The Decline and Fall of Montréal's Caffé Art Java

Caffé Art Java on Mont-Royal in Montréal was, when it first opened, our favorite cafe in the whole world.  Great location; sleek, but inviting, ambiance; decent food; and mind-blowing lattés.  What wasn't to like?  We were steady-going regulars for years.

We were concerned when we learned the founders had sold the place, but we hoped the new owners would leave everything more or less untouched.  And they mostly did.  But things still started to slide.  The new owners started advertising their menu using grainy photos--appropriate for late-night Chinese take-out, but not an upscale cafe.  The kitchen and barista staff turned over almost immediately--to be replaced, we think, by the owners.  And so the food became barely adequate and the coffee, frankly, went to hell.

We eventually stopped being regulars, but we still went every now and then because the ambiance was still great. Tonight was the final visit, though.

One of the owners just forced me to pay for a tisane that I never received.  Several weeks ago, I ordered a tisane that never arrived at my table.  I got so engrossed in my work that I didn't really notice; in fact, I only noticed that it hadn't arrived when it was time for me to pack it up and go.  So I left, slightly miffed that I never got my tisane.  Annoying, but mostly harmless and certainly innocent.  It's the kind of brain fart that can happen to any server.

When I left this evening, however, the owner who was working the register presented me with two bills: one for this evening's tisane, and one for the tisane I never received.  I protested, saying that I had never received the tisane.  The owner insisted that she distinctly and specifically remembered preparing this tisane, which I never received.  This went back and forth several times until I thought it had been made clear that if she made me pay for something I never received, I would never come back.  The owner insisted, so I paid both tickets.

The owner's decision to push the issue over my strong protests (no matter what she does or doesn't remember) says everything that needs saying about the new management at Art Java.  Maybe she thought she was being tough or something, but did she really think I was trying to wriggle out from paying $3?  Does she not realize that she's basically calling me a liar and a thief?  In any case, $3 is apparently more than my good opinion (which, at bottom, equates to all of the business they might ever get from me) is worth to them.

So, do you think people willing to squeeze regular customers for three whole dollars might be willing to cut corners?  Think they really care whether everything is fresh, clean, and of the best quality?  Think they'll believe you if your drink or meal doesn't come out the way you ordered it?  At Art Java, every penny counts--but every customer, not so much.

Serious snow removal

When it comes to winter, probably the only countries that have anything on Canada are Greenland and Russia.  And that's only a maybe.  I'm sure you think your winters are tough, but allow me to show you what snow removal looks like in Montréal (remember that Canada goes much, much further north than Montréal):


That's a tractor equipped with a snowblower the size of a sofa.  A big sofa.

First, they plow the snow.  Then they remove the snow.  Because it won't melt (much) and there's so much of it things would get seriously disrupted after the second or third storm.

They fill hundreds of these trucks.  Hundreds.  Each snowfall.

And did I mention that I have to walk to school uphill both ways? ;)

Avoid Toqué! in Montreal

Executive Summary
While the service and wines at Toqué! in Montreal were excellent and the ambiance inoffensive, the food was for the most part pretentious, awkward, and poorly executed. Definitely not worth the price or the fuss. Your money will be better spent and your appetite better sated elsewhere. More specifically, we suffered from amateurish dish conception, improperly cooked beef, and a pair of unrepented choke-bones. We essentially laid out a few hundred dollars for several glassfuls of good wine, several platefuls of frustration, and the sure knowledge that chef de cuisine Normand Laprise and his staff--notwithstanding their talent, training, and untrammeled access to high-quality ingredients--do not give a damn about your experience, your good opinion, or your second visit.

Overview
(My dining companion and I ordered the tasting menu with wine. I have detailed notes for each course below. The courses are numbered according to the order in which they made their appearance. I have rated each course individually on a scale of one to five; the rating key is at the bottom of this post.)

Although I had heard about Toqué! years ago, I postponed my first encounter with Montreal's most highly reputed eatery for an appropriately special occasion. Opportunity presented itself in the form of a cross-continent visit from my brother, who is a professional cook in the San Francisco Bay areal. To my chagrin, our overpriced and over-hyped meal at Toqué! served as his introduction to Montreal's fine dining scene.

