Becoming Québécois 101: Cabane à Sucre

With spring slowly approaching, so does the season for extracting the sap of maple syrup. After finding out that a sugar cabin (cabane à sucre) called le Chalet des Érables is opened while I’m back in Montreal for reading week, le bf and I decided to drive out to Sainte-Anne-des-Plaines, a city in southwestern Quebec, to check it out.

A sugar cabin, also known as a sugar shack, consists of a series of cabins where sap collected from sugar maple trees is boiled into maple syrup.
Historically, sugar houses were a tradition introduced to New France by settlers of Swiss and Normand origin in the 17th century. The purpose was to produce delicious syrup for trade and for personal use during the Winter. After the British conquest of 1763, the tradition was spread to the Ontario, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia but remained the only family-related tradition in Quebec.

Though I’ve already visited one other cabane à sucre near Montreal before, I was very excited about this one since their website boast of having various animals :D

Upon arrival, our first stop was the reception hall, where lunch was being served.

Inside the salle à manger

Rustic decorations with the light

The quality of the food wasn’t too refined (kind of expected since it’s all-you-can-eat), and the portions were big for the two of us. Still, it’s worth to try it at least once in my opinion. All the dishes are complemented by maple syrup, which were freshly produced on-site.

All-you-can-eat lunch:
Bread, pea soup, sausage and ham in maple syrup, oreilles de crisse (fried smoked pork jowls) with eggs, potatoes, salted bacon, baked beans, ice cream sugar tart

Le bf really liked the oreilles de crisse (the brown crispy things with the eggs), and we originally thought they were made from bits of bacon. After researching afterwards, I found out that oreilles de crisse, a traditional Quebec dish, is made of deep-fried smoked pork jowls, traditionally topped with maple syrup.
An interesting piece of knowledge that came with it:
The word crisse is the Quebec French profanity word for “Christ”. So the name of the dish literally translates to “Christ’s ears”! Sounds delicious, doesn’t it? :P

After lunch, I wanted to go see the animals, but not before we make a stop at the wooden stand outside for some maple taffy (tire sur la neige).

Maple taffy is made by boiling maple sap past the point where it would form maple syrup, but not so long that it becomes maple butter or maple sugar. It’s part of traditional culture in Quebec. It’s poured onto the snow and then lifted with a small wooden stick and eaten as a snack.

Tire sur la neige (maple taffy)

Yummmy!

We kept coming back to the taffy stand, le bf ate a totally of 6 tire sur la neige! That’s how good the maple syrup was :D

I found out that the best way to bond with the animals was to offer them food. Good thing I smuggled some bread from the dining halls from lunch :P

All the deer came after they saw I had food

The biggest deer of the herd, he kept pushing the others out of the way to get bread from me

Mama sheep protecting her babies

Timid baby lambs

My new goat friend: Goat-migo!

 
I became fast friends with the goat, I swear by the end of our visit he could recognize me. He really liked thebread I gave him and kept stand up with his front legs on the ledge. I almost thought he was going to follow us home!

He’s attempting to eat my coat!

One of the baby goats (:

Looking kinda derpy :P

This alpaca needs some combing

—–
The visit to the llama and alpaca was not so enjoyable for le bf. I’m not sure if he did something to irritate the llama, but he spat on le bf, twice!
(Maybe he didn’t spit on me since I gave him bread? :P)

The llama likes bread

Where all the maple syrup comes from

Adventures near the Old Port: La Banquise, Ice Fishing, La Maison du Macaron

Since I had a week from school for reading week, I had time to come to Montreal and do some of the fun stuff that le bf and I have been wanting to do for ages!

We kinda had to pack a few places to go within a Sunrday since le bf still had to work during the weekdays. So to be efficient, everything we did that day was located near the Old Port.

Starting off with brunch at Poutine La Banquise, which is a restaurant specializing in, of course, the French Canadian delicacy: poutine!
Located on 994 Rachel Street East, this casual restaurant is opened 24 hours and serves 25 different types of poutines.
As we arrived, there was already a line of people forming outside the store. Luckily the queue progressed quickly and we were inside and seated within 15 minutes.

