carswell

ID, I don't often shop at Atwater Market, so this was my first encounter with S.O.S. Didn't notice the sauerkraut but wish I had; I'm out of homemade and refuse to buy the canned stuff. While I didn't ask about confit at the bio butcher's, they didn't have any on display. Will do so next time if you or somebody else doesn't beat me to it. The other three purveyors are: Terrines & Pâtés (see below), A. Bélanger et fils and the abovementioned Boucherie Viau, who were selling duck confit from Élèvages Périgord. The Queue de Cochon was already on my Plateau list along with several stores on Mont-Royal and Laurier. Surprisingly, Pied de Cochon's confit had escaped my notice; they don't list it on their take-out menu but I'll ask next time I'm in the 'hood. Thanks. Lesley, thanks for the tip. Hadn't noticed there was a butcher there. Will check it out provided I don't O.D. first.

Thanks for the wet rag. Maybe instead of ace you should have chosen the nickname partypooper? You're right that making confit is a simple matter. All it takes is meat, fat, seasonings, time and cool storage. But, as I can attest from recent experience, it's not easy to source affordable duck legs on less than two weeks' notice. And then there's the copious quantities of fat required; either you render it yourself (which means buying more than just duck legs) or you buy it. Maybe you can point us to a cheaper source, but where I shop duck fat runs $3.50 a small tub. Then there's the time factor. Larousse Gasto suggests rubbing the legs with salt and leaving them for 26 hours, then cooking them for two hours in fat, then transferring them to a crock, covering them completely in fat and "to obtain an authentic confit, store in a cellar for 5-6 months." (Yes, I'm sure that none of the local purveyors age it that long, except maybe Anjou-Québec, whose duck confit comes packed in a jar.) Also, where am I supposed to store the stuff while it ripens? I live in an apartement with a galley kitchen and no cool spots. So, simple it may be but not very practical, especially when you've suddenly got the jones. Also, believe it or not, a lot of people just won't go to the trouble; should they be deprived as a result? What about visitors from out of town (there are lots who read this board) who live in places where decent duck is non-existant and what duck there is comes whole; are you for forcing them to buy three frozen birds to harvest six legs? And anyway, what's objectionable about surveying the purveyors of any product? Are you going to bop over to the NY forum to lecture the Burger Club members on the pointlessness of their endeavour since they can make a perfect burger at home? I also take issue with your contention that making confit at home automatically entitles one to say it's the best. While I've never made duck confit, I have preserved half quails and guinea hen legs. Based on that experience, I'd guess that any duck confit coming out of my kitchen would pale beside André Philippot's. That's the Holy Grail as far as I'm concerned. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll continue on my quest for it.

You mean Les Volailles et Gibiers Fernando on Roy and Coloniale. And the answer is nope. It is on my short list, though. Along with several other Plateau establishments. And the Boucher du Marché (Jean-Talon). And Anjou-Québec. And the Maître-Boucher on Monkland. Hope I don't O.D. Am renewing my gym membership tomorrow...

jpps1, do you mind a counterpoint? I've done the wine flight thing at Anise only once but found it quite satisfactory. And since our party was pretty evenly split between those who took the nine-course surf and those who took the nine-course turf, I got to taste all the matches on offer that evening. None of them was less than good and a couple were truly inspired. The waiters were generous with their pours, too. Sorry to hear your oenological experience was less than satisfying. Maybe it's the luck of the draw? By the way, we skipped the hard stuff and started with a house cocktail, a sparkling Montlouis (think Vouvray) haunted with a few drops of the chef's homemade violet syrup. Light, refreshing, aromatic. Just lovely. We spent at least as long there, too. Time seemed suspended, a sure sign of a great dining experience. Thanks for the detailed report.