I visited the restaurant's website as a prelude to our dinner, and I found there a promise that chef de cuisine Normand Laprise will deliver "surprise after surprise to your table" during the seven-course tasting menu. While M. Laprise certainly did surprise us, I am sad to report that few of the surprises were pleasant ones. Take, for example, the choke-bones we found in the charcuterie plate (#4). Surprising, certainly; pleasant, not so much. Now, bones are not supposed to leave the kitchen, but it can happen. You generally let the kitchen know about it in the spirit of helping them prevent it from happening again. And the chef (or sous-chef) generally apologizes in a spirit of contrition. We found two bones: I found one in my stewed rabbit, and my brother found one in his pancetta. Our server apologized perfunctorily, but we never heard anything from the kitchen or from management. Nothing. Not even a word. Thus the most unexpected surprise delivered to our table that evening turned out to be a crucial truth about Toqué!: M. Laprise and his staff may have talent, training, and high-quality ingredients, but they could care less about your experience, your good opinion, or your second visit.

Meal Notes
Overall, M. Laprise's food is long on presentation, but short on grace, empathy, and (unforgivably) flavor. Chefs like to say that you eat with your eyes first, but M. Laprise has apparently forgotten that this is merely a figure of speech. Most of the dishes on the tasting menu were self-indulgent spectacles of fastidious preparation that simply didn't taste all that good. There were highlights, but tellingly, the two tastiest dishes in our meal (#0, #2) were the plainest visually.

The quality of the food was wildly inconsistent, and M. Laprise and his team put on a impressive spectacle, making just about every mistake it's possible to make in a professional kitchen at least once during the meal. Two dishes were under-salted (#1, #3), yet one was over-salted (#5), meaning that these problems are not simply a difference of taste. One dish was over-peppered (#1). One dish defied the law of noncontradiction by being simultaneously over- and under-cooked (#5). Several of the dishes were poorly conceived, making them unpleasantly difficult to eat. One dish challenged the eater's dexterity and composure (#1) and two dishes comprised such a bewildering farrago of components that it was impossible to know how the chef meant them to be eaten (#3, #4). And so perhaps the most damning thing that can be said of M. Laprise is that he is not idle.

(#0) Amuse-bouche: sweet corn and celery-rabe mousse. {****} The amuse was served as a soup: several mouthfuls of foamy liquid that had to be spooned out of a large bowl. It was thus much larger than the single bite one expects as an amuse. Also, it wasn't at all acidic, which is usually best for kicking off a meal. These criticisms were rendered largely irrelevant by the single, simple fact that it was wonderfully tasty. Topped with a daub of melted butter, the amuse was essentially several spoonfuls of liquid, salty, delicately creamy-sweet popcorn.

(#1) Tuna-wrapped crostini with lime mayonnaise. {*} The first course was a single crostini wrapped with paper-thin strips of beautifully marbled fatty tuna, which was then dusted with chili powder and pepper. The crostini arrived at the table in a small bowl, leaning its hip against the inside edge. At the bottom of the bowl was a layer of lime-infused mayonnaise topped with some fresh arugula sprouts. This dish was a big disappointment: the chili and pepper overwhelmed the tuna, and the dish tasted under-seasoned despite the presence of what should have been a happy marriage of flavors because there just wasn't enough salt. Using a prosciutto instead of tuna may have been more predictable, but it certainly would have tasted better. This dish was also difficult and a little embarrassing to eat, because it's impossible to snip tuna fat with your teeth. Each bite engendered a tug-of-war between the crositini and my mouth, with the fish strung out between. We were left with the ugly impression that the chef had never simply tried to eat this dish in its finished form.

(#2) Scallop, cheese, and bacon tartelette. {*****} There's a grizzled old culinary rule that one should never combine seafood and cheese. We were delighted to discover that M. Laprise had broken it. This is dish was a thoughtful, playful, and scrumptious reinterpretation an an Alsatian classic. Potatoes replace the crust in this tartelette, which is then filled with in a bacon, cheese, and scallops. The potatoes, astonishingly, add air and lightness. Despite its innocuous appearance, this was a impressively accomplished and satisfying dish. High cuisine at its very best.