We picked 2 different regular sized ones: La Miam and La Danse, they were both delicious! Le bf and I both preferred La Miam though, since it had a heavier flavor and various different ingredients in the toppings.

La Miam: ground beef, merguez sausages, onions, tomatoes & swiss cheese

La Danse: chicken, onions, bacon, pepper sauce

So happy with food :D

Note: These are only regular sized dishes! If you’re REALLY hungry or with a group of people, you can always go for the large size (:

We overestimated the size of our stomachs and had to pack the rest to go. The leftovers made a good dinner after being reheated though :D

Afterwards, with full tummies we felt ready to do some ice fishing at the Ice Fishing Village (Village de Pêche Blanche) on the Old Port.

After getting our fishing permits from the reception, we were assigned a tent and given various equipment: a fishing rod, a bucket full of live baits, and a sifter to filter out ice.

Our bucket full of baits

I was a bit worried beforehand about standing hours on a lake at -20C. However, upon entering our tent, I was pleasantly surprised by the heater and little chairs that were inside. 4 holes were drilled inside the tent, and 2 were outside. Though inside the tent it wasn’t as warm as it is in a house, it was a lot better than having to stand outside with the wind chills.

Inside of our tent (#15)

I was surprised that they had given us little fish as bait, and couldn’t bear the thought of having to put hooks through their tiny, writhing bodies ): Fortunately le bf was there to do the necessary tasks.

Ready to do some fishin’!

We stayed for about 2 hours, and decided to leave as the sun was starting to set and we were getting hungry. Though we didn’t catch anything, I was able to convince le bf to let me free the rest of the bait fish, so it wasn’t a total lost :D

Sunset by the Old Port

We decided to go to La Maison du Macaron for some tasty desserts before heading back home.

Sortilège: Frais et parfumé, ce mélange réunit le thé vert pencha aux parfums des fruits exotiques, papaye et
mangue. des notes sucrées et fraîches.
suggéré : en accompagnement des desserts à base de fruits… $3.10

Miam! : Macaron garni d’un crémeux au citron et de framboises fraîches… $6.75

Mûre-mûre: Pâte sablée, crème légère à la pulpe de mûre, morceaux de mûres fraîches, mousse à la purée de marron, confit à la pulpe de mûre… $11.50

Just a couple of macarons for the road:

Macaron du mois: Rose
fraise & rhubarbe:
Biscuit macaron bicolore parsemé de sucre rouge garni d’une ganache aux pulpes de fraise et
rhubarbe

I have to say, even though Ladurée is still my favorite brand for macarons, the ones from La Maison du Macaron were really good!

Ristorante Portovino – Company Christmas Dinner

So my dad’s company decided to have a fancy dinner at the Italian restaurant Ristorante Portovino.
There were a lot of people going, so we had a custom-made menu which included: the antipasto, a choice between 2 main courses (salmon or ossobuco), and dessert (cannoli, chocolate mousse, or crème brûlée) with coffee or tea.

I was surprised at how big the portion of the antipasto was, luckily it was meant to be shared between 4 people. I liked that there were a variety of different things to choose from from the plate, and I particularly enjoyed the smoke salmon and prosciutto and honeydew.

Antipasto – Crispy calamari, smoked salmon, bocconcini, Italian tomatoes, capicollo, salami, prosciutto, grilled Italian sausage, honeydew and cantaloupe, capuccine capers, olives, roasted peppers and marinated eggplants

Salmone Alla Griglia Mediterraneo – Fresh grilled Atlantic salmon, topped with a mixture of cold pressed olive oil, lemon juice, fresh oregano and garlic.

I picked the ossobuco without really knowing what it was. Though I don’t usually order red meat at restaurants (I’m more of a seafood kinda gal), I was glad the I accidentally made this mistake this time. The meat was so tender that it felt like it was melting in my mouth. And as it was my first time eating ossobuco, it was interesting for me to eat the bone marrows with the tiny spoon that came with the dish.

