Poutine week MTL

I've never been much of a poutine person.  This is why Poutine Week in Montreal was so good to me: so many different types of poutine, so little fries-brown-sauce-squishy-cheese trios :) It was, like, calling out my name! Out of 30 poutine places, about 27 were offering non-traditional poutine. That made me happy. VERY happy!

We 'teamed up' with one of my school friends and her bf and set out to our first choice (out of 30) of poutine places on Monday. We chose La Mauvaise Réputation. Who knew we would end up going to 2 other restos that night and to... 7, yes, SEVEN others that week (for a total of 8...EIGHT!!!).

Every resto chose one poutine (or two) and it was either supposedly 5$ or 10$ (sometimes 13$ or 15$ $%/?&*). Every restaurant would give you a 'Poutine Week' card with a code on it and you could go vote for them on the Poutine Week website. This gave you points and then you could cash in your points. We actually both chose a 30$ gift certificate at Bota Bota. Not too shabby!

Here we go!

Mauvaise Réputation

Place: New restaurant, very cute . LOVED how when you get in, there's somewhat of an indoor abri Tempo and you don't feel the cold at ALL when you're seated. Nice. Very nice. There's a big window right at the front of this long resto and around it is a brick wall. Who doesn't love a nice brick wall I ask? I think our favorite thing that day, in that resto, was that right beside us, there was a shiz load of heating. May I remind you that it was -40 ish outside. Brrrrr. The music was nice and neutral and lounge-y.

Service: The waiter was very nice and friendly and we got our [paper] menus quickly--perhaps because we were actually the first ones in the resto. I think it was about 6:30. Throughout our meal, the waiter also came back to re-serve the water, which was nice. The menu itself was nothing to write home about --hamburgers, noodle soup... We were obviously only interested in poutine.

Poutine: Pulled pork poutine. Pulled pork, caramelized onions, coleslaw, smokey chips. We decided to share 2 poutines and to add a couple sides which are not really even worth mentionning here. Poutine got to our table and we were immediately happy. It was in a square bowl and it was vertically inclined instead of flat which made my eyes happy. Eat with your eyes first, right? The main part of the poutine was the pulled pork. I loves me some pulled pork! And the sauce the pork was marinated in had a wonderful mix of spices. The coleslaw was actually a nice addition to the poutine as it was refreshing and it went well with the rest of the ingredients. Oh, and the smokey chips were great and a good fit too but obvisouly not homemade. The caramelized onions, on the other hand, were not so present. I believe there was only one... maybe two in the entire poutine. Also, the sauce was a bit too liquidy and agglomerated at the bottom. All in all, a very good start to what was to be an epic (that's right, epic!) poutine run throughout the week. And that pulled pork was a winner!

Score for food: an average of 7.5    service: an average of 8

La Bêtise

Place: If you didn't have the address to this restaurant, you would definitely miss it. Most definitely! When you come in, it looks a tad fancy but then you see the tv. pfff.... damn tvs! Open kitchen, wooden everything including the menus (except for the tables, which were plastic... seemed like they ran out of money...), and lots of people! There were also huge drapes coming in to 'take care of the cold' but that didn't work out as well as they had planned.

Service: Nothing special. Got water and that's it. They were really busy.

Poutine: General Tao poutine. Cheese curds, battered chicken, original General Tao sauce. This was supposed to be my favorite poutine. I mean come on! General Tao? I LIVE for good General Tao! But man was that one ever disapointing. The fries were obviously bought and not homemade, the chicken was meh and the sauce KIND of ressembled the sweet General Tao sauce but it wasn't close enough. Also, it was 13$ instead of the 10$ we thought it was going to be. Another thing... it was lukewarm. Uncool.

Score for food: an average of 6    service: an average of 7

Poutineville Beaubien

Place: This place was full of people and so we had to wait... but only for a couple minutes! The decor is nothing special: frames and IKEA lamps, stucko (nice ;p) and pop corn ceiling, with tight seating room. It's the type of place you go to with friends to enjoy a nice... poutine! Duh! You can also 'make your own poutine', so that's pretty cool. We were seated next to a vacuum cleaner. Fun.