(#3) Mackerel and summer vegetables. {*} The slender half-fillet of mackerel arrived on a capacious plate, dressed with an understated sweet soy sauce, and surrounded by a carnival of seasonal fruits and vegetables. We counted not less than 14 (!) distinctly prepared and presented components on the plate, not including two pinches of different chili powders and what we believe was a smear of pesto. Of all the dishes we were served, this was the most infuriating. Everything on the plate was well cooked, but it was impossible to grasp how the chef thought the dish should be eaten. It was as though the chef had made a trip to Jean-Talon Market, purchased a bit of everything, and then asked us to decide how it ought to be eaten. Are the chili powders and the pesto for the fish or the vegetables? Which seasoning with which vegetable? Are the vegetables to be eaten with the fish or with each other? It's unsurprising that anyone should be dazzled by Montreal's local produce (I know I am), but it's flat out amateurish simply to serve a plate of bewildering options to your patrons.

(#4) Charcuterie plate with sausage, stewed rabbit, pancetta, and black trumpet mushrooms. {**} This plate was another visual and gustatory train-wreck, with too many components creating too many options. The stewed rabbit was adequate, the pancetta was... well, it was bacon, and the black trumpets were inexplicable. The small portion of sausage, however, dressed with what we think was a strawberry and balsamic reduction, was divine; those two bites of sausage were two of the most transcendentally perfect mouthfuls I've ever had. (This dish gets one star for each bite of that sausage.) I'd really like the chef to explain why he chose to dilute transcendent perfection. Everything else on the plate just got in the way. Especially the bones; both my brother and I found bones in our meat. I found one in my rabbit, and my brother one in his pancetta. Now, bones are not supposed to leave the kitchen, but it can happen. You generally let the kitchen know about it in the spirit of helping them prevent it from happening again. And the chef (or sous-chef) generally apologizes in a spirit of contrition. We found two of them. Our server apologized perfunctorily, but we never heard anything from the kitchen or from management. Nothing. Not even a simple request for our forbearance. M. Laprise and his staff may have talent, training, and fabulous ingredients, but they evidently do not care about your experience, your good opinion, or your second visit.

(#5) Seared Kobe beef with a baby leek. {*} This was the first dish ever served to me at a fine dining establishment that I actually sent back to the kitchen unfinished. (My brother sent his back as well.) Amazingly, even after the choke-bones from the previous course, sending back a half-eaten cut of Kobe beef provoked no response from the kitchen. Continuing with the tour de force of sauces, the steak and leek were dressed with an excellent veal-stock reduction featuring (we think) blueberries and beets. The baby leek was so forgettable I already can't remember it. The beef was improperly cooked: excessively charred on the outside so that it tasted strongly of charcoal (not just a hint--strongly) and underdone on the inside (I like my steak bloody, but this meat was so raw it was stringy). The steak was also inexcusably over-salted. To add insult to injury, this ultra-rare steak was served without a steak knife, forcing me to hack and saw at it with my butter knife.

(#6) Lightly melted cheese over summer vegetables. {***} A simple, tasty cheese course: sweet yellow tomatoes and summer squash covered with a blanket of slightly melted cheese, dressed with fresh herbs and blueberry vinegar. Unremarkable except for the blueberry vinegar, which was utterly extraordinary. Another instance in which the best item on the plate got lost in the effort to impress the diner with packaging.

(#7) Dessert: Raspberry tart and blackberry sorbet. {**} The simple tart comprised some fresh raspberries, whipped cream, and pancake crisps, all of which were stacked together to form a little tower. The scoop of blackberry sorbet at the other end of the long plate was well made, perfectly shaped, and rather dull. One welcome surprise was the presence of tiny clippings of fresh, fragrant herbs beneath and over the whipped cream, each of which provided a startling little burst of flavor in an otherwise relatively bland dish. While the presentation was pleasantly whimsical, the dessert amounted to little more than fresh berries with a few accompaniments. Not that I don't like fresh berries, but I expect a great chef to use his skills to improve his ingredients--not simply to re-label them.

Rating Key:
{*****} Superlative: inspired, astonishing, and just plain delicious.
{****} Good: creative, fun, and tasty.
{***} Acceptable: competent, but I wouldn't order it again.
{**} Fails to suck: inoffensively forgettable.
{*} Sucks: never should have left the kitchen.

Vive le Quebec!