Ossobuco Alla Milanaise – Quebec milk fed veal shank braised in its own juices with tomatoes, fine herbs and white wine, garnished with gremolata.

The portions of the desserts were quite small, but I was happy to get to get a taste of all 3 different kinds (:

Dessert: Cannoli Portovino

Dessert: Chocolate Mousse

Dessert: Crème brûlée

We were even each given a box of Lindt chocolate at the end :D

Lindt Gourmet Truffles

How was everyone’s Christmas food adventures?
Omnomnom (:

Follow me to Florida: Christmas Edition

New additions to the Follow Me series in the Around the World section, featuring photos on my second trip to Florida this year with le bf.
This was my first time spending Christmas holidays in a tropical climate since I’ve lived in Taiwan as a child! Gotta say, it felt a tad weird for the Canadian in me to see Christmas ornaments and lights hanging on palm trees :P
Overall it was awesome not to be freezing in the -20 something Celsius in Montreal though!

“Asia”, Disney’s Animal Kingdom, Orlando, USA

And more updates from the holidays will come out soon, I promise (:

Authentic French pastry since 1952: Duc de Lorraine

Now that I finally have some time to do some posts after the whole midterms/assignments/Halloween madness (this is what university student life does to you), I realized that I haven’t done a review for Duc de Lorraine, one of my favorite pastry shops located at Côte-des-Neiges, Montréal.
I’ve actually been there twice already in late August. Both times we got the patio seat on the big sofas, with a nice view of the famous Saint Joseph’s Oratory :D

The first time I was there with my sister, my mom, and some friends of my mom. The waiter was very attentive, he came over and sat down beside us to explain everything on the menu before we ordered. While waiting for our food to arrive, my sister and I couldn’t resist the urge to snoop inside the store as we saw a lot of pretty desserts inside.

Just to show a few:

Paris Brest: made of choux pastry and a praline flavoured cream

Assortment of tarts

Religieuse: made of two choux pastry cases, one larger than the other, filled with crème pâtissière, mostly commonly chocolate or mocha

We wanted to try all the desserts! However, as it turned out, we’ve ordered more than enough food, so we didn’t end up getting the desserts.

Nom ALL the foods!

House Salad

Salmon salad

Assiette de charcuterie | Meat plate

Assiette de formage | Cheese plate

I really liked one of the cheeses: La Tomme de Savoie aux Mare, from Savoie in the French Alps. It is a mild, semi-firm cow’s milk cheese. This one in particular had a fruity taste (the black stuff on top are dried fermented grapes I believe).

Tomme de Savoie aux Mare

The 5 of us (all females) kept asking for refills of baguettes (which were free) to go with the cheese and charcuterie. I’m pretty sure that’s why our waiter recognized me the second time I went there :P

My second visit was with my family and le bf (who had invited them to celebrate receiving his work visa :D). This time we finally got the chance to try some of the desserts, which were really good as well!

Left top to bottom right: meat and cheese plate, grilled cheese baguette, ham and cheese quiche, opera cake, mousse aux fruits, tiramisu

All in all, this is a good place to go to if you’re in the mood to experience some real French food and European atmosphere (all of their staff are actually from France)!

Bon omnomnomage to all you foodies out there♥

Restaurant Français: Le Surcouf

Sorry for the lack of updates recently, since I’ve been done exams I’ve been on holiday mode and finally enjoying the joys of being a lazy bum and hanging around all day just chilling :P

Since le bf and I are leaving for our Florida trip soon (TOMORROW!), we decided to have a dinner with him and my family before (treat of le lovely bf, might I add (: ).

We landed on choosing the French restaurant Le Surcouf, located on the island of Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue. We discovered it one day after having lunch in the area, the quaint appearance of the restaurant caught our eye (also their sign advertised a 3 course meal for $25:P ), so we went in to take a look at their menu. I fell in love with the interior decor and atmosphere immediately.

Interior view of the restaurant

So the 5 of us (le bf, me, my sister, my parents) decided to order 4 of their Formule bistro, which is a set menu offered on Sunday to Thursday nights.