Service: Took a while for the waitress to get to our table and longer to get water. She was nice nonetheless and gave us a great suggestion concerning which potatoes to have our poutine with. We took l'écrasé de patate (specialty of the house. Other choices include sweet potato, julienne, or 'coupe maison'): clumps or agglomeration of potatoes, which turned out to be quite good. Quite freaking good. It did take a while for the poutine to arrive to our already full stomachs...But our waitress was nice and smiley and that is gosh darn important.

Poutine: Le Montréalais. Swiss cheese, mushrooms, smoked meat and breaded pickle on potato écrasé poutine. I'm already not a fan of poutine, but I think I'm even less a fan of smoked meat. The only time I went to Shwartz, I ended up eating a pickle. This poutine, I believe, changed my mind. First of all, that pickle (which we had to share four ways) was damn good. And thank you, waitress, those potatoes were damn good as well. Well seasoned but most importantly, well clumped :p The mix of flavors was DE-licious and it was so good that it turned out to be my two friends' best poutine of the night. The mushrooms were a nice addition to this lovely surprise. The smoked meat wasn't half as bad as I thought it was going to be. As I mentioned, it may have changed my mind about smoked meat. It was very nice in this poutine. Very fitting. Not as salty as I thought it was going to be. It was missing something for me though. Missing an OUMPH.

Score for food: average of a bit over 7     service: 8

Lucky's truck

THIS is the one we were supposed to go to on that first day but it was closed. It was the one that was most appealing to us anyway.

Place: Not much to say; it's a bar that looks like a bar. Lucky's truck is usually, well, a truck but in the winter, the food is served in the bar L'Abreuvoir on Ontario corner of St-Denis.



Service: Thing that sucked was that A: we needed to have a drink since we were in a a bar and that B: it wasn't clear who was serving what (food, drink?). The 'drink girl' came by quite quickly but the girl that was serving the food was  nowhere to be found... for a while. Oh and we had to pay two different bills and since it's a bar, we had to pay cash. Pfff.

Poutine: La fameuse. Duck confit, caramelized onions, foie gras sauce and red wine. As I mentioned before, this was supposed to be THE poutine. I mean, come on... it had duck in it! Duck! But alas... it was cold, the sauce wasn't as present as we wanted it to be and the duck was dry. One of the only good things was that the fries were good, at least! Basically it sounded way better on paper than in my mouth. And the caramelized onions? Where were they? Well they weren't on my plate. Nice presentation but maybe not the best vehicule for a poutine?

Score for food: average of 5.5     service: 5

Méchant Boeuf

Place: This was in Old Montreal so I think that automatically means it will be fancier. And I obviously did not think about that before I decided to wear a somewhat ripped hoodie that evening (what? I needed room to 'grow' after 3 poutines!). The place itself was very big and had huge windows. Its actually a part of the Place d'Armes Hotel and a member of the Antonopoulos 'take-over' of Old MTL. Seriously, they have a bunch of hotels and restaurants, most of which were taking part in Poutine Week and all of which were in the Happening Gourmand. The lights were dimmed, a band was playing CCR tunes, I was home :)

Service: The waiter was very nice, professional, and came to our table quickly. A bit TOO quickly: there were two poutines and I couldn't choose which one! He came back and took our order a couple minutes later.

Poutine: Fricadelle, oka, cheddar, confit pork flank and tempura onion rings.  All of this on baby potatoes cut in half. This was our 5th poutine of the week and after eating it, ze wife claimed it was her favorite one (or so she thought ;p) I must also mention that there were 2 different kinds of poutine, none of which were actually on the Poutine Week website. The onions were crunchy (as they should be) and delicious and the cheddar was damn good in there. One thing that didn't fit was  somewhat of a big fat meatball right in the middle of the poutine. Why? Why was there a big fat DRY meatball there? To remind us that we were eating at Le Méchant BOEUF? That part, we could have done without. This poutine was huge, even if we were sharing it. The mix of flavours (uh... not counting the meatball), was great, the pepper sauce was well done and there was just enough. Asking ze wife, it was her fave, considering the other 4 we'd eaten.

