montreal

Went to Montreal for a quick Easter getaway.

Day 1 - Good Friday.
Arrived in Montreal around noon. Went straight to Omni. Hotel let us checked in early. Probably could have gotten a room on a higher floor if we checked in later.

Lunch - We followed my Montreal Eats cheat sheet to find Olive et Gourmando in Old Montreal. What a great find!!! I had a small salad with tofu, wild rice, celery, raisins and cashews and a cup of Borscht. Hubby had a Cajun Chicken Panini and a cup of Borscht. Food was fresh and tasty. Also bought a small square of brownie. The brownie was highly recommended in Chowhound. It was pretty expensive for a small square. We didn't eat the brownie until Saturday though. Oh... we also bought a green tea mousse from the chocolate place across the street. It tasted good but not sure if it's worth the $5. Brownie is a better deal at $3/piece.

Dinner - Le Taj. This is a recommendation from Frommer's. We wanted something close by as the weather was pretty frigid (much colder than Toronto). We ordered Daal Lamb, Roasted Aubergine, basmatic rice, naan, and hubby had wine. Food is good, service so so.

Day 2 -
Breakfast - Starbucks. We wanted to find a small cafe to have crossiant. We must be too early for downtown folks. We didn't really find anything and we were too cold. Finally settled on Starbucks. It's too cold to walk around just to find a cafe. I had a cafe au lait and a small bite of bagel. I am really not a Starbucks fan.

We walked around St-Denis/St-Laurent/Plateau area. Determined to try a bistro. Found L'Express.

Lunch - At L'Express, we had lunch when everyone else was having breakfast. It was strange cause it was close to noon but everyone was having breakfast. We are too early for Montrealers. We decided not to have a hugh lunch as we wanted to eat something else later. I had the Fish soup, hubby had Sorrel soup and we also ordered Bone Marrow with Coarse Salt from the appertizer menu. The bone marrow was interesting. Had to scrape the marrow onto the toast and top it with coarse salt. Not sure I would order it again as it's quite messy to eat.

We went back to the hotel and set out again to find some local food. I wanted to try sugar pie, Tarte au Sucre. So we set out to find this place called Ma'am Bolduc. After walking for 25 minutes from the Metro, we decided to call it quit and found some place that we could find for sure. Since we wanted some Quebec food, we settled for poutine. It was 2 hours later that we finally sat down at Frite Alors on St-Denis.

Late Afternoon Snack/Dinner - Frite Alors. We both ordered poutine. They have different sauces to put on top of the poutine. My sauce had harissa in it (never tried that) and hubby had a mexican flavored sauce. The poutine was hugh. We were too full to eat dinner.

Day 3 - Easter Sunday
Mall is not opened. We knew that going to Montreal so we had decided to visit the Marche Jean-Talon on Sunday. Following my tradition of choosing the wrong exit, it just took us an extra hour to find the market. The market was interesting. Not all stores were opened because of Easter. I do think TO's St. Lawrence Market is better. But then again, if we go back in summer, we might stroll around more and find more stuff. We bought some Quebec cheese, baguette, cherry tomatoes and smoke meat to bring on the train for dinner. We tried merguez and maple taffy for the first time. The taffy was made by pouring maple syrup on clean snow and using a wooden stick to roll the syrup. It was pretty good, but one was definitely enough. Also ate churros and had a coffee (tea for hubby). Produce is not that cheap in the market but tasty and fresh.

I have been to Montreal 3 times. Except the first time on a guided tour with my sister, I enjoyed all the restaurants that I had tried. I do think Montreal's restaurants are better. Toronto has more mediocre restaurants like Spring Roll that is popular somehow. Enough said.

I enjoyed staying at Omni very much. The hotel has a heated pool. I swam but it was kind of cold still. We enjoyed soaking at the hot tub at the end of the day. I found that Montrealers eat slowly, and usually have wine at dinner. I am not a wine drinker myself. Also, the sidewalks were icy. Don't they clear them?

Oh... I didn't have steak au poivre this time. Oh well, next time for sure.

All in all a pretty good long weekend. Our goal was to try different food, and we have done that.