Saturday saw me raiding the Atwater Market for duck confit. I came home with legs from five purveyors, all located on the second floor. Here's a report on two. I was rooting for the leg from ominously named S.O.S. Boucher because it was the only one not cryovaced. What's more, it looked the genuine article. Twenty minutes in a 400ºF oven turned its skin an appealing golden brown with crispy edges, and it smelled fantastic. Plated alongside a mound of lentils, it was picture perfect. Which all goes to show that you can't judge a book by its cover. While the duck taste was there, it lacked a foil, had nothing that raised it to a higher plane. Did they use any salt or herbs in making this? I certainly found a shake or two of sea salt improved matters, a first in my many years of preserved duck consumption. The texture was more chewy than melting. The word scrumptious did not spring to mind. The leg from Boucherie Les 2 Frères was nicely packaged in its cryovac shell, covered by a small mound of duck fat decorated with a thyme sprig and pink peppercorns. Since this is a comparative tasting, I prepared it as usual: c. 20 minutes in a hot oven. It, too, emerged nicely golden, though the skin was soggy. This was one meaty duck leg, about half again as big as the others. Advantages: it tasted of duck. Disadvantages: it didn't taste of duck confit; it, too, was undersalted; the meat was stringy; and a thick layer of fat lay under all the skin, so I ate next to none of what can be the best part of the dish. The lentils were cooked with garlic, pancetta lardons, carrot chunks and thyme and garnished with cracked black pepper and fresh winter savory. This time they were lentilles vertes de Berry, another Vivien Paille product that took a bit less long to cook and were, perhaps, less earthy than last week's lentilles vertes de Puy (if so, the terroir moniker is not out of place, as Puy and Berry are about 30 km apart). Our wine was a 2000 Cahors, the Cuvée particulière from Château Lamartine, which retails for just under C$23. Young, it needed an hour or so in the carafe to tame the tannins. Lots of plum on the nose with notes of crème brûlée. Round and fruity on the palate with a distinct layer of vanilla oak, a tannic rasp and not much in the way of complexity. Unremarkable finish. Agreeable enough for a modern-style Cahors; for my part, I'll stick with the more traditional Triguedina (a few bottles of the lovely 1997 are still to be had at the SAQ). S.O.S. Boucher, 138 Atwater (Atwater Market), Stall 17, 514 933-0297 Boucherie Les 2 Frères, 138 Atwater, Stall 9, 514 931-7125

Isn't "bone-in filet mignon" an oxymoron? Miriam-Webster defines filet (in the meat processing sense) as: While never using the phrase "bone-in", Larousse Gastro is somewhat more circumspect in its Fillet entry, referring to veal fillet chops (côtes-filets), lamb fillet cutlets ("without knuckle") and mutton chops. It also specifies that "pork filet mignon is cut from the boned fillet." Yet none of the recipes for beef fillet specify that it is to be boned but clearly assume that it is. And the diagram for French cuts of beef shows the filet as boneless. On the other hand, the diagram for French cuts of lamb shows the filet as being a rack of lamb, i.e. bone-in. In which case, I assume the boneless fillet would be referred to as the longe or loin, right? Now I'm really confused...

Made it to Boucherie France-Canada (BFC) on Saturday. The store was a bit less fancy than I expected, certainly not as upscale as, say, the Lescurier Tradition Gourmande a couple of blocks to the west. The first thing I noticed on entering was the smell: a clean but pungent mix of game, red meat and other aromas. Not unpleasant but a bit disconcerting compared with the antiseptic odourlessness of most other butchers I frequent. A big refrigerator case well stocked with sausages and meat, including fresh turkey, runs along the left side of the store; some shelving and, a bit incongruously, a small table with two chairs, are to the right; and a small refrigerator case is at the back. That's where the duck legs, along with related delicacies like gésiers confits, were to be found. Service was solicitous and friendly if a bit formal in that French kind of way. I bought three legs and a box of lentilles vertes du Puy because it was a brand — Vivien Paille — I'd never seen before and because I'm a sucker for blurbs like Les sélections du terroir and Cultivé sans engrais and for AOC labels prominently displayed on packages. I didn't notice the price until I got to the cash: at $6.59 for 500 g, they're the priciest lentils I've ever bought. As usual, we put the legs in a baking dish and heated them in a 400°F oven for c. 20 minutes. They smelled delicious. We plated them with sides of warm lentil salad, poured the Madiran and dug in. First impressions were mixed. The skin hadn't crisped up the way André Philippot's used to. A bit of fat squirted out when I first cut into the meat, which surprised me, since that never happened with André's (and he sold his duck legs encased in a substantial block of duck fat, which you could save and use for sautéing vegetables and seafood, while BFC's legs were devoid of salvagable fat). In the piehole, the flesh was saltier and fattier than expected and, while savoury, didn't taste strongly of duck. While pleasant, the flavour was a bit odd in that it reminded us of something else. With only a duck leg apiece, we didn't have the opportunity for extended analysis. Toward the end Leslie began to nail it: while the confit was in no way fishy, it reminded her of fish, maybe high-quality olive oil-packed tuna? I countered with grilled reconstituted salt cod. She thought I might be right but, alas, the duck was gone by then. That particular flavour was not nearly as pronounced in the third leg, which I ate by myself on Sunday. In short, BFC's duck confit is good. I'd guess the preparation involves the liberal application of herbs and salt, both of which give the meat a certain savour. But, in the end, it doesn't achieve the sublime scrumptiousness of André's legendary duck confit. And while I expect I'll visit BFC again, I'm also going to continue my search. By the way, the lentils took forever to cook, about 45 minutes to achieve al dentetude (the box said 15-20). They held their shape beautifully, however, and tasted great. Boucherie France-Canada, 1142 Van-Horne, Montreal (corner de l'Épée, a few blocks east of the Outremont metro station), 514 277-7788

