Prince William and Kate dine on 'unusual' delicacy during Canada visit

Robert Jobson28 September 2016

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge dined on a rare delicacy of wild clam in Canada - and said it was delicious.

At a food and wine festival in British Columbia, they tucked into geoduck, a giant clam with a long neck which the uninitiated often find off-putting.

As the couple toured a food and wine festival in the idyllic setting of a hilltop winery in the Okanagan valley, they initially appeared as if there was no chance of any geoduck passing their lips.

“Presentationally they are quite challenging,” said William.

But chef Ned Bell told them: “They are getting more popular all the time.”

A few stands later at the Taste of BC festival at the Mission Hill winery, they came across some geoduck prepared by Japanese chef Hidekazu Tojo - and could not resist it.

It was, however, unrecognisable from the raw version on Mr Bell’s stand, having been transformed into thinly sliced BC wild geoduck sashimi, garnished with miso mustard sauce.

William and Kate visit Kelowna in Canada

1/8

“There is a slightly firmer texture to this,” said the duchess. “It’s really unusual. I've never seen it before. It's so fresh from the sea.”

Mr Bell said: “It is an extraordinary species. You can eat the body, but you can also eat the neck raw, which is what they ate.

“It is absolutely phallic, but at end of the day it is a clam. Here on the west coast we have some of the best wild, well-managed shellfish in the world.”

Their tour saw them taste an array dishes from some of Canada’s most celebrated chefs.

They included Mr Bell’s cured north noast BC wild sockeye salmon tataki with miso, maple and BC grown radishes, and chef Rob Feenie’s braised cache creek oxtail and caramelised onion ravioli with Hazelmere farms celeriac puree, port wine jus, shaved parmesan and extra virgin olive oil.

From Chef Vikram Vij they ate Maharaja style coconut curried BC vegetable curry with basmati rice and wine marinated BC lamb popsicle. Asked if she liked cooking, Kate replied “Yes, especially curries.”

William said: “This is amazing. It's the right level of spice for me. I'm very glad you did not surprise us with a vindaloo. I can't manage that - it's too much for me.”

William also tried a laird of Fintry single malt whisky, which William pronounced “delicious”. He said: “You can tell the Scottish element - there's a peatiness to it.”

Kate turned down the whisky, but tried their cassis - a blackcurrant liqueur - instead, which she said was “like sloe gin”.

Earlier the couple, wearing almost identical Raybans, tried their hand cutting pinot noir grapes from the vines.

Okanagan Valley is Canada’s second largest wine region, and accounts for 90% of all wine produced in British Columbia.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in