 Wednesday, August 21, 2002
Back from vacation in California. One of the highlights was visiting a “home” vintner in the Napa valley. Dale Lochel makes his own Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon, and boy, was it good. He only produces about 1,800 bottles a year and isn’t bonded (it’s too much hassle) so he doesn’t sell the wine—just trades it for various things. Astonishing stuff.
Also paid a visit to my favorite Korean place in Oakland. Just like being in Seoul.
But I’m back, and the first weekend back was a great one. Here’s how it went:
The "Eat" Trip—Sunday August 18
Barry has once again proven he is the reigning Meister of all things Montreal.
The assignment: Schlep around town two individuals who hail from a food magazine from far-off Japan while keeping a jaded Montrealer tagalong from chewing the carseat with boredom.
Barry came through.
It was a day with only a vague plan centering around lunch at L’Express.
 The food people were from a magazine called (what else?) “Eat.” They were going to be running a piece—an insert, actually—about food in Montreal, and they had kindly requested that we montrealfood.com itinerant sybarites (that’s Barry and me) squire them around for a day—no rules and no regulations. Whatever we wanted to do. No pay, but all you could eat. That’s my kind of assignment.
Barry rose to the occasion. I was expecting a few hours walking up and down rue St. Laurent, but he showed up in his town car and drove me to our first location, Caffe Italia, with a spring in his accelerator, having “biked for two hours around the Lachine Canal” before he even showed up at my place at 9:45 on a Sunday morning. I for one was amazed, seeing for the first time the sun on a Sunday before 11 a.m.
 “You biked around Lachine Canal?” I queried, nonplussed. “Up at six!” was the bright answer. Oh, never mind.
Our guests were hunched on a stoop outside Caffe Italia in the morning sun, looking bedraggled after two days of dining and wining with other hosts. (Three days to do Montreal food—it’s a job only a dedicated few could contemplate.)
Francois, the Zen-like Production Manager (5 years in Japan will do that) and Nigel, the Mancunian-Londoner scribbler extraordinaire, squinted at us through the early morning glare like overfed partridges inspecting a bag of seed.
 Caffe Italia is not for the faint-hearted, especially the weekenders who prefer their weekends snug in a shade-darkened room with earplugs till 1 p.m.
There were many customers, old and young. Lots of cigarette smoke in the tiny room. Every conceivable kind of coffee, minus the trendy toppings. It’s a Little-Italy-Sunday kind of thing. Coffee before Mass. Old men outside the joint, silver-haired and arguing on the sidewalk. My Au Lait was not enough to stifle the yawns.
Barry, however, was on a roll. We strode through Little Italy all the way to Jean-Talon market, inspecting little cafés and ethnic markets along the way. Milano is mind-boggling. I cannot believe I’ve lived in Montreal for 8 years without having been there. It’s a one-stop shop.
 A boucherie where the main man is making sausages at 10:20 a.m. on a Sunday. “I’m onna be doin’ dis alla day,” the grizzled grandfather of twelve says happily, stuffing delicious-looking pepper-and-herb flecked ground meat into a tubular lamb casing. You believe him. He persuades you to buy your own lamb casing for your new meat grinder. (Okay, Barry did too.)
Jean-Talon Market. It was an astonishing sight for one who likes darkened shades. Many, many, perhaps too many, people on a Sunday morning. I’ve been here before, but not at the height of summer, the height of the Quebec harvest.  There are millions, perhaps billions, of vegetables. Onions which still have the buds: exuberant white globes with not a shade of crispy browned skin, still clinging to their muscular sun-bound shoots; green peppers which defy all descriptions of the color green; blueberries in tiny plastic baskets so succulent looking that you have to force your fingers from plucking “just one” to taste.
“Un, Deux, Trois Chocolats.” This guy is the undiscovered National Treasure of Montreal. It’s a tiny shop with a handmade sign, but the incredible stuff within—it’s beyond words. The owner and sole artist, Thierry (from Belgium) creates treasures: gold masks, Monarch butterflies and other fanciful creations (ask for what’s “under the counter”) entirely in chocolate. The patinas alone range from brass to silver. How can this stuff be edible? But it is.  He can also conceivably make a chocolate mask from your creation, but it depends upon the medium. Why fudge any further? Have your wife’s . . . er, nose done in pewter-covered chocolate.
Then it was off to Ethnic Montreal, à-la Barry. This man knows the neighbourhood. Transitional Jewish-Italian-Vietnam-Bangladesh? We’re there.
Except it’s Trinidad. Maison Cari Golden.
Young Caribbean dudes hanging on the sidewalk in front of their 4 X 4, debating the merits of backwards baseball caps. A vast plastic yellow menu, not Indian, but boasting everything Indian.
“Curried Goat & Potatoes & Rice & Salad $5.95/Chevre du Cari & Patate avec Riz et Salad $5.95”— it’s a whole different Montreal here. Possibly called “Port of Spain, succursale-Jean Talon.”
 Next stop: Bangladesh. Curry leaves, fresh ones. Indian munchies, available by the vat. Inde en vrac. The tiny stores, packed to the gills at 11:30 on a Sunday morning, too small to navigate with a tiny laptop backpack. A father of possibly six doing his week’s worth of shopping in front of you: okra, methi and dozens of onions and basmati rice holding up the line, but you don’t mind. This is not Metro.
Through the Greek neighbourhood—or maybe it used to be Greek. Everything is changing. Mile End. Or is it TMR? Only Barry knew.
We went to the upper-crust neighborhoods of Westmount. “You want expensive? I’ll show you expensive,” Barry said. The houses looked very expensive.
“I’ve been pulled over by cops asking what I was doing driving around here,” Barry said, as we crawled by Brian Mulroney’s house.
 Then, just to balance it, we go see Pierre Trudeau’s old house. “Is he still there?” I ask, meaning does the house still belong to the Trudeau family. “No,” Barry says without missing a beat. “Why?” I ask. “He’s dead.”
Then lunch at L’Express. The usual fantastic fare, capped with a Ricard.
Then Atwater market, an absolute zoo. Thousands upon thousands of shoppers. Douceurs du Marché was wall to wall. It was obvious the two owners were in mild panic mode.
Barry took off after that to cook his meal for ten, bolstered with armfuls of fresh corn and other goodies.
He left the three of us at Guy and St. Catherine. We walked all the way to St. Laurent and headed up looking for Sergent Recruteur. Finding out that it was above Mt. Royal, we abandoned the trek and settled in at a pub that played Bob Dylan at earsplitting volume.
 Moving closer to the dinner location, Formosa, we ended up at a bizarre bar named Inspecteur Epingle, a place with no sign outside which seemed to be filled with pretty underaged girls playing pool. And the night crept by measured by Boreale Rousses and then it was past dinner time — we abandoned the plan to go to Formosa. We were still all full after L’Express.
Last I saw the intrepid voyagers, they were on their way to Chinatown for a Vietnamese sandwich.
Can’t wait to see how they write the whole thing up.
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