On the Île d'Orléans…
they use ground pork, beef and veal, adding a little pork fat, a clove of garlic and some spices. The texture should be less grainy and is bound together with an egg.

In Charlevoix…
they take the recipe from the Île d'Orléans but replace the pork with hare, and all the meat and potatoes are cut into cubes, except for the chopped pork fat.

In Mauricie
You have to stop at the Guay Bakery to discover the tourtière of Pointe-du Lac made with big chunks of beef, pork, chicken and potatoes.

In the Outaouais region…
tourtière is made solely from duck, cut into cubes and simmered in chicken stock.

In Rigaud,..
they use pork and beef to which potatoes and a pinch of dry mustard are added.

In Val-Jalbert…
they take the recipe from the Île d'Orléans, but replace the veal with a chicken breast and the water with chicken stock.

The choice is up to you… or create your own combination!

Originally it referred to a cooking utensil used to make a pie or "tourte." By 1611, the word tourtière had come to refer to the pastry containing meat or fish that was cooked in this medium-deep, round or rectangular dish.

While every region claims to be the birthplace of "real" meat pie, which is traditionally served with a tomato ketchup, the English regime also played a part in its history. Tourtière would come to be known as "Pâté à l'angloise," the red devil's delight, served with a sweet and sour condiment of vegetables and fruit.

Should potatoes be added, and if so, in what proportion? Should they be raw or cooked?

Should it made from beef, pork, veal, game or what is the best combination? Should the meat be ground or cubed?

And the spices… apart from salt and pepper, should you add cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, even sage or thyme?

Is minced onion obligatory?

First of all, let's settle the question of the pastry. Use a basic pie crust, or pâte brisée.

First of all, there are two basic schools. The cooked filling involves putting all the ingredients into a pot, covering them with water or stock and letting them simmer for a couple hours over low heat. Then the meat just needs to be broken up with a fork, drained if necessary, and placed into the pie crust. The actual cooking time of the tourtière itself is reduced to 20 or 30 minutes.

On the other hand, if the meat is raw, allowances have to made in the cooking time (tripling it), except in the case of "Six-pâtes" from the Lac St-Jean region, which requires 3 hours and is made from game. Fillings made with uncooked ground meat will have a denser texture when cooked in the oven, as is the case with tourtière from Rigaud.