Haven't tried their confit, Andrew, but thanks for the reminder. I, too, had noticed that blurb in Quartiers Gourmands back in November when I was trying to source a bunch of raw duck legs for a pot au feu. I made a mental note to check the store out but, what with work, travel, family and the holidays, it had slipped my mind. I just called and asked if they had duck confit on hand and they replied "bien sûr," so I'll probably brave the cold and drop by this afternoon. Report to follow.

It's probably the combination of the frigid weather, the bag of new-crop lentilles de Puy in my cupboard and the bottle of Madiran (Château d'Aydie '95, which should be hitting its stride about now) in my drink-soon queue, but I've suddenly developed a major hankering for one of my favourite winter combo, duck confit with warm lentil salad. The problem is the duck. Back in the good old days, Boucherie de Paris, the little butcher's shop on Gatineau across from the former HEC building, sold the best confit de carnard I've ever tasted anywhere. After a quarter hour in a hot oven, it would emerge all golden and crispy-skinned and falling-off-the-bone tender. The meat had a texture somewhere between unctuous and silky and a mild yet deep, dark flavour with salt and fat in perfect balance. Had he done nothing else, then-butcher André Philippot would have earned my eternal gratitude for this triumph of gastronomy. (In fact, he did much more. I first learned of the shop when Bee McGuire proclaimed it the winner of the Gazoo's toulouseathon, its search for the Montreal's best toulouse sausage. André's terrines were also works of art.) Alas, the Philippots sold their shop a decade or so ago and retired who knows where. And while the new owner does some things as good or better, confit isn't one of them. (Neither are the toulouses; I suspect the main problem is his decision to cut back on salt and fat in deference to les goûts modernes, as he once put it.) It's not that his confit is bad, it's that it's not great. So, finally getting around to my question, who in your opinion now makes the best duck confit in the city? Although I'm mainly interested in retail outlets, please feel free to mention any restos that do a bang-up job. Thanks!

In Windows, the easiest way is to change your keyboard setting to Canadian Bilingual. The downside is that not all keys then correspond to their labels (e.g. the slash/question mark key becomes é/É). You can also give the on-screen keybaord a shot; its usefulness will depend on your keyboard setting. In XP, display it by selecting Start > Accessories > Accessibility > On-Screen Keyboard. An image of the keyboard pops up, showing the location of the various characters, which change as you press the Shift, Alt and Ctrl keys on your physical keyboard. A workaround is to hold down the ALT key to the left of the spacebar while you type a character code on the number pad: 128 - Ç 130 - é 131 - â 133 - à 135 - ç 136 - ê 137 - ë 138 - è 139 - ï 140 - î 144 - É 147 - ô 150 - û 0128 - € (euro symbol) Have yet to find the codes for several accented capitals (À, Â, È, Ê, Î, Ö, etc.) or the oe/OE ligatures. On Macs, you used to be able to use the keycaps map, which is similar to Windows' on-screen keyboard. Don't know how it works under the new OS, however.

