Recipe For A Perfect Canadian Poutine

Do you love poutine as much as I do? Chances are big you do!

This traditional Canadian recipe is incredibly tasty! For a potato-lover like me, it comes close to heaven! This is why in this post, I am going to share the recipe for a perfect poutine with you!

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What is poutine?

In case you don’t know what poutine is, I’ll provide you with a short introduction. So, poutine is traditionally coming from Quebec, Canada where it was created somewhere in the 20th century.

At this moment, all Quebec villages claim to have invented poutine and they all have their unique story behind it, but no one actually really knows what the truth is.

The dish includes french fries (I like to call them Belgian fries because yes they were invented in Belgium), gravy and Quebec cheese curds. This is how a basic poutine looks like, but you can actually top it with whatever you want! This could be any kind of meat, vegetables, cheese etc.

Now you’re probably wondering how to make this delicious recipe, aren’t you?

Well, I am delighted to share with you the recipe for a perfect poutine from a real professional Quebecer cook!

When I was visiting Quebec, I decided to take a poutine cooking class hosted by Sammy or The Potato Chef as he likes to call himself!

This was my first time taking an Airbnb experience and I loved it! So I will certainly take many more of them in the future. The benefit of this is that you meet local people as well as other tourists during your vacation!

You can book your poutine cooking class here!

But let’s focus on the recipe now!

The ingredients – 4 persons

• 8-10 medium-sized potatoes
• 1 white onion or french shallots
• redhot sauce (or any vinegar-based spicy sauce)
• 1 oz of red vinegar
• 2 oz maple syrup
• 2 oz dijon mustard
• 3 oz demi-glace/gravy mix
• red wine (as much as you like)
• corn starch (3-4 small spoons)
• Quebec cheese curds (or the cheese of your choice)

The poutine recipe

First of all, preheat the oven to 475 degrees (fahrenheit) for 20 minutes.

Step 1 – fries

1. Peel and wash the potatoes.
2. Finely cut the potatoes into Julienne fries (you can also cut them bigger but it will take longer to cook).
3. Put the fries into a bowl and spread them with a small amount of vegetable oil (if you use olive oil, the fries won’t be as crispy; canola oil would be the better choice).
4. Flavour the thin fries with salt, pepper and other spices as you wish.
5. Mix the fries with a spoon so they are all covered with oil and spices.
6. Put the fries on an antiadhesive (very important!) plate and into the oven for 25 to 30 minutes, or till the fries are gently grilled and crispy.
7. Flip the fries after 20 minutes and put them back into the oven for 5 to 10 minutes.

Step 2 – sauce

1. Cut the onions or shallots roughly.
2. In a medium-sized pan, fry the onions or shallots gently till they start to turn golden, and deglaze with approximately 2 oz (or more) of red wine.
3. Mix the 3 oz of demi-glace into 8 to 10 times the amount of water (approximately 20 oz of water) and whip it till the demi-glace is dissolved into the water.
4. Add the mixture into the pan and whip gently.
5. Add the red vinegar, maple syrup, hot sauce, dijon mustard and make it boil, then reduce to medium fire.
6. At this point, the sauce should be constantly thickened. Although, for a good poutine sauce, you should thicken it a little bit more because you don’t want it to make a soup in the bottom of your bowl!
7. To thicken it more, mix some corn starch with cold water (don’t put the corn starch in the sauce right away or it will make lumps).
8. Thicken the sauce till it doesn’t break when you put a spoon into it.

Step 3 – Cheese

In order to make an authentic Quebecer poutine, you need real Quebec cheese curds! If you don’t have access to this kind of cheese, you can also cut the cheese of your taste in small cubes.

Step 4 – Mixing

The final touch is putting everything together! The order in which you put the elements in the bowl is very important!

First, put the fries, then the cheese, and finish with the sauce that will melt down on the cheese and make a creamy, but yet crispy poutine!

Toppings

As I mentioned before Canadians top their poutine with anything you can imagine! I remember eating a poutine cheeseburger, poutine with bacon and even a poutine foie-grass (even though that didn’t taste as I expected).

So, you can literally put anything on your poutine! When I studied in Kingston I also went to a poutine festival where a lot of award-winning poutines could be tasted!

Let me share with you some pictures of the poutines I tasted!

It’s time to try it yourself!

I really hope you loved this recipe and if you try it at home, let me know how it turned out!

All credits to The Potato Chef of course! You can visit his website (with more delicious potato recipes on it) at thepotatochef.com, take a look at his Instagram, or even better, book a poutine cooking class!

Right now I am also accepting recipe contributions to my blog! So if you know how to cook a very tasty dish typical for the country/region you live in or a dish you learned to cook abroad, please send an email to emmasroadmap@gmail.com!

I hope you like it and I can’t wait to read your recipes! If you’d like more inspiration about Canada or Kingston, take a look at my recommendations here!

PS: don’t forget to check out the other Recipes Around The World!