5349 Gatineau, Montreal, Qc H3T 1X1 514.731-3388
Open for dinner daily except Monday. Open for lunch Tues – Friday
Wheel chair accessible, Parking in the area can be difficult. Near Metro Côte des Neiges
n Poland there are authentic old style restaurants where you eat from wooden bowls and have a dish of pork lard to slather on thick rye bread. These restaurants are savored for their antique atmosphere. They serve food like they used to in the last century, I mean the real last century, around 1850.
Then there are the newer upscale Polish restos that lean toward French and Italian cooking styles. And of course, there are lots of restaurants, like Cracovie, which sit somewhere in the middle with hearty home style food that your grandmother used to make, that is if she ate a diet heavy on fried food, beets and potatoes.
On a rainy day approaching winter, Cracovie welcomes us with smells of bean and barley soup, stewed tripe, and bigos – a hearty hunter’s stew similar to an Alsatian choucroute. Hearty, in fact, is an adjective that could be added to almost any dish on the menu: the chicken schnitzel, the stuffed cabbage rolls, the foot long Polish sausage, the pig’s knuckles or the cheese and potato stuffed pierogi (think steamed, large ravioli). This is a place to try dishes that you cannot find elsewhere: the bigos, for example made with sausage and sauerkraut or the tripe served in small bubbling cauldrons.
We were four, the night we ate, and chose mostly from the table d’hôte that included soup and tea or coffee and ranged from $9.95 to $13.75.
Chicken schnitzel
The chicken schnitzel was large, but not exciting. It takes something special to make this dish extra-ordinary and the hot beets and potatoes weren’t it. The veal roast was insipid and, with a few grey slices of meat, looked like something that had come from the back of a cafeteria line. On the other hand, the slightly sour Polish country soup, also known as zurek, was great. This is a large bowl of slightly fermented soup filled with chunks of Polish sausage and, also served with a side of potatoes and fried onions.
Pierogis
The pierogi were good and the fresh rye bread that was always on the table was delicious. Desserts are good but the choice is meager – an excellent nut cake, a good cheese cake (Polish style, just lots of cheese and no fruit) and a good hot apple pie. Skip the coffee and go for an old fashioned tea with lemon.
What is missing, unless you are a large group, is atmosphere. The FM traffic reports on the radio did little to set the mood; and the dining room, although pleasant, is sparsely furnished with Polish dishes on the plate rail and a few hangings on the walls. The cactuses on the windowsills are an exotic touch.
When Cracovie is packed, it can be fun. These are summer evenings on the terrace or a wintry weekend when there is a good crowd from the neigbourhood. It’s a great place to come to after skating or skiing on Mount Royal. By the way, this is the same Cracovie that used to be downtown on Stanley years ago. The owner got tired of paying downtown rents and moved to Côte des Neiges. His Polish clientele stayed with him.
When you go – and the prices and portions make it worth it – come with a crowd and sample your way through the menu. For those with Polish souls, Cracovie is a taste of home. -- Reviewed by Barry Lazar (Nov/06)
