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100 Saint-Paul Street West
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Tel. 788-4000. http://www.hotelnelligan.com. verses@hotelnelligan.com
 The fine dining choices in Old Montreal include California Dream, Verses, Restaurant S, L' Epicier, Cube and many others.
We will attempt to give them all the Restospy treatment before the winter of 2003-2004 is over.
All of these restaurants are architectural jewels, typically with high ceilings, exposed walls and wood or stone floors. Last week, I sampled Verses, the restaurant of the artsy Hotel Nelligan on Saint-Paul Street, which is advertised on the hotel's web site as "rustic chic". Accompanied by two rustic megapolitan chicks who could not tell the difference between a coq and a rooster, we managed to spend to spend $233 in under two hours without taking our clothes off.
 Since arriving in Canada about thirty years ago from Greece, brothers Tony and Costas Antonopoulos caught about 500 colds.
Backed up by a shipload of Peloponnesian Neo-Sitran, they have built an empire of elegant restaurants and virus-free boutique hotels in the historic district of Old Montreal, which will soon be renamed MacreauPolis. The Antonopoulos cartel employs about 400 people, and hotel and restaurant holdings include Restaurant du Vieux Port, Restaurant Steak & Cie, Modavie Restaurant Wine Bar, Auberge du Vieux Port, Restaurant Remparts, Hotel Place d'Armes, Aix Cuisine du Terroir, Hotel Nelligan and Verses Restaurant.
Verses is an optical phenomenon with a soothing ambiance. It is easy to doze off in your chair here and wake up in the Onassis Suite upstairs (suites are rented out for $300 to $2000 per night but are free if you donate a kidney to Hellenic research). Not even thirty years old, chef Yannis Turcotte manages to deliver a great product largely based on local ingredients that are even younger than him. The decor, the main waiter, Adonis Phlirtakis, and the bartender, Penelope Megamelonis, are all certified Japanese tourist destinations. We ordered a Chateau Sancerre 2001 ($56) from the printed wine menu, whose average price is about 20 dollars above the web wine menu.
 If you print the web list and take it with you, the Greek magnates will legally have to give you the lower price, I guess. Since the back alleys of the Nelligan are a bit dark, and Telly "Kojak" Savalas's body was found in 1994 in Old Montreal with his stomach full of Tony's oktapodi, I decided not to try the web menu trick.
All our fish dishes without exception were excellent, but undersalted and not overwhelming in either presentation or innovation.
I was thinking that our bodies are in perpetual balance. So, what goes in (food) should be as salty as what comes out (sweat and other stuff). Thus, if you are unsure about a particular dish, lick your armpit before trying the sauce, and salt accordingly (the dish, not your armpit). If you want to be really really really sure, then I guess you'll have to lick the other stuff too. For example, the tuna and salmon sashimi appetizer was armpit-anemic.
The same was true for the brave arctic char with sautéed tomatoes and basil ($26) and the dapper seared half-raw tuna steak.
 The spartan oysters ($15 for six) were merely decent.
But then, out of nowhere, Yannis cooked up an unbelievably "rustic" magret de canard (sliced duck breast) with crispy finger fries, marinated in ginger and braised red cabbage ($25). This duck died under
Yannis's armpit, I am sure, as the salt and all other enzymes were right on.
The menu has further choices along this line, such as Quebec lamb, rack of Boileau deer with caramelized apples ($38) and Angus beef filet with noisette de foie gras ($35).
The service was absolutely perfect, but I missed the interplay with the staff, because Adonis was busy adonizing the single woman at the next table, and Penelope was nonsapphically occupied with an American business man from Athens, Georgia. So, we quietly moved on to the desserts. One of us had an Arlette of strawberries, and the others had the obligatory crème brûlée, which was one of the best I ever had, an attractive Mykonos-baked layer on a smooth body. — reviewed by RestoSpy
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