Score for food: average of 7.5    service:8

Bevo

Place: This is a huge restaurant, on 2 floors. Basically, a pizza place. The first floor was pretty much full, on a wednesday night, in Old MTL, which I'll always find weird... I mean, who decides to go to Old MTL on a freezing night? No? Anyhoot, we got seated at the pizza bar, which      

                                was nice. We were near the fire and the bored pizza guy :p

Service: The waitresses wore white and red and were very smiley, which is always appreciated! Our waitress came quickly and gave us glasses of water and took our order. Wasn't that hard... 1 poutine for the two of us! The one thing that was less appreciated was the fact that the waitresses were talking (about their personnal stuff) between themselves in a corner, in plain sight. Gosh, I hate that. Oh and the big boss was lurking the whole night which started to make us feel uncomfortable!

Poutine: Italian sausage poutine. Italian sausage, mild cheddar, onion confit, peppers and fresh herbs. The sauce was good with just enough salt but if you didn't have either a piece of onion or pepper in your bite, it didn't have that much taste.  There wasn't that much cheese though. A good mix but not enough taste, I found. And ze wife didn't think very highly of the fries.Good thing was the sausage. THAT was goo-hoood. I just wished there would have been more than half of one!

Score for food: average of 7    service:8

Miss Prêt à Manger

*We ended up there after having gone to Café Pavé (where we were ready to eat an 'apparently amazing' veggie poutine) and noticing that it was closed because of water dammage. Thanks for putting it on the website, a**h****!  May I just mention that it was EXTREMELY COLD and we froze our butts off just getting there!*

Place: This place was tiny, with about 20 seats all together. Most tables were high ... only a couple were 'normal height'. They make lots of good things like yummy salads and sandwiches. That's why they are a caterer, first and foremost.

 

Service: There were two waitresses, I believe and they were everywhere at once! It was even hard to get a price off of them... like the price of a glass of wine (which turned out to be 10$ for a glass... tad expensive!). Needless to say it was very busy during the lunch hour. The boss/owner was running around, swearing because the heating wouldn't work. Funny but unprofessional.

Poutine: Pulled lamb poutine. Yukon gold & sweet potato fries, braised organic lamb shank, shredded (Fermes St.-Vincent) organic Québec cheese curd, gravy from lamb juice and edible floral garnish. I loves me some edible flowers! At this point, there's such serious poutine competition! We thought Méchant Boeuf had the best one but this one was winning top price! It was so damn good. Like amazing good. Really tasty, with sweet potatoes in there (yuuum!), and a bit of parsley, not only for deco, but to go with the lamb. Mmmmmm! I'm thinking about it right now and I want to go back! The meat was so tasty and juicy. Nothing dry there! And so well seasonned! Really, I have nothing bad to say about this wonderful poutine! It was also such a nice presentation with the flower petals! Another good thing was that the plate was freaking hot when we got it. Hello? Can't everyone follow in their footsteps? This is the right thing to do people! The only downside was that this poutine was 15$ :/

Score for food: average of 9    service:6.5

Fabergé

Place: The place itself is quite hip looking, with lots of sun coming through the large windows. We had one of the best spot, but maybe that's becaue it was about 1:15 when we got there.

Service: Our waiter, who seemed to be more of a manager or even owner, was very nice and friendly. He was very interested by the fact that this was our eighth poutine of the week! And, he came to check up on us and the poutine.

Poutine: Breakfast poutine. Homefries, sqeaky curd cheese, caramelized peppers and onions, hollandaise sauce, poached egg. Yum yum yum! The potatoes were crunchy, the peppers were well done and the presentation was just lovely! At first, i gotta say I was scared of the egg on top but it was just deeeelicious! On top of it, the plate AND the poutine were hot. You know how much I like hot plates by now! Everything was well seasoned and we were so happy that we went for that 8th poutine after all! 

ps: They make maaad mimosas (you can actually choose other flavors besides orange juice)!

