Hwy 59 Food Road Trip

Dish, the magazine they give away at the MLCC liquor mart, delivered a Highway 59 food-based road trip itinerary in its spring 2010 edition.

Dish is actually a more alluring magazine than most of this region's "lifestyle" magazines, and here I'm counting the insular, dull GLove, and those horrible, Ontario-based, one-trick-pony home decor magazines--Decor mantra of each and every month?: "Slap a coat of white paint on it, especially if it's wood." Time for a new editor. (However, there was in summer 2009 a fascinating edition of the Manitoba Historical Society's Manitoba History magazine, on the Winnipeg General Strike.)

The downside to Dish is that it has a cutesy but absolutely infuriating, retrograde archiving method on its website. So, assuming you don't have an hour or two to spend on disinterring a fuzzy, eyeball-seizure-inducing, one-page article, I'll spare you the hassle and just transcribe (ow! my eyeball!) the Hwy 59 itinerary here:

Foodie Road Trip

Southern Manitoba Hwy 59

Prairie Farms

1)    Fruit: Two white BC fruit trucks are parked off Hwy 59: near Spring Hill and in the parking lot of the Fifty-Niner Motel close to Birds Hill Park.

2)    Vegetables: Windmill Potatoes & Vegetables, near the Hwy 4 turnoff. Windmill is operated by Cliff & Liz Waytiuk, selling organic vegetables from a store adjacent to their home, 29048 Road 79N. 204-482-5302.

3)    Vegetables: Chorney’s Vegetables & Fruit, corner of Hwy 59 and Road 80, near the Hwy 4 turnoff. Doug Chorney offers vegetables, berries, painted Easter eggs, perogies, and garden flower bouquets. 204-482-8538.

4)    Honey: The Honey House, operated by Bob & Lorraine Check out of their house at the junction of 508. 204-482-5198.

5)    U-pick Raspberries: Devil’s Creek Herb and Berry Farm, 12 km north of Selkirk. Besides U-pick raspberries, Robert & Wendy Shearer sell vegetables and raspberry leaf herbal tea. 204-766-2669.

Boreal Forest

6)    Berries and shrooms: Wooded areas produce wild blueberries (often on top of granite hills), strawberries, Saskatoon berries and raspberries. Gathering adventures are fun and delicious. (I need to spend the upcoming years locating chantrelle and morel stashes. But when I do, I’ll never write about it, of course.)

7)    Pie: Idle Thyme Restaurant, at Traverse Bay Corner, corner of Hwy 59 and Hwy 11. See also: the Plum Creek Gift Shop.

8)    Smoked pickerel: Near Traverse Bay Road, local fishermen put out signs and sell smoked walleye.

9)    Coffee & take-out picnic sandwiches: Saffie’s Store in Albert Beach.

10) Vegetables: Greg’s Organic Produce, truck parked between Albert and Victoria Beaches.

11) Bakery: Enfield’s Bakery, on Birch Avenue in Victoria Beach. The bakery is a short walk from the community parking lot.