I love a parade. Ever since my childhood in the days when the local floats and firetrucks would throw candy to the children (before we worried that the candy might be tainted), I have loved watching bands, cheerleaders, and random assemblies of uniformed individuals march past. So you may naturally be surprised that in my four years in Quebec, I have never gone to the parade for St. Jean Baptiste... until today.

But first, a little history... The festival for St. Jean Baptiste is also known as the Fete Nationale du Quebec. Even those of you not fluent in French may be wondering... the National Holiday of Quebec? I thought Quebec was only a province, not a nation? Well, according to our fair Prime Minister Stephen Harper among others, Quebec is a great nation within a united Canada. As far as I'm concerned, if this language makes the separatists feel better, so be it.

Even though I'm not a big flag waver, I am a big fan of this province where I live, so I dressed MGP for the occassion.


Papa looks on as Mitch kicks around wearing his "Fait au Quebec" (made in Quebec) bib.

Then off we went to watch the festivities. We saw large effigies of some of Quebec's best known leaders.

That's a 30-foot effigy of Rene Levesque on the right - and probably the only time he's been seen without a cigarette.

But then Mitch got a bit overheated, so we needed to head into the shade and take in some cool breezes:

"Mama, I'm hot. And I don't just mean good looking..."

And finally, after gazing at such a handsome baby all afternoon, I saw Quebec nationalism looking for a place on the "don't wear this" section of the style page:

Quebec pride meets Cat in the Hat.

Another introduction

When considering starting a family, many couples get a cat or a dog to try out the responsibility of having a dependent. After the past summer of taking care of Fiorella, J and I have begun the journey toward having more responsibility together...


Profile shot


Check out those big, beautiful lips

A couple more photos can be found on our Flickr account, which we'll be updating shortly with some more photos of us.

After getting opinions from many friends, we decided to leave the sex of the baby a surprise. Since J and I have had names picked out since we were dating, we're enjoying the mystery of not knowing whether we're having a boy or a girl. We're also getting a big kick out of signing the little one up on daycare waitlists under the nom de plume, "Bébé Powers." Go ahead and say it with a French accent - I bet that it will make you giggle, too.

Have a guess for the baby's birthdate and sex? We'll find a suitable prize for the person who leaves a comment with the correct guess for gender and the closest guess for birth date and time. (Bébé Powers is scheduled to arrive on 28 February.)

Introducing Fiorella

Goodness, are there people that still read this blog? Thank you for not giving up on us.

While J has been gallivanting around Europe, I've been tooling around Montreal more fashionably than ever.

Introducing Fiorella.

Fiorella is a dragon red Vespa LX 50. She gets up to about 55 kmph going downhill, a gazillion kilometers to the liter, and lots of looks and stares as we drive through Montreal. I bought her from a delightful woman in Toronto who had won her in a contest and wasn't interested in keeping her. After the big adventure of getting her back to Montreal with me, it was time to name her. She needed have an Italian name, and Fiorella (which means little flower) won.

And, if Fio isn't cute enough for you, J and I even got matching helmets...

Don't make me hit the horn. You won't like the sound of my horn.

We have two helmets, so that you can take a spin with us when you come to visit. Just make sure to work on your obligatory shoulder shimmies in advance...

Play it. You know you want to.

Maple syrup nation

Being somewhat more travel-prone than your average bloggers, we TruffleWarreners absolutely love maps.

Old maps of Montréal.


Taoist maps of the human body.


Silly maps of the internet.

Give us an adjective, we've got a map to match. Try us. We dare you. And if you think we aren't ready for you, just chew on this: we've even got a maple syrup map. Well, actually it's a food traditions map, but, well... just look for yourself:

The maple syrup nation self-evidently has a manifest destiny to engulf the continent.

In all honesty, I had never really thought of maple syrup as the basis of a food culture. H assures me that it is--but then, H argues with some earnest that maple syrup qualifies as its own food group. Moi, je suis sceptique. After all, the same authority from which we're deriving the very concept of the maple syrup nation also indicates the existence of a clambake nation and a pinyon nut nation. So count me skeptical... but tickled.

The city's hall speaks

Contemporary North American city dwellers, though we have more than enough to feed our stomachs, have precious little upon which to feast our eyes. Generally accustomed to the banal concrete, glass, and steel designs which constitute the unintended legacy the Bauhaus's so-called "International Style," we have limited experience with cityscapes which evoke simple delight and honest pleasure.

