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Village Squire, 1975-04, Page 19Everything from turtle soup to vine leaves heinvich's Despite the fact that Western Ontario is one of the most productive and varied food producing areas of the world, for many food fans there was something missing for many years. That was back in the early 1950's before John Ward opened his gourmet food section in Hdimrich's on Ontario Street in Stratford. Although the crowds attracted by the Stratford Festival and the sophisticated tastes they brought with them helped drive up business at the store (which is only a couple of blocks from the Festival Theatre) the store actually preceeded the Festival by two years. The guests who started flooding into the city for the annual festival soon found they could get many delicacies in the little corner store they just couldn't find in any other store in town, or in any store in a lot of other towns for that matter. Mr. Ward estimates that his customers came from a radius of 75 miles around Stratford in all directions. Though the Festival visitors are an important part of business, he finds business strong through the Christmas season and in the spring once the roads become good for travelling. They come for things• like canned vine leaves, or turtle soup, or coffee from just a about every country in the world where the art Craft 46 Hamilton St., Goderich 1 Block off Royal Bank Corner LEWIS CRAFT SUPPLIES Rug hooking Needlepoint Tapestry wool Rug Wool Craft yarn Sayelle yarn Knitting supplies GRUMBACHER ART SUPPLIES Oil paints Water colours Acrylic paints Sketch hooks Canvases Brushes 20% off copper and brass gifts and .hand crafted jewellery. STORE HOURS: 1:30 to 5:30 Closed all day Wednesday beverage is served. There are imported cheeses and ingredi- ents for those who, like to cook Chinese, Japanese or Indian food. For many a novice in the world of gourmet foods the foods may seem strange. What they really are, Mr. Ward says, are the national dishes of nations around the world. Many of them, he says, he's had to ferret out to try to get for his store. He says he's learned as much from people who have travelled around the world and visited his store to tell him about foreign foods as he's learned anywhere else. What was the strangest request he's ever had? Well, he can't really say for sure but about the rarest thing he's been asked for of late is Torroha Soup, a soup made from a type of snale in New Zealand which is not being exported these days because of some sort of ecological crisis. The interest in gourmet foods, Mr. Ward says, is growing because people are becoming more aware of quality. It used to be that people knew the price of everything and the value of nothing. Now people realize that it's worth paying more for quality. Quality is also available at Heimrich's in another deparment where you can buy quality china and crystal to compliment your gourmet food. IM•••=m■m.m.r y; 7 t5 ittrft�IP (ticiitabi ttt N'ntea ;g (Green (I,.11erui designs 0ODERICH Our notes and Ontario Scenic Prints are available at selective stores in Huron and throughout Ontario. VILLAGE SQUIRE/APRIL 1975, 17