Score for food: average of 8    service: 8.5

That's it for us and poutine week. After rating the poutines on the poutine week website, we ended up ranking 15th out of 4356 something poutine eaters. Ain't that bad huh? I guess I AM a poutine person now!

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Update-- 24/02/13: I'm now 35th :) I'm shooting for the stars and going for #1.

2nd update--8-03-13: well hello there, I'm now number 32!!!



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Maison Kam Fung

I believe my favorite thing to eat Sunday morning is dim sum. I just love it love it love it! Did I mention I LOVE it? Yep. I convinced the wife to go (she wasn't too keen on it at first) and invited a couple friends that had never (yes, NEVER) eaten dim sum before. We got there at around 10h50, apparently the right time to get there for there were only a couple people in line before us. Usually, we have to wait a good 30 minutes minimum and the whole floor is filled with people waiting to eat this wonderful dim sum (can you tell I like it?).

This is how it happens: you get there, they give you a number, and you wait until they call it out on the microphone (that's right...and no, you don't feel like a celebrity ;). You go in and it's freaking full... and I mean FULL. So full that you usually have to squish yourself and go through the labyrinth of tables. Needless to say there are always a shizload of people! A shizload of asian people. You know what THAT means: this must be good asian food!!!

'Trolley girl!

The place itself is HUGE ... I'd say around 200 to 250 seats, lots of windows... and lots of employees! There are the 'trolley girls' (the women that pass by with the different dim sum) and the waiters (most of them men, in charge of cleaning your table and providing you with water, etc). Every time they give you food, they mark it on the piece of paper that's on your table (2,75$, 3$, 5$).

We were seated in somewhat of a corner which, at first, we thought was unlucky; that we weren't going to get to see all the food passing by. Turns out it was A-OK: the girls passing by were always yelling (I'm not kidding: yelling) what they had to give (sell) you.

So, it had begun: the feast! Our friends looked like they were really enjoying themselves, which made us happy; we just wanted to share our experience at Maison Kam Fung! Also, you know that when you go there, you won't have to wait for your food... it's there as soon as you sit down!

We had a variety of dim sum that day... I can't remember it all...

Shrimp rolls

Pork rolls

Spring rolls: Moist and delicious, we had some pork ones and some shrimp ones I believe. SO good!

Shriiiimp!

Fried shrimp: My fave, of course! Shrimp, fried in a spicy batter that makes you go 'YUUUUM'.









Dumplings: Some shrimp ones and some peanut ones. Both good. The peanut ones had too many...peanut chunks and were too hard for my poor teeth but still amazing!








Chow mein: One of the moistest chow mein EVER.... so damn delicious you want to order more even when you are full and everyone else as well.... and you tell yourself that would just be ke-ra-zy!

There were also some veggies (which, when you are surrounded by fried goodness, you don't really care for). We had some rappini, which turned out quite tasty :)

For the desert, we had what we usually have: some kind of jellied coconut and mango. Very nice! Texture is questionnable but it's nice! 

This, as per usual, was a great food experience: good food, funny people fighting, language you don't understand, lots-o-people and good times! The tea that they serve you at the beginning is quite good and it's free refills (woohoo!).

We shared the bill and it cost us about 14 to 15$ each INCLUDING tip! If that's not a good deal, I don't know what is!

Our two friends that came along had a couple things to say:
1- Loooooved the tea (they give you tea with your meal and they refill it regularly). Chow mein had a good texture not slimy like Chinese fast food.

2- Spring rolls were delicious, expecially with the sauce. Chow mein was baller as well as dessert. 
 

And now, the scores!

Food: an average of 8.75
Service: an average of 8 (good until the end when the very busy waiter basically told us to fuck off when we wanted the bill and to go directly to the cash!!!)

All in all, as usual, a great dim sum experience! We just loved it!

