Great Tastes of Manitoba Season 33 Show 1: Easy Italian

We’re shared our second Great Tastes of Manitoba show of season 33, “Easy Italian,” on Saturday, February 11 at 6:30 p.m. on CTV Winnipeg.

Gina Sunderland, Food & Consumer Relations Specialist Dietitian and host Dez Daniels will showcase three delicious “easy Italian” chicken recipes: Easy Chicken Piccata, Baked Chicken Parmigiana and Chicken Meatballs & Tomato Sauce. We love these quick and tasty Italian-inspired recipes that allow home cooks to create their Italian entrées with ease in their own kitchens. In this episode, Gina and Dez will share tips for how to make these favourites just a little healthier too! All three recipes are family-friendly, and even the youngest family member can get involved in helping to prepare them.

This season we’ve continued the tradition of featuring our Manitoba farms by introducing you to some of the hard-working families who produce the food for our recipes. On this show, we introduced you to Roland and Liane Poiron and their family.

Roland (Rolly) and Liane have always loved the rural lifestyle and knew they wanted to raise their kids close to their farming roots, but owning a farm wasn’t a viable option for them for many years. In the meantime, they pursued other careers, started a family, and became involved in volunteer work in their small community. In 2017 they applied to the Manitoba Chicken Producers new entrant program. They, along with their extended family, were extremely excited about the chance to farm again. Rolly and his brother run the farm together and although they are first generation chicken farmers, they aren’t new to farming. They are committed to maintaining a very high level of biosecurity. A clean environment is necessary to raise a healthy flock, and chicken farmers in Manitoba and across Canada must adhere to very strict national “Raised by a Canadian Farmer” biosecurity standards. This includes limiting access to the barns, disinfecting anything that enters the barn, and changing footwear to avoid bringing in any harmful pathogens from the outside environment. The Poirons understand that when raising livestock, the details matter. They monitor everything from the quality of their water to the air flow and light levels in the barn to provide an optimal environment for their chickens. A sincere, heartfelt thank you to Rolly and Liane and their family for sharing their story.