Category Archives: Trips

A Montreal Saturday

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Saturday was our day of laziness. (Come to think of it, Sunday will be the same.)

We met up around 11am, took care of some minor shopping details, walked to Café Myriade for some of the best coffee in the city, and then after some downtime, went to the gym and met for dinner.

Dinner was at Nora Gray, which as I’ve already noted, is quite new, having been open for only three months. But this place is pretty special. The restaurant showcases the food your Italian grandmother might have made, and it delivers beautifully.

As you can see from the photo of the space, taking pictures of food in this lighting was pretty much impossible. But all of it looked delicious and tasted quite good.

We ordered stuffed calamari, winter vegetables, meatballs in a light marinara, and a rabbit liver paté for appetizers. The calamari and the vegetables were the winners in this collection, although we felt all of the plates could have had a bit more salt.

Our mains outshone the appetizers, and were delicious. I had cavatelli and wild boar ragout, which was sensational – the dense pasta cooked exactly to the wonderful, chewy texture I love, a dish with restraint and balance. I reluctantly shared.

My friends got pistachio stuffed leg of lamb and sweet and sour rabbit. Had I managed to swipe a bite of either of these dishes, I would say something about them, but this was a rare meal where we were engrossed in our own plates. They were fantastic.

Oh, and we had two bottles of a delicious, light Domaine de Courcel Bourgogne Pinot Noir 2008. Light, yes, but with a balance of fruit and tannins, strawberry, cherry and cassis on the palate. For the occasion, a perfect wine pairing.

Nora Gray is new, and it’s something of a pioneer on it’s stretch of St-Jacques. But it’s a brisk 15 minute walk from Place Victoria, it’s worth every penny and I think it’s going to enjoy a good run.

Friday in Montreal: Arrival, Champagne, the Small Seafood Platter

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I’ve devoted a lot of space over the years to my obsessive compulsive concerns about every aspect of my trip to Montréal.

There was the year we waited half an hour while the gate crew tried to move a frozen jetway away from the plane. We made our connecting flight only because it was an adjacent gate. There was the year when, fearful of an approaching winter storm, I switched my travel to another nearby hub at the last minute, rented a car and drove there to catch the flight.

Yesterday, perfect. Both flights left and arrived ahead of schedule. Off the plane, through customs, to the cab, engaging in the customary fight with horrendous traffic, and voilà!

I got to my auberge at 5pm, my friends arrived at their hotel at 5:30pm, and we met at 6:15pm for our tradition champagne toast at the W Hotel.

The planned dinner at Garde Manger almost didn’t happen. We checked in at 7pm: no room for three. So we left and made alternate plans. But 15 minutes later, on our way to the new reservation, the maître d’ apparently saw us walk by and ran out the door, asking us if we still wanted to eat – he had an open table for 2 hours. Done.

Garde Manger was exactly as I expected and wanted it to be: loud, dark, fun… with delicious oysters, a shockingly good poutine made with lobster and sauced with an especially thick lobster bisque (it was my first poutine; I’d sworn never to eat it, but this was damn good), and a perfect shrimp risotto.

That was the extent of my first night in my favorite city after nearly a year. I’m back!

My Montreal Holiday Begins Tomorrow

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Months ahead of time, I obsess about restaurants. I go over my packing list. I worry about weather for traveling. I worry about whether my flights will arrive on time. I worry about whether my friends’ flights will arrive on time. I double-check my list of to do items to make sure I’m finishing everything before I leave.

But… tomorrow I’m leaving. Assuming flights are on time, I’ll be in Montreal in 22 hours, to enjoy 10 days that I look forward to all year.

This is gonna be good.

Eating Montreal, v8.0

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I’ll be in Montréal from 12/16-25 with friends, my eighth Christmas holiday in the city. This is part of what comprises the longest vacation I take during the year, and I make the most of it.

Days in Montréal are easy: breakfast at the auberge, an activity like a museum visit to occupy the morning hours, a trip to the gym, a trek to Café Myriade for afternoon coffee, and cocktails leading to dinner, followed by an hour or two with a good book before bed.

The activity that gets the most attention in the planning process, and much of our attention during the holiday, is dinner. Me and my friends love good food and wine, we are omnivores, and our most relaxed time of the day is sitting around a table filled with great food and drinking wine and talking, sometimes for hours.

