eG Foodblog: Gabriel Lewis - From Nihon to Sichuan to ... Sorbet?

[Gabriel Lewis]

When I was in school in Burlington Vermont, we would pack into a car and drive the 90 minutes north to Montreal for an urban fix every three months.  I loved walking around town and sampling the ethnic treats from storefronts and restaurants.  The Jazz Festival there became an annual must-see years later.  I love your town.  I can still taste the draught St. Amboise from a little bar in Vieux-Montréal.  Blog on.

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Burlington is quite close; my cousin often flies out of burlington as it is cheaper that way, in fact he'll be coming back from california through burlington tonight. Vermont is a state I'd love to get to a know a bit better, as I've heard the folks over at endless banquet praise it endlessly. As for the beer here, I've found some I like, but I spent a few years in the other Portland (OR), and the quality of beer there is pretty hard to match. Incidentally, any Montrealers with suggestions for great Quebec beer, feel free to jump in if you're reading this.

[Gabriel Lewis]

Breakfast:

Today it was a banana, banana bread, and jasmine tea. The bread was a gift from my friend Nathalie at work last night; she's going to pastry school right now and this was from school earlier in the day. I often have tea in the morning, typically green or Oolong. I do like black tea too, but don't like to drink that much of it, I find it and coffee upset my stomach. With green or oolong it's easy to bring a thermos to school and sip my tea during lecture.

I'm off to school for the afternoon, I'll be back later on. Tonight we switch to Japanese.

[Gabriel Lewis]

On my way home from school I stopped to get steaks, beer, and bagels. I also took a few photos in my neighbourhood.

First stop was La Paradis des Bieres, a small specialty beer store that carries a lot of different beers, at excellent prices to boot:

I opted for a six pack of Boreal Blonde. Boreal is a big Quebec brewery, but their beer is actually pretty good. I'm partial to the Blonde as it's clean, refreshing, and especially good very very cold. I've been meaning to branch out a bit more, but I hesistate at times; alcohol is expensive here, and if I'm going to pay good money for it, I'd like it to be good. Again any montreal beer experts, here is your chance to educate me.

While in the neighbourohood, I took some photos of Laurier street restaurants. Laurier is a few blocks north of Mont Royal, and is a bit of a trendy street in the mile end/plateau neighbourhoods. There are tons of restaurants, bars, shops, cafes and generally a lot of activity. Any montrealers can feel free to correct me if I'm misstepping here; I haven't actually eaten at most of the places I'm about to describe.

Here we have La Chronique, generally considered Montreal's number two restaurant behind Toque. My apologies for the glare, the sunlight and their sign made it difficult to take a clear picture. Chef Marc originally hails from belgium, and his food can be thought of as modern high end french, although my boss tells me it is somewhat rustic. I haven't eaten here yet, but would like to. A comprehensive meal with wine here would cover my food budget for a month. If you're on a budget, they have excellent 3 course meals for 25$. I'll take advantage of this eventually.

Across the street from La Chronique (from left to right) are Bazaar (white sign), Bistro Bruno (black sign), and Raza (the red sign can barely be seen at the far right).

Bazaar is chef Racha Bassoul's new venture, in the same locatio as her old Anise. When she closed Anise, she seemed to indicate that she was closing for good, but the new place opened only a few months afterwards. A lot of people think this was a rather clever ploy to pick up business. Her original venture Anise was higher end fine dining, but she toned this down for Bazaar. A number of people have speculated to me that the switch was made with a more profitable restaurant in mind. Bassoul tends to work with a lot of different flavors, but her foundation is persian/mediterrean and french, and all her food comes from this theoretical framework. Philippe deVienne speaks highly of Racha and her cooking.

Bistro Bruno is a new french bistro that opened about a year ago? I don't know much about it, but supposedly they have some nice bistro classics for a good value.

