February 16 to 22, 2026 was Heritage Week in British Columbia with the theme this year of “Stir the Pot.” Many communities throughout the province registered over one hundred events highlighting this food focused theme. In Chilliwack, Monica Braun from the Heritage Chilliwack Society authored and posted eight blogs on the Society website, each is a brief three minute read about food history of the Chilliwack area. For some wonderful reading, check out the blog section on www.heritagechilliwack.org beginning with the lead blog posted February 9 “The Farms That Fed Us.”
Other blog titles: “Milk, Cream and Community: Chilliwack’s Dairy Story”
“Picked in Chilliwack: Crops, Community and Memory”
“Beyond the Barn: Hatcheries, Plants and the Making of a Meal”
“Preserving Food in Chilliwack: From Kitchen Table to Early Canneries.”
“Frozen Food: Chilliwack’s Kitchen Revolution”
“Chinese Vegetable Farmers and Food Heritage in Early Chilliwack”
“Food as Ceremony, Food as Relationship in the Sto:lo Nation”
Together, the blog posts provide a broad and diverse picture of food production and practices in the Chilliwack community, supplemented by an excellent selection of photos from the Chilliwack Archives. The blogs are an example for other communities that may wish similarly to document their food history.
It’s been a great theme for Heritage Week 2026. The BC Food History Network was honoured to be part of the launch event on February 13. If you weren’t able to attend the launch event, the slide show is available on the Heritage BC website: https://heritagebc.ca/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/HeritageWeek2026_VirtualLaunch.pdf
We all eat, many of us grow some of our own food. We all have memories of food and food events. It’s a topic we can all relate to. Thank you Heritage BC for stirring up a great theme for Heritage Week 2026!
The BC Food History Network has featured blog posts in the past about Chilliwack related topics:
“Chilliwack Corn” (2020) https://bcfoodhistory.ca/chilliwack-corn/
“Summer Strawberries” (2021) https://bcfoodhistory.ca/summer-strawberries/
“Chilliwack/Abbotsford Dairies” (2021) https://bcfoodhistory.ca/chilliwack-abbotsford-dairies/
“Food From Home to Warfront” (2019) https://bcfoodhistory.ca/food-from-home-to-the-war-front/
“Hazelnuts” (2021) https://bcfoodhistory.ca/hazelnuts/
