Main-dish meat sales may be flat for the sixth year in a row, but they still accounted for 1.4-billion servings across the country during the 12-months ending May 2013, according to Toronto’s NPD Group Inc. Chicken entrées account for 900-million servings, says Joel Gregoire, Canadian food and beverage industry analyst, NPD. The kitchen standby flies well above beef, which accounts for 300-million servings and pork at 200-million servings, despite the proliferation of pulled pork and pig’s ears.
So, innovation on meat menus is growing, as chefs turn to lesser-known beef and pork cuts to challenge themselves and offer value. “I like to show different preparations of a meat people are familiar with,” says Scott Vivian, chef/owner of Beast in Toronto. “Instead of a slab of steak they’re going to get a nice 90-gram portion of striploin, pan-seared in cast iron with clarified butter to medium-rare and sliced so it’s suitable for sharing.” Cam Dobranski, owner of Kensington Brasserie and wine bar in Calgary, sells only Alberta hanger steak with classic steakhouse sauces ($24 to $26), and, according to chef Michael Blackie of Ottawa’s Next, steak tartare has become “the crème brûlée of appetizers.”
But, whether serving chicken, beef or pork, chefs agree that their customers want meat from an animal that is raised responsibly and locally.
CHICKEN
Of all the meaty mains served in restaurants across the country, chicken rules the roost. “I call chicken the tofu of the meat world, because it gives you really big flavours,” says Dave Smart, a former vegetarian and the chef/owner of Front and Central in Wolfville, N.S. The luxe chicken pappardelle ($15) on his small-plates menu is a prime example — wide egg noodles tossed with arugula pesto, sautéed bacon and mushrooms, toasted walnuts and local Dragon’s Breath blue cheese. Even the pasta’s shredded confit chicken thighs get a flavour boost from being immersed in chicken and duck fat and cooked for three hours in a low oven until the meat falls off the bone.
On the West Coast, chef Tret Jordan brines and rubs whole chickens with a world of flavours to encourage repeat visits to the new Homer St. Cafe and Bar in Vancouver. The restaurant’s centrepiece is a bright red $50,000 Grande Flamme Olympia Rotisserie oven from France with six spits that hold 36 whole chickens. Jordan adds potatoes and jus, and the chickens sell for $32 (for a whole), $26 (for a half) and $18 (for a quarter).
In his first month of experiments, Jordan’s wet brines included a fragrant mix of cinnamon, allspice, star anise, orange peel, garlic and thyme, and his dry rubs featured Morocco’s ras el hanout and za’atar, a blend of herbs, sesame and salt from the Middle East. “In Vancouver, you have every flavour in the world,” says the French-trained chef. “We like to mix it up so guests won’t get bored.”
Far from being bored, customers at Next in Stittsville, an Ottawa suburb, can’t get enough of Blackie’s bestselling Blackie’s Chicken ($16). “If I take it off the menu I’ll have a riot on my hands,” says the chef, who learned to make the crispy dish a decade ago while working in Bali, Indonesia. He deep fries thin strips of boned, skinned chicken legs coated in tempura batter and tosses them in an “addictive” sauce of sweet Balinese soy sauce (kecapmanis), the salty version (kecapasin), and a touch of sriracha sauce for heat. The dish is garnished with cilantro stems and freshly grated ginger.
Meanwhile, despite an onslaught of health concerns, southern-style fried chicken appears to be sweeping the country. “People love fried food,” says Mark McEwan, the Toronto celebrity chef who offers a “super-popular” southern fried chicken with smoked chipotle pepper sauce and homemade biscuits ($36) at his star-powered One restaurant in Toronto’s Hazelton Hotel. At venerable Hy’s steakhouses in Ontario, Manitoba and B.C., buttermilk fried chicken ($30.95) comes with creamed corn and bacon; and, in Wolfville, Smart has perfected his newest chicken dish — sous-vide buttermilk fried chicken with cornbread and pickled peach purée ($14).
BEEF
For 56 years, Hy’s of Canada Ltd. has offered great steak and great service. While locations and decor have changed, Neil Aisenstat, president and CEO, says steak remains the same with classics such as steak Diane and châteaubriand that his increasingly younger customers (35 to 55) demand. “People still love steakhouses,” says Aisenstat, who’s based in Vancouver, “and they’ll continue to gravitate to the concept as long as it’s well executed.”