Restaurant Raza, headed by chef Mario Navarrette is a Nuevo Latino restaurant. Think french techniques and approach with latin flavors. I used to work here, and at his sister restaurant Madre over on Masson street. I learned a lot from Mario, but eventually felt the need to leave for personal reasons. Navarrete's cooking draws on influences from all over South and Latin America, with an emphasis on Peru where he hails from. Some of this combinations are delicious indeed, and if you do go to either restaurant I'd suggest the Ceviche as a starter.

Here we have Les Touilleurs, a cooking equipment store, and Juni, a high end Sushi joint.

Les touilleurs is a beautiful store, but a bit too yuppieish for my tastes. I prefer to shop at restaurant supply stores and the like, where I don't feel like I'm getting gouged for shopping in an elegant white setting.

Juni is supposedly one of Montreal's better sushi places. They do a tasting many, and have some french influences too, but I'm told its best to stick to traditional options.

Next I stopped at Chez Vito, my local neighbourhood butcher. They have good selection and prices, and are very friendly and helpful. The man behind the counter in the picture is Vito himself, the owner. He was in the process of breaking down a giant side of beef, and was kind enough to let me take a picture.

Next I stopped at St-Viateur bagel, as I'm running low on supplies. Here is the storefront:

The main counter:

Another shot of the main counter, in the back you can see an employee who's just inserted a wooden board of bagels into the wood fired oven. To the side is the bagel dump, where hundreds of freshly made bagels sit. The ones higher up are still warm.

Here's someone cutting out long strips from a massive block of dough, to be shaped by hand into bagels.

Storage space, the sacks on the left are sesame seeds; as you can see, they go through a lot of sesame seeds here.

After that was home, I'm off to prep for dinner here which will include steak teriyaki and egg drop soup.

[Gabriel Lewis]

Tonight for dinner we had:

Beaten egg soup (kakitama-jiru)

Steak Teriyaki (Gyuuniku Teriyaki), Asparagus with mustard dressing (asupragasu karashi-Ae), and steamed rice (Gohan):

Individual pictures

Here are some of my comments on the dinner. I'm still very new to Japanese cooking, so if you see or read anything obviously out of place, or something I'm missing, feel free to enlighten me.

The soup was very good; light, clean, and simple. The only thing that didn't seem to go as the recipe indicated was the egg turning into thin thread like filaments, as you can see.

The steak was also quite good, but slightly overcooked as I overestimated the thickness. I also have to wonder why Shizuo specifies half inch slices. I found these a bit large to chew, and it would've been easier to plate thin slices better.

The asparagus was so-so. The dressing consisted of 1 egg yolk, 2tsps mustard powder mixed 2tsps water, and 1tsp dark soy sauce. This was very mustardy and not much else; I can't figure out why he used so much mustard.

[Pam R]

The bagels are gorgeous. I've only had them sent to me frozen, and they're good, but I doubt they're anything close in taste to fresh ones from that bakery.

Any chance we'll get to see some smoked meat? S'il vous plait?

[Hiroyuki]

The soup was very good; light, clean, and simple. The only thing that didn't seem to go as the recipe indicated was the egg turning into thin thread like filaments, as you can see.

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The soup looks good to me. Was the soup hot enough (boiling) when you added the beaten eggs? Was the heat high enough? Otherwise, the soup will get cloudy.

Also, did you use a pair of chopsticks to add the beaten eggs? Bring the bowl containing the beaten eggs in contact with the chopsticks so the eggs runs down the chopsticks and into the soup. And, you also have to move the bowl and the chopsticks in a circle while adding the beaten eggs.

[sanrensho]

I am sooo jealous of those bagels. I've had a lot of bagels from a lot of different geographic locations (including NY), and nothing compares to the bagels I had in Montreal.

I can still recall those bagels like it was yesterday, even though it's been over 15 years since I had them.

[mizducky]

Only just caught up with this blog tonight--it's been that kind of week. Great blog! I haven't been in Montreal since I was a kid, so it's cool to see it through your eyes. Loving the look of the Montreal bagels ... never had the opportunity to try one, but I'd surely do so given the chance.