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Aix Cuisine du terroir

Ah yes, the Happening Gourmand is upon us again (www.happeninggourmand.com)! Last year, we went to Verses and this year, we decided to try an all new restaurant in the old port: Aix Cuisine du terroir, or Aix for the regulars. Let me reiterate what this Happening is all about: 6 restaurants (Vieux Port steakhouse, Restaurant Modavie, Taverne Gaspar, Méchant Boeuf, Suite 701, Bevo Bar + Pizzeria) have 23$ table d'hôte instead of the regular 36$ and 2 restaurants (Verses, Aix Cuisine du terroir) have a 27$ or 37$ table d'hôte instead of 44$. About half of them also offer a table d'hôte for lunch at 15$ (22$ usually). This, from the 10th of January to the 3rd of February. Basically, this gives us poor-ish people a chance to eat a great meal at a lower price :) We liked our experience last year and we love the concept so we decided to do it again this year! This time, instead of going with a bunch of people (and risking that some will be late![lots of swearing ensued]), we went with one friend and we had a great time!

Aix is located in the Place d'Armes hôtel, right below Suite 701. Actually, the latter was also part of the Happening but Aix's menu looked more appetizing. It's a 5 minute walk from the metro so it is quite well located indeed!The restaurant is very nice and chic, with banquettes everywhere, brick walls (we love love love that!) and big lamps, 60's style. I kind of had the feeling I was entering a Mad Men episode :)The ambiance was very nice at the beginning what with people talking and the clinging of glasses (but then a: the couple beside us started fighting and b: a loud group came in).

Anyhoot, our friend was already waiting for us so we sat down quickly. On top of it... at 7:45, the resto wasn't even half full. A very professional waiter arrived at our table right after we sat down. The way the Happening Gourmand works is that you have either 3 or 4 choices of appetizers and entrées and one desert. We had some questions about the menu and he was able to answer all of them. This is nice because sometimes you get waiters that don't know their menu. This pisses me off. WHAT? I'm a difficult client :) 

We had had the chance of looking at the menu online before and we had chosen what we wanted so the ordering was quite quick. We shared a bottle of white between us three. I had the bison carpaccio and the beef medallion (served with swiss chard, shiitake, dried fruits, mashed parsnips---yum and porto sauce). Ze wife had the vegetarian poutine and the salmon steak (served with shrimp bisque, butternut squash pearls and herb chiffonade) and ze friend had the smoked bacon parmentier (soup), spinach and l'Île-aux-grues cheddar  and the salmon as well.

The bread arrived with our appetizers and I kind of expected it to be warm but alas.... :( The waiter served us wine the right way (well, the right way is of course the way they do it at ITHQ... duh :)... but seriously, I mean he asked who wanted to taste it, and after, served the others before that person got more wine. Also, he did not turn the bottle while opening it. That is key. Why? Because it looks better damn it! So koodos to him! Oh, what was also ITHQ-like is that they brought us the right utensiles before every course. THAT's nice. It's nice not to have 18 utensiles on your table at first, you know?

My bison carpaccio

Ze friend's soup

Ze wife's veggie poutine

Let's talk about food, shall we? Let me just mention that I was lucky enough to pick the best things on the menu (which will explain my score, later).My appetizer was darn good, if I may say so myself (and the two other girls at my table said so too!)! Very thin slices of bison accompanied with jerusalem artichokes' chips, beet sprouts, parmesan shavings and apple jelly. Ah man. It's rare that I'm THIS satisfied with my food and this was gooo-hoood! The mix of flavors was perfect. Every bite was good. I must say I was perfectly amazed! Ze wife's veg poutine was good too, very original I must say. In it, there was polenta, leeks, caramelized onions, pepper sauce and cheese curds. The mix was a weird one, I must say, but it kind of grew on you. Ze wife liked it but I don't know... it remained a bit of a 'weird special poutine'. Another thing was that the polenta itself could have been crispier according to her. Ze friend's soup was good but a tad watery... which always sucks when you order soup.I must say though that the smoked flavour from the bacon came out really well and was delicious.