The bestselling steak at Hy’s is the 16-ounce prime Alberta beef rib steak ($48.95). An eight-ounce filet topped with gorgonzola cheese and napped with port wine demi-glace ($45.95) is another popular choice, along with the 14-ounce New York steak with a homemade brandy green peppercorn sauce ($51.95).
But, these days it’s not just about the cut of the meat, it’s also about the portion size. “Before, our big steak would be eight to 10 ounces, and now [it’s] 14 to 16 ounces,” says Hy’s Aisenstat, who attributes the change to influences from Canada’s southern neighbour. “We also sell a 22-ounce bone-in New York steak ($59.95) in Whistler, B.C., and a 22-ounce Porterhouse in all locations ($58.95 in Toronto).” Cooking the meat on the bone keeps it tender and sweet, he says, and the larger steaks are perfect for sharing when ordered sliced or Englished. “In the last few years I’ve seen this trend more and more,” he says. “If you want to try a bit of filet or a bit of rib steak, you can order two cuts, have them Englished and eat them family style.”
Eating steak family style is also encouraged at Earls Kitchen + Bar as the Vancouver-based chain rolls out its new Butcher’s Cut program, starting with a 12-ounce rib-eye certified Angus steak rubbed with a porcini-herb seasoning blend. Diners can order the homegrown steak two ways, with a warm potato salad and seasonal vegetables for $33, or sliced on a board for $25 to share with family and friends.
And, a beefed-up selection of shareable side dishes complement the new program and provide a hearty vegetarian option, says Reuben Major, Earls director of Culinary and Bar Development. The side options include roasted ruby red beets with goat cheese coulis and crushed pistachios; roasted brussels sprouts with parmesan, lemon, chili and capers (both $6); and a barley-and-wild-mushroom risotto ($8).
The Butcher’s Cut menu, which is expected to change every few months, follows last spring’s successful Steak Redemption program, which featured a 16-ounce bone-in Certified Angus rib-eye steak for $30. “We wanted to show guests you don’t have to go to a traditional steakhouse to get a great steak,” says Major, explaining that Redemption lifted the company’s steak sales by five per cent in April over the previous year.
PORK
The other white meat has always struggled on the fine-dining scene. “Pork is the slowest mover on the menu,” says McEwan, whose Toronto empire includes three high-end restaurants, an Italian-style trattoria and an upscale grocery store. “Cooking snout-to-tail has garnered a lot of attention with the media, but the general public doesn’t buy it in large quantities.”
While many Canadian chefs agree, others believe times are changing. “Six years ago pork was a hard sell in Vancouver,” says Jordan of Homer St. Cafe and Bar. “Now people get excited about things like
suckling pig. When we tell customers about the fresh local pork steak ($20) that we brine for two days and char-grill, served with roasted fennel and beautiful cipollini and a pan sauce finished with a bit of crème frâiche and grainy mustard, they appreciate it.”
The Brasserie’s Dobranski says pork has sold well since he arrived in Calgary nine years ago. “Because we’re such a young city, I think people are into trying new stuff,” says the chef, who butchers his pigs, makes bacon and cures the jowls to make guanciale. “I’ll put tête de cochon [pig’s head] on the menu and sell out of it,” he says, adding that pig’s ears ($5) are another big seller as a bar snack.
The trick is to learn how to merchandise the odd bits. “If you sell an entrée-size pile of headcheese people aren’t going to try it,” Dobranski says. “For the more adventurous stuff, I’ll sell bite-size portions for $2 or $3, or pair a piece of breaded and fried pig-face — more of a rillette — with something high-end like prawns or scallops. People just love it.”
In Toronto, a porcine heart also beats at Vivian’s tiny Beast restaurant. Along with the weekly pig board ($14), which may include marinated pork heart, pickled tongue, a rustic pâté and headcheese, pork hocks ($12) have become a signature item. But they’re not your grandmother’s pork hocks. Vivian braises the whole hocks overnight until they’re fall-off-the-bone tender, then shreds the meat, fat and collagen before discarding the bone. He then presses the meat mixture into a pan where it forms a solid block as it cools. For service, he cuts five-centimetre cubes, dredges a handful in cornstarch and deep-fries them until crisp. The cubes are tossed in sweet soy sauce, such as an Asian barbecue glaze, served in a bowl with gingery, garlicky homemade kimchi and topped with caramelized peanuts. The result is sweet and savoury pork candy.
So, although sales of meat such as chicken, beef and pork are flat, innovation within the foodservice category continues to drive sales — even as vegetarian fare and “meatless-Monday” campaigns continue to command attention. l
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