Edited to add: do they also make bialys? Now a good bialy is a true thing of beauty.

Edited October 4, 2007 by mizducky (log)

[Gabriel Lewis]

Woke up late this morning, and rushed off to class. Had time to scarf down this, bot not to write about it:

I work afternoons on tuesdays, and spent most of the afternoon doing something I'm not crazy about: pounding whole dried turmeric into small pieces. We get turmeric in these huge bags in whole dried form from India, and seeing as it is so hard that it breaks the blades of our grinders, we have to pound it by hand with a mortar and pestle to use in our spice blinds. This is hard work. Luckily I don't mind the physical part, as I am pretty well accustomed to hard work with a mortar from making curry pastes. But still, by the end I am sweat, sneezy, and very very yellow.

I was in such a rush that I forgot to bring my camera, but we had leftovers for lunch. The pizza I made on tuesday, an eggplant/cauliflower curry of sorts based on roasted red peppers;cracked coriander; and black pepper (I made last week), and a jamaican style curry a coworker of mine made last week. Leftovers can be pretty good.

[Gabriel Lewis]

Only just caught up with this blog tonight--it's been that kind of week. Great blog! I haven't been in Montreal since I was a kid, so it's cool to see it through your eyes. Loving the look of the Montreal bagels ... never had the opportunity to try one, but I'd surely do so given the chance.

Edited to add: do they also make bialys? Now a good bialy is a true thing of beauty.

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Thank you! I don't know what bialys are, so I'm not sure I can help here. I might know them by apperance, if not by name if you can describe them. Or maybe someone can help me out here.

[prasantrin]

What happened to make them infamous? 

My sister went to McGill, and I visited a couple of times.  I love Montreal for the food (but it's a bit too "big city" for this prairie girl).  Are you going to take us to Schwartz's?  Or any other Montreal institution?  Do we get pictures of St. Viateur (sp?).  They're the ones with the tiny store with the big oven (is it wood burning?)?  I love them!

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Not anything specific I would say, just their dedication to quality and the consistently excellent service they provide. It was through their stores that I knew I wanted to work for them. Philippe also gives cooking seminars at the market, and the two stores have become very well established at the market, and in Montreal. We supply spices to stores all over Quebec, and Philippe has a book on how to cook with spices coming out in late October.

Ah, I always use the word "infamous" in it's prescriptive sense (dictionary says it means "notorious), rather than the descriptive sense (people use it to mean "really famous").

What part of the prairies are you from? I'm originally from Winnipeg myself, and still love the city, despite what some may say about it. What do you find "big city" about it. It is one of Canada's biggest cities, but rarely do I get a big city feel from it.

I'm from Winnipeg, too! It's a great food city, and I love the size. I think the feeling of bigness in Montreal comes from the traffic and all those tall buildings. I do find it to be more crowded than Winnipeg, in general, but I guess that's partly because of the tourists infiltrating the city.

Schwartz's maybe, St-viateur definitely. I live about a block from them, and I'll do a tour of my neighbourhood later this week.

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Now that you've shown us St-viateur, I'm still hoping for Schwartz's! Fatty, please. None of that lean stuff! (And after seeing those 4 fried eggs, I don't feel you're a lean-meat kind of guy!)

Since your focus in cooking recently has been on Chinese (and Japanese), how do you feel about the Chinese food in Montreal? The best place in Montreal that we knew for dim sum (somewhere around Chinatown, in an office-like building, I think, on an upper i.e. not main floor), kind of sucked compared to Winnipeg dim sum. But there were some non-dim sum restaurants that were OK, but still not as good as Winnipeg Chinese restaurants.

Do you ever get back to Winnipeg? For the food, at least?

