A new online documentary series that features Wood Buffalo profiles the region’s original farm-to-table and locally-sourced cuisine rarely found outside of the Boreal Forest.

Red Chef Revival, a six-part travelling web series sponsored by Telus’ STORYHIVE initiative, takes three Indigenous chefs to Indigenous communities across Canada to experience their cuisine.

The episode featuring Fort McMurray and its surrounding rural areas is hosted by chef Cezin Nottaway, an Algonquin woman running a food business out of the Kitigan Zibi Algonquin First Nation (Maniwaki) in Quebec.

During the 22-minute episode, Nottaway tries cannabis-infused butter made by Cheeko Desjarlais of the Fort McMurray #468 First Nation. Brian Bird, a local moose hide tanner, serves trout cooked over an open-fire with birch syrup.

The episode finishes with a feast of beaver tail cooked in maple syrup and rabbit after training with the Janvier Volunteer Fire Department.

“The simplicity of the bush food is no spices, no fancy herbs,” she says during the episode. “You’ve got yourself and your pepper, cooking it on open fire like meat and potatoes. Not even any vegetables. You’re lucky to get a carrot.”

Throughout the episode and speaking in a Friday interview, Nottaway says the experience was as much of a spiritual and cultural one as much as a sensory one.

At one part of the episode, she reflects on how quickly nature bounced back after the May 2016 wildfires and continues providing a harvest for the people she meets.

“It’s important that other people need to learn about who we are as a people,” she said in an interview. “It’s also important that people know every aspect of our culture and food is such an important part of our lives, that people know about our way of life.”

A main goal for Red Chef Revival was to show food as a cultural access point, said B.C.-based filmmaker and director Dan Berish.

“Food is a great way to talk about people and community and tradition,” said Berish, who produced the series with fellow filmmaker Ryan Mah. “Indigenous people, just like every other culture, have very deep connections to food.”

A major takeaway was how the modern trend of farm-to-table cuisine and locally-sourced food is centuries older.

While that observation may sound like an obvious conclusion, Berish said it is easy to forget it was how people ate for centuries and that what was around you influenced your diet.

Cougar, for instance, reminded him of wild boar. The beaver tail was sweet, fatty “and pretty incredible.”

“Those are all things I had never heard of before, but it was incredible to see our chefs take those traditional recipes and sometimes put a new spin on them,” he said. “Everywhere we went, we were literally foraging within 10 metres of where we were cooking.”

The other two hosts are Rich Francis, a Top Chef finalist and member of the Tetlit Grich’in and Tuscarora Nations; and Shane Chartrand, a Métis/Cree chef who was a finalist on Chopped and the first Indigenous chef to take top honours at a Gold Medal Plates competition.

Episodes of Red Chef Revival can be found on the YouTube page for STORYHIVE.

vmcdermott@postmedia.com