April is peering around the corner… showing its nose with warmer sunshine and pleasant spring light that caresses our winter-reddened cheeks.

The maple sap run will soon end and the birch sap will take over just before the buds show green at the tips of its branches. This sap is similar to maple sap, but much less sweet. We can drink it straight to enjoy its benefits, and we can also boil it down slowly on the stove until it becomes a dark, balsamic-like syrup that delights me more each day. It takes about 130 litres of the sap to make a litre of syrup. I’m lucky enough to live close to a forest whose birch trees allow me to carefully harvest their sap to make my own birch syrup.

In the Gulf of St. Lawrence, April is also snow crab season, which creates a furor in our Quebec fish shops. Sadly, with the warming of the waters, the increase in government fees and charges and the reduction in quotas, snow crab fishing is in decline. Price increases also discourage would-be buyers. In spite of last year’s price increase, I was able to build up a nice stock to include on the 2024 springtime menu. As I write these lines, however, the 2025 season does not look good for the fishers.

To bring out the flavour of the crab, it only needs to be steamed and served plain. In my Laurentians cuisine, I provide the tastebuds with a path to umami – the fifth taste – by incorporating, into snow crab, homemade shiitake mushroom chips and flakes of sea bacon. Then I place the precious flesh between beet-scented blinis. Lastly, at the moment of serving, I pour on a trickle of my famous birch syrup.