[rooftop1000]

Gabriel

A Bialy looks like a cross between a Thomas' English muffin and a bagel...flat and no hole on the bottom then puffed like a bagel with the dent in the middle filled with onion and poppy seeds....they are To Die For hot dripping with melted butter

tracey

[mizducky]

I don't know what bialys are, so I'm not sure I can help here. I might know them by apperance, if not by name if you can describe them. Or maybe someone can help me out here.

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All about bialys, courtesy of Wikipedia, including a photograph. Alas, it appears they still haven't made their way outside the New York metro area ... but considering how badly bagels have been dumbed down by the big franchised bagel operations, maybe the bialy's continued obscurity is a good thing. (Except when I'm craving one like crazy!)

Edited October 5, 2007 by mizducky (log)

[Gabriel Lewis]

I'm from Winnipeg, too!  It's a great food city, and I love the size.  I think the feeling of bigness in Montreal comes from the traffic and all those tall buildings.  I do find it to be more crowded than Winnipeg, in general, but I guess that's partly because of the tourists infiltrating the city.

Since your focus in cooking recently has been on Chinese (and Japanese), how do you feel about the Chinese food in Montreal?  The best place in Montreal that we knew for dim sum (somewhere around Chinatown, in an office-like building, I think, on an upper i.e. not main floor), kind of sucked compared to Winnipeg dim sum.  But there were some non-dim sum restaurants that were OK, but still not as good as Winnipeg Chinese restaurants.

Do you ever get back to Winnipeg?  For the food, at least?

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Yes Winnipeg is a great city; it takes a certain kind of person to appreciate it. As for Chinese in montreal, I can't say I think much of it. I've been to a few of the restaurant in Chinatown, and I wasn't particularly impressed by any of them. There is one Sichuan restaurant called Niu Kee on clark street that it quite good, although less so since a change of ownership I am told. Truth be told I am not a very good person to ask; I eat out very infrequently, and most of my restaurant knowledge is secondhand. I find it very hard to part with what little money I have for (usually) a meal I could easily outdo for far less money if I cooked it myself. When I do bother to eat out though, usually I turn to Endless Banquet, a food blog by a montreal couple. They have been blogging for years, have excellent taste, and have an enormous list of great montreal food spots. If you are planning a trip to montreal that is food centered, this is your best bet for recommendations.

I do get back to Winnipeg, but not as much as I'd like. I don't have any family there, and its hard to find a reason to get out there when its so far from where I am. I left relatively young, so I don't know much about the food there, but I would be interested to see what it has to offer next time I get back.

[Gabriel Lewis]

I don't think they have bialys here, atleast at the St-Viateur store anyway. You might be able to find them somewhere in Montreal, there are a lot of immigrants here.

Dinner tonight was Japanese again,

Miso soup:

Steamed Salmon and Roe (Sake no Oyako-mushi), with Grilled eggplant w/ soy sauce & ginger (Yakinasu)

Any of you out there who make Miso soup frequently, I'd love to hear some of your favorite versions. I am quite taken to miso soup, but haven't expanded much beyond a basic soup with either white or red miso, tofu, maybe some mushrooms, green onions, or sansho powder. I'd love to try some different versions, especially ones that highlight a particular kind of miso.

The steamed salmon was excellent; rich flakes of salmon coated in a sour sauce, interspersed with bursts of savory flavor as the salmon eggs burst between your teeth. This is another dish with the whimsical "parent child" name (oya = parent(s), ko = child), similar to Oyako Donburi, a chicken & egg dish served over hot rice.

The eggplant was also very tasty for such a simple preparation; I love the texture of smooth eggplant. We have some nice asian eggplants in season at the market right now; I am not too fond of the giant purple ones.

For desert, I had a bit of vietnamese peanut brittle:

I am quite partial to asian snacks and deserts, and often roam the isles of asian grocers in search of something new.

Tommorow I work all day, but afterwards my friend Nathalie is coming over to cook Sichuan food with me. I'll need to go to the Jean Talon to pick up some ingredients, and I'll post a bunch of pictures after I get back from the market tommorow.

