

"There are lots of edible mushrooms around Thunder Bay that we find every year in a season," Rathod said.

As a forager, he said he forages many of the wild blueberries, raspberries and saskatoon berries, as well as a lot of mushrooms and more around Thunder Bay.

For the evening, Rathod plated a savoury tart called tarte de bosquet, made with various types of mushrooms.

"We infused the morel mushroom in the tart itself and then the mix itself was made with king oyster mushroom, baby shiitake mushroom and shiitake mushroom that was from the wet mushroom farm out of Sudbury, (Ont.)," Rathod said, adding that they also included many different local vegetables and produce.

Thunder Bay

"On top as a garnish, we had a mushroom faux gras, which is completely vegetarian and then we also had a blue cheese fondant, which was also local from (The) Cheese Encounter and a little bit of microgreens," he continued.

Showcasing the dish at the interactive event, Rathod said it felt "really great" and was almost an honour to plate food that people could naturally find around the city.

"Specifically, our growers, our farmers and our suppliers who are around Thunder Bay and the way we can create something which is... not (included in) a day-to-day use," Rathod explained.

"We try to make something (extravagant) for a Feast On festival like this to showcase some of the culinary skills that we have in Thunder Bay and our food scene that is daily growing."

What to expect

Managed by the Culinary Tourism Alliance, Feast On functions as a local food certification program.

Melissa Gagné, the alliance's destination development consultant, said the alliance runs the program to ensure all chefs and craft beverage producers they work with meet the minimum requirement that at least 25 per cent of the ingredients they use in production are Ontario-grown and raised.

"Usually, they're at a much higher percentage than this, but that's sort of the criteria of the program," Gagné said.

"And tonight is a celebration of all of those businesses in Thunder Bay who are Feast On certified, so it's a great way for people to be able to taste food from all over the city and from different chefs with different perspectives and ways of cooking and interpretations of those ingredients."

Culinary Tourism Alliance Feast

She added that it was a really great reflection of the city's food scene and how diverse and different it can be, while still sharing the same values of supporting local suppliers, producers, ingredients and really ensuring it was something people recognized but could also see through a different lens.

"This is a partnership with Tourism Thunder Bay and Destination Northern Ontario and so this is something that we have been working on together in order to really highlight Thunder Bay as a food destination, which we all know here already," Gagné said.

"And it has been just a really great opportunity... to work together in order to bring that to light, not just within Thunder Bay, but to the broader tourism network and for visitors who are interested in seeing what Thunder Bay has to offer."

There are lots of edible mushrooms around Thunder Bay that we find every year in a season.

Where this fits

Menus are the clearest record of what diners actually wanted, since every change reflects something that did or did not sell.

The short version

  • "There are lots of edible mushrooms around Thunder Bay that we find every year in a season," Rathod said
  • "On top as a garnish, we had a mushroom faux gras
  • Showcasing the dish at the interactive event, Rathod said it felt "really great" and was almost an honour to plate food that people could naturally find around the city
  • "Specifically, our growers, our farmers and our suppliers who are around Thunder Bay and the way we can create something which is... not (included in) a day-to-day use," Rathod explained
  • "We try to make something (extravagant) for a Feast On festival like this to showcase some of the culinary skills that we have in Thunder Bay and our food scene that is daily growing."

The bottom line

The details will firm up over the coming months. What is already clear is that this is unlikely to be the last we hear of it.