Maître d’ Holger explains the evenings menu for a group of diners in the Chanterelle Inn and Restaurant dining room. Photo by Galen Simmons
By Galen Simmons
One theme I keep coming back to after taking time to think about the places we visited on our honeymoon is that it really isn’t the food or location that make a place special, but the people who put their time, effort, money and love into it.
That’s certainly true when it comes to the Chanterelle Inn and Restaurant on Cape Breton, located about half an hour north of Baddeck off the Cabot Trail, a short distance from where the Cabot Trail meets the stunning and rugged Cape Breton coastline.
Tucked away amongst the beautiful Cape Breton hills, the Chanterelle Inn is accessible only by a steep, gravel driveway. It is owned and operated by Chef Bettina Hartenstein and her husband, Holger.
While Bettina, a classically trained chef with decades of experience in professional kitchens, prefers to remain behind the scenes, dreaming up seasonal dishes that celebrate the ingredients grown or produced on the island, Holger is the self-deprecatingly funny jack of all trades, checking in guests, attending to their needs at all hours, serving as the restaurant’s maître d’ and driving all over the place looking for the ingredients his wife needs to make her magic.
Holger would be the first to tell you he isn’t entirely qualified to do any of these jobs, but the love he has for his wife and his desire to support her dreams makes up for any lack of experience. Personally, I found Holger to be incredibly easy to get along with and I appreciated his openness and honesty.
Bettina, meanwhile, is a little more reserved and it’s clear she prefers to let her food do the talking, though she does man the front desk from time to time when Holger is off doing any number of things for the business. In speaking with her, it’s very clear her love for the ingredients of Cape Breton and the inspiration she draws from the seasons and the beautiful landscape around her allows her to unveil her full creative potential at dinner each night.
For Bettina, that creativity begins with a commitment to excellence, something she says she reminds herself of each and every morning before beginning another long day in the kitchen.
“I get up every morning and I write it, I actually write it down. I said, ‘You choose excellence every day of your life,’ ” she told me.
That means resisting the temptation to take shortcuts, even when the long hours and demands of operating both an inn and a restaurant make the easier option seem awfully appealing.
Instead, Bettina looks to the world outside her kitchen windows for inspiration, allowing the weather, changing colours and availability of seasonal ingredients to guide her menus.
“I find the weather is very inspiring to me,” she said. “Because when it’s summery, you want lighter things. You want lots of salad and like lemony things and stuff. So I think the weather is what gives me my inspiration and colours.”
As summer gives way to fall, her thoughts turn to heartier dishes, roasted vegetables and the warming flavours of the harvest season. Even the changing quality of the light and the golden colours spreading across the hills influence what she wants to put on the plate.
And while the Chanterelle’s remote location is certainly part of its charm, it also presents challenges when it comes to sourcing the fresh, local ingredients Bettina insists on using.
Much of what she serves comes through Cape Breton’s Food Hub, a collective that connects local farmers, growers, food producers and even foragers with businesses like hers.
Through the collective, Bettina can source everything from squash, pumpkin and microgreens to farm-fresh eggs, locally made jams and other products. Some ingredients come from neighbours and friends, including apples from trees on nearby properties.
The Food Hub’s delivery system has also made an enormous difference for the couple, allowing Bettina to access ingredients from places like the Margaree Valley without Holger having to spend hours driving across the island to collect them.
“This has been a game changer for us,” she said.
For Bettina, supporting those local producers is about more than simply buying fresh ingredients. It’s also about introducing visitors to the incredible food being grown, raised and produced across Cape Breton, something she believes is an essential part of experiencing the island.
“I think that’s a good vessel to tell people a story about where you are,” she said of food.
And after experiencing her cooking firsthand, I couldn’t agree more.
When Julia and I first arrived, we immediately found ourselves in awe of the view from the Chanterelle’s parking lot – a vista of exploding fall colours stretching over rolling hills for miles in every direction. And when we stepped inside the inn, we were just as impressed with the décor.
Though the building was constructed relatively recently, in the ’90s, the interior feels much older – the parlour and dining room are adorned with beautiful antique furniture, bookshelves packed with books, a chessboard and games for guests to play at their leisure, an ornate fireplace and artwork that celebrates the natural world, as well as some of Cape Breton’s nautical history. Guests even have the option of eating indoors or out on a covered and screened-in deck overlooking the hills and valleys when the weather is warm.
The rooms carry that old-world charm as well. While our room reminded me of a bed and breakfast in a lovingly maintained heritage home, it had the comforts and amenities of a modern inn, including a spacious bathroom, climate control and a large, comfortable bed.
And while we were impressed with the accommodations, it was dinner that really set this place apart from others we’d stayed and eaten at on our trip.
Dinner was a seven-course tasting menu thoughtfully crafted by Chef Bettina using fresh, in-season ingredients and a deep understanding of how to make each ingredient shine.
Interestingly, Bettina told me the restaurant previously offered two different tasting menus – one with five courses and another with 11. However, with the rising cost of ingredients and a desire to keep the experience accessible, she decided to combine elements of the two into a single menu.
The tasting-menu format also gives her an opportunity to showcase a much wider variety of ingredients and flavours than she could with a conventional appetizer, main course and dessert.
