What “Canada?”

See this billboard? Yesterday, Paul Hoven sent me half-a-dozen photos of funny signs, under the title “Do Canadians Have a Sense of Humor?” Several were amusing, but the board above tickled my sense of the absurd.

I Googled restaurants in Saskatoon, presuming that it would naturally be in Canada, right? Saskatoon, in the Province of Saskatchewan? Right?

Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Just as I miss-identified the SOG of Canada in an earlier post, the Saskatoon Restaurant is in – ready for this? – Greenville, South Carolina. The owner, Edmond Woo, echoes the Great Canadian Plains province right on the restaurant’s attractive website:

Come taste the unique Northwest outdoors. Pull on your hiking boots and bush poplins or come dressed elegantly casual! Either way, you’ll hear the rainbow trout sizzlin’ in an iron skillet and smell the hickory wood coals, just like an open campfire. It’s calling you to Saskatoon.

In Greenville. South Carolina. Just 2052 miles from where it’s supposed to be. A mere 33-hour drive.

The restaurant billboard promises “wild game.” The menu’s sure enough got your Buffalo Flank Steak, your Wild Game Sausage and your Elk Tenderloin. You can also Saskatoon Shrimp and Kangaroo Steak – two critters not usually associated with the upper Canadian Midwest.

Laugh if you like: George Gardner, writing in The Greenville News last year, give the restaurant a strong review:

Be sure to bring your sense of adventure to this restaurant. The menu is unapologetically meaty and a bit bizarre, but the service is top notch and the decor is woodsy and inviting, like a cozy hunting lodge. I had the quail appetizer, which was baked and served with a rich, delicious sauce and a spicy bread and bean stuffing, with warm bread and sweet berry butter on the side. The entrees come with a garden salad, and mine was fresh and crisp. I had the kangaroo steak medium-rare. The meat was lean, yet tender and graced with a sweet orange sauce, which I thought was scrumptious.

From the website photos, it looks like a warm, attractive place. But it was the creative billboard that caught my eye. I’d like to find out who did Woo’s creative – you can see more of it in on the website under the heading “Saskatoon Apparel.” The beer list is pretty nice, too.

One client, Mustang Engineering, has a business unit in Greenville. Maybe I’ll get a chance to try the Saskatoon Restaurant for myself: it’s only 1.3 miles away (according to AAA).

Meantime, who created the restaurant’s billboard? It’s really very funny. Even if it’s not Canadian.