As for the main, well I have nothing bad to say about mine. Only good. First of all, all the plates were beautiful. The different colours and textures were there and our eyes were more than pleased! My beef was cooked just the way I like it, semi-rare. I'm not even exaggerating when I say it melted in my mouth. The parsnip puree was so smooth and very well seasoned, the mushrooms and the sauce were a great addition to the plate and the little green deco on top was lovely. Lovely!

Ze wife and ze friend's meal was enjoyed but not as much. It had a shrimp on top of the salmon and it was a tad plastic-y :( Also, the skin was still on and it was quite soggy so that was a tad unpleasant. Ze wife said that if they are going to keep the skin on, might as well make it crispy. Ze friend's fish had many bones still in there which was rather uncool (on the other hand, ze wife's had none). Don't get me wrong here, they liked their salmon very much, they just didn't like it as much as I LOVED my beef.

As for the desert, there was only one choice... so no choice :p It was basically cream and cookie and tiny chocolate balls in a verrine. Tasted very nice but obviously, it was nothing special. But that's ok. It wasn't overly sweet either so that's good sometimes and ze friend liked it like that:) It was a nice, simple desert. We didn't go there for desert!


Without tip, it cost me 45$ for my meal and 1/3 of a bottle of wine. Not too shabby for such a good, very much appreciated meal!

The service was amazing at first. AMAZING. The waiter was very present and he answered all of our questions. But then, nothing. No more waiter. He did not serve the wine again, or the water. The only other time we got some water was at the end of our meal by a busboy. And I was the designated wine girl during the meal. He also did not come by (not even once) to ask us how our meal was. That's just common courtesy! Sheesh!

So, for the (much awaited) scores:

Food: Me: 9

          Ze wife: 7.5

          Ze friend: 7

Service: I would say an average of 7 overall because our waiter was not nearly as present as we wanted him to be.

All in all, such a great foodie experience, especially for me! You have to try the Happening Gourmand... it is well worth it! You still have time, it ends feb 3rd.

Brit + Chips

Front of the resto in CDN. Meh.

We rarely go to fish + chips restaurants (well when the wife was in England in the fall she did take advantage of them f + c restos) so we decided on a whim to try one of them after going to see the new Bond movie (ha, you see the theme here?). So we decided to try Brit + Chips near our place on Côte-des-Neiges. There is one downtown which is quite popular and has a 91% on urbanspoon.com. Not too sure this one would get that score.

I say that because well... the place has been opened about 6 months, maybe a bit less, and there is never ANYONE in there. NO ONE. EVER. Who wants to go eat in an empty restaurant? How good can the food actually be if it's empty? THAT's what passers-by will tell themselves. Of course I don't think like that :) I wanna see WHY there's no one in there! And we have our first clue right when we get in. The way the restaurant is laid out, at the front, there are single chairs at a counter. Obvisouly you won't eat there if you're not alone. It's just badely laid out. They must lose a ton of customers because of that! Makes me sad. I feel a tear a-commin'. Also, it is not well located. Just before Pacini on Côte-des-Neiges, it's kind of in a 'hole': on the first floor of an apartment building, it's kind of weird and well, there are people south of it and north of it but not many pass BY.

As the restaurant is layed out, there are about 25 [noticeably very empty] seats up front and about 70 at the back. There were 4 clients in the resto when we got there. 4. And it was prime dinner time too. This is not starting off well.Anyhoot, the lack of clients aside, something reaked. I mean really reaked. What was it? Well what do you think can smell so bad in a fish and chip restaurant? Frying oil of course. Bah. I swear, the next day, after having a shower, I still smelled like that damn oil.Apart from that god awful smell, the place seemed really nice, brand new moldings, counters, etc... all in white and beige with frames on the wall of, you know, british stuff :p The music started off nice but then we started wondering why, you know, as somewhat of a theme, they were not playing english music. There was french music, popular music, but no english music. Weird. I mean whhheird.

