Bison Berry Restaurant & Catering

Bison Berry Restaurant and Catering

Neechi Commons

865 Main Street

204-949-1338 – ext. 110

neechifs@shaw.ca

https://neechi.ca/contact-us/

November, 2017

I’ve shopped at the Neechi Commons for a long time and it’s a great place for wild game and very reasonably priced beef prime rib.  Every time I visit, I can’t leave without a loaf or two of freshly made bannock.  I don’t know why, but for the years I’ve been visiting the grocery store, I never made it to the restaurant on the second floor.  That’s a real shame because I didn’t know what I’ve been missing.

Upon arriving, we discover that they're down two staff servers and facing one of the busiest days.  You can tell it's all hands on deck as the art store clerk, someone from the bakery and a suit all flitter around bussing tables and bringing food.  For today, we attend to our own coffees and waters from the communal table off to the side.  We help ourselves to refills as well but the staff soon catches up and come around with carafes. 

This unassuming dining room looks like an offshoot of yesteryear's cafeterias a la Zellers or K-mart.  The furniture's a bit dated but there's nothing wrong with their functionality; the panorama afforded by the picture windows and the original art make up for the furniture. 

Bison Berry serves breakfast all day; the breakfast menu offers all of the usual fixings in addition to some nice Indigenous twists.  The main menu looks somewhat limited, with varied options for burgers, wraps and sides/soups/salads. 

Rather than a soup, I opt for a bowl of stew to start the meal.  True to the description, this hearty stew comes with big chunks of vegetables as well as beef.  The carrots taste a bit overdone, which is quite normal for stew as chefs often add many of the ingredients at the same time.  The beef tastes nice and soft, and well infused with the flavours of the sauce.  This exquisite sauce makes the dish.  Tasting deep, rich and flavourful, it supports every ingredient and leaves you wanting for more. 

I love the slices of bannock, although the buttering’s a heavy for my preference.  While I love the texture of bannock and I love eating it by itself, it doesn’t make a great finisher for stew.  I want a spongy bread to soak up all the wonderful juices and the absorptive potential for bannock doesn’t have much capacity for this.

The Caesar Grilled Chicken Wrap features fresh and crisp vegetables, backed by a rich Caesar salad dressing.  I love Caesar salads but I find the dressing a tad heavy and overpowering to use as a sandwich spread.  The nicely grilled chicken breast anchors this wrap and it tastes moist and tender.  A bit of light toasting on the pita makes this entire presentation a lovely nosh. 

One of their signature items, the Bison Berry consists of slow roasted bison covered with house-made blueberry barbecue sauce, Bothwell mozza, pickled onion with a slaw side.  The bison meat tastes delightfully light and tender, melting in your mouth.  I love the blueberry barbecue sauce accompaniment; I'm a firm believer of using fruits to enhance traditional sauces and this one is wildly successful.  Onion makes every dish taste better and the mozza gives the creation some body and substance.  The bun's a bit on the dry side but easily forgivable given how fresh and crisp the lettuce and tomato taste.

The slaw also has lots crisp crunch and I love the light dressing.  I also like going heavy on the red cabbage which gives the side a vibrant, bold look.  The fries taste crispy as well, perfectly fried without any weight or greasiness. 

I love this place.  I love what they've done for the area, for the community and for the neighbourhood.  All that aside, I love the friendliness and jocular nature of the staff, but most importantly, I love the food.  Bison Berry is a quintessential reason why Winnipeg is known as a diverse and adventurous, yet local and cultural hub for food and restaurants.  I hope that Bison Berry becomes more of the regular discourse of "where do you want to eat?" because they certainly deserve it.  Dining involves more than just the food—it encompasses the whole of food, people, experience and joy, all of which are abundant here.

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