What does a $100 meal look like?

There's this guy in Montreal who's like some kind of mini restaurant mogul, owning three restaurants in three different genres.  He's got an upscale one, a bring-your-own-wine place and a "market restaurant" place.  The "market restaurant" place is this place where they serve "market fresh" food or something -- you know, the whole "eat local" movement. (The "eat local" thing seems to be a thing in Montreal.  Even Gordon Ramsey's Rôtisserie Laurier boasts Quebec-grown chicken.)  

The "market fresh" place is fucking expensive and is located in a random working-class neighbourhood (up-and-coming!).  I honestly don't know how they stay afloat.  I mean, how many working class (or even up-and-comers) are going to eat at a place where dinner for two (with shared dessert and only one glass of wine) costs a hundred bucks before tip?  And I honestly don't see the fancy-shmancies of the world trekking out to a neighbourhood that boasts ... nothing.  

But the rent's probably dirt cheap.

A slab of chocolate custard isn't a tart.

Oh, as for dinner:  I had duck with bbq sauce (tasty!) and a chicken-corn-coriander soup.  Spousal Unit had veal cheeks and crab cakes.  We shared a dessert of crustless chocolate custard tart (so basically a slab of dense chocolate custard) with dulce de leche ice.  I won't lie:  it was damned good. I don't know if it was $100 good, but it was damned good.

In which we eat out with Irene

The beauty of the holidays is that you can go out for lunch to places that aren't the place next to your office.  I mean, that panini place is awesome, but I've had enough chicken-and-goat-cheese sandwiches.  

The other awesome thing about the holidays is that I actually get to see Irene in person instead of over dodgy cellphone connections.  

My parents had the day off and offered to take care of The Toddler while my Spousal Unit and I did some last-minute Xmas shopping and went out for lunch.  The last minute shopping went very badly:  there was a line-up in the bookstore that made us despair and leave; the liquor store was so packed, we couldn't find anything; and we totally forgot what we went into the fancy soap store for.  But we had a nice lunch at Gordon Ramsey's rotisserie!

On the table, there were pickles.  Instead of bread, you get pickles.  I didn't have any, but Spousal Unit said they were really good: crunchy, not too salty, not too vinegary.

Then we had our mains.  Spousal Unit had a 1/4 white meat rotisserie chicken with fries and coleslaw and I had tourtière.  Spousal Unit ate the salad that came with my tourtière and I had his fries.  They were damned good fries and it was a damned good tourtière.  It had cherries in it!

Throughout the meal, we kept seeing these slices of lemon meringue pie passing us, so we ordered lemon meringue pie for dessert.  Damned that was good!  The lemon part was a thick, creamy lemon curd.  I don't think I've ever had such a good lemon meringue pie.  This is like the time I was in Florida and had key lime pie at this upscale restaurant and then I could never have key lime pie ever again.  

The End of The Meal

After our lunch, we went next door to meet Irene for a coffee at Juliette et Chocolat.  We had a cappuccinos and a brownie ("Le Balsamico").  Again:  Damned that was good!  

Irene and I both took pictures of the cups.  Guess whose picture is whose.

Cappucino Study

I took a picture of cups.