Every second Saturday of the month, the Delormier family house in Kahnawake is bustling as mother and daughter Beverly and Coreen turn their home kitchen into a meat pie assembly line.
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Over the last four years, the mother-daughter duo has turned a traditional meat pie recipe into a successful small business.
They got the idea after Coreen couldn’t afford to visit her sister who lived in Hawaii at the time.
“She came for a visit and when she was leaving, I was so sad. I told my mom, ‘I’m never going to make it,'” Coreen said.
That’s when Beverly said, “Let’s make meat pies.”
Word spread and in just a few months, their pie-in-the-sky business went from baking 10 pies for friends and family, to dozens in the community.
After 10 months of selling pies for $10, the family managed to afford that visit and many more.
Since starting their business four years ago, the two have managed to cook more than 5,000 pies.
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Beverly says the meat pie is a traditional staple in the Mohawk community. She jokingly calls the pies, “Mohawk tourtieres.”
The Delormier family admits there is no special recipe to their spin on the traditional delicacy. If there was a secret to their success, Beverly says it’s simple.
“My mother always said, ‘When you’re cooking, always taste it,'” Beverly said. “We always do that and we don’t start until we have it the way we like it.”
“We’ve talked about it — it’s still in discussion,” Coreen said, talking about expanding the business outside of the home kitchen.
For the meantime, they will continue their operation which they say is rewarding both as a side business and as time spent together as a family.
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