Le Creuset and Community Food Centres Canada: A Partnership

Chef Chuck Hughes

We’re a proud sponsor and supporter of Community Food Centres Canada (CFCC), and we’re excited about their new partnership with Le Creuset as their Official Cookware Partner!

Le Creuset will be outfitting all existing and future CFCC centres with its full line of cookware, bakeware, dinnerware and accessories. They will be used in community meals, kitchens and food education programs to promote cooking skills and healthy lifestyle choices to people of all ages.

“As proponents of good food and community, we are proud supporters of the work of CFCC, which tries to ensure that everyone has access to enough good food for a healthy life,” said Raffi Kouyoumdjian of Le Creuset.

In recognition of this important partnership, Le Creuset has collaborated with celebrity Chef Chuck Hughes to help promote a limited edition Mini Cocotte Gift Set to help generate awareness. This gift set will be available at fine kitchen stores across the Canada, including Le Creuset’s flagship stores in Sherway Gardens (Toronto), Carrefour Laval (Montreal) and Chinook Centre (Calgary).

“I’ve been cooking with Le Creuset forever and CFCC does great work helping people in need get better access to high quality fresh food, so it was important to me to join them and get the word out about their great initiative – plus I get to hang out and cook with kids, which I love!” ~ Chef Chuck Hughes

The limited edition Mini Cocotte Gift Set, offered at a special price of $79.99 (value $120)

Chef Chuck Hughes has also contributed his favourite recipes through a step-by-step recipe app “Deep Dish” included as a free bonus with each gift set. Le Creuset will use proceeds from the sales of the gift sets to help equip the planned 15 Community Food Centres across Canada over the next five years in its role as Official Cookware Partner.

“In our partnership with Le Creuset, we take another step towards offering low income communities dignified access to good, quality food,” said Nick Saul of CFCC. “The generous contribution from Le Creuset, as well as their long term support of both The Stop and the CFCC, helps to ensure that communities across Canada can enjoy nutritious food for all.”

We’re thrilled to see an iconic brand such as Le Creuset and a celebrity chef like Chuck Hughes to hop on board and help sow seeds of change. In celebration of this partnership, we’re giving away 2 Le Creuset limited edition Mini Cocotte Gift Sets! Enter to WIN here.

#YVFChickenRun

Since June, July and August are the months of beautiful weather and fun festivals, we decided to make the best of it all and hit the road with our organic chicken. This summer we partnered with 5 food trucks that visited various retailer locations and the hottest festivals of the summer, and served up Yorkshire Valley Farms inspired dishes.

Charcoal-Grilled Chicken Tacos from El Gastronómo Vagabundo

Folks tasted our chicken at Flavours of Niagara Festival with El Gastronómo Vagabundo, Toronto Beaches Jazz Festival with Gorilla Cheese, Spalsh Festival and Riot Fest with The Feisty Jack, and the Oakville Waterfront Festival with Gourmet Gringos. Not one weekend was wasted!

Krystian Catala of Gourmet Gringos at Oakville Waterfront Festival

The line-ups continued at major retailers such as Nature’s Emporium, Longo’s and The Real Canadian Superstore. Matt Basile from Fidel Gastro’s and his food truck, Priscilla, parked outside of the stores and handed out free samples of his famous sandwiches and tacos filled with our organic chicken. It’s safe to say there wasn’t much left over.

Nature’s Emporium with Fidel Gastro’s

We had such a wonderful time with this program because between retailers and festivals, we were able share our wholesome, organic chicken to new fans and friends, along with the old. We take pride in the food we produce; it’s important to us to that consumers are aware that good food is within arm’s reach.

Apple Butter Wings from The Feisty Jack

The other highlight of this venture was that these 5 incredible food trucks integrated our organic chicken into their menus. Our chicken was grilled, smoked and fried up into these delicious dishes:

Chicken Tinga ~ Gourmet Gringos

Charcoal-Grilled Chicken Tacos ~ El Gastrónomo Vagabundo

Smoked Chicken Grilled Cheese Sandwiches ~ Gorilla Cheese

Indian Chicken Tikka &  Apple Butter Wings ~ The Feisty Jack

Talk about variety!

Smoked Chicken Grilled Cheese Sandwich from Gorilla Cheese

A big thanks goes out to El Gastrónomo Vagabundo, Gorilla Cheese, The Feisty Jack, Gourmet Gringos and Fidel Gastro’s for making our summer filled with fun and great food. The summer may be over, but it will never be forgotten!

Turkey Time With Tim deWit, Our Organic Turkey Farmer

The time of year has come when our organic turkeys are available to be cooked up, roasted and devoured amongst family and friends. We figured what better way to kick off the turkey season than to bring you our organic turkey farmers, Tim and Katrina deWit.

The deWits and their three young children operate an organic turkey, sheep and cash crop farm in Oxford County, just west of the town of Ingersoll. Tim and Katrina have been in the turkey growing business for 12 years and for the last 3, they’ve been growing organic turkeys for Yorkshire Valley Farms.

The deWit Family

Tim and his family got involved in organic turkey farming because they enjoy the challenge of trying out new ways of raising turkeys or growing crops. Not to mention, it’s a sustainable model when they can grow both livestock and crops organically. The deWits believe that organic farming fits well with their farming practices and they’re always looking at new opportunities to supply healthy food to growing markets. A perfect fit for Yorkshire Valley Farms!

The deWit Farm

Why is it important to buy organic turkey for your holiday meals? Take it from the organic turkey farmer himself, it comes down to how the turkey has been raised.

“When you are buying an organic turkey you are getting a bird that has been able to live out its life as nature intended it to.  Organic turkeys have access to pasture, they’ve been fed certified organic feed, free from GMO grains, pesticide contamination, and antibiotics.  Consumers should also know that when they are buying a Yorkshire Valley Farm organic turkey, they are supporting a local family farm in Ontario.  95% of the labour involved in growing our organic turkeys are done by our family.”

Knowing how stressful it can be to prepare a turkey, and how to cook the turkey without drying it out, Tim gave us the inside scoop on the deWit way of holding those juices in.

“Our family’s favourite way to prepare a whole bird is to deep fry it in a turkey deep fryer.  It may sound unhealthy but deep frying actually seals the turkeys natural flavor and juices in making for a great tasting bird in about and hour.  A lot of turkey tips including how to deep fry at www.turkeyrecipes.ca.”

There’s never a dull moment when working on a turkey farm, especially for Tim and Katrina. Every so often, their kids love to help out mom and pop in the barn. Tim shares a moment when his daughter, Charlotte, spent a day at work with him.

“My youngest daughter (who was 4yrs old at the time) was in the barn with me shortly after receiving our day old baby poults from the hatchery.  She loves to help me in the barn with the baby turkeys and will spend hours playing with them.  I didn’t realize this but she actually hid a baby turkey under her sweater when she left the barn.  My wife Katrina called me a few hours later after she discovered her playing with this turkey up in her room.”

Charlotte deWit