Every year, I publish my dining itinerary. It’s not the first word on Montréal dining, nor is it the last. My dining schedule isn’t the list of the best restaurants in the city. Some of those are not on the list by design. After months of reading, asking friends who live in Montréal, and juggling restaurant and holiday schedules, it becomes my personal statement about what I like to eat, and the way I think the city expresses itself at the table.

And what is the essence of Montréal? In my personal view, the city is warm, friendly, convivial, welcoming; when work is done, it knows how to have a good time; many of the formalities of city life are smiled away by locals, who are relaxed and who take having a good time seriously.

Yet again, I’ll stop before the generalizations become too thick and brittle. But, over the years, my list of restaurants has been shaped by my effort to celebrate and absorb this aspect of life in Montréal.

Practically speaking, what’s the approach? A small number of signature fine dining experiences, no more than three in number; and a series of bistro meals at good restaurants that capture a portion of that spirit of Montréal that is so important to me.

So, Montréal Dinners v.8, with commentary:

  • 12/16 Garde Manger: I’ve been checking this restaurant out of the corner of my eye for a few years – it’s 4 doors down from the auberge where I stay. Chuck Hughes has been so exposed that there’s a risk that someone going here is stepping into a TV version of a restaurant. But I like the atmosphere, I like how Hughes cooks and his sensibility in the kitchen, and I think it’s worth a trip.
  • 12/17 Nora Gray: Some alums of Liverpool House have opened Nora Gray. It’s new, it’s Italian, it’s had a very positive review, and a whole slew of complaints on Yelp. I thought the complaints were not credible – either one time issues (a bad night) or customers who are clearly plagued by their own demons. I was impressed by the newspaper review. I asked a friend in Montréal whom I trust implicitly because he has great taste, and he had dined there several times and was effusive in his praise. I expect this to be one of the best meals we have there.
  • 12/18 Le Chien Fumant: This same friend highly recommended Chien last year, and we had such a good time, we tried to go back again, but couldn’t because it closed for the holidays. We’re back again this year.
  • 12/19 Le Local: I wasn’t entirely convinced about Local when I ate there the first time in 2008, but I think the food is more solid now.
  • 12/20 Les 400 Coups: Marc-André Jetté, Patrice Demers and Marie-Joseé Beaudoin have dazzled us for 4 years, as we’ve followed them on their trek through the city: Laloux, Newtown and now at their own Les 400 Coups in Old Montréal. Jetté and Demers can invent and dazzle in the kitchen, with elegance and a surprising assurance given their relative youth. This will be our fifth dinner at their hands – we loved our dinner at Laloux so much in 2008 that we went back two days later.
  • 12/21 Liverpool House: Everyone crowds Joe Beef, and it certainly is a quintessential Montréal experience. But litte sister Liverpool House is next door, it’s smaller, has a higher ratio of locals to tourists, and to me it’s a part of the essence of Montréal, with tremendous pub food, and a Quebecois twist. (yes, that’s horrendous, but you know what I mean.)
  • 12/22 DNA: This will be another highlight of the trip – our fourth dinner here. And each time, we never know what to expect, except that we know we’ll eat at least one thing we might not have considered edible before this encounter, and we know the tasting menu will be fantastic, in one of the only restaurants that looks like a Borg ship.
  • 12/23 Osteria Venti: This is a new restaurant in Old Montreal, in a wonderful space that used to host a very nice food and wine establishment, unfortunately named Stew Stop. Marie-Claude Lortie of La Presse wrote earlier this year that innovation isn’t the hallmark of this restaurant, but if you’re looking for simple, delicious Italian food, you’ve found it. She describes tasty charcuterie plates, and melt-in-your-mouth ricotta gnocchi, and perhaps a too simple tomato sauce. Chef Michele Forgione has a good reputation, and I’d like to see what he’s up to. And frankly, I have fond memories of this space.
  • 12/24 Bonaparte: Christmas Eve is about one thing – tradition. And we always return to Bonaparte for a traditional Quebecois French meal, impeccably created and served in the restaurant’s grand dining room.

Perhaps at some point, I’ll produce a separate list of the best restaurants in the city – as opinionated as this one.

A Few Dinners Past

Montreal Holiday, v8.0

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Not that long ago, it was 350 days away. Now it’s five days until I arrive in Montréal for my eighth Christmas in the city.

