This weekend, we had a mini getaway to Montreal with one main mission - eat! We enjoyed the sunny weather on Saturday as we ventured to Mont Royal and Old Montreal to seek out the city's specialties - from bagels to poutine.



1. St. Viateur Bagel & Cafe Mont Royal - Montreal's famous bagels made in-house. I had the Poulet Sesame Bagel - love the toasted bagel with hint of sweetness. Chicken was bland; the Moo-Moo (roast beef) and MTL smoked meat with mustard were better. The beef & barley soup of the day was great. A cute little cafe and love how you can see the production of the bagels.

2. Point G Macarons - Pretty, affordable macarons and many unique flavors to choose from. The texture is so delicate and soft without falling apart in your mouth, with just a slight crunch in the shell. My favorite was the Tire D'Erable (maple) - didn't think I'd like this one but it had a strong maple flavor without being overly sweet.

3. Les Delices D'Erables - All maple errything at Maple Delights - maple body cream, maple dressing, etc. Happy to have found tire d'erable sur neige - rolled my own maple taffy on snow along with some maple cappucinos.





4. Ferreira - Amazing Portugese seafood in a romantic setting. Mom's go-to place. The best seafood rice - rice was a bit hard for my liking but the sauce was amazing. Scallops and shrimp were perfectly cooked and meaty. We also enjoyed the Bouillabaisse and grilled seafood in a garlic-parsley sauce (fresh octopus, fish, lobster) Dessert was warm fig cake and sweet potato icecream - delicious. Not much sweet potato flavor but instead gingerbread-cinnamon notes.

5. Cacao 70 - Mom's favorite dark chocolate fondue with fruit, fluffy waffles, and rich dense brownies. Long wait!! but worth to try since Toronto doesn't have a good fondue.

Day 2:

6. Humble Lion - A nice cappucino and breakfast granola bar at an independent coffee shop.

7. La Banquise - A 24h poutine heaven. Suprisingly not too heavy, I enjoyed La B.O.M (bacon, onion, merguez sausage - love the sausage!) and B liked his hamburger steak. We then ordered a second poutine - La Miam (ground beef, Swiss cheese, onion, tomato, sausage). The only bad thing is they charge mandatory 15% tips. Also, there was a long line up outside but it was for take-out so better to ask!

All in all, a wonderful satisfying getaway to MTL! Everything was delicious and enjoyed with great company :)

 

Belgian truffle prep

Final products - After decorating Belgian & North American truffles - messy but fun

Last Tuesday, I attended the Truffle Making 101 Workshop courtesy of Chocolate Tales. We made three types of truffles - Belgian, French and North American. It was fun! We started with Belgian truffle - first filled the chocolate molds with white chocolate then put in the fridge for 5-10 minutes. Then we capped it with dark chocolate, refrigerate again, and then roll two layers of chocolate and decorate white white and pink drizzle. These were surprisingly good and not too sweet - liquid smooth chocolate inside with hard dark chocolate coating.