Which is reason number 24 gazillion why we're lucky to live in Montréal. Certainly the city has its share of BSSs; it also its share of the good stuff. Imagine, if you will, that this is your City Hall.

Now, if that doesn't say "Cradle of Liberty," I don't know what does.

Whoops! Sorry! That's Boston's City Hall. Not exactly what I was intending, but while the photo's up there, I might as well make use of it. Officially, Boston's City Hall is in the brutalist style (yes, there really is an architectural style called brutalism--technically derived from the French for concrete: béton brute). Personally, however, I've always thought that a more accurate description of the building's style would be man-the-battlements-the-citizens-are-approaching!--but maybe that's a bit bombastic. Whatever we call it, doesn't it just make your inner architect swoon? (On the other hand, maybe your inner architect is just suffering from another bout of who-the-hell-authorizes-this-stuff. Your mileage may vary.)

But back to Montréal. As I was saying: Imagine, if you will, that this is your City Hall.

I'll concede that it resembles Vincent Price if you'll concede that there are worse architectural muses.

Not that it's perfect, but it would be hard to argue that Montréal's Hôtel de Ville isn't impressive, dramatic, and even beautiful in its overwrought way. Basically, then, H and I moved from a city where the municipal government hunkers in a brutalist fortress with Soviet overtones to a city where the municipal government cavorts in a Second Empire wedding cake with drama-queen lighting. It's not like this is the only domain in which Montréal surpasses Boston, but it's definitely one of the most spectacular.

Hours of superpowers

H and I believe--good optimists that we are--that every person possesses at least one superpower. Our friends JD and JB, for example, are able to throw epic parties at will. Our friend CE bakes the world's best bread--without a recipe. Even I have a superpower: I can seduce women more superpowerful than myself at will. I can even get them to marry me.

Of all H's superpowers--and I assure you that she has many--my favorite is unusual in that it seems to require study. Not that H isn't innately talented, but I caught her reading up on how to enhance her already impressive abilities during our weekly trip to the library.

It won't be long before companies start paying her to use their products.

Watch out Hetty Green!

Cultures, colors, and cross-coordination

The Basilique Notre-Dame is not only one of Montréal's architectural jewels, it's a venerable bastion of Québecois Catholicism.

Talk about an unexpected place for a blue-light special...

It therefore came as little surprise to see that its keepers have chosen the official colors of Québec for the church's lighting scheme. "What are the official colors of Québec?" you ask.

A pleasant, if somewhat unoriginal, color combination.

So, when actually stop and reflect upon it for a moment, the whole blue light thing makes sense. But to be completely honest, "Vive le Québec!" wasn't exactly the first thing that popped into our minds when we we first set eyes upon the Basilique's lighting scheme. I mean, think about it for a second. Blue and white holiday lights adorning a religious building in the winter time...

Yep. That's right.

Yes, you too can be the life of every Hanukkah party you attend with your very own menorah hat (only $24.95 plus S&H).

I guess you could say our first thought was something like, "Happy Hanukkah, Montréal!" Not what the decorators intended, I suppose, but still a seasonal sentiment. Nothing like cultural cross-pollination for a good chuckle.

Bonne Nouvelle Année !

Happy New Year, one and all! Our warmest wishes to all of you, our dear readers. May 2008 see you happy, healthy, and hearty. Indeed, may this year be the one in which your wildest dreams come true... except maybe for that one where you showed up at school naked.

Wow. Impressively wild. So... where do you carry your trig homework in that getup?

H and I are enjoying a quiet evening together, watching a few good films and reminiscing a little. Despite all the adventure, we're not all that sorry to see 2007 recede into the past. We look forward with great hope and intense anticipation to 2008. May it be our--and your--most adventuresome year yet!

Give it an inch...

H and I were delighted when snow finally arrived here in Montréal. Since we don't own a car, we were entirely unintimidated to learn that we were living through a record-breaking snowstorm. Heck, we even giggled with giddiness, watching it all come down. It's hard to faze Canadians with snow--even 40+ centimeters of it.

Even the potted plants in Montréal just shrugged and got on with it.

At the end, though, we had so much snow that the politicians started talking about how much it would cost to remove all of it. Care to guess how much? Nope. More. Nope. Even more. Try...

