Conton / Creton French Canadian Pork Spread Recipe on Food52 (2024)

FAQs

What is Quebec Creton made of? ›

cretons, a cold pork spread with a texture that varies from smooth to chunky. The pâté-like dish is common in the cuisine of Quebec and first gained popularity with French Canadians. It is made by cooking ground pork and pork fat with water or milk, bread crumbs, onions, and spices.

In Quebec cuisine, cretons (sometimes gorton or corton, especially among New Englanders of French-Canadian origin) is a forcemeat-style pork spread containing onions and spices. Due to its fatty texture and taste, it resembles French rillettes.

The spread is typically flavored with garlic, cloves, ginger, celery, parsley, nutmeg, cinnamon, onions, and allspice. Its texture is fatty, creamy and tender, and it is often served for breakfast, when it is paired with toast.

Season to taste and add spices. Cool mixture, stirring occasionally. Place cretons in small bowls. Keep in refrigerator or freeze.

The link, linguistically, appears to be to the medieval French word creton, which according to the online Dictionnaire du Moyen Français (1330-1500) means 'morceau de panne de porc frite', that is, 'small piece of fried pork fat'. If you fry a piece or pieces of pig fat, you get something akin to pork cracklings.

/ (krɛtɑ̃) / pl n. Canadian a spread of shredded pork cooked with onions in pork fat.

"Creton is a french-canadian specialty; this type of "pork pate" is certainly not healthy, but really delicious! I like it spread on toast or crackers, along with hot mustard. Many in Quebec eat it at breakfast.

Cooked meats: 3-4 days. Confit meats: 2-4 days. Cretons: 2-4 days.

This original creton, made from leaf fat, is very rare today. In 1940, Marius Barbeau, who was a famous Canadian ethnographer and folklorist, described how the recipe had its origins in the monasteries of the lower St. Lawrence River valley.

Cretons are usually served on toast as part of a traditional Quebec breakfast. Not to be confused with "fromage de tête" (tête fromagée in Quebec) or head cheese. From Me, Creton was a comfort food that I grew up with after moving to a small town outside Montreal Quebec called St.

What is the shelf life of Creton? ›

Creton should be refrigerated. Its shelf life in the refrigerator is three weeks. It freezes well for several months.

Pate freezes pretty well. You may notice a slight change to the taste and texture, but nothing too major. The best way to minimise the changes to frozen pâté is to properly store the pate in an airtight container and to defrost slowly in the fridge overnight.

Although it's possible to store French toast either cooked or uncooked, we don't recommend freezing uncooked ingredients. Prepare cooked French toast: The egg and milk mixture takes about 15 minutes to prepare, and freezing it with the bread would require more time to defrost and cook.

It gets its name from the tourte, which is what it was originally made from. Though the name "tourtière" is derived from its filling, the tourte—the French name for the passenger pigeon that is now extinct in North America—was historically used as its filling before the 20th century.

Traditionally made with liver, and mixed with wine and spices until it's cooked down into a spreadable texture, pâté can also be created with liver or other parts of pork, venison, chicken, fish, duck and other game, and even created with veggies on occasion.