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Eric Akis: Are you a Canadian foodie? Take this quiz and find out

Canada Day will soon be here, the time of year I offer another edition of my annual Canadian food quiz. Give it a try, eh, and see how you do. You’ll find the answers here .
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Canada Day will soon be here, the time of year I offer another edition of my annual Canadian food quiz. Give it a try, eh, and see how you do. You’ll find the answers here.

1) In their most recent listing, Air Canada’s enroute Magazine named this Ucluelet establishment as one of the top 10 new restaurants in Canada:

a) Shed

b) Pluvio Restaurant + Rooms

c) Wolf in the Fog

d) Sobo

2) Who named the B.C. municipality of Peachland?

a) Graham and Florence Peach, the couple who owned the first commercial orchard in the Okanagan Valley.

b) In the late 1800s, a contest was held, residents submitted names for the area and Peachland was chosen.

c) An American peach grower from Georgia named Billy Cobb named it after moving there in the 1800s and declaring the land perfect for peaches.

d) Mineral prospector turned land developer John M. Robinson did in the late 1800s, after staying in the area and tasting peaches grown there. In 1889, he purchased and subdivided land for a townsite and fruit lots.

3) Ginger beef is a popular dish served in Chinese restaurants across Canada. According to Ann Hui’s book Chop Suey Nation, where was it first prepared?

a) In Canton, China.

b) George Wong first made it at the Silver Inn Restaurant in Calgary in the mid 1970s. It was originally called deep-fried shredded beef with chili sauce. Customers thought its spiciness came from ginger. Other restaurants began serving their own version, and it eventually became generically known as ginger beef.

c) In San Francisco, around 1869, during the gold rush. The dish then made its way around North America, becoming extremely popular in Canada.

d) Toronto’s Hong Kong Garden restaurant, first opened in 1947, which is known for serving classic Chinese-Canadian dishes, such as chop suey and, of course, ginger beef.

4) The small town of Mundare, Alberta, is home to a roadside attraction said to be:

a) The world’s largest perogie replica, built to honour the community’s historical ties to Ukraine.

b) The world’s largest rainbow trout replica, signifying the great fly-fishing in the area.

c) The world’s largest sausage replica, which is 12.8 metres high and weighs over 5,400 kilograms. Mundare is home to Stawnichy’s Mundare Sausage, a business known for its Ukrainian-style sausages.

d) The world’s largest wheat sheaf replica, a symbol of the importance of that crop to this part of Alberta.

5) According to research by the University of Saskatchewan, this animal is spreading rapidly across Canada, particularly in the Prairie provinces, threatening native species such as nesting birds, deer, agricultural crops and farm livestock:

a) Wild pigs (a mix of wild boar and domestic swine)

b) Badgers

c) Black footed ferrets

d) Armadillos

6)What’s a Regina-style pizza?

a) A pizza with green and white ingredients, symbolizing the green and white jerseys of the Saskatchewan Roughrider football team.

b) A specialty pizza with a dough made with organic Saskatchewan wheat flour.

c) A good-with-beer pizza served at Regina bars topped with perogies and kolbasa.

d) A thick-crusted pizza, spread with a tomatoey sauce, that’s topped with layers of meat and vegetables. Cheese is then set on top and when baked, melts and spreads from edge to edge, creating a thick, hefty and filling pizza very popular in Regina.

7) According to the Spectacular Northwest Territories tourism website, spectacularnwt.com, their territory has the most gargantuan Arctic Char on Earth, a fish they say can tip the scales at more than:

a) 30 pounds

b) 40 pounds

c) 50 pounds

d) 70 pounds

8) According to an article on the Canadian Encyclopedia website, thecanadianencyclopedia.ca, broadly speaking, “country food” can refer to a variety of cuisines prepared by locals in what is often a rural area. But, typically, when used in Canada, and in reference to Indigenous peoples, country food describes:

a) Foods prepared using centuries-old First Nation cooking techniques.

b) Foods, such as meat, preserved using traditional methods, such as air-drying.

c) Traditional Inuit food, such as hunted, caught or harvested local seafood, sea and land mammals, birds and plant life.

d) Traditional foods served at special gatherings.

9) In many diners and takeout joints in Winnipeg and other parts of Manitoba, you’ll see a type of burger called a “Fat Boy” on the menu. What is it?

a) A three-patty burger with cheese and all the fixings.

b) A messy, but tasty burger featuring a beef patty adorned with a bean-less style of chili, dill pickles, onions, mustard, lettuce, tomato and mayonnaise.

c) A gourmet burger featuring a thick 10-ounce patty made from ground bison.

d) A cheese-stuffed, jumbo-sized burger with an enormous bun first served at Winnipeg’s Red River Exhibition.