"I will keep your city snowbound unless you give me...

...$20 million Canadian dollars."

Yup. And that was just the first of the December storms. It's since snowed again. And we've heard tell that it will snow at least once more before 2007 ends. We also hear, however, that things may warm up, so we're probably looking at peak snow accumulation here--and let me tell you, if Tom Thumb were a ski-freak, he'd be in heaven in our jardin.

In Canada, it sometimes snows so damn hard you lose your chair.

Having paid my share of the $20 million it took to clear the streets, I'm just wondering how much the city's economy loses per snow day. Is it really worth it to remove all that snow absolutely ASAP?

Google to the rescue. Montréal apparently manages to produce a paltry CAD $96 billion or so of rough economic value per year (that's the 2006 figure). Since there are approximately 250 business days in a calendar year, we can estimate that each of those days is worth about CAD $384 million of rough-and-ready productivity. Now, some of that value doesn't depend on the weather (web-based, residential utilities, etc.), but plenty does. So, I suppose it is worth it.

Even though I checked my math thrice (and H checked it after that), I could hardly believe that Montréal produces CAD $384 million per day. It just seemed like too much. But... Canada's 2006 GDP clocked in at CAD $1.4 trillion. Their 2001 census claims 14,695,130 workers (excluding unemployed) in the country. That divides out to an average annual productivity of CAD $95,270 per worker. (The equivalent figure in the US is USD $91,389.) Bottom line: if you're working and making less than $90k a year (in whatever currency), you're not even making the average. So, I suppose Montréal's numbers make sense after all, given the relative (in)justice of our current economic system. Perfect sense.

Welcome, snow!

H and I are enjoying the snowstorm today. Neither of us particularly minds the cold, but long winters aren't much fun without snow. They're predicting 35cm for this storm. Yay!

In Canada, it sometimes snows so damn hard that even the snow has to sit down to take a breather.

If the snow looks perhaps a bit too comfortable in that photo, don't worry. We couldn't be snugger--not even if we were bugs in a rug.

Dining in the dark

It's long after my birthday--nearly a month in fact--but we finally made it out to my birthday dinner. This year, instead of going with predictably scrumptious (say, L'Express, or Au Pied de Cochon, or Toqué), I decided to go with damn, that's novel. O.Noir ("It's better in the dark!") offers diners the novel experience of dining in utter darkness.

The b-day dinner crew gets ready to raise a ruckus.

When you enter the restaurant, you find yourself in a small foyer, where you read the menu, place your order, and wait for your waiter to guide your party to your table. The menu always features a "surprise" dish for each course. Your waiter--the entire service staff is blind--leads you to your table, and then... it gets interesting.

I wrote a review of the experience for my friend EP, which I think pretty well captures the experience of the evening:

O.Noir was at once a thrilling and a disappointing experience. Our party included me, two MBAs (my wife being one of them), two architects, and a psychologist. We talked a great deal about the design of the space, the design of the experience, and the experience's business proposition.

The bottom line (at least for this particular dine-in-the-dark restaurant--there are others): the food was completely unremarkable in both taste and texture. We had hoped for intense odors, unexpected shapes and textures, and so forth. The design of the space was disappointing in that it didn't seem to harbor any serious ambitions to capitalize on the fact that we couldn't see. Why not playful changes in flooring and wall textures. And the design of the objects we used (plates, glasses, forks, chairs, etc.) was also dull, dull, dull. The flatware could have been shaped differently; the glasses heavier in the base to prevent spills; the chairs at different heights; etc. etc. It was also very, very loud. High ceilings, hard surfaces, and no sound mitigation strategies.

BUT... the possibilities were extremely exciting. Our culture is so focused on vision that we often forget the importance of our other senses. During dinner, we talked about how thoughtful, creative design could have provided a magnificently rich experience. Someone--I can't remember who--suggested "eating gloves," which would be a fantastic design challenge.

As it was, cutting food was ridiculously difficult, so most of us ended up eating with our hands. We speculated that applying the east Asian principle of knifeless eating (all cutting done in the kitchen) might have been appropriate. We talked about adopting a culinary approach more sensitive to senses other than sight: using more aromatic seasonings (e.g., lavender, cumin, and mint), ingredients and dishes which have a auditory component (fizzy water, breads that need tearing, crunchy appetizers, etc.), and texturally engaging finger foods. Out impression was that management wasn't fully engaging the possibilities--for the interior designers and the chef, it was basically just a gimmick.

