YELLOWKNIFE - Over the next two weeks southern Canadians and New Yorkers will have their taste buds awakened to Northern cuisine thanks to Yellowknife chef Pierre LePage.

Chef Pierre LePage stands in his restaurant, L'Heritage. For the past six months, LePage has been preparing for a three-city tourism promotional tour where he will cook food from the three territories. Northern food has been sent south for the events. - photo courtesy of Pierre LePage

The co-owner and chef of L'Heritage and Le Frolic restaurants is travelling to Toronto, Montreal, and New York to promote Canada's three territories.

LePage's first stop will be at City TV's Breakfast Television where he will cook a caribou rack and chat about Northern foods and life.

He will also attend a tourism promotion event in Toronto, put on for southern Ontario travel media. Premiers from the three territories will be attending and LePage will showcase food from each of the territories.

He has chosen caribou to represent Nunavut, muskox for the NWT, and salmon to show off cuisine from the Yukon. Birch syrup and Northern berries will also be used in the dishes.

After a short stay in Toronto, it is off to Montreal for a similar event with Quebec's French media.

"People are amazed with the food," LePage said. Southern Canadians are used to seeing woodland caribou but are not used to the red wine colour of the Barrenland animals.

The New York event will be the easy part of the trip, LePage said. In Toronto and Montreal he will have no staff working with him, but in New York he will be directing a team of 71 cooks. The Canadian Tourism Council is putting on the event, taking place at the Waldorf Hotel.

Each province and territory in Canada will be represented, but the three territories will be hosting the opening reception.

"People in New York probably wouldn't even conceptualize that you could eat a muskox, a caribou, or an Arctic char," said David Grindlay, executive director of NWT Tourism.

In addition to showcasing food, the event will have entertainment from the territories.

"It's a whole gamut of the look, the feel, the smell, and the taste of what the North is all about," Grindlay said.

The recent "Look Up North" tourism promotions, which include TV and newspaper ads, spawned from funding from the federal government following the Canada Winter Games in Whitehorse last month.

The year-long campaign is the largest collaboration of the three territories' tourism departments.

"The campaign has generated a tremendous amount of interest from across the country," Grindlay said. NWT Tourism has received hundreds of inquiries about the trips and products the North offers. Attracting visitors to the North is tricky, LePage said, who has seen the number of tourists fluctuate over the years.

"Yellowknife is at the end of the road," he said.

"It's an industry that's just going to grow and grow," he said. "Everyone benefits from tourism."