My yearly June trip to Montreal (looong)

So, inspired by this thread (thanks, riddlemay!) I am posting about my recent trip to Montreal, trying to use words other than“delicious” and “good” over and over again.

I’m going to do it in parts because if I wait until I have time to write it all down at once, it will be next summer by the time I post.

I go to Montreal every year for the Canadian Grand Prix with a good friend who is a) a vegetarian and b) not a wine-drinker. The fact that we’ve traveled to this race together for the last 7 years speaks volumes for our friendship, given that I am a) a carnivore and b) I love wine and try to drink it as often as possible. While Montreal is not the most vegetarian-friendly city in the world (many of its best restaurants have no options for vegetarians whatsoever), we’ve certainly found good meals over the years. 2006 was a banner year for us.

Our first night we went to Piazzetta, on rue St-Denis on the Plateau. We picked it at random just walking by, deciding that the menu and the terrace looked pleasant. We sat outside and watched the endless parade of people walking by in the evening sunlight, me with a 1/2 liter of rose, and my friend with his diet coke. The menu was mostly pizza-oriented, with a pronounced Mediterranean/middle-eastern influence. We split a pizza and a “rouleau”, basically a wrap made with pizza crust that hadn’t been as crisply baked, and then sliced. The buffalo mozzerella/basil/sun-dried tomato pizza was fairly good, but we both would have preferred a crisper crust, given how thin it was. The rouleau contained a variety of Mediterranean vegetables and came with a tzatziki dipping sauce. Not terribly exciting. All in all it was a decent meal, and pretty reasonably priced, but given the many better options in Montreal, I probably won’t be going back.

Stay tuned for the better options!

Piazzetta
4097 rue St-Denis

geli wrote:I go to Montreal every year for the Canadian Grand Prix with a good friend who is a) a vegetarian and b) not a wine-drinker. The fact that we’ve traveled to this race together for the last 7 years speaks volumes for our friendship, given that I am a) a carnivore and b) I love wine and try to drink it as often as possible. While Montreal is not the most vegetarian-friendly city in the world (many of its best restaurants have no options for vegetarians whatsoever), we’ve certainly found good meals over the years. 2006 was a banner year for us.

On the other hand, one of the best vegetarian restaurants (Les Chevres) serves foie gras.

from restomontreal.ca:

Although the menu is mainly composed of vegetarian items, Les Chévres also offers other French delicacies including a choice of two meat dishes and one fish item every day. Les Chevres also boasts an amazing vegetarian menu de degustation (or taste menu) that will satisfy even the most sophisticated of palates.

Arghh! How have I never heard of this place? Oh well, something to look forward to for next year! Thanks, rcianci for bringing it to my attention.

Not to be overly flip mind you, but go to L'Express. You the carnivore should order the pate', and your friend the vegan can fill up on the gallon jar of cornichons they bring out to accompany it. To really test the strength of your friendship, order the roast marrow bones after that.

So after 7 years of going to Montreal, I finally decided to try the famous Montreal bagels. My excuse for not trying them until now is that I’ve never really been much of a bagel person. Sure, they’ll do in a pinch, but I’d prefer some good whole-grain bread or even a nicely toasted English muffin with my breakfast, thank you very much. After my first trip to St-Viateur Bagel and Café, I realize my error: I’m not a bagel person, I’m a Montreal bagel person! Briefly, these bagels are hand-rolled, then simmered quickly in honeyed water, and then baked in a wood-burning oven, all of which makes them nice and “al dente” on the outside, and tender, dense and moist on the inside without being heavy. Delightful! And addictive. St-Viateur was the only place we went twice while in Montreal (well, besides a bar or two…)

We went to the location on Mont-Royal East, on the Plateau. The first time, we were there in the morning so I just got a nice little lop-sided (hand-rolled, no corporate perfect symmetry here) poppyseed bagel with cream cheese and strawberry jam. I think I took only two mouthfuls before I said, “We’re coming here for lunch tomorrow.” My dining companion was equally pleased. The next day for lunch I had the classic, which was a bagel with cream cheese, smoked salmon, red onions, capers and fresh-sliced tomatoes. Again, wonderful. The atmosphere was great, too—since the weather was nice, the big front windows were open to the street, and they had a HD television tuned to the World Cup match of the day. (Pretty much anywhere serving food and/or drinks had the matches on, except for the truly upscale places.) The volume was turned up enough that you could follow the game, but not so much that you couldn’t ignore it if you wanted to. But the best thing was the bagel oven, which was in full swing both times we were there: looking like an oversized pizza oven full of rows of roasting bagels, which the baker would flip with a large—really large—metal spatula looking thing, and then use the same implement to take each row of finished bagels out before flipping them into a long wooden box. It was pretty cool.

They now ship their bagels throughout Canada via orders placed on the internet, and I just recently got an email from the owner (what service!) saying that they were looking to ship to the U.S., pending approval from the FDA. So, for whatever that’s worth…

Anyway, there’s tons more info and also pictures on their website, it’s worth a look.

St-Viateur Bagel and Café
1127 Mont-Royal East
514-528-6361
www.stviateurbagel.com


ps. Fast Eddie wrote:

Not to be overly flip mind you, but go to L'Express

and I did! More about that in another installment...

geli wrote:Anyway, there’s tons more info and also pictures on their website, it’s worth a look.

St-Viateur Bagel and Café

OK, I'm officially over the top. It's 5:30am, I'm in a hotel room in Milwaukee looking at Montreal bagel porn. Not only that, but I'm getting annoyed as I know, from previous stays, the complimentary bagels the hotel offers, along with coffee etc., are of the poofy, doughy variety.

Geli, you've made me realize it's been way too long since I've been to Montreal.

Enjoy,
Gary

I'm afraid I must withdraw my recommendation of Les Chevres as a high end resto for vegetarians. When they started out their idea was that vegetables were just as worthy of being the central focus on the plate as game, fish or foie. Sadly, they could not sell that concept to the Montreal dining public. Their new menu focuses on meat and fish. Below is a link to a recent review.

Les Chevres Review