How barbecued chicken came to Cape Dorset

GREG YOUNGER-LEWIS

CAPE DORSET – When the northern co-op’s first southern worker joined its ranks in Cape Dorset, he found an idea – and a settlement – in its infancy.

Only a few buildings had sprung up in the shadow of Kinngait mountain on the island’s shore.

Besides some federal government bureaucrats, Hudson Bay Company workers and a few missionaries, only a few Inuit came into town to avail themselves of supplies now and again. Otherwise, they camped out on the land.

At that time – more than 40 years ago – Terry Ryan drifted into the outpost as a bright-eyed artist from Toronto, keen to make a difference as the first general manager of the co-op, a fledging enterprise with scant selection in food and clothing.

In Ryan’s own words, the co-op was basically a trading post.

This month, the West Baffin Eskimo Co-op and the community turned a page on local history: they got hot barbecued chicken, cooked on the spot.

And, along with aisles of new frozen foods and Nike shirts, the co-op shoppers got more than a hockey rink’s worth of new store space to shop in.

“I think it’s tremendous,” said Ryan, who at the age of 69, has gone into semi-retirement from his duties as general manager of the co-op.

Judging by the zippy sales and busy flow of customers after doors opened to the expanded and renovated store, Ryan’s description hits the mark.

Shoppers were enthusiastic about the extra elbow room, long stretches of frozen food, and the strangely fresh leafy greens sitting under fluorescent lights.

“They’ve got more, healthy food,” Noah Nungusuituq said, pointing to the wall stacked with milk and cheese, tomatoes and lettuce. “We didn’t see this before. It’s weird.”

Besides giving local diets a little more colour, the co-op board’s decision to expand the previous store – from a measly 3,000 square feet, to over 16,000 square feet, not including the new warehouse – also gave job seekers an extra serving of hope.

After more than six months with little pay on contract work, Ashevak Qavavau landed a prime position serving up chicken in the co-op’s rotisserie. On the eve of the grand opening on Feb. 2, the 40-year-old cook said he was nervous, but a few days later moved around the kitchen in his chef’s apron with ease.

His favourite parts of the new co-op?

“I got a job.”

Anything else?

“I love to feed the people,” he added with a grin.

The increased capacity to feed people didn’t come easy. In his decades of retail experience, Glen Patryluk said he’d never faced a challenge as big as Cape Dorset’s co-op expansion, especially in finding reliable help.

But, surrounded by bunches of party balloon and the slightest scent of paint still in the air, Patryluk said the payback came immediately, in hearing people say thank you.

“That’s what makes the work worth it,” he said as he waved to customers going out the door.

Patryluk said the next step will be filling the old space with skidoos and snowmobile parts.