Dominic P. Tremblay

As part of the Culinary Nutrition Expert Program offered by Meghan Telpner, I had to create a recipe that is healthy and anti-inflammatory. I could have gone the easy route by creating a soup or a stew, but I decided instead to attack one of the most popular, but probably unhealthiest French Canadian delicacy: the poutine. It was a big challenge, but I came up with the following recipe after a lot of testing and after asking many friends to give it a try. I got good feedback so far from people who tried it. I hope you like it too!

The basic poutine contains three main ingredients: the fries, the gravy and the cheese curds. In this version of the poutine, the deep-fried potatoes have been replaced with baked sweet potato “fries”. The beef or chicken gravy has been replaced with shiitake mushroom gravy containing anti-inflammatory spices such as ginger and fermented soy such as tamari. For the cheese curds, the cow-milk based curds have been replaced with raw cashew cheese curds.

Sweet potato fries:

Ingredients

• 2 medium-size sweet potatoes
• 3 tbsp coconut oil
• 2 tsp dried oregano
• 2 tsp dried basil
• sea salt to taste (or Altura Pink Salt)

Procedure

1. Preheat oven to 300 F
2. Cut sweet potatoes (leave the skin on if organic) into piece of approximately 7 mm x 7 mm with the desired length.
3. In a bowl, combine melted coconut oil, oregano, basil and sea salt.
4. Stir the pieces of sweet potato in the mixture until they are all covered with the oil and seasoning.
5. Spread sweet potatoes on a baking dish with parchment paper and bake for 40-45 minutes until the “fries” are crispy on the outside.

Variation: To make this poutine even more anti-inflammatory, a mix of roasted veggies could be used instead of sweet potatoes.

Shitake mushroom gravy:

Ingredients

• 1 cup of dried shitake mushrooms
• 1 cup of warm water
• 1 tbsp organic toasted sesame oil
• 1 small onion diced
• 1 clove of garlic
• 1 cup of water
• 1 tbsp organic tamari
• 1 tbsp of dried parsley
• ½ tbsp. of fresh grated ginger
• a pinch of cayenne
• sea salt to taste (or Altura Pink Salt)
• 1 ½ tbsp arrowroot starch and 2 tbsp cold water

Procedure

1. Reconstitute the mushrooms by putting them in one cup of warm water. Drain, but keep the soaking water.

2. Heat up the sesame oil in a skillet over medium heat. Sauté the diced onion until transparent. Add the garlic and grated ginger and sauté for another minute (or until lightly brown).

3. Add the reconstituted sliced mushrooms and sauté for another 3 minutes.

4. Add the soaking water, the extra cup of water and bring to a boil.

5. Reduce the heat, cover and simmer for 10-15 minutes.

6. Strain the mixture to remove pieces of mushroom and onion. Poor the strained mixture back in the skillet. This step is optional and only necessary if you want gravy without chunks.

7. Add the seasoning (tamari, parsley, cayenne and sea salt). Taste the gravy before adding too much salt, as the tamari is already very salty.

8. In a small bowl, dissolve the arrowroot starch in the cold water.

9. Pour the arrowroot mixture into the hot gravy. Whisk the mixture to prevent the formation of clots until the gravy thicken.

Cheese curds:

Ingredients

• 1 cup of cashew
• Juice of 1/2 lemon
• 1 tsp of onion powder
• ½ tsp of sea salt (or Altura Pink Salt)
• water

Procedure

1. Put the cashew nuts, onion powder, sea salt and lemon juice in a food processor. Pulse until the mixture is a thick paste. To get coloured curds (and boost their health properties, you can also add turmeric to the mix)

2. Slow add water until the mixture holds together but is not too liquid (similar to toothpaste). The mixture will need to be shaped in the form of cheese curds.

3. Pour the mixture in the form on cheese curds (approx. 7 mm wide, 7 mm thick and 2 cm long) on a dehydrator non-stick sheet.

4. Dehydrate at 52 C for approximately 8 hours (until the curds are dry enough to hold together, but not too dry to be to hard). It can also be done with an oven at the lowest temperature and with the door open.

Variation: Walnuts can also be used to make this poutine even more anti-inflammatory.

Assemble the poutine:

To achieve the perfect poutine the French Canadian way there is one rule that must be followed. When assembling the poutine at the end, there should be one layer of fries, one layer of cheese curds, one layer of fries and one layer of cheese curds. The gravy is then poured on the fries and cheese curds. It is a common mistake to put only the cheese curds on top. Enjoy!