Village Squire, 1976-04, Page 22John Alderson and his Beanpot Restaurant are out to elevate
the white bean to a high place in the culinary world. It's only
just since the bean has done so much for the village of Hensall
where the Beanpot is located.
THE BEANPOT
Beans on the menu
in the town where
the bean is king
The lowly bean...whether you call it the
white bean, the pea bean, the navy bean or
whatever...was long in disfavour, but in the
village of Hensall, the bean is king.
Hensall is in the centre of the bean growing
area of Ontario in southern Huron and Perth
counties and northern Middlesex. It's fitting
then that a restaurant in the village should
undertake to build its menu around the bean.
John Alderson is doing just that in his new
restaurant, The Beanpot. John and wife
Alison bought a little coffee shop on highway
4 on the edge of Hensall last fall and slowly,
but surely are making it into a dining spot to
celebrate the new importance of the bean.
Beans, John notes, are being recognized
more and more as a good source of protein at
a time when vegetable protein is becoming
more important.
The new value of the bean, along with the
fact that the little vegetable means so much to
the local economy gave the Aldersons the
idea to specialize in dishes including beans.
Beans are also very versatile, John points
gut. They can be used in place of pasta,
potatoes or vegetables. They can be used in
10, VILLAGE SQUIRE/APRIL 1976
soups, stews and main courses.
John has a wide background in food.
Trained as a chef in England, he came to
Canada in 1969 and lived in Exeter for a
couple of years. He worked for Beaver foods
which has its head office in London and was in
on the beginning of Say Cheese in London.
He then moved to St. Catharines and was
there until he and his wife bought the little
restaurant last fall.
Like the bean itself, The Beanpot has had a
rather lowly beginning. The restaurant
clientelle was mainly the truck stop and coffee
break crowd when the Aldersons took over.
They have definite ideas of what they want to
do with the place but they don't want to move
too fast and alienate the regular clientele.
Even a little change like putting cloths on
the tables brought criticism from some of the
regulars, John recalls with a chuckle.
So the restaurant is still rather bare and
unadorned. Eventually there will be a
souvenir corner where people can buy bean
pots with Hensall printed on them, and little
bags of beans and other souvenirs to let them
known they've been in beantown, Huron
county.
And more and more beans will be taking up
an important position on the menu. Presently,
John says, there are about five dishes on the
permanent menu with beans. These include
beans with ham, beans with Dashwood
sausages and home made chili. There are
often daily specials that involve beans as well.
The Aldersons are feeling their way along and
when a special is a hit, they repeat it and if
customers continue to like it, it becomes part
of the permanent menu.
To go with the beans, the restaurant
specializes in homemade soups and pies.
His aim, John says, is to do things a little
different with beans, but keep things in a
moderate price range. Good food, he says,
isn't necessarily expensive food.
His restaurant serves two kinds of
customers he says. In the winter it depends
on the local people and the truck drivers. In
the summer it has more customers from the
cities, people with a more sophisticated
palate. The tough job is to try to serve both
kinds of people well. He thinks it can be done.
The reason so many restaurants go broke,