How the tradition started
It is near dusk on a hot summer evening in the Laurentian Mountains north of Montreal, the storm clouds having given way to a clear sky. A table outside the entrance to L'Eau à la Bouche, the Relais & Châteaux property that Anne Desjardins and her husband, Pierre Audette, opened as a basic bistro 30 years ago, is set simply for four. Sage plants border the flagstone walkway that leads from the small, 21-room hotel the couple built in 1987 to the restaurant's front door, their giant leaves scenting the air as if in anticipation of the alfresco meal to come. Desjardins, 58, a self-taught chef, has shed her beloved white uniform and toque for a silk magenta blouse and lightweight black pants, this because tonight, she is the served rather than the server, a host who has planned the meal but left the cooking to her son and second-in-command, Emmanuel Desjardins-Richard. It is a meal that speaks to tradition and the passing on of knowledge from mother to child, and to a regional cuisine that has grown and gained renown far beyond maple syrup, meat pies and those globs of deep-fried fat served in sugar shacks known as oreilles de Christ, or Christ's ears.
Most of all, it is a meal that is testament to Desjardins, who broke into the field when most women still restricted their culinary endeavours to their own kitchens, not because she wanted to be famous — she simply thought it would be nice to live in the country and try cooking with fresh, local ingredients. She laughs when I suggest her notion was revolutionary. "I think of it as good food," she says, taking a sip of Pétale de Rose, a crisp, dry Provence rosé. "You don't hide it. You celebrate it."
Celebrating traditions, old and new
And that's exactly what we are doing this evening: celebrating good food and a menu that was created, not over days but in mere minutes, the result of a brief, murmured conversation between Desjardins and her son. As the four of us sit down at the table — Desjardins, Audette, me and my husband — the light bathes everything it touches in a blanket of sheer gold, softening lines as if part of a painting. Call it "Rare Still Life with Anne," for in real life, she doesn't stop, not from the moment she rises in the wee hours of the morning and mounts the steep stairs to her study to check email, research new recipes and evaluate trends, through to her nightly forays through the restaurant, when she meets and greets diners old and new. She has written one cookbook (a compilation of recipes from the restaurant), contributed to others, cooked for the august James Beard Foundation in New York City, been lauded by the New York Times, Gourmet magazine and the Académie Culinaire de France, and been named a Quebec chevalier, or knight, for her key role in developing and promoting the province's cuisine.
What's her secret? "It's all about balance and passion," she remarks, citing what seems to have become her mantra. "Those are two different things, to be sure, but you need to work with them together. You have to constantly renew, tweak, learn and transform yourself to keep things more interesting and remain at the top of your game."
