An East Coast Experience with President’s Choice

Last month, I was fortunate enough to take part in an amazing East Coast experience hosted by President’s Choice. One thing about being Canadian is having the chance to travel from east to west and discover our beautiful country.

I have really only been to the west coast, Vancouver and Kelowna so this province was always a dream for me to visit. The trip was jam packed into three days and boy did we ever have fun.

Our first stop was at a quaint restaurant in a small town to sample an array of goodies for lunch. Then it was off to a salmon smokehouse. Donning all our safety gear, we entered different areas of the plant to observe how President’s Choice Atlantic Salmon is processed and packaged. The plant was absolutely pristine and we were given the opportunity to get hands on with some pretty good looking fish. I was able to massage a mixture of brown sugar and salt onto large filets of salmon and then weigh and package the slices after they were smoked. Our challenge was to lay out exactly 300g of smoked salmon and guess what? I was BANG ON.

What amazed me more than anything was that most of this process was handled by the line workers.

We finished our tour and then it was off to the resort to settle in and get ready for dinner. After a welcome cocktail, which I opted out of because I don’t drink (the bartender actually made me a Shirley Temple and the real adults had a signature martini).

The menu was as follows:

Appetizers

Lobster Arancini

Cape Cliff Seafood Chowder

Organic Tomato and Bocconcini Cheese Salad

Mains

Fillet of Line Caught Halibut Braised in Tomatoes and Pernod

Roast 8 oz Ribeye of Beef

Hodanca Farms Organic Chicken Breast

Dessert

Local Blueberry Swiss Roll

Carrot Cake Cheesecake

The meal was served with local wines, chosen by a sommelier (also passed on those – gawd I’m boring). I had no trouble choosing what I wanted to eat paired with my “kids cocktail” and it was totally DEELISH.

We started the next morning off right. A full sampling of PC Blue Menu new products all prepared by PC’s executive chefs who joined us on this adventure. Some of the highlights from this meal were prepackaged hard boiled omega -3 free run eggs, supergrains oatmeal, vegetable breads, a delicious assortment of cereals and fresh fruit. I believe I ate the equivalent of 3 breakfasts that day but I needed some fuel to take these photos of the beautiful property we were staying at.

Day 2 was a “free day” to do whatever our hearts desired. Some of the group went on a lobster boat tour, some went kayaking and I chose to have a nice relaxing day which included strolling through the property, visiting the spa and last but not least scarfing down a big fat lobster roll with a load of sweet potato fries. Smart move, right?

The best was yet to come in the evening. The folks at President’s Choice created a full themed dinner based on the upcoming holiday season. We basically had Christmas in August and sampled an array of products that would be wonderful for entertaining your guests at a holiday party. Here’s a copy of the menu and yes, they went all out with decor!

On Day 3, we were whisked away to a frozen food plant that specifically packages blueberries for President’s Choice. After a brief presentation, and some yummy blueberry inspired snacks, we were off to tour the inside of the plant. Just an incredible process to observe that took us from “field to frozen”.

It truly was a unique experience to watch the blueberries exit the crates and make their way through the washing, sorting by size, stemming, freezing and finally, packaging process.

But that wasn’t the best part. From the plant, we were taken straight to where the blueberries are cultivated. Imagine standing in the middle of a blueberry field and being able to rake the fresh berries from the ground into a bucket.

This happened! Along with picking blueberries (which was like a dream come true for a blueberry freak like me), we were also treated to a full sit down lunch with one of the most celebrated chefs on the East Coast – Alain Bosse, otherwise known as The Kilted Chef.

I don’t think I could have been more in my element. A menu designed wholly around blueberries which included: blueberry mimosas. a maple and wild blueberry vinaigrette for our salad, grilled chicken breast stuffed with wild blueberries and topped with a rosemary blueberry demo-glaze and for dessert, shortcake topped with peppered wild blueberries and Chantilly cream. D.A.G.T.B.H. (died and gone to blueberry heaven).

I took a ton of pictures – and probably too many of just the blueberries and food we were served. Concluding with a meal this spectacular was truly the icing on the cake.