As someone who grew up Catholic, my primary touchstones for abbey life were the unfun nuns of The Sound of Music. An abstemious bunch, they objected, in song, to the fact that novice Maria — who would eventually leave the order to marry Baron von Trapp — was late for chapel but never for meals.
And so, last spring, it came as a surprise when I toured my first Québécois abbey and discovered that food was among the most intriguing reasons to visit. Indeed, a series of current and former religious communities scattered across Québec offer fascinating culinary experiences as well as historical tours and opportunities to spend time in nature.
Abbeys to Visit:
It was March when I stopped in Oka, 45 minutes west of Montréal, to overnight at the Auberge de l’Abbaye d’Oka in the former Abbaye Notre-Dame-du-Lac. I’d planned a tour with a member of the local historical society, expecting to see where Cistercian monks had once eaten, slept and studied. But my guide, a young woman who had grown up when the monks were still in residence and whose father had worked at the abbey, took us instead into a crumbling tunnel that snaked underground to a pair of old dairy barns. The barns once housed Ayrshire cows whose cheese put the abbey on the map, she explained. In winter, monks could milk the herd without stepping into the snow.
The history of Québec’s Cistercian abbeys begins in 1881, when eight monks from the order’s strict Trappist branch were expelled by France’s anticlerical republican government. They founded a Trappist abbey at Oka — the first of its kind in the province. There, they began making an aromatic, French-inspired, semisoft, washed-rind cheese using milk from their herd. In 1887, they set up a small agricultural school for orphans, focusing on the care of cold-climate orchard trees. Over time, they expanded to teach cheesemaking, poultry farming and grain production.
Accredited in 1908 as L’Institut Agricole d’Oka, the abbey school had a productive first decade. In 1912, Father Athanas Montour crossbred the Montréal market melon with a cultivar called banana melon, resulting in a hybrid Oka melon with distinctive ribbing and floral, juicy flesh. It stars in salads, cocktails and chilled soups in the region’s farm-to-table restaurants.
A few years later, Brother Wilfrid Châtelain developed Canada’s first chicken breed, Chantecler, a heritage bird that thrives in winter weather and is good for producing both meat and eggs.
At its peak, in the 1950s, 177 Trappist monks lived at the abbey. By 2000, only a few dozen brothers remained. Instead of keeping the sprawling, costly Oka property, they built an elegant, modern monastery — with geothermal heat and a green roof — in a pastoral setting an hour and a half northeast, in the town of Saint-Jean-de-Matha. They moved to Abbaye Val Notre-Dame in 2009. The old Oka abbey was transformed into an inn and restaurant.
After the dairy barn and the history lesson, we visited the grand refectory, where the monks once ate in silence; saw a massive mixer used to make bread for hundreds; and stepped into the buzzing mechanical room that keeps heat and water flowing throughout the property.
The abbey basement held one of the tour’s oddest details. Since the monks left, the building has been leased for several film productions, including the 2023 boarding school horror flick The Sacrifice Game. For one movie — our guide wasn’t sure which one — a portion of the lower level was transformed into a prison set. Seeing the cells was a jarring moment in an otherwise pastoral, historically rich experience.
I was curious to follow the monks north, but before I could, my travels took me just above the Vermont border to the Eastern Townships, where I visited my next Québec monastery on a brisk spring day. Tucked into a sheltered nook between Lake Memphremagog and one of its bays was Abbaye de Saint-Benoît-du-Lac, established in 1912 but constructed over decades.
It’s currently home to around 30 Benedictine monks. Daily services — including Lauds, Mass and Vespers in Gregorian chant — are open to visitors. (If you miss them, you can buy a recording.) From late June through late August, guided tours showcase the building’s unusual architecture and décor. The edifice is more modern than the one at Oka, with funky stained glass; a floor boldly tiled in black, blue, ocher and burnt umber; and stadium seating in the chapel. We were lucky enough to catch one of the younger brothers playing the chapel’s 42-stop organ, crafted by Karl Wilhelm from white oak in the 1990s.
Our last stop was the store in Saint-Benoît’s basement, which is nothing like the eerie movie set at Oka — though this abbey is the inspiration for mystery writer Louise Penny’s fictional Saint-Gilbert-Entre-les-Loups. We capped our visit by sampling the abbey’s products, including its renowned Bleu Bénédictin cheese, which comes in wedges of classic, extra-aged and smoked. Everything we tried — including fresh cheese curds and a nutty tomme called Frère Jacques — is made on-site with milk from nearby dairies.
Not much goes better with cheeses than tart, sweet fruit; with 3,500 trees in the orchard, the brothers make plenty of apple products. We spooned up maple-apple sauce and blueberry-apple sauce and smeared crackers with apple butter. In fall, visitors fill bags with pick-your-own apples.
And then, this winter, I finally got my wish — following the monks from Notre-Dame-du-Lac to their new home, at Abbaye Val Notre-Dame, in the Lanaudière-region town of Saint-Jean-de-Matha. Fittingly enough, the visit began with food. Inside the abbey’s Maison des Forestibles — an educational center dedicated to foraging and forest cuisine — cooking instructor Nadine Tessier, former owner of Montréal’s lauded O’Thym restaurant, waited as seven Francophone Quebecers et moi swapped snowy boots for Crocs. We paired up at a U-shaped bar in a simple demo kitchen. In front of each twosome was a pile of green and red cabbage, daikon radish, chunky thumbs of ginger, and garlic cloves.