The tradition began in 2004 with a group of friends, some of whom had their own long tradition of holidays in Montréal. As their tradition ended, I started my own, and over the past 8 years, others have joined me on the excursions. This year, for the fifth time, my close friends Michael and Bob will hang out in Montréal with me.

Why Montréal? The answers to that question range from the practical to the ethereal.

  • It’s close: I’m 800 miles away. I can get on a plane at 11:30am and after a short layover in Detroit, I arrive in Montréal before 4:00pm.
  • It’s accessible: French is the official language of Quebec, but the Québecois are mostly bilingual, especially in Montréal. The language gives the city a somewhat European feel, if you squint, and many tourists have remarked about the old world air of Old Montréal.
  • It’s affordable: despite an exchange rate to the US dollar that now hovers between parity and a Loony advantage, it’s still reasonably inexpensive for food and lodging.
  • It’s Canada: and, therefore, different. Many Americans consider Canada as little more than an attachment to the US, but Canada – despite the gravitational pull of the massive US Black Hole – retains its own view of the world, its own sensibility, its own social compact between government and governed, its own sense of civility. I think this is especially true of eastern and central Canada, even though you can find Montréalers who will tell you, sadly, that Canadians are becoming more American every day. Canadians not only see the world in a subtly different way, they see more of the world than we do because they look outward more than inward.

Well, too many generalizations like that, and the point begins to fray. But that’s my rather haphazard attempt to grasp a piece of the difference between the people of the US and the people of Canada. We Americans tend to think we have a common colonial past and so we come from the same place, but we might be less surprised at our differences if we understood that those differences go back a few centuries.

Montréal Holiday v7.0: 30 days away

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A month from today, we’ll be on our way to Montréal for 10 days in the city – our longest trip there. Here’s an update.

The restaurant plan: thus far, reservations are in place for Toque!, DNA, Les 400 Coups, and Bonaparte. I expect more reservations for Laloux (11/28 now made) and Au Pied de Cochon this weekend, with some “gap-filling” over the next couple weeks.

  • 12/17 Toque!
  • 12/18 DNA
  • 12/20 Laloux
  • 12/21 Les 400 Coups
  • 12/24 Bonaparte

Another note, while I’m here: Marie-Claude Lortie has an interesting review of DNA in La Presse. Push it through Google Translate if you need to, it’s worth reading.

I’ll leave late morning on 12/17 and should arrive mid-afternoon in Montréal. My friends, my now perennial holiday revelers in the city, arriving late Thursday.

Planning for Montréal at the Holidays, v 7.0: Dinner

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photo: braised veal with polenta, Restaurant DNA, 2010-12-22

With 92 days remaining before the annual Christmas trip to Montréal, here’s the dinner plan:

2010 Working Restaurant List

There are a number of other restaurant possibilities waiting in the wings, among them Mas, 3 Petit Bouchons, Brasserie t!, La Fabrique, le Saint-Gabriel.

The usual holiday placeholders are present: Otto and Bonaparte… both of which are perfectly good choices for dining on Christmas eve and Christmas night. Making a first time appearance: Le Chien Fumant and les 400 coups, the new restaurant opened by Marc-André Jetté and Patrice Demers.

This list will change over the coming three months, and as we navigate restaurant holiday schedules. But this is where we start.

Thinking about Montréal 2010

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With a mere 168 days separating me from my 7th holiday to Montréal, you can imagine the growing excitement. (If you think I’m kidding, you’d be surprised.)

Montréal 2009 was a truncated vacation – 5 days instead of the expected 8. We enjoyed ourselves and 5 days was enough to have a really good time, but we did miss out on a few things we wanted to do. So as we left the auberge, we booked a much longer trip for 2010: 11 days. Now, I look back on that decision and I feel it’s a bit excessive and indulgent.

In other words, it’s perfect because those words are what Christmas is all about.

The activity list in Montréal will be the same: low key, with one activity per day, maximum. The restaurant list is not likely to undergo a major change from last year, although I’m keeping a close eye on restaurant openings, as always.

One possible change: we’ve discussed an intra-vacation excursion to Québec City, perhaps flying there on December 17th or 18th and then taking VIA Rail to Montréal on December 20th for the rest of the stay. I’ve never been to Québec and a couple days there would add some “discovery” to the “discovered” so to speak.

