From the Orchard to Yonge & Dundas: Ontario Apples Get the Shake Shack Treatment
There might not be an apple orchard anywhere near the corner of Yonge and Dundas, but this fall, a little taste of Ontario apple country has landed at one of the busiest intersections in Canada.
View this post on Instagram
Shake Shack has teamed up with Ontario’s Chudleigh’s for a limited-time fall menu featuring two decidedly local desserts: the Chudleigh’s Apple Pie Concrete and Chudleigh’s Pumpkin Pie Shake.
The Apple Pie Concrete blends Shake Shack’s vanilla frozen custard with Chudleigh’s apple pie, made with freshly peeled Ontario apples. The Pumpkin Pie Shake takes the same idea into pumpkin season, blending frozen custard with Chudleigh’s pumpkin pie made with local Ontario pumpkins.
And the location makes this collaboration particularly interesting.
Shake Shack’s Yonge & Dundas restaurant sits in a 5,500-square-foot space overlooking Sankofa Square, formerly Yonge-Dundas Square. The Square reports more than 38 million pedestrians passing through the area annually, along with more than one million annual event attendees.
That’s a lot of potential Ontario apple pie.
It also represents something we’re always interested in at Canada Takeout: what happens when a major international restaurant brand doesn’t simply bring its existing menu to Canada, but finds ways to put Canadian producers and ingredients in front of its customers.
Chudleigh’s has been growing apples in Milton, Ontario for generations. Now its apple pie is being blended into frozen custard and served in the middle of downtown Toronto.
From an Ontario orchard to one of Toronto’s busiest corners, that’s a pretty Canadian journey for an apple.