Aw, shucks. And here I was marshalling my arguments... One thing I've discovered in the last few minutes, though, is that it's surprisingly hard to find a map that shows the "city" limits of NDG. There's nothing especially useful on the Web. As I occasionally work for the city government, I have municipal directories of activiites and services going back to 1996, but even the premerger maps deliniate only the NDG-CDN "area" (shades of things to come). And I've not found a description of the boundries of either the former municipality of NDG or the parish. Most of the northern and eastern borders are clear, as they are defined by the surrounding former municipalities (now boroughs) of Côte-Saint-Luc and Hampstead to the north and Westmount to the east. The northeast corner, the Décarie corridor, is the problem. Psychologically speaking, NDG stops at Côte-Saint-Luc Road for most Montrealers I know. One block north of CSL Road is Snowdon Street and just north of the corner of Snowdon and Décarie is the Snowdon post office. My detailed premerger map of Montreal and environs has the neighbourhood descriptor "Snowdon" printed just to the northeast of that (in smaller type than that used for the NDG and CDN descriptors, though; I don't believe Snowdon was ever a muncipality in its own right, unlike NDG and CDN). Yet the NDG municipal electoral district goes up the east side of Décarie all the way to Queen Mary (click here then click on the district map). Municipal and historical society offices are closed for the holidays, so I probably won't be able to pursue this further until the new year. Maybe someone following our exchange will know and volunteer the information. -carswell PS I'd be willing to bet that, while you won't find spittle at Schwartz's on your smoked meat marathon, you may find spam at Déli cieux...

While I'm unsure as to exactly where the northern limit of NDG lies (my guess is Côte-Saint-Luc Road), the east side of Décarie between Queen Mary and Isabella is most assuredly several blocks north of it. And while you might take refuge in a technicality (since the recent municipal mergers, the area has been part of the unweildy Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce borough), Montrealers continue to refer to the SD's neighbourhood as Snowdon.

So, we've more or less determined that great burgers and pizza are, if not nonexistent in Montreal, then rarer than hen's teeth. And my lard query was a bust. It's always struck me that, for a place with a mostly deserved reputation as a foodie destination, there are some surprising gaps in this city's gastronomic credentials. Here are some of the things on my wishlist. What about yours? ∙ Three-star (in the Guide Michelin sense) or maybe even two-star restaurants ∙ First-rate Chinese, Thai, Indian or Mexican restaurants ∙ Asian restaurants with truly excellent wine lists (like Slanted Door's in San Francisco) ∙ Crème fraîche (Yes, Hamel does sell some fine artisanal CF but why should we have to schlepp all the way there? In France — and even some cities in the States, doggammit — you can buy CF at grocery stores. Why not here, where French cooking is ubiquitous and dairy coops are said to be desperately seeking ways to increase sales of high-fat milk products?) ∙ Real cream (not the tasteless, ultra-pasturized, cellulose-and-other-additive-ridden crap that's the only "cream" found on grocery store shelves these days) ∙ Good-as-homemade tortillas ∙ Decent tamales ∙ Lobster mushrooms ∙ Meyer lemons ∙ Key limes ∙ Affordable pigeons ∙ German and Austrian wines ∙ Street food ∙ Also, French olives (e.g. Picholine, Nyons) are surprisingly rare, especially in bulk (Until a couple of weeks ago, I would have added a credible wine bar, but apparently BU has stepped in to fill that gap.) And if you know where any of the above can be found, please pipe up!

I've had one exceptional meal at L'Orchidée, a lunch arranged by a friend of the owner and designed to complement a flight of high-end French wines, which it did beautifully. And that's precisely what's wrong: however refined, the food is unauthentic, the twist being that it's not so much Canadianized as Frenchified (the then and possibly current head chef trained at Maxim's, so I was told). This is apparent in the kitchen's use of French techniques (the sauces especially have a Gaullic slant), the toning down of strong flavours and avoidance of unusual ingredients and the lack of coherence in the menu (a jumble of Mongolian, Cantonese, Szechuan, Peking and other dishes). The result is food stripped to within an inch of its ethnic identity. Throw in a posh decor and downtown address and you have an experience that appeals to Caucasian suits and boutique shoppers, most of whom know little about Chinese cuisine. Every other meal I've had there has been passable (more than I can say for Le Piment Rouge) but forgettable, a shadow of the Real Thing available from restaurants that charge half as much (or less!) and even from my own kitchen. That's why most Chinese in my acquaintance, and apparently yours, avoid the place. Probably it's best viewed as a Hong Kongish take on French-Chinese fusion; on those terms, it's not bad tho' still overpriced.