In all, we essentially paid $55 a head to eat mediocre food during a power outage. A novel experience which provides great grist for a stimulating conversation about innovation and design, but not somewhere I'd spend money a second time.

Hope your birthday dinner causes as much thinking as mine did!

She made it!

Ladies and gentlemen, by the power invested in McGill University by the province of Québec, I now announce that HLMP is officially a Master of Business Administration!

Hide your business plans! Lock away your financial statements!

H loves few things as much as a good ceremony, especially when there's a bagpiper involved. (She is Scottish, after all.)

Yep. There he is. Second from the right in the first row. Can't miss the kilt.

And of course, it's always more fun to do these sorts of things as a group. There really is nothing like a crowd for generating a little energy and excitement. Especially afterwards, when you get to speculate as to where your new wings might take you.

H and friend ML prepare for takeoff.

Congrats, H. You really did earn your wings. We can't wait to see you soar.

The wonder of Stevie

You may not have known, but H's favorite musical artist is Joni Mitchell. Well, to be perfectly accurate, it's Joni Mitchell except for when it's Stevie Wonder. And Stevie Wonder it is tonight, for H has secured orchestra-level seating for the Stevie Wonder concert tonight.

Tix to the hottest show en ville, and I got them at 75% of list price. You may kiss me now.

Rest assured: the concert will rock. And we will be there to rock with it.

UPDATE (26 Oct. 2007): Stevie rocked, we rocked. Assurance rested.

Lookah at the Hookah!

To celebrate the occasion of my acceptance of an excellent job offer, J and I were accompanied by our friends JPhB and AP to a local shisha bar, Cafe Gitano. I admit that I had been eying the lovely pipes in the window since we moved to Montreal, but had never ventured in. The time had come for some deliciously flavoured tobacco shared amongst friends.

JPhB and AP savour every last trickle of Double Apple smoke.

Apparently, the up-tick in hookah bars is not just a local phenomenon, and is being reported by one of the U.S.'s trashiest broadsheets. The hookah (Hindi), also known as a shisha (Arabic), is a water pipe device for smoking, and originated in India but has gained a great deal of popularity in the Arab world. Unsurprising then that there are a number of shisha bars in Montreal, since roughly 2% of Montreal's population is Arabic. According to a very friendly taxi driver of ours, Arabic is the third most spoken language in Montreal (after French and English, of course).

But let's get back to our celebration. I have been a rather vehement non-smoker since, at the age of five, I convinced my mother to stop smoking. However, I have turned a blind-eye to the fact that smoking shisha is indeed smoking. It's tasty, and it's fun...

J on sensory overload from the delicious apple-y magic.


I can stop whenever I want. Really. I can.

Better living through tomatoes

If you've been paying any attention to what you've been eating during the past few decades, you've probably noticed what we have: the US's relationship with what and how it eats is unhealthy--and it's getting worse. Stressed by foolish management practices, soil quality in the US has been declining, meaning that the nutritional punch of crops grown in the US has been declining apace. Perhaps as part of a confused attempt to compensate for this decline, agribussinesses have laced the US food supply with a broad spectrum of literally thousands of additives, pesticides, and other toxins. Also, most of what you eat likely contains ingredients which have been genetically modified in a lab. It's become harder and harder to find good food Stateside.

Despite the fact that American food isn't much good, we eat too damned much of it.

When you say, "Super size me!" to a MacDonald's employee, you just might get what you ask for.

And on top of all that somatic nastiness, the collective psychic relationship with food in the US ain't none too good neither. All in all, it's not easy to eat well in the US if you can't afford The French Laundry (often called the best restaurant in the US; currently priced at USD $240 per head per meal).

But here in Montréal, it's different. How different? Very different. With 1.9 million inhabitants and some 12,000 eateries, Montréal can boast the extraordinary per capita restaurant density of 1 eating establishment for every 158 residents. If that seems really dense, it is. Chicago offers a restaurant for every 359 residents; and Paris, surprisingly (since they can claim credit for inventing restaurants in first place) provides only one restaurant for every 742 residents. At the other end of the spectrum, Tokyo offers its 12.8 million residents an almost unbelievable 190,000 restaurants--which yields a mind-boggling per capita density of 67. Few cities of comparable size offer a better per capita restaurant density than Montréal--certainly none in North America do.

