Lac-St-Jean's wild Blueberries

Living mainly in the taiga and bogs, blueberries have hundreds of varieties and grow in shrubs. The blueberry is a small fruit within the genus vaccinium (a genus that also includes cranberries, bilberries and grouseberries).

Indigenous peoples were major consumers of this little fruit. They used it fresh or dried. The cultivation of blueberries in the Lac-St-Jean’s region is however more recent, in the late 1800s. The abundance of this little fruit for the region is indebted to the great fire of 1870, which makes it an ideal ground for its land propensity and due to the fact the Lac-St-Jean is a boreal region.

The benefits of blueberries

Not only delicious, blueberry is a wise health choice.

Blueberries are full of properties:

• Powerful antioxidant
• Prevention of certain cancers
• Anti-inflammatory properties
• Memory Disorder Prevention
• Prevention of cardiovascular disease
• Maintaining good eye health
• Prevention of urinary tract infections
• Antidiabetic properties

Did you know?

Blueberry stands at the top of the ORAC (Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity) index of fruits and vegetables with antioxidant effects. The ORAC index assesses the potential of foods to neutralize or slow the damage caused by free radicals and reactive oxygen species.