watermelon

The Canadian Food Project Experience was started on June 7, 2013 by Valerie Lugonja of A Canadian Foodie. It’s a compilation of Canadian Food Bloggers who are committed to sharing their time, unique Canadian food experiences, and recipes. I came into this 12 month challenge a couple months late and this will be my first submission. Our theme for August is to write about A Canadian Food Hero. This is a difficult topic as there are so many Food Hero’s deserving recognition. So how do you pick one? From the Ranchers and Farmers who work endlessly to get their goods to market, local shops and artisans who are committed not only to their craft, but to getting their items to you, to the local foodie advocates who promote the local restaurants and chefs by creating public awareness through various channels. Choosing one was hard. So I decided to choose two.

Late last week I had the opportunity to sit down with Dana VanVeller and Lindsay Anderson of Feast, an Edible Road Trip, while they stopped in Calgary. This opportunity to chat with these two remarkable ladies was provided by the Food Bloggers of Canada, who hosted this small and intimate Tweet-up at Café Gravity Espresso & Wine Bar. It was here I learned about the journey that brought Dana and Lindsay to create Feast: an Edible Road Trip, and later discover where they would be going next.

Foodie Friends Dana and Lindsay started their coast to coast food adventure in June with hopes of increasing Canadian Food Culture awareness through various stories, recipes, photographs, and videos. These ladies are driving, camping and eating their way across Canada finding and featuring local people, communities and organizations that strive to make each Province’s food systems more vibrant, sustainable and accessible. Their journey so far has brought them through British Columbia, the Yukon, Northwest Territories and Alberta with many Provinces to go. Sitting beside these two, enjoying a glass of wine while listening to their stories, makes you feel like you’ve known them forever and could easily stow away in their car to join them, if they’d let you.

Dana and Lindsay are my Canadian Heroes. They are the storytellers, bloggers, writers, educators and food activists who are sharing their stories from the road and making our mouths water with their photos and experiences. Checking their blog has become a daily ritual for me, eager to see what’s new in their world, what epic culinary adventure they’ve had that day and drooling just a little more with each photo.

I was inspired to create several recipes from their experiences thus far, but with the kids on summer holidays, July was mostly a travel month for us, and so time was not on my side. So this former BC girl decided to create a simple recipe derived from the fruits of the Okanagan, a place Dana and Lindsay visited and a place I’ve frequented many times over the years. My home is Alberta, but my heart remains in British Columbia.