Beers, Bastions & Backstories in New Brunswick
- Ginger North
- Jul 5
- 5 min read
The Maritimes: Where the Dirt Under My Nails Tells a Story
I’ve said it before (possibly too often), but I’m a Maritimer. That’s not just geography—it’s a worldview. It means I grew up breathing salt air, dodging dive-bombing shithawks…sorry, how unladylike...*ahem* seagulls, and climbing around places that most kids would’ve written off as “just ruins.” But to me? They were portals.
Despite some pretty chaotic stuff in my personal life, I was lucky. I got to grow up in Atlantic Canada, and New Brunswick in particular gave me a front-row seat to history. And I don’t mean textbook history. I mean the kind you feel in your bones when you're standing alone on a foggy field where an Acadian fort once stood, or watching wind ripple across the Miramichi like it remembers something. Here, history isn’t tucked behind velvet ropes. It’s in the soil, the water, the food.
And food, of course, is why we’re here.
This is part of the culinary time travel portion of my #30CanadianFoods series. You can check out the whole cross-country adventure here. But today? We’re staying put in my home province—and heading to some places that shaped me.
A Province Held Together With Bark, Bread, and Grit
New Brunswick has always been a meeting place. Mi’gmaq and Wolastoqiyik peoples have lived here for thousands of years—long before the French or British tried to claim it with flags and forts. Then came the Acadians, carving out farms from the salty marshlands.
Then Loyalists, escaping the American Revolution with little more than desperation and a kettle.
And out of that jumble came something uniquely New Brunswick: a province shaped by resilience, reinvention, and a whole lot of quiet strength.
Also? Fossils. No, really. The New Brunswick Museum recently revealed they’d found full-on fossilized trees—three hundred and fifty million years old—just chilling in the rocks. So yes, our stories go back far.
But you don’t have to be an archaeologist to dig deep. All you need is a good pair of shoes, a bit of curiosity, and maybe a thermos of spruce beer.
Beaubears Island – Where Ghosts and Pine Trees Share the Same Roots
If you’ve never taken the boat out to Beaubears Island, go. Trust me. It’s one of the most quietly magical places in the province.
This spot has seen it all: Mi’gmaq camps, Acadian refugees, 19th-century shipbuilding that once made Miramichi world-famous. The island itself feels like it's caught mid-story, as if the trees are waiting to see who’s going to write the next chapter.
The on-site interpreters are incredible—they don't just tell the stories, they live them. You’ll meet voyageurs, shipwrights, and Acadian survivors brought to life with humour and empathy. One moment you're laughing, the next you're blinking back tears because suddenly this place feels personal.
And here’s what no brochure will tell you: Beaubears Island teaches you how layered a landscape can be. How the same patch of earth can carry joy and grief, survival and loss, resistance and reinvention—all at once.
Fort Beauséjour – A Fortress Built From Hope and Heartbreak
The first time I visited Fort Beauséjour, I was a kid. I don’t remember the tour guide or the signage. I remember the wind. I remember standing inside the old star-shaped walls and feeling like the ground itself was trying to tell me something.
Built by the French, captured by the British, and renamed Fort Cumberland, this place is basically the colonial version of your favourite drama series—betrayals, alliances, power grabs, and a whole lot of heartbreak. The Acadian Deportation started right here in 1755, and you can still feel the ache of it.
But it’s not just a sad story. There’s pride here, too. Mi’kmaq warriors. Acadian families who refused to vanish. People who shaped this place with stubborn love.
The visitor centre brings that complexity to life, with interactive exhibits, immersive video, and a surprising amount of humour. But it’s outside, walking those grassy slopes with wind in your hair, where the real connection hits. This isn’t “the past.” It’s a prologue.
Carleton Martello Tower – Small But Mighty (Like Most New Brunswickers)
Overlooking the Saint John harbour like a stubby stone lighthouse, Carleton Martello Tower doesn’t look flashy. But don’t let its squat size fool you. This little cylinder has seen war after war—built for the War of 1812, fortified again in WWII, and now sitting like a patient sentinel through renovations.
Right now you can’t go inside (they’re giving it some much-needed TLC), but the grounds and visitor centre are still open, and honestly? The view is a stunner. There’s something beautiful about standing on that hill and realizing you’re in the same spot soldiers once stood watch for enemy ships. It’s humbling. Grounding.
And hey, it inspired a sandwich spread recipe so simple and sturdy, it might as well be the province in food form.
A Few More Stops for the Curious and Hungry
St. Andrews Blockhouse
Built by locals who were not waiting around to be invaded during the War of 1812. It's small, scrappy, and still standing. Right on the water in one of the prettiest towns in the Maritimes.
Metepenagiag Heritage Park
If you want to understand this land, go here. Thousands of years of Mi’kmaq history, all rooted in one place. They call it a park, but it’s more like a window into a time before time.
Recipes: A Sip, A Spread, A Step Back in Time
Spruce Beer – Fort Beauséjour Style
Forget IPA. This is the original Atlantic brew. Spruce beer was the Acadian answer to hydration, happiness, and (accidentally) vitamin C. You can smell it before you sip it—forest-y, a little wild, like licking a pine tree in the best possible way. According to this Parks Canada recipe Acadians used rye, wheat, fir tree shoots, dandelions and hops as a base for their beer, and added water, yeast, and sugar. Then set the mixture aside for several days to ferment.
Ingredients
7 oz | 200 g cleaned and washed spruce tree shoots
2 quarts | 2 litres water
1.5 oz | 40 g yeast
1.5 oz | 40 g sugar
Directions
Boil spruce shoots in water. Let cool.
Stir in sugar and yeast.
Cover and let it do its thing for a few days.
Strain, bottle, chill, enjoy.
Want it sweeter? Add more sugar or a dash of molasses. Want it fizzy? Ferment longer. Want it less wild? Sorry, can’t help you there.
High-Protein Sandwich Spread
This isn’t fancy. It’s not going viral on TikTok. But it is deeply comforting. A wartime classic this Parks Canada recipe from Carleton Martello Tower National Historic Site, it's full of protein and peanutty nostalgia. The combination of eggs and peanut butter might seem odd, but during times of ration or shortage, fillings were simple and nutritious.
Ingredients
2 oz | 60 g soft butter
2 oz | 60 g peanut butter
3 or 4 hard-boiled eggs
Directions
Mash it all together. Spread it thick. Toast your bread if you're feeling fancy. Eat like someone who needs to keep watch on a harbour.
What This Journey Teaches
The point of visiting these places isn’t to memorize dates. It’s to feel connected—to the land, the people, the fight to keep memory alive. It’s understanding that you are, in some way, part of a much longer story.
And that story? Sometimes it tastes like spruce. Sometimes it’s sticky with peanut butter. Sometimes it just sounds like the wind moving over an old fort wall.
If you ever get the chance—go. Stand where history happened. Listen to what the land still wants to tell you. And bring snacks. Always bring snacks.
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