Published on November 20, 2025
Top 10 Quebec Books on Local Food
Top 10 Quebec Books on Local Eating
Quebec has a rich culinary history, passionate producers, and chefs who are showcasing our local products like never before. Fortunately, many of them are also writing about it!
Some books naturally find their place in the kitchen. Others settle onto the coffee table and never leave. Whether they are cookbooks, gourmet travelogues, or deep dives into our culinary history, the works we are suggesting all have one thing in common: they celebrate what we produce, manufacture, and cook here. From maple to potatoes, from forests to beehives, here is a selection of inspiring books to explore, cook, and celebrate what we eat here—enough to feed both your curiosity and your appetite!
1. Territoires Comedian and columnist Fabien Cloutier teams up with hunter-gatherer chef Jean-Philippe Leclerc to take us on a gourmet journey across Quebec. Featuring anecdotes, recipes, and portraits of local producers, Territoires celebrates our riches—forests, rivers, game, and terroir products—with the conviction that everything tastes better when you know where it comes from. Volume 1 introduces us to spring, while Tome 2 plunges us into the large tables and comforting dishes of autumn and winter, between hunting trips and ice fishing. and it’s not over yet: the duo promises two more seasons to complete this quintessentially local quartet!
2. Mangez local! : recettes et techniques de conservation pour suivre le rythme des saisons Ready to "locavorize" your diet for good? Nutritionist, terroir lover, and agritourism enthusiast Julie Aubé guides you month after month to make local products your best allies, winter and summer alike. With tips, recipes, and techniques for preserving, freezing, canning, and lacto-fermentation, this practical and inspiring guide proves that with the right habits, eating local all year round isn't rocket science! It has been so successful that Julie followed up with Mangez local 2, as well as a brand-new book dedicated to a kitchen essential: Cassez des œufs !
3. Miels The co-founder of Miels d'Anicet, Anne-Virginie Schmidt, leads us to discover honey-based cuisine through both sweet and savory recipes that celebrate the infinite palette of colors, textures, and flavors of this noble ingredient. Photographed over an entire year, Miels invites us to cook according to the blooms and seasons, following the same rhythm as the bees that play a central role in our food system. It is an ode to sustainable beekeeping, led by a company pioneering the protection of bees and biodiversity.
4. Racines A chef of Turkish origin established in Quebec for over twenty years, Fisun Ercan is now at the helm of the gourmet farm-to-table restaurant Bika, in Saint-Blaise-sur-Richelieu—an establishment recognized by the Aliments du Québec au menu program with an established reputation. Both a cookbook and culinary memoir, Racines is a celebration of a dual heritage—Turkish and Quebecois—and an invitation to reconnect with the cycle of the seasons and the generous land that feeds us.
5. Steak Blé d'Inde Patates No recipes here, but a fascinating dive into the history of what we eat! Journalist and Quebec culinary historian Priscilla Plamondon Lalancette traces the evolution of the Quebec plate through its key moments: Indigenous heritage, French influence, waves of immigration, Expo 67, the rise of celebrity chefs… not forgetting pets-de-sœurs, cipaille, smoked meat, and, of course, poutine. Born from the meeting of several cultures, our gourmet heritage makes Quebec a unique place—and this captivating book will definitely make your mouth water!
6. Incroyable érable Chefs, spice hunters, bakers, chocolatiers, and pastry chefs: maple’s culinary ambassadors gather in this gourmet work to share their passion for "blond gold" through more than 60 inspiring recipes. Published in collaboration with the Producteurs et productrices acéricoles du Québec, Incroyable érable is much more than a cookbook: it is an invitation to explore this jewel of our terroir in all its facets—sweet, savory, at any time, and in unexpected ways. Proof that maple has moved far beyond the sugar shack: many chefs now consider it as indispensable to their cooking as olive oil or fresh herbs!
7. Légumes. Recettes créatives et délicates Trained under Normand Laprise at the legendary Toqué! and now a teacher at the ITHQ, chef Stelio Perombelon has held a special love for vegetables for 30 years. In this work, which is both a cookbook and a visual masterpiece, he revisits 20 vegetables in three different ways each, with special attention paid to colors and textures. Caesar-style broccoli, carrot bisque with northern shrimp, butternut squash Wellington, tomato and raspberry pavlova: his delicate and creative recipes restore vegetables to their full glory. The kind of book you leave on the coffee table… and give as a gift with pleasure!
8. Les saisons de Gabrielle Former pastry chef at the Au Pied de Cochon sugar shack and Pastry Chef of the Year at the 2024 Lauriers de la gastronomie québécoise, Gabrielle Rivard-Hiller opens the doors to her maple-based pastry shop, La Cabane sur le Roc, in Saint-Joseph-du-Lac. With special collaboration from author Fanny Britt, this generous book accompanies us through an entire year of flavors and scents, season by season. Salted caramel mille-crêpes, "sugar" Queen Elizabeth cake, cinnamon and maple butter buns, garlic flower rolled croissants, tourtière sticks: whether sweet or savory, her recipes are irresistibly mouth-watering. A book as gourmet as it is generous, much like its author!
9. L'érable et la perdrix A book to be consumed slowly, with attention and appetite. Author and restaurateur Élisabeth Cardin, a leading figure in local and wild cuisine in Quebec, teams up with Michel Lambert, a renowned historian and specialist in the origins of our cuisine, to create an exceptional work born from a dialogue spanning more than four years. Together, they invite us to rediscover the culinary knowledge and techniques of our ancestors—families from here or those who came from elsewhere to settle in the Quebec cold—while taking a clear-eyed look at the future. A deep dive into our culinary identity, between collective memory and the transmission of skills.
10. Épatante patate : éloge de la pomme de terre Gratin dauphinois, poutine, shepherd's pie (pâté chinois): no vegetable is more modest than the potato, yet it is one of the most consumed in Quebec! It has been on our plates for so long that we forget its importance—and yet, it has a fascinating story to tell. Épatante patate plunges us into the world of the artisans and passionate families who work day and night to feed us, through stories that are, at their heart, the stories of Quebec itself. The book is enhanced with recipes from a host of great local chefs—Antoine Masson-Delisle, Antonin Mousseau-Rivard, Fisun Ercan, Jérôme Ferrer, Isabelle Deschamps-Plante, and many others. This book is guaranteed to change the way you look at the good old potato!