Google and Canada411 turn up nary a mention of Bu, the wine bar. (Lot's of hits for Boston University, however...) So, where is it, please? And what makes it so cool?

According to the staff, they're farm-raised but fed real food (I assume that means a diet similar to what they'd eat in nautre, i.e. squid, shrimp, eels, small fish, shellfish, marine worms, etc.), not fish chow, given no antibiotics and held in pens in something approximating their natural habitat. Whatever. It's mighty good, if not quite at the level of the wildly expensive wild striped bass they sometimes sell.

IMHO = in my humble opinion FWIW = for what it's worth AFAIK = as far as I know FYI = for your information TYVM = thank you very much YMMV = your milage may vary LOL = laughing out loud ROTFL = rolling on the floor laughing ROTFLMAO = ROTFL my ass off IANAL = I am not a lawyer etc. = etcetera...

Nouveau Falero on the west side of Park just south of Bernard. On the whole, the city's best fishmonger. And, believe it or not, Boucherie Atlantique on the southwest corner of Queen Mary and Côte-des-Neiges (a few doors north of Duc de Lorraine) has a small fish counter that sometimes sells excellent red tuna. Usually comes in on Thursday or Friday and it's not there every week, so best to give a call before making the trek (514 731-4764).

Not worth going out of your way for. IMHO, of course.

Thanks so much for the lesson... For the record, all the coffee I've drunk there has been from a stoneware mug or porcelain cup or bowl. Or are you referring to take-out? (In which case, what do you suggest they serve the coffee in?)

Gus is right. Ruby Rouge took over Maison Kam Fung's premises on Clark south of La Gauchetière when MKF decamped for St-Urbain and René-Lévesque. Tong Por is on the northwest corner of La Gauchetière and St-Dominique, one block west of St-Laurent; there's a dining room downstairs but I've always had dim sum on the second floor. Beijing is on the south side of La Gauchetière West between Clark and St-Urbain.

More than 30 years now. Haven't been keeping count. 50? 100? (And what does Montreal have to do with it anyway? Throw in other places and we're definitely talking hundreds.) I also grind and brew my own espresso at home. Only in northern Italy, unfortunately (or not, because from an espresso standpoint I prefer the northern style to the southern). But I don't consider an Italian pilgrimage prerequisite to espresso appreciation any more than I think one has to spend time in France to appreciate French wine or cooking. Coffee, like wine, can be and is judged according to objective criteria. Assuming one is using good beans, bitterness and sourness are symptoms of brew water that is either too hot or too cold respectively. Along with unwarmed cups, stale and/or inferior beans, improperly ground and/or tamped coffee and badly timed pulls, off-temperature water is one of the main reasons so much espresso these days is dreck. And don't get me started on milk-foaming...

There's no disputing taste. But please don't ascribe motives to others when you, in fact, have no idea what their motives are. To tell the truth, I don't much care for the ambience, such as it is, at Cafe Italia. I go there because of the brew which, by any objective standard, is good: good crema, good aroma, good body and good flavour, to my palate balanced and avoiding the common pitfalls of bitterness and sourness. Have never tried Zanetti's wares, but I'll take an espresso from Italia over one from International any day of the week (plus your clothes don't reek of cigarette smoke like they do after 15 minutes at Cafe Italia). And if you really want "an example of what not to serve as good espresso," try Starbucks or Second Cup. Their drinks absolutely require milk to be palatable. Hmmm. How do you know what the coffee's like if they haven't opened for business?

Funny but the first time I encountered the phenomenon was just after my butcher got a vacuum-packer and received a shipment of raw milk Manchego (one of my favourite cheeses, too, and one of the few that goes really well with red wine). The first chunk was incredible. The second chunk, which had been vacuum-packed for a few days, was less resplendent. The third chunk, vacuum-packed for a week and a half or two weeks, tasted like cardboard. But, hey, it's just a personal data point. Might be interesting to post a query on the Cooking or General Food Topics board and see what the consensus is.

Based purely on personal experience, I often find vacuum-packing detrimental to raw milk cheeses. It's fine for short-term storage but after a couple of days, the cheese can take on a stale or musty flavour. My theory — and I stress that it's only that — is that raw milk cheeses are living, breathing things and that oxygen deprivation adversely affects (kills?) the microbes on which their flavour depends.