More precisely, it is pronounced [put[sup]s[/sup]ɪn] in French (or something very similar, I am not completely fluent in IPA). The ‘s’ is actually the result of a linguistic process called affrication that happens in many languages, including, I think, most North American varieties of French. This is the actual consonant. This process happens even in formal varieties of North American French (not only in joual, which is a slang or informal French spoken in Quebec), and it doesn’t have anything to do with Church Latin that I can tell.
As far as I’ve been able to figure out, “poutine” is actually a French pronounciation of “pudding” that was used as a name for many different regional meals in parts of Quebec and New Brunswick. It eventually came to label this fries-curds-gravy fast food mixture that somehow became popular across Canada during the 70s or so and whose exact origin is somewhat muddled. The name is still used today for other recipes, notably Moncton’s poutine râpée or Acadian poutine (picture and information in French) which I will have to try some day.
The Russian prime minister’s name is written and pronounced the same way in French, by the way. This led to a very interesting piece of news a few years ago, when he met an American official named Berger.
For those who are wondering how to make “authentic” poutine, the cheese is fresh curds (which are very easy to get around here, but seem to cause a problem for Dopers in other locales, from my recollection of other threads) and the gravy is, well, whatever gravy you’d enjoy. Here you can buy poutine gravy, but any thick chicken gravy should do, and I’ve eaten at a place that served it with a white gravy, so variations aren’t unusual. I was under the impression that the curds were cheddar cheese, but Muffin claims they aren’t, so I’ll wait for his input.
Always been white cheddar curds for me. Nor have I ever heard of any other curds than cheddar. I too am interested to hear what others define as the appropriate curd. Typing curd is fun, too.
To me, chicken gravy is made from the leftover grease after frying chicken. It has milk (or cream), flour and salt and pepper. Is that the kind of gravy that you mean?
You are correct. I was wrong. The curds are from the making of cheddar cheese. They do not taste like cheddar cheese, though, which is what I should have said, were I not such a puddin’ head. My apologies.
The thing is that, for some reason, people have made the poutine into some sort of symbol of Quebec cuisine, or of Quebec itself, which is a bit insulting when you think about it. Consider [post=9430637]this post[/post], for example, or from the article itself:
A delicacy?! :eek: There are many other dishes that would be more representative of Quebec, and that could be more easily made into “delicacies”!
The activist mentioned in the article, Jean-Paul Perreault, is from my region, and while I don’t especially like him, I understand his frustration in this particular case. But there’s not much we can do about it. Seeing Quebec as “Poutineland” is about as offensive as seeing Americans as fat Big Mac eaters, but of course that is in fact how many people view the US.
Of course, most of the comments in the article are the usual Quebec-hating complainers you will see crop up in any CBC article about Quebec (even the article about the Quebec National Holiday on June 24), and there’s not much we can do about this either.
Those comments are tame compared to what I’ve seen on the Globe and Mail website and I can’t imagine the ones on the National Post website are any better.
I don’t know why they bother. Leave the commenting to the blogs and message boards; it degrades the news.
Still in Edmonton? Check out Nikki’s for Poutine. Last I knew they were in the Boardwalk building downtown (you can also get donairs there, or smoked meat, and there’s a lovely Chilean lady at another spot in that food court who sells churros and empanadas…). Say Hi to Bill and Lemoia for me.
This might be out of date it’s been a few years since I was last there…
You’ve obviously never tried poutine from Smitty’s or Albert’s… nastiest stuff ever. Over cooked fries, horrid brown gravy, and cheddar cheese.
In March, I had occasion to dine at the Victoriaville diner that is supposed to be the origin of poutine. Appropriately, they serve something like eighty varieties. My arteries hardened just going into the place.
Hopefully it has gotten better. I haven’t had poutine in ages (last time was… oh about two years ago I guess, from New York Fries… it wasn’t bad but I still miss Nikki’s poutine…)