[Kent Wang]

I make miso soup a lot. I like to add wakame seaweed, enoki mushroom, shitake, oysters, mussels -- not all in the same pot of course! I generally like mine less minimalist than the traditional way.

[sanrensho]

Any of you out there who make Miso soup frequently, I'd love to hear some of your favorite versions. I am quite taken to miso soup, but haven't expanded much beyond a basic soup with either white or red miso, tofu, maybe some mushrooms, green onions, or sansho powder. I'd love to try some different versions, especially ones that highlight a particular kind of miso.

That meal looks good. Especially the salmon and miso soup.

As the days get colder, you might want to look into heartier variations like tonjiru (made with pork) and miso kenchinjiru (tofu and vegetable soup, but with miso added at the end). These are two of my favorites during the colder months.

Other ingredients we often use in miso soup are sliced onions, eggplant, daikon and potatoes. You can also up the umami factor by crumbling some of the little dried anchovies into the soup.

Corrected to change sardines->anchovies (sorry, I had sardines today)

Edited October 5, 2007 by sanrensho (log)

[SheenaGreena]

Im confused, you had asian pear the other day for dessert....did you eat the skin? Usually its really bitter and makes my mouth pucker, so I was wondering.

How did you make your egg drop soup? When I make mine (korean style) I like to add a few dried baby anchovies (or are they sardines? niboshi) to some water, whisk in some eggs with my chopsticks and add sliced green onion at the end. Its a very very easy recipe and goes well with kimbap. I even like to dip my kimbap into the egg drop soup sometimes - very yummy.

kind of a dumb question, but at school I'm assuming all of the professors teach in french, right?

eta: when I make miso soup I like to add shredded carrot, potatoes, cubed eggplant, shitake mushrooms, tofu, green onion, kabocha, shredded cabbage, etc

Edited October 5, 2007 by SheenaGreena (log)

[Hiroyuki]

As for miso soup ideas, here is a thread on miso soup in the Japan Forum:

http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showto...ndpost&p=899943

where I posted a photo of asari (a type of clam) miso soup.

As for your "I'm missing something" question, I'd like to see a complete meal. I think you know the phrase ichiju sansai (one soup and three side dishes), the very fundamental structure of a Japanese meal.

[sanrensho]

Im confused, you had asian pear the other day for dessert....did you eat the skin?  Usually its really bitter and makes my mouth pucker, so I was wondering.

How did you make your egg drop soup?  When I make mine (korean style) I like to add a few dried baby anchovies (or are they sardines? niboshi) to some water

Thanks for catching my error (I meant to say anchovies)--my excuse is that I had sardines for dinner tonight.

Personally, I usually eat Asian pears with the skin on, as long as it isn't too tough. We often get smaller pears from our friends' trees or organic ones, so I don't find the skin particularly bitter or tough. I am really not fond of peeling almost all fruit as is the custom in Japan. Especially since we don't often get the huge fruit that they get in Japan. If I peeled everything, there would be very little left to eat.

[SheenaGreena]

Im confused, you had asian pear the other day for dessert....did you eat the skin?  Usually its really bitter and makes my mouth pucker, so I was wondering.

How did you make your egg drop soup?  When I make mine (korean style) I like to add a few dried baby anchovies (or are they sardines? niboshi) to some water

Thanks for catching my error (I meant to say anchovies)--my excuse is that I had sardines for dinner tonight.

Personally, I usually eat Asian pears with the skin on, as long as it isn't too tough. We often get smaller pears from our friends' trees or organic ones, so I don't find the skin particularly bitter or tough. I am really not fond of peeling almost all fruit as is the custom in Japan. Especially since we don't often get the huge fruit that they get in Japan. If I peeled everything, there would be very little left to eat.

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I actually put sardines down first, then edited it to say anchovies after I read your post. I always get the two totally confused, and always mix them up. So they are anchovies then?

I will have to remember that niboshi = anchovies I forget the korean name for them? (help!)