And I have to say, as someone who tends to eat a little too quickly, I appreciated the opportunity to slow down between courses, savour each dish and reflect on the ingredients and flavours before moving on to the next.
The meal started with a gougère (a savoury choux pastry) stuffed with beautiful whipped local blueberry and fromage blanc (white cheese), before moving on to a roasted winter squash potage – a thick French vegetable soup. The transition from the salty and sweet pastry to the warm squash soup really woke up our tastebuds and set our expectations high for the rest of the meal.
Bettina later explained how she roasts the squash alongside onions and other ingredients, allowing their flavours to develop and come together before transforming them into the finished dish.
Even Julia, who isn’t typically a fan of squash, was thoroughly impressed.
Next was an expertly crafted Caesar salad with a housemade dressing – thinner but just as flavourful as the dressing Julia and I are used to – crisp romaine lettuce, croutons and shaved parmesan, followed by another savoury-sweet combo, a barley and sweet corn risotto. The soft, unctuous texture of risotto and barley matched perfectly with the pop of sweet from the corn.
With two options for the main course – a blackened Nova Scotia halibut and patty pan squash on romesco sauce and osso buco ragù on creamy polenta – Julia and I ordered both to share.
The fish was seasoned and pan-fried to perfection, and paired wonderfully with the sweet squash and the rich yet tangy romesco sauce. The slow-braised osso buco beef ragù was about as tender and flavourful as it gets, and the creamy polenta provided a beautiful medium from which the ragù could really stand out as something special.
As a palate cleanser, we were then treated to something I’d never had before but something I would go back to in a heartbeat – a spoonful of rhubarb sorbet bathed in a non-vintage Brut sparkling wine. The sweet-dry flavours of both the sparkling wine and the sorbet danced over my tongue in just the right way, wiping my palate clean of the strong, savoury flavours that preceded it, and preparing me for dessert.
Dessert was also a masterpiece – port-marinated raspberries served hot over some of the best vanilla ice cream I’ve ever had. As the raspberries melted the ice cream, the flavours balanced between the tartness of the fruit and the sweetness of the ice cream. Even though I was full by this point in the meal, I probably could have happily eaten a whole tub of the stuff.
Something else I appreciated about the Chanterelle’s dining experience was Bettina’s commitment to showcasing Nova Scotia’s wines and spirits alongside her food.
She told me she deliberately avoids filling her wine list with familiar international offerings, preferring to give guests an opportunity to discover wines produced closer to home.
Her reasoning is simple: When people travel somewhere like Cape Breton, they should have an opportunity to experience the place through what they eat and drink, including products they might never encounter otherwise.
Having been sufficiently fed, and with a couple glasses of Cape Breton whisky under my belt – the Glen Breton Fiddler’s Choice single malt and the Caldera Hurricane 5 were both excellent choices – Julia and I climbed the stairs back up to our room and enjoyed a truly restful night’s sleep.
In the morning, we came back downstairs to the dining room for breakfast. Having been thoroughly introduced to Chef Bettina’s food the night before, we were ready for another unforgettable meal, and that’s exactly what we got for breakfast.
Julia ordered her standard breakfast – two eggs over easy with sausage, home fries and fresh fruit – and, for the first time in I don’t know how long, I decided to order the pancakes.
While I’m usually an eggs, meat and potatoes kind of guy, I simply couldn’t ignore the siren’s song of Bettina’s Nova Scotia blueberry pancakes. They were big and fluffy and absolutely packed with those beautiful blue pearls that grow wild everywhere on Cape Breton. For my money, Nova Scotia blueberries are the best in the country and I have no regrets about my breakfast order at Chanterelle.
After breakfast, Julia and I packed the car and stopped in for one last chat with Bettina and Holger before we hit the road.
During that conversation, Bettina explained that the couple has deliberately taken a slow and steady approach to growing their business, relying largely on word of mouth and the experiences of satisfied guests rather than expensive advertising campaigns.
Having spent years working in large resorts, Bettina knows firsthand how impersonal the hospitality industry can become when businesses focus too heavily on accommodating as many people as possible.
That’s not what she wants for the Chanterelle.
Instead, she and Holger have worked to create a place where guests feel welcome, where there is time for a conversation and where the quality of the experience never has to take a back seat to the number of people coming through the door.
That approach seems to be working. Bettina told me the inn’s occupancy has grown steadily over the years, reaching more than 90 per cent in recent months, with guests already booking rooms for the following summer.
And despite the long hours, the challenges of operating a seasonal business in rural Cape Breton and the never-ending maintenance that comes with owning an inn, Bettina made it clear she wouldn’t trade this life for something else.
“I want to stay. I want to live here. Like I want to be here,” she said.
Though our stay was brief, we got a real sense of the love, care and attention the Hartensteins put into every aspect of the experience.
And reflecting on our time at the Chanterelle, I think that’s what makes it such a special place.
Yes, the accommodations are beautiful, the landscape is breathtaking and the food is exceptional. But knowing the care Bettina puts into choosing every ingredient and crafting every dish, and seeing how Holger works tirelessly alongside her to make the whole experience possible, adds something that can’t be measured in stars or online reviews.
It’s the kind of place that reminds me why Julia and I love travelling and sharing our experiences in the first place.
Before we left, we promised we would be back, and that is certainly a promise Julia and I intend to keep.
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