But the restaurants are really only an indicator of the culture's interest in and concern for excellent food. The gems in Montréal's culinary crown are its fabulous open air markets, from which the restaurants receive their ingredients. Can't make good food without good ingredients. The market closest to H and me (there are officially four such markets in the city) is the marché Jean-Talon, located near the Jean-Talon metro station.

Nothing pictured here traveled more than 100km to reach you, except maybe the furniture.

J-T (as H and I have nicknamed it) is open year-round, but its late summer offerings are second to none. I'd put its produce up against anything else I've ever seen. Not Paris's--nay, not even Strasbourg's markets can top it. To help you picture it all, I've prepared a little photo tour, a brief exercise pamphlet for your salivary glands, if you will. And remember that the city's master chefs have yet to get their hands onto this stuff. As astonishing as it seems, everything you see here will actually taste even better once they're done with it.

If you can't think of what you could possibly do with all those berries, you're one more victim of supermarkets and agribusiness.


Ever wonder what it might feel like to palpate a rainbow?


You might even learn a little fractal math--if you don't eat it first.


J-T's coup de grace: tomatoes. Lots and lots of tomatoes.


Yes, even the tomatoes come in a rainbow of flavors.


Half-sunny? Half-shady? Who cares, 'cuz it's all tasty.

Only in Québec

For all its old-world charm, Montréal often feels a lot like North America. Wide, straight boulevards. Rectilinear street grid. Ridiculous steel and glass skyscrapers clustered in a downtown core. But sometimes the fact that you're living in Québec is suddenly thrust upon you in the form of some inimitable sign. No, not that kind of sign. This kind.

"Don't you touch 'Bill 101.'"

You're wondering, perhaps, what Bill 101 is. And perhaps also you want a little background, which would help explain why all of these people seem so motivated to protect it. That's what those links are for. And if you're still confused, try imagining the USA--just as a thought experiment--attempting to manage an analogous situation (this last article is extremely helpful for Americans).

As a general rule, H and I don't worry too much about the French language thing. We assume that both French and English are necessary, and the more completely we master both, the better life will be for us here. But living in two languages isn't always easy. When people ask us about language difficulties vis-a-vis McGill, for example, we have to explain that the whole situation is rather a long way from cut and dry. You see, McGill is an English-speaking university in a bilingual city in a French-speaking province in an English-speaking country.

Let me assure you that there is no English Now movement in Montreal.

There are those who, evidently, believe that the whole situation should simply be rationalized. If everyone would just learn English, for example, things would sure be easier for your average American tourist. Then again, if all those Anglophones would just speak French the way God intended, this whole mess would just blow over.

Ever get the feeling that some of your neighbors have a HUGE chip on their shoulders?

There's more behind the history of Bill 101 than meets the eye. It's never been simply a language thing. There are interrelated histories of cultural dominance and exploitation, economic power, wealth, and political power. Still, H and I believe that bilingualism represents the sanest and surest way forward. As any young montréalais will tell you, and as we're verified through our own experience, two languages are most certainly better than one.

Le mort par chocolat

Many of our readers are probably familiar with Lasse Hallström's 2000 film, Chocolat, in which Juliette Binoche uses chocolate and sass to open hearts in a small French town. Not a bad chick flick.

We in Montréal, however, have no need of Ms. Binoche, because we have our own Juliette, who makes the most amazing chocolate [en français] you will ever drink. Ever. The dark hot chocolate fait à l'ancien ("made in the old way") ought to be renamed "sin in a cup" for how deliciously naughty you feel as you let the amazing stuff carry you to cocoa-magic Shangi-La. If the servers teased you by wafting a cup of Juliette's liquid ambrosia under your nose, then told you flat out that even a sip was death to any mortal, you'd order a double and chug it, just to make sure you get to taste the last drop before the gods exacted their revenge.

J plays it cool while facing triple chocolate overload, while H risks brain freeze on top of the injured vanity of the chocolate gods.

Next time you make it up to Montréal, you have only to ask and we can deliver at least the perceived risk of death by chocolate.