Eating the Northwest Territories: Arctic Char, Caribou and Cloudberries

The NWT's food culture is the food of the North — wild fish, game, foraged berries, and the Dene and Inuit traditions that have sustained people here for thousands of years, plus a small Yellowknife modern scene. It's a remote-food story at its most authentic. Here's what to eat.

The fish Great Slave Lake is one of the world's great freshwater fisheries — the lake trout, the whitefish, and the inconnu (coney). The shore lunch (fresh-caught, pan-fried on a remote lake) is the northern ritual; the fly-in lodges serve it. Arctic char, from the coast, is the other northern fish — rich, orange, and world-class.

The game Moose, caribou, and muskox are the land-meat — lean, rich, and central to the Dene and Inuit diet. The caribou herd migrations are one of the great wildlife events on earth; the meat, dried and smoked ('pemmican' and 'dry meat'), is the traditional food. Muskox, from the Arctic islands, is the delicacy.

The foraged Berries are the northern sweet — cloudberries (called 'bakeapples' or 'aqpik' in the North), blueberries, and cranberries, all wild-picked in the brief summer. The bannock (the frybread) and the game-and-berry traditions are the base of the northern food.

Yellowknife restaurants The small scene. The Woodyard, the Wildcat Cafe (the 1937 log cabin), and Bullocks Bistro (the fish institution) do modern northern cuisine — Arctic char, lake trout, bison, and the local berries. The craft breweries (NWT Brewing) do the 'Kold 9' beer.

The Indigenous food The Dene and Inuit food — the dry meat, the bannock, the game, the fish, and the berry 'ice cream' (akpuk) — is the deep story. The cultural centres and the community feasts are where to find it.

Where to eat Yellowknife for the restaurants; the fishing lodges for the fresh catch; the cultural feasts for the traditional food. And eat the lake trout and the Arctic char — they're the territory's signature.