We were starving when we got there, therefore very eager to eat! I guess that's the good thing about there not having very many clients: service is quick! Our waiter was very friendly and peppy. We read the menu, and decided on a couple things that we were to share. Luck would have it that half the things we wanted (pasties and pies) were not 'available' because they make them in the morning and when they're out, they're out. FUN! We ordered the cod with burgundy batter (a beer batter, very popular in fish and chips' native England) and the haddock with maple syrup batter, mushy peas and as a starter, we had the curry fish cake. We also had a glass of white wine each. 7$. Full to the brim. TO...THE...BRIM. I mean it wasn't the best wine, but not the worst either.

Curry fish 'cakes'

Since we were 4 in the resto, the food came very quickly, so 2 minutes later, we had our first course. Our 'nibble' was good (curry fish cake) but I must say that it DOES say 'cakes' on the menu and there was only one :( It was very nice and tasty and well curried (oh, and hot, which was nice!:) Accompanied with a nice little mayo and a slice of lemon with a great batter that was quite crunchy and satisfying indeed. The cake itself was a bit smooshy (such a technical term!) but still very enjoyable.

Haddock with maple syrup batter + fries + mushy peas

Cod with Burgundy batter

Now for the main course, I was not so keen on the mushy peas. They just didn't taste very good. They didn't have mint in them like they do in England and frankly, didn't have much taste. As for the fish, we couldn't really tell the difference between the maple syrup and the burgundy batter. Maybe one was SLIGHTLY sweeter but that's it. Both fish were moist and well cooked but not seasoned enough. I also found that there was a tad too much batter on both but I guess that's why it's called fried fish. I also found it a tad too greasy for my taste again, I am aware it was deep fried...). The fish came with a lovely tartar sauce (it was quite lovely indeed!) and some lemon of course. For a couple bucks more, you can take the chips (fries) with your fish so we did for one plate. Meh, the fries were ok but nothing to write home about. A bit disappointing seeing as they are supposed to be half of what people come to this restaurant for.

mmmya, it dson't look good...

...but at least there's ice cream! :p

As for the desert, well... we just HAD to try their 'deep fried whatever', a deep fried chocolate bar! I've heard about this a lot and never had I tried it SO.... we had the choice between a deep fried O'Henry, Bounty, Reese, Sneakers and 3 Musketeers so we took the latter.It was OK. Weird but OK. The batter could have been crispier. Apart from that, not much to say... I mean it's probably one of the piggiest (!) thing I've ever eaten. Leaving the restaurant we actually uttered the words 'je vais exploser'. When we got home, I think we stayed on the couch for an hour  before we could move again.in.

The service began really nicely and then we didn't see our waiter for a while. He didn't even check up on us to see if the meal was to our liking. Uncool. I'm just asking you to at least be in the room, you know? Sheesh!

Now, for the scores...

Food: 6/10

Service: 6.5/10 Could have been higher but, you know, he deserted us :(

OK experience but from what I've read, the downtown Brit + Chips should be better.

L'Avenue

Ah, l'Avenue! Nous adorons, ADORONS ce resto mais à chaque fois que nous y allons, il y a une file d'attente. Nous y sommes allées hier et laissez-moi vous dire qu'il faisait froid en ti-pépère! Le mercure est descendu jusqu'à -22 je crois. Très, très plaisant! En plus, tout le monde qui est déjà allé à l'Avenue le sait, il faut attendre dehors et souvent, on attend longtemps. Mais bon, des fois il faut souffrir pour être belle...euh... pour bien manger :)

UNE HEURE plus tard, une fois rentrés, nous pouvons admirer l'excentricité de la place. Il y a des gros miroirs avec des cadres dorés et des grosses boules lumineuses. Plutôt rétro :) Les toilettes sont, comme à l'habitude dans ce restaurant, psychédéliques avec des télévisions et plein de couleurs. Il y a un mannequin en entrant avec des habits excentriques. L'atmosphère en tant que telle est très plaisante: musique moyennement forte (le soir, par contre, il paraît qu'on ne s'entend pas parler) des années 90, beaucoup de gens et des serveurs qui courent ici et là.

