cover image The Boreal Feast: A Culinary Journey Through the North

The Boreal Feast: A Culinary Journey Through the North

Michele Genest. Harbour Publishing/Lost Moose Publishing (Partners Publishers Group, U.S. dist.), $28.95 trade paper (224p) ISBN 978-1-55017-627-8

Genest (The Boreal Gourmet) serves up a fresh, fun and sophisticated northern feast that is anything but the typical vision of wintery cuisine. After all, summer does come to northern Canada, Alaska, and Scandinavia, and culinary delights can be found anywhere if you know where to look. Juniper berries, anyone? Genest first divides her recipes into seasons then into thematic feasts for easy meal planning. Interspersed throughout are lovely essays about her food-driven adventures in northern climes, which have an earthy, nostalgic tone. The book includes a section on boreal pantry items, in case lingonberries and spruce tips are not normally on your grocery list. It outlines wild edibles by season, gives directions for foraging and provides instructions on making, gathering and preserving staples, from rosehip syrup to shaggy mane oil. Resources, such as books, guides, suppliers and travel companies are listed at the back. Despite usually containing specialty ingredients, most recipes become accessible to non-northerners with substitutions of readily-available products. That said, the recipes don't dilute boreal traditions to blend into the modern food landscape; they're the real deal. Genest's book stands out from the crowd with engaging writing, beautiful photos and eye-opening recipes, all firmly rooted in the far North. (Aug.)