Tyler and I planned a road trip so we could see ‘new places’ and feel some sense of human adventure in our bones. We planned to go up to Vermont, New Hampshire, and Canada. Places that though I’d lived on the east coast all my life, I’d never been too.
Our first stop was Brattleboro, Vermont. We got there around dinner time and picked up some burritos from Titos Taqueria before heading to the river to eat them. I loved the simplicity of a local Chipotle dupe. Afterwards we wandered into the local COOP in town that was the biggest one I’d ever seen. I picked up a blueberry icecream sandwich with lemon cookies and ate it happily while it melted on my fingertips. The local brand was Sisters of Anarchy which wouldn’t be the only time in this trip I experienced their quality creations.
Next up, still in Brattleboro that’s worth checking out is the Retreat Farm Market. We didn’t buy anything, but we tasted a bunch of scrumptious free cheeses and I later wish I had gotten more there. They had amazing local vendor products from sausages to handmade vegan marshmallows. It also is a great place for some morning hiking and they have monthly community events with live music and food.
I had my eye on Putney’s farmers market while skeleton-ing out the trip itinerary (if that’s even a word). It was one of the only farmers markets open on a Sunday and since we would be camping the next few days, I wanted some fresh seasonal ingredients to cook with. Not only was the weather perfect this day, but so was the energy at that market. We hustled down a gourmet bagel ( za’atar bagel with scallion cream cheese, tomato, cucumber, basil oil and pickled onion), and snatched up fresh eggs, one pepper, a bag of mixed greens, one leek, a small bunch of basil, carrots, and link breakfast sausages. There was a coop store there as well, so we got a few small cups of yogurt and fresh Vermont maple milk. I put the rest of a leftover nitro brew in it, turning it into the equivalent of a Starbucks canned latte; but more of a granola farm-girl version.
At camp our meals consisted of mostly of eggs, potatoes, and sausage, while also making some protein pasta. I didn’t bring enough spices to add a ton of flavor to the meals and mostly winged it. Camping food is what it is, you do what you can with what you got. It’s nothing like the kitchen at home.
Moving up to Burlington we decided to award ourselves with satisfying the craving for pizza once we set out bags down and unpacked. Going downtown, I had done a serious deep dive into pizza places in the area and was set on a place called Flatbreads. It was funny because once we got there Tyler was worried they only sold flatbreads and not pizza. I could see they did serve pizza, they just called it flatbread and sliced it in large rectangular strips. We were unfamiliar with this method, but it was in fact delicious so we got over it. They had a ‘special’ elote pizza which we tried on one half and got farm sausage on the other half. Absolutely no regrets.
The next day I wanted to get some produce from local farm/s in the area. Close to us was Bread & Butter Farm, who also offered a cafe atmosphere serving drinks and pastries in the mini market. We didn’t get anything to eat, but we did a little grocery shopping picking up : one tomato, two eggplants, one onion, apple cider vinegar, swiss chard, and some other things probably I forgot to take photos of. Later we made a delicious quinoa bowl with potatoes and chickpeas, local smoked cheddar, and veggies from Bread & Butter.
Our last day in Burlington we had planned to explore the widely talked about, Shelburne Farms property. It was a massive amount of land, and Tyler really wanted to try their food cart a couple hours before we had dinner at the Inn by the water. We got to the food cart an hour before it closed and I ordered a salad since I wanted to save my appetite for dinner. Tyler got a black bean burger that was the best I’d ever had if I’m being completely honest. My salad was so fresh I would bet money that the ingredients were picked that day out of the field. It feels good to eat salad greens and cherry tomatoes that don’t even need dressing, they have such beautiful natural flavor. It feels real, even realer that a burger on a bun of course. After walking that off for quite a while, we had dinner at the Shelburne Inn. Accompanied by a gorgeous view of Lake Champlain, I tried my best to take it all in. We ordered stuffed peppers with goat cheese as an appetizer and were also given complimentary sourdough and butter to quell our appetite. The peppers were delicious and the cheese was the consistency of whipped-like cream, topped with chives. They looked like litter lobster tails, and I loved the thought that a vegetable could ever live to resemble a crustacean. We split the fish of the day that, similar to the food cart salad tasted like it was caught that morning it was so fresh. I also forgot to mention that we did buy a fresh loaf of sourdough at Shelburne too, and Tyler did a taste test while it was still WARM.
There was a heat wave hitting the area while we were there, and inevitably after a long day of sweating and walking around Shelburne Farms, I was craving ice cream. In Brattlesboro, I had an ice cream sandwich I snatched from the local town grocery COOP. It was blueberry ice cream between two perfectly soft lemon cookies. A flavor BOMB. Funny enough, the company that made them was just south of Burlington and close to where we were staying. Sisters of Anarchy, they’re called. They seemed to grow a lot of berries, and had one I had never even heard of before, which I later sort of regretted not getting in ice cream form. We got maple and blueberry, which was a safe bet we couldn’t go wrong on.
Along the trip, we had brought a great tool I asked Tyler to get me for my birthday this year : a portable blender. It came in handy to make sauce while cooking and smoothies in between meals while traveling. Here is the link: https://www.ninjakitchen.com/products/ninja-blast-max-cordless-portable-blender-sea-glass-zidBC251MT
After Vermont, when we got to Montreal and I saw the kitchen at our airbnb, I knew we’d be spending more time eating out here. I wasn’t apposed to this either since cities have endless food spots to explore, generally speaking. I decided to give myself permission to splurge on food the rest of the trip. Besides one sandwich I made with the sourdough from Shelburne, eggs we still had from the farmer’s market in Putney, an avocado, the last of the swiss chard and a tomato from Bread & Butter farm, butter. I think that was it.
We tried a lot of places, and truly ended up just walking around, all day, everyday. In not so chronological order, notable food spots included Olive & Gourmando, Falafel Yoni, Roxy’s Foccacia, Kahera Street Food, Le Filles Fattoush, Iconoglace, Dalmata, and more. Cafe’s included Olympico, Kahera, Maison Sauvage, and my personal favorite, Joie De Livres. If we had a nicer kitchen I would’ve gotten more ingredients from Jean-Talon Market and cooked with things from there too.
At the end of the day, it’s really crazy to live in a time and place with such abundance. Where food is not just a means for survival but also an experience and a creative outlet. I’ll always have such a high level of respect for everyone in the food industry. Next time you’re in Vermont, or Montreal checkout these places & support the local growers if you are going to cook!
*also, when I figure out how to add an accent to the ‘e’ in Montreal I will, but for now, it’s wrong, sorry. I couldn’t figure it out lol.
With love,
Claire <3
