Speaking in Cod Tongues is an authentic and detailed survey of the culture surrounding Canadian in our many regions, This would be a good title for any Canadian or international traveller who will be exploring Canada, or any Canadian foodie. I wish there were some recipes included in this book, reading it made me hungry!

Speaking in Cods Tongues is a revelation for anyone whose impressions of Canadian food culture have been eclipsed by their louder, brasher neighbour to the south.

Uneasy tensions between the French and the English meant that Canada didn't strongly establish a monolithic food identity although the culinary genealogy of Canada's indigenous people has been largely erased from the narrative until recently. In this way Canada is no different to a lot of other nations who drove away their native peoples.

Newman identifies seasonality, wild ingredients and multiculturalism as three fundamental aspects of Canadian cuisine although her exploration of this suffers because of her tendency towards flights of academia which cause her prose to become turgid. I confess I glazed over at times, keen to get back to more grounded examples of how Canadian food evolved.

There's much to enjoy here with plenty of food facts and a fresh look at maple trees and the syrups and other sugars produced from them. They might appear to be a well-worn national cliche but Newman's hands, the reader gets to see just how fundamentally important their cultivation is.