More to come as I flesh out the details.

UPDATE: just after I posted this, Patrice Demers announced on twitter that he and Marc-André Jette are leaving Newtown for a new restaurant, to open in October. Naturally, this will alter our plans, since we like to follow these guys.

UPDATE 2: The new restaurant will be in Old Montréal, btw.

Trip Countdown: Dinner List

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With less than 40 days remaining before this year’s trip to Montreal for the holidays, the dinner plans are starting to fall into place. First, a reset: Each year, we spend the Christmas holiday in Montreal, with a trip of 6-8 days. We’ve done this since 2004. We do it because it’s relaxing, a nice time to reconnect with friends who join us, and it’s become, over time, its own holiday tradition. We like to eat good food, and so a big part of our planning for the trip is actually planning where we’ll eat. Each year, we choose a mix of favorite restaurants, as well as a few new ones to try. This year, with 8 nights to fill and perhaps a 9th, here’s the plan:

There are long-time favorites like Toqué and Au Pied de Cochon; restaurants we tried last year and enjoyed, like DNA and Laloux; new restaurants on the list, like Trois Petit Bouchons and Newtown; and the Christmas Eve tradition, Bonaparte. In the case of Newtown, we’re following the chefs, Marc-André Jetté and Patrice Demers, from Laloux to their new venue.

I’ve written about this before, but one of the factors Chuck considers when he’s working on the plans is the style and type of restaurants on the list. He likes a mix of “signature experiences” and homier fare. Naturally, he wants all of it to be good. Now, he’s figuring out whether we’re too heavy on a certain style of bistro cooking – expressed differently at each restaurant, but still similar in style and concept. If that’s the case, I expect we’ll see a replacement of the dinner for Monday night – jumping into one of the ethnic traditions, perhaps. More to come.

2009 holiday plans, v. 1.0

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Well, with only(!) 110 days left before the next trip to Montreal, and our sixth holiday spent in the city, our restaurant plan is beginning to take shape. Readers of this blog know that food matters a lot to us, and on a vacation where the goal is to relax and do little or nothing, planning meals takes center stage.

Each year, we choose a mix of old favorites, as well as new restaurants to try, and for our 8 dinners this winter, here are the 10 restaurants that have made the first cut:

  • Laloux
  • Newtown
  • DNA
  • Le Club Chasse et Peche
  • Toque
  • Mas Cuisine
  • Au Pied de Cochon
  • Restaurant La Chronique
  • Bonaparte
  • Otto

Favorites:

Laloux is now helmed by Eric Gonzalez, and the initial reviews are good, as expected. We ate his food at Cube in 2006. We went to Laloux twice in 2008 and loved it.

Newtown is where you now find Marc-André Jetté and Patrice Demers, lately from Laloux. Their review in the Gazette in July was more guarded, but we were so impressed at Laloux that we’ll head to Newtown.

DNA is impressive; we had an excellent meal there in 2008, and our friends enjoyed it again in May of this year. Plus it’s kind of fun to sit in a space that looks like a Borg cube and watch the holiday fireworks over the Old Port.

Toque has had its ups and downs with reviewers, but we’ve had two excellent dinners here in 2007 and 2008, so we’ll return. The wine list is also quite good.

Au Pied de Cochon – well, what can we say that hasn’t been said? A dinner here is de rigeur.

New Entrants:

La Chronique has floated around the planning list for a couple years now, and I think this will be the year when we give the bistro a try.

Le Club Chasse et Peche is another restaurant that’s landed on our restaurant list at least twice, only to drop off. Not a statement about the quality of its food, but more the result of difficult choices. 

Mas Cuisine is run by the former chef from Bruinoise, which was a restaurant we loved in 2006, now just a memory. Brunoise is still fresh in our minds, so we’ll hope for a repeat at Mas Cuisine.

Christmas Eve and Christmas Night: These two days present their own challenges, since so many restaurants close for one or both days. Hotel/Auberge dining options are usually reliable, and while Bonaparte and the W Hotel’s Otto aren’t what I would call stunning, each is reliably good. And as I’ve said so many times here, Bonaparte is kind of special on Christmas Eve, with its traditional, beautifully cooked, French/Quebecois food.

I’ll say more as we get closer and start working the list against our calendar and each restaurant’s plans around the holidays.