I would imagine smaller asian pears having a much softer and tender skin compared to the big ones. The ones I am used to eating are the size of my head (well close to it) and have really really tough skins. I didn't know that it was customary to peel the skin on fruit in japan, as its pretty much the same in korea.

asian pears are one of my favorite fruit to eat. It was always a real treat to get a $20 -$30 box of asian pears from korea during the colder months. My mom left the box in the garage so that they would keep extra cold and after eating a pear I'd always put the "fruit sock" on my head and do a little dance.

[sanrensho]

I actually put sardines down first, then edited it to say anchovies after I read your post.  I always get the two totally confused, and always mix them up.  So they are anchovies then? 

Yup, sardines are the big 'uns and anchovies are the little ones. Funny story about the fruit sock/net, my little one also does the same thing.

Edited October 5, 2007 by sanrensho (log)

[CaliPoutine]

I don't know what bialys are, so I'm not sure I can help here. I might know them by apperance, if not by name if you can describe them. Or maybe someone can help me out here.

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All about bialys, courtesy of Wikipedia, including a photograph. Alas, it appears they still haven't made their way outside the New York metro area ... but considering how badly bagels have been dumbed down by the big franchised bagel operations, maybe the bialy's continued obscurity is a good thing. (Except when I'm craving one like crazy!)

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Not true ducky. I've been eating bialys for years. They're sold at all bagel shops in S. Florida. I even had one in San Rafael a couple weeks ago. I also used to get them at Western Bagel in WLA. Not sure if they were authentic, but they tasted similar to the ones I grew up with.

[Gabriel Lewis]

I think I will have to try miso soup both with some niboshi, and with niboshi dashi.

Sheena: Virtually all the asian pears here are the size a large apple or smaller, and I don't find eating their skin unpleasant in the least. Apparently we have a good climate for Asian pears here, I am hoping to get up to a farm that grows them, but they are quite far away.

Hiroyuki Thanks for the link, don't know why I didn't think of that. As for Ichiyu Sansai, yes I am familiar. I have only been cooking Japanese foods for a little while though, and a soup and three side dishes can be hard to pull off. It is a lot of work (even if they are simple), but it isn't just that. I don't have a huge resevoir of recipes in my head, or even on my bookshelf, and coordinating three different side dishes that go well with each other can be difficult; it takes a lot of planning. As I familiarize myself more with the techniques and recipes, it'll be easier to pull it all together, but in the meantime coordinating the shopping, planning, cooking etc stumps me at times. Plus outside of this blog I sort of stick to japanese for a week or two, and then to sichuan, and then back. But I may be able to manage sansai ichiyu or even better this weekend, and it is definitely something I want to do more of in the future.

So I woke up this morning to find I had a flat tire. I called in to work to let them know I would be a little late, little did I know. It turned out to be a very vexing flat a tire, and by the time I was finished there wasn't much point in going to work. I was so caught up in "winning" against my flat that I lost track of time. My supervisor was ok with it, she is pretty flexible, but I feel terrible. At one point I was ready to smash my tire to bits and give up in despair.

However, on the plus side it gave me the afternoon free, and so I headed to the market early. Earlier I snacked/breakfasted on these and another asian pear.

I love these chips; I can easily polish off a bag in one sitting. The ingredients don't seem very thai to me, but atleast they are all what I'd consider "food". I am really digging the increasing availability of pre-prepared foods that aren't chalk full of garbage.

Here is what I picked up at the Market:

[Gabriel Lewis]

My first stop was Marche Orientale:

One of the best asian grocers in montreal, and conveniently located a few blocks from the JTM. They have a small bakery, roast pigs & roast ducks, good asian produce, lots of crazy fruit from all over asia, and overall good selection for all things pan asian. I am here about once a week atleast, and they have come to know me; I even get a smile out of the cashiers sometimes. The Aisles are a bit narrow here, but I did manage to take a few pictures.

Produce section:

Snacks:

Teas: