PadmeSkywalker's Profile
Frustration with grocery chains in Montreal
Loblaws is a little different in that they have a very heavy house brand presence and with a lot of big value packs tend to aim for the family on a budget demographic.
There are other grocery stores though and I will go to my parent`s run of the mill suburban grocery store in Toronto and find things that I have to go to Jean Talon to find here. I don`t think one should have to live in a restricted geographical area or be willing to take an entire afternoon to go from store to store in order to find "exotic" products.
Frustration with grocery chains in Montreal
I've tried speaking to the grocery store manager where I go more than once. They've pretty much told me that if they've never gotten it, it's not an option to order it. Once in a while they'll get a more interesting product and it will go out of stock and they won't bother ordering it. Last time that happened I made sure to go see whichever supervisor was on the floor at the time and request that they get the product back. I did this every time I went grocery shopping, so once a week, it took them 3 months of me asking every week to order it again but they did eventually. Quite possibly just to shut me up. lol
Frustration with grocery chains in Montreal
I never "blamed" anyone, I just gave my observations. Unfortunately you seem far too defensive to hold a conversation about this subject.
Frustration with grocery chains in Montreal
Companies go to where the demand is. Food Network was launched in the US in 1993, Food Network Canada was launched in 2000 although we could get the US version already and Zeste was just launched this year. Had there been a greater demand for that kind of specialty channel in Quebec before there would have been a channel a long time ago. Same thing with grocery stores, if people were more interested in "exotic" products there would be more on the shelves.
Frustration with grocery chains in Montreal
Montrealers tend to believe that their city is the be all of food, which it is not. It does some things really well and some things less well. I quickly googled statistics and Montreal's immigrant population is around 25%, Toronto's is 50%. In 2004 the United Nations Development Programme ranked Toronto second behind Miami with the city with the largest foreign born population. That is a huge difference in terms of diversity and the people who will buy more "exotic" ingredients. This means that they are more readily available and there is a bigger variety. Can you find ingredients in Montreal? Yes. Can you find everything? No. But I don't think everyone either lives near Marche Jean-Talon or wants to trek to 4 different stores all over the island to make dinner. And just for the record there are some things that I can't find in Toronto either. Saying that "exotic" products are hard to find doesn't mean that people here aren't willing to try new foods, it just means it does not form a large part of their diet.
Frustration with grocery chains in Montreal
Preach on my friend. I completely agree.
I'm from Toronto and there are things I have to go to Marche Jean-Talon to find or can't even find there that my parents can get at their suburban grocery store. I get so frustrated with the selection in supermarkets here. 50% of the time they don't even have cilantro in my supermarket and when they do it comes in a tiny little pouch for 3 bucks. I can't even find cornmeal and have a hard time finding any cheese that is not cheddar or a French cheese. The other day I asked for gorgonzola and they didn't know what that even was and I go to the supermarket with the best selection where I live. I could go on and on with the things that I can't find. It's a little crazy that when I go back to visit Toronto I come back with suitcase full of food.
My theory on why the food selection is so bad is that Montreal has a much lower immigrant population than other large urban centers and most Quebecois de souche just don't cook at home and when they do it is pretty basic things (i.e. not with "exotic" ingredients), while immigrants will consistently cook from scratch. If you look at a lot of French cooking shows and books the recipes are rather light on foreign ingredients and often they are pre-made mixes or pastes rather than individual items. No flames please, these are just my observations.
Where to find Kale?
Am I the only one who has a lot of problems finding Kale in the supermarket? I've checked all my local supermarkets and none of them stock it. Is this just an anomaly in my area? Anyone have recs for a place that consistently carries it? Thanks!
Crappy fruit - what's the story??
I forgot to add, Costco tends to have surprisingly good fruit. In season, the sell pomegranate arils in a container. I love this since I hate the mess separating them from the pomegranate makes.
Crappy fruit - what's the story??
I'm with you. I have a hard time finding decent fruits and vegetables. A lot of supermarkets have fruits that are starting to go bad or they're completely inedible because they are mealy or dried out. Sometimes I buy things and two days later they're rotting even though I'm storing them properly. I know someone who has family in food distribution and importation, he says that among the big cities in the region Montreal tends to be last on the chain and that things tend to go to Toronto and New York first.
Frozen Yogurt
I went there today and I liked it. I've never tried Yeh though so I can't compare. They had about 8-10 flavours from what I remember. I got chocolate and caramel and they were both good. Lots of toppings as well.
Garde Manger opening hours?
I'm not sure about weekdays but I remember calling for a reservation for a Friday night and they were booked 2-3 weeks in advance, if you want to go call ahead of time to make sure you get a table.
Looking for chucharron in Montreal!