Je ne vais pas mentir, l'unique et seule raison qui nous amène à manger le petit déjeuner à l'Avenue est la sélection d’œufs bénédictines au menu. En parlant du menu, il est IMMENSE!!!Celui-ci a l'air d'un livre...Un peu encombrant lorsque nous sommes cinq à une table destinée à quatre personnes! Revenons aux œufs bénédictines adorés: ils avaient changé leur menu depuis la dernière fois que nous étions allées donc ceci était très excitant! Habituellement, nous prenons les oeufs bénédictines avec du vieux fromage cheddar mais cette fois-ci, nous nous sommes décidées à choisir un nouvel item. Celui-ci avait l'air tellement alléchant que nous ne pouvions passer à côté! Bien sûr, comme d'hab, les oeufs ben sont accompagnés de petites patates délicieuses aux épices et aux herbes. Mmmmmm! Une brochette de fruits accompagne également cette assiette et est servie avant de recevoir le 'plat principal', un peu comme une petite entrée :)

Vu que nous connaissons bien les grosses portions de l'Avenue, nous allions séparer notre repas. Notre choix, Tout le monde à poële: poêlée de champignons sauvages, lardons, ail confit, roquette, réduction à la crème, nappés de sauce hollandaise. Tout ce que j'ai à dire est MMMMmmmmm! Quel bon mélange de saveurs! Les lardons avec les champignons=mmm. Les lardons avec la crème=mmmm. La roquette et les champignons=mmmm!!!! La seule chose qui clochait un peu c'est que l'ail ne paraissait pas très présent dans l'assiette. La sauce hollandaise était parfaite, l'oeuf parfait, tout était parfait. C'est certain que c'était un peu plus salé mais bon, il y avait des lardons donc on devait s'y attendre un peu.Les patates étaient excellentes, aucun autre commentaire n'est nécessaire!

Nous avons aussi pris un petit chocolat chaud (avec crème fouettée, bien sûr!) qui n'était vraiment pas si petit donc nous étions contentes de ne pas avoir pris le grand!  La personne qui faisait les drinks était très occupée donc notre serveur est venu nous informer que nous allions devoir patienter un peu, ce qui fût très apprécié. La crème fouettée était délicieuse (comme toutes les bonnes crème fouettées :) mais le chocolat chaud en tant que tel était un peu trop comme de l'eau chocolatée. Même pour 2$ et des peanuts.. c'était un peu triste.

Nos trois amis de table ont tous pris quelque chose de différent. L'amie de ze wife a pris un classique, les oeufs bénédictines de Monsieur Séguin. Son commentaire: délicieux comme d'habitude, le chèvre est bon et soyeux mais il y a un mini morceaux de chorizo qui a quitté une autre assiette en cuisine et s'est rendu jusque dans son assiette. Elle aimait le petit 'kick' mais pas tout le monde aurait aimé ça. Elle donne un 9 pour la bouffe.

Son copain a pris une omelette nommée La biquette (fromage de chèvre, asperges, oignons rouges, poivrons, poireaux, épinards, champignons sautés au beurre): un peu sèche, aucune bouchée n'est pareil, et il trouve un cheveux (qui, on espère était le sien!) dans son assiette. Il donne un 7.5.





Le copain du copain avait pris le Bobby does Dallas (3 oeufs brouillés avec cheddar, steak, champignons, oignons sautés à la sauce BBQ, sur pommes de terre rissolées). Celui-ci a dit de son assiette qu'elle était fantastique, merveilleuse, un vrai orgasme culinaire! Surtout la viande et la sauce. Il donne 7.75 car l'omelette en tant que tel n'était pas très satisfaisante, un peu fade.

Notre serveur était très amical, très enjoué. Il venait voir si tout allait, il nous emmenait les choses que nous lui demandions le plus vite possible, l'eau était sur la table avant même que nous aillions le temps de regarder nos menus, et il était souriant. J'aime les serveurs souriants :)

Alors, pour le pointage:

La bouffe 9.5
Le service 8.5 ... Nous avons attendu un peu trop vers la fin pour avoir l'addition...

Nous adorons ce resto et vous allez l'adorer aussi... si ça ne vous dérange pas d'attendre! À moins d'y aller soit à 8h OU à 14h!