Regional Foods

Many years ago I was in Edmonton, Alberta, and had dinner at a Mexican restaurant. I made a rule: Never have Mexican in Canada. I’ve refined that rule during my travels.

Don’t expect seafood unless you can drive to the sea in 2 hours. Mexican is only good when you are close to Mexico or there are Mexicans around. Beef is best where they raise cattle. Cheese is outstanding where you find large dairy operations. Fruits are best where they grow them.

Cincinnati chili is only in Cincinnati, BBQ is really only in Texas, crawfish is only Louisiana. I never try to buck the reality of the region I’m in, but jump on the chance the area difference presents. Unless you are in South, fried chicken really isn’t.

This trip I’ve discovered another variant on the rule. Up north, the upper half of the country, sausages are common, by far the best can be found around the Great Lakes. In the South, sausage is hard to find.

I felt like having pasta, with a marinara and some Italian sausage. There is no Italian sausage in the grocery stores here. In fact, there is no sausage here at all, excepting Andouille. Where one in the north can expect to see in the cooler Italian, Polish, and Summer, here it’s Ball Park.

I’ve decided to have a marinara with shrimp.