Try La Carreta near JTM. It comes with yuca and curtido. Yum.
http://maps.google.ca/maps/place?oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&q=la+carreta&fb=1&gl=ca&hq=la+carreta&hnear=Laval,+QC&cid=930790744249746754
Who Makes The Best Tres Leche Cake in Montreal
Itacate has it but you have to order it ahead of time.
Lost -- How to culinarily celebrate the last episode?
MSNBC did an article on how to throw a Lost party. http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/37203308/ns/today-entertainment/ There are some pretty cool pictures in there.
New Mexican restaurants.
I also recommend Itacate. I went for the first time this Friday. Great authentic food. I`m Latin American and I have no complaints about their food. Their mole was a touch on the sweet side but the tacos al pastor were amazing. Their XXX sauce is actually hot, not wimpy hot like most restaurants. The prices are really good as well.
Has anyone recently visited the Burgundy Lion?
I looked up reviews on Chowhound and on the internet but they are mostly from around the time that they opened. Since they're hit and miss I wanted to know if their service and food has improved. Thanks!
Maple syrup prices
I live in Montreal, Quebec so you think prices would be cheaper here but they've been high for a few years. Last year it was 10 bucks for 500ml. This year it is down to 8$. I actually get mine at Costco, it is local maple syrup, 1 liter for 14 dollars if I recall correctly.
Alicia Silverstone The Kind Diet
She does have some recipes that have ingredients that are difficult to find unless you are lucky enough to live near a Whole Foods and an Asian supermarket. I make a lot of substitutions when cooking her recipes since there are so many things I can't find.
APDC Cabane à sucre 2010
I have pictures on my blog: http://cookbookfixation.blogspot.com/2010/03/pied-du-cochon-sugar-shack.html I went a week ago and loved it. As per Chowhound mod requests I am posting the full text here even though it doesn't make much sense without the pictures.
In Quebec during the maple syrup season families traditionally go to sugar shacks to eat endless amounts of traditional foods such as pea soup, smoked ham and maple syrup pie. This year the food bloggers group to which I belong decided to go Pied du Cochon’s Sugar Shack. Martin Picard’s take on a sugar shack menu is decidedly more decadent than a traditional place and if I have to beg, borrow or steal I need to find someway to go next year. 3 hours worth of non-stop good food had me in foodie heaven.
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Like all sugar shacks the seating was fairly rustic. We all sat at long picnic tables and the food was passed around family style. It was nice in a big group but it must be a bit awkward if you’re sitting with complete strangers.
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Our sitting was at noon and I arrived just in time. I was so worried that I was going to miss the first course but I got there as everyone was ordering coffee and tea. Since I saw that they had Kusmi tea which is excellent, I decided to have some.
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I picked the sweet love tea which is a blend of black China tea, ginseng and liquorice roots, spices, guarana seed and pink pepper.
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It was really good. I need to buy some for the house.
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We had bottles of maple syrup on the table to pour over our food since most sugar shacks have pretty much everything from sausages to dessert drenched in syrup but strangely enough it went pretty much untouched throughout the whole meal.
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To start off with we had a traditional tourtiere, which is a savoury meat pie accompanied by a home made tomato ketchup.
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We had one pie for the entire table of roughly 15 people so we each had a small slice but since there was so much food yet to come it was more than enough. As you can see from the pictures there were generous chunks of meat in the filling. The home made ketchup was a bit plain, it was diced tomatoes with onions and some seasoning but it did a nice job of cutting through the richness of the meat and the pastry.
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Up next was the pea soup with chunks of Foie Gras. This was one of my favourite dishes of the night. Pea soup is traditionally peasant food so I loved how they took something so humble and added such a decadent ingredient.
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The chunks of Foie Gras were pretty generous and went surprisingly well with the peas.
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Up next was some salmon gravlax.
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We also received some buckwheat pancakes to eat with them.
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The salmon was really fresh and of great quality but it tasted very plain, almost like sashimi from a Japanese restaurant.
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Next up was a salad of mixed greens with chunks of ham and cheddar topped with pork rinds.
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I had one bite of the pork rinds and then proceeded to pick them off my salad. They were very puffy and crisp so I would image if they’re your thing that you would love them. The salad was strangely enough, one of the few items other than the desserts that actually had maple syrup. The dressing was a tangy maple syrup mix which tasted amazing. For me the salad was one of my favourite parts of the meal.
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There was also cretons which is a ground pork spread.
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Usually you eat this spread on toast. I thought that this was just ok. It was very grainy and a little bland.
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These were chicken feet cooked in barbeque sauce. Ok, I have to confess I didn’t even try them or think about trying them. The thought of eating chicken feet freaks me out, I was afraid I was going to end up swallowing and chicken foot nail and the thought of that makes me shudder. Those who were more adventurous than me and gave them a go said that they were good.