10) Winnipeg is said to be the place where a divine dessert called Schmoo torte, also spelled Shmoo, was invented. What is it?

a) A layered dessert made with cake, such as angel food or sponge, whipped cream, caramel and nuts. Lore suggests that, years ago, a Winnipeg mother invented it for her son’s bar mitzvah.

b) A Jewish-style spice cake layered with Winnipeg-style cream-cheese icing.

c) Schmoo is short for schmoozing, why this addictive, ganache-filled cake is great to serve at large gatherings.

d) Schmoo is a style of marzipan, which you’ll find layered in this tall cake that also features raspberry and lemon.

11) Due to such things as increasing global demand, this crop now ranks fourth among Canada’s principal field crops:

a)Soybeans

b)Quinoa

c)Amaranth

d)Red Fife Wheat

12) This book won gold in the English-language, General Cookbooks category of last year’s Taste Canada Awards:

a) Vegetarian Viêt Nam

b) Out of Old Ontario Kitchens

c) Set for the Holidays with Anna Olson

d) Joe Beef: Surviving the Apocalypse

13) In 1890, Toronto chemist John J. McLaughlin started making soda water, which he sold as a mixer for flavoured extracts and fruit juices. 14 years and numerous experiments later, he came up with this beverage:

a) Hire’s root beer

b) Dr. Pepper

c) Canada Dry Pale Ginger Ale

d) Sprite

14) According to the Bonjour Quebec tourism website, bonjourquebec.com, cheese curds, a classic Québec treat, are fresh cheddar curds not yet pressed into blocks. They say you’ll know a good one by:

a) The way it melts and blends with the gravy on poutine.

b) How tender and pillowy it is.

c) Its fresh, summer grass-like aroma.

d) The “squeak-squeak” sound the curd makes when you chew it.

15) The McCain brothers, Wallace, Harrison, Robert and Andrew, opened the first McCain Foods production facility in their hometown of Florenceville, New Brunswick in 1957, producing frozen French fries. In the company’s timeline, it says they’ve expanded quite a bit since then, noting that:

a) They now produce over 30 types of frozen potato products.

b) They now sell throughout North America and recently began selling in England.

c) They now have sales in over 160 countries and a global team of 22,000 people.

d) They now use over one million kilograms of potatoes each year to make their french fries.

16) If you’re eating poutine râpée in New Brunswick, what are you having?

a) A boiled dumpling made with potato with a tasty centre of seasoned pork.

b) Râpée means quickly, a reference to the frozen french fries and canned gravy used to make this quick-to-prepare type of poutine.

c) A coarse pork pate with bits of potato and cheese curds in it.

d) An Acadian-style of poutine where the fries and gravy are topped with creamy nuggets of chèvre, soft goat cheese.

17) According to the Mussel Industry Council of Prince Edward Island, that province’s mussel industry has grown from an annual yield of 88,000 pounds in 1980 to this staggering amount:

a) 10 million pounds

b) 50 million pounds

c) 5 million pounds

d) 100 million pounds

18) What is a chix, also called a chicken, lobster?

a) An undersized lobster not ready for harvesting.

b) A lobster weighing approximately 450 grams.

c) A dish where sautéed chicken breast is topped with buttery chunks of lobster.

d) A large lobster about the same weight as a roasting chicken.

19) Figgy Duff is a traditional Newfoundland-style steamed pudding. Duff refers to the pudding. What does “figgy” refer to?

a) The fig jam used to sweetened the pudding and its sauce.

b) The dried figs added to the pudding, introduced to Newfoundland by Mediterranean cod fishers.

c) The raisins added to the pudding. Throughout Newfoundland’s history, in many parts of the island, raisins were referred to as figs, a Cornish term for that shriveled fruit.

d) Figgy is the last name of the person that created this pudding, Wallace Figgy.

20) Used to make preserves, partridgeberries, which are related to cranberries, can be found growing in wild places, such as Newfoundland and Labrador’s coastal barrens. Internationally, though, in places such as Europe, these berries are most often called:

a) Chokecherries

b) Wild cranberries

c) Cloudberries

d) Lingonberries

Find the answers here.

Eric Akis is the author of eight cookbooks. His columns appear in the Life section Wednesday and Sunday.