We were making kimchi laced with produits forestibles, the French portmanteau for comestibles gathered from woodlands, such as mushrooms, tree saps, wild greens, fruits and nuts. We sliced and grated, sprinkled gray sea salt and gochugaru chile flakes, and added wild seasonings. I chose powdered balsam fir needles for Christmas nostalgia, plus neon orange sea buckthorn berries, mouth-puckering as lemon drops. After, we snacked on bread, cheese and pickles, chatting in a mix of French and English.
Outside, the parking lot filled with cars. The day had warmed, and skiers and snowshoers were arriving to trace forest and field trails. Afterward, they might pop into the nearby store to buy a charcuterie, cheese and a six-pack. Some might even take a few minutes to pray.
In 2014, a few years after the Oka monks moved to the Lanaudière region, so did François Patenaude, former chair of economic studies at Université du Québec à Montréal. After studying wild harvesting — and concerned about climate change and the environment — he bought land where he could set up a forest farm with nuts and fruits.
The abbey’s 462 acres were bursting with wild edibles, so Patenaude approached the monks and asked if he could pluck berries, conifer needles and greens from their woods. Instead of simply granting permission, the monks also gave him a job.
The abbey’s 462 acres were bursting with wild edibles.
These days, Patenaude is the abbey’s forest coordinator, responsible for planting, processing and training at the Maison des Forestibles. The foods the team harvests include hazelnuts, miniature kiwi, deep blue haskap berries (also called honeyberries), balsam fir tips, and herbs such as agastache, bee balm, lemon balm and mint. One strict rule: All wild products sold must come from lands owned by the abbey.
After completing the kimchi class — which was offered in French but was easy enough to follow sans translation — I went to the chapel for None, the fifth of seven daily sessions of prayer, which begin each morning with Vigils at 4 a.m. and end with Compline at 7:30 p.m. Bright and tall, the room features a small cross backdropped by a floor-to-ceiling view of a mountain.
Before I left, Patenaude accompanied me to the on-site store, proudly pointing out displays of abbey products alongside other local wares. There were jars of pickled fiddlehead ferns, a variety of tea blends, faux capers crafted from daisy buds and packaged mixes for making herbed bannock bread. I filled a box before heading home.
From the former monastery at Oka to the quietude of Saint-Benoît-du-Lac to the kitchens at Val Notre-Dame, each of these three Québec abbeys tells a piece of the province’s story. Oka, with its many unused buildings, is of the past; Saint-Benoît is firmly rooted in the present. As Patenaude and his team expand their permaculture orchards and teach students to combine wild and cultivated plants in cooking classes, they are looking to the future.
Auberge de L’Abbaye d’Oka
1600 chemin d’Oka, Oka, 450-415-0651, abbayeoka.ca
Offerings: The inn’s store features foods made at Cistercian monasteries around Québec — and contains a seasonal scoop shop and spot where visitors can dine on sandwiches and poutine. In-depth historical tours run by the Société d’Histoire d’Oka can be arranged in advance by phone. Nearby Oka National Park offers swimming, hiking and cross-country skiing.
Accommodations: The monks have moved out, and the abbey is now a clean, comfortable inn with rooms from CA$150.
Abbaye de Saint-Benoît-du-Lac
1 rue Principale, Saint-Benoît-du-Lac, 819-843-4080, abbaye.ca/en
Offerings: Come for guided, 70-minute tours (CA$14), a store packed with monk-made products, pick-your-own apples in season, occasional concerts and special events.
Accommodations: The abbey has separate guesthouses reserved for men and women seeking silence or a place for reflection. In Magog, a 20-minute drive, options include Victorian-style inn Le Château du Lac (lechateaudulac.com, from CA$129).
Abbaye Val Notre-Dame
250 chemin de la Montagne-Coupée, St-Jean-de-Matha, 450-960-2889, abbayevalnotredame.ca
Offerings: This abbey, home to around 20 monks who moved from Oka in 2009, hums with activity. At its Maison des Forestibles, visitors take classes on foraging, gardening and cooking. The grounds include trails for hiking, mountain biking, skiing and snowshoeing. A store offers a wide selection of snacks, beverages and culinary ingredients. All are sourced from Québec, and some are made in the abbey factory.
Accommodations: The on-site hotel is for those who would like to pray alongside the monks or engage in reflection. Nearby beds can be found at Expérienza (from CA$119), an inn and restaurant whose menu features French and Québécois classics.
With a spectacular view and spacious modern rooms, La Montagne Coupée (from CA$148) is a mountaintop auberge overlooking the abbey. Its menu highlights area products in dishes such as fondue, beef tartare with hickory oil, and seafood ravioli in clover bisque.
The original print version of this article was headlined “Abbey Road | Visiting three Québec abbeys for food, outdoor fun and spiritual nourishment”
This article is part of a travel series on Québec. The province’s destination marketing organization, Alliance de l’industrie touristique du Québec, under the Bonjour Québec brand, is a financial underwriter of the project but has no influence over story selection or content. Find the complete series plus travel tips at sevendaysvt.com/quebec.
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