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This was an omelette with smoked mackerel and other mixed seafood. I didn’t catch the description of everything that was in there since the waiter was talking at the other end of the table. This was good but it tasted almost like an egg custard rather than an omelette.
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This was one of my favourite parts of the meal, lobster and pork meat stuffed in a cabbage with French lentils. There were nice chunks of lobster meat and the sauce was very rich.
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There was also a chicken cooked in maple syrup with maple syrup baked beans. This was good, the chicken was moist and tasted as though it had been brined and the maple beans were not cloyingly sweet which was good.
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This was beef tongue with celeriac slaw. The slaw was good, it was tossed in a creamy sauce but I just couldn’t bring myself to try the tongue. Especially since you could see all the little taste buds poking up.
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Finally, we got to the best part. Dessert! This was maple taffy which I absolutely love even though it is so simple. It is made by boiling maple syrup and then pouring it on fresh snow, or in this case ice chips. A popsicle stick is then twirled around in the syrup to pick up the taffy.
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I think I did a pretty good job of getting all the taffy.
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These were pancakes absolutely drenched in maple syrup. They were very eggy and puffy which made me wonder if they were actually just fried egg whites
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This was a banana split with maple ice cream, maple cotton candy, chocolate sauce and chunks of maple sugar. The combo of the chocolate sauce with the ice cream and the maple cotton candy was really good and a lot of fun but the bananas weren’t ripe enough and I just ate around them.
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Last but not least was maple mille feuille. I could have sat down and eaten this whole thing by myself or at least eaten the filling. It was delicious although the actually puff pastry was a tad over cooked.
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There were food items to take home but at that point I was so full that I didn’t want to think about eating anything else. It actually took me 24 hours to eat anything after that massive pig out.
All in all the food was delicious and well worth the 50 dollar price tag. I thought the chicken feet were an odd addition to the menu though and I’m willing to bet that they went mostly untouched at most of the tables. The one thing I was slightly annoyed at was the fact that coffee and tea were not on the drink menu so everyone assumed that it was included in the price but it was extra. Other than that I have very few qualms.
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Hakka Restaurants in Montreal?
I'm from Toronto and I still pine after Chili Chicken. Every time I go back I go have some. Last time I even froze some takeout and brought it home in my luggage. I keep on trying to find Hakka recipes on the internet but I haven't had much luck.
Alicia Silverstone The Kind Diet
I have it. I'm not vegan or vegetarian I just like non-meat based meals. The cookbook section has recipes which are easier to find and some which are downright impossible to get for many people unless they live close to a Whole Foods or a Japanese food store. I've tried a few recipes and I've liked them. I constantly sub things in recipes all the time so for me taking one of the recipes with more exotic ingredients and changing it around isn't a problem.
As for the pro-vegetarian part, I found it was evenly written. Of course, it encourages you to be vegan and underlines the reasons why it doesn't really moralize about it.
APDC Cabane à sucre 2010
Lucky you! He wasn't there when we went from what I could see. That sucks that he didn't stop by to say hi to the other tables. I noticed that they were selling maple cotton candy, t-shirts, tourtiere and some other food items but strangely enough the cookbook was the only thing I didn't see.
Dinner recs in Old Montreal that will not break the bank?
A friend and I will be in Old Montreal for dinner this Saturday. I'm looking for a place with good food but that will not cost a fortune. Up to 15$ for appetizers and up to 25-30$ for mains. I was looking around Bonaparte's web site but their menu has no prices, although they mention that prices are reasonable but reasonable can vary greatly. Any recs are appreciated. Thanks!
APDC Cabane à sucre 2010
Thanks for the review. I'm going in two weeks so it's nice to know what is on the menu this year. I'm not a big fan of offal either but I'll try to give the chicken feet and the tongue a try,
Cooking Oil & Allergies [split from Quebec Board]
My husband is allergic to nuts. Depending on the degree of sensitivity some people can go into anaphylactic shock just from smelling nuts/peanuts. I remember one time we were in the grocery store and they were baking peanut butter cookies and we had to leave because he started having trouble breathing. Even though most people with severe allergies carry around an epi pen all that gives you is 15 more minutes to get to the hospital before you basically choke to death if you start having a reaction.
All of that to say that even though allergic people might not have an allergic reaction from peanut oil anyone in their right mind would not take the risk. It would be a bit like saying that a restaurant dish might have cyanide, why take the chance if you don't have to.
Quail eggs, truffle oil
At Marche Jean-Talon there is a stall where they sell different fresh eggs. They have quail, chicken, duck and geese if I remember correctly. As for truffle oil there are two stores that right besides the market that have fine groceries. It's on the same side as Marche de Saveurs. Try the Italian grocery store, I remember they have truffle salt so they probably have truffle oil as well.
