Toronto restaurants have been taking culinary cues from Quebec since the pre-referendum days, but in recent years, the city’s interest in our neighbour province’s cooking has approached full-blown obsession. We are living through a decadent war of pimped-out poutines, gamy meats and charcuterie plates. It was only a matter of time before some clever entrepreneurs capitalized on our love affair by establishing a shop devoted exclusively to franco-food.

Enter Joanne Thompson and Sylvain Landry, who just opened A Taste of Quebec, a cozy food store located just inside the Distillery District’s gates. The place delivers on its titular promise. Curious customers can nibble, sip and get hooked on samples of duck magret, iced cider and everything else de la belle province. The rustic front room works as a boutique-deli, with rounds of artfully stacked cheeses and mini-jars of tartinade and confiture placed around the room like votive candles. Vacherin Chaput ($8), the centrepiece of this stately display, is a raw-milk cheese based on an old-country recipe, wrapped in spruce bark and produced only in Châteauguay. A tasting salon in the back room houses an open kitchen, where chefs showcase their talents and demonstrate how to use products from the shop (J.P. Challet, formerly of The Fifth and Le Sélect, and his catering crew are already onboard). The space can also be the setting for dining events for up to 40 people, but the catacomb-like downstairs, untouched since the building’s distilling days, will soon be converted into a private room for tasting parties.

The same proprietors are behind the eponymous Thompson-Landry Gallery (just a few cobblestones away), which features Québécois art exclusively, so they know Quebec sells. Case in point: within a week of setting up shop, two shipments of specialty cheese, Le Secret de Maurice ($15), sold out. Why? This unique creamy cheese needs six hours at room temperature to melt before one cuts a hole in the top to allow for fondue-style dipping of fruit or bread. Other artisanal goodies (nothing mass produced is permitted) include maple syrup laced with cranberries from Drummondville ($28) and St. Marguerite salmon smoked with armagnac ($6). With products expertly selected from Quebec’s regions, a poutine that rivals Jamie Kennedy’s is now possible at home and within budget.

A Taste of Quebec, 55 Mill St., Bldg. 36, 416-364-5020, www.atasteofquebec.com.

Related:
• Total Eclipse of the Heart: A risk assessment of five killer poutines
• New Deli: The city’s best cold cuts
• Café du Lac: Restaurant review