Lesley, this has also been my experience when dining in Montreal. I'm impressed with the level of care paid to the food at all levels of the food industry in Montreal, and to an extent, Quebec in general. Ottawa has "good" restaurants but few that I would call consistently great. Lucky for us, we share a border with Gatineau so there are worthwhile restaurants if one does a little searching. That being said, we are not a barren wasteland and my current favourite Ottawa restaurant is The Black Cat in the Byward Market, just down a little ways from Domus.