We were delighted when they served the Amuse-Bouche, which my parents weren’t expecting since they’re not familiar with the courses of a French meal.

L’Amuse-bouche: mousse au avocat / avocado mousse

The white objects on the couscous that I thought were so sort of fruit (like pear slices) at first glance turned out to be big pieces of scallops. I really liked the contrasting textures of the grainy couscous and the soft scallops.

Entrée (Appetizer): La suprise du chef – Couscous with scallops

Entrée (Appetizer): Salade

We asked for medium rare for the steak. The blue cheese sauce was delicious, and the portion was hearty. I highly recommend this for all the meat-lovers.

Plat Principal (Main Course): Bavette de boeuf sauce Roquefort (Beef bavette with blue cheese sauce)

Plat Principal (Main Course): Pavé de thon grillé, sauce vierge aux tomates sèches et olives noires (Grilled tuna with sundried tomatoes and black olive salsa)

Plat Principal (Main Course): Croquette de confit de canard sur verdure (Duck confit croquette on mixed greens)

Dessert: Crème caramel

Dessert: Sorbet

Dessert: des fruits

Dessert: Mousse au chocolat

La Mignardise: Cholocat covered orange slices

Le bf and I

Papa and Mama Chen

All in all, a very satisfying and sophisticated meal, my parents were quite impressed and are already planning to come back again.
Also, We were lucky we only ordered 4 portions instead of 5, it would have definitely been too much!

Finally, a giant pepper grinder found in the restaurant to end this post:

It’s literally half my size!

Bon omnomnomage everyone! (:

ALL the foods!

Some adventures with food from my Montreal weekend:

We went to one of my all-time favorite Lebanese restaurant, Poissonnerie & Restaurant Rayan, located in Côte-des-Neiges for some fresh seafood.
The cool thing about this restaurant is that you get to pick from the display case the food what you want to order, tell them how you want it to be made, and then they cook it right away after. Therefore the food is not only fresh, but they’re also very flexible with adjusting the portion, since the price is measure by weight.

The dressing was really good!

A whole grilled fish with spices

Sauteed shrimps with onions

Aside from the meat of the fish being a bit dry (since we ordered it to be grilled), everything was delicious. I think we ordered a bit too much though, since aside from the salad, the shrimps, and the fish, we also ordered a slice of salmon, and sweet potato fries. Luckily my dad and le bf were more skilled at me and my mom at omnomnoming all the foods :D

Afterwards we went to St. Joseph’s Oratory, which was just around the block, for a small post-meal hike.

St. Joseph Oratory: Canada’s largest church

Beautiful sunset view from St. Joseph

And then there was date night with le bf at Casa Grecque, the night before I had to come back to Waterloo (:
It was lovely sitting outside on the patio, while listening to the street artists sing on the sidewalk.

Salad, bread, soup, and we brought our own wine!

The steak and grill platter for 2

Hope you guys had an awesome weekend full of noms too! <3

A Day With Nature: Biodôme & Jardin Botanique

As promised, this an update from my adventures in Montreal on the weekend of July 12th.

Le bf and I decided visit some touristy places that he hasn’t been to yet: Biodôme & Jardin Botanique!
Though I’ve already been to Biodôme before I was still super excited since I love looking at all the animals :D

The picture-perfect Tour de Montréal

Riding frogs at the entrance

The Biodôme allows visitors to walk through replicas of four ecosystems found in the Americas:
Section 1) The Tropical Forest is a replica of the South American rainforest.

The world’s largest rodent, the capybara, and its duck friend (:

Sparkly piranhas… not as dangerous looking as I expected

Little black monkey (Goeldi’s marmoset) jumping over our heads!

The golden lion tamarin, one of the cutest animals in the dome :3

I wonder how these birds hide from their predators being so brightly colored?

Section 2) The Laurentian Forest is a replica of the North American wilderness.

It is gathering wood to bring back to its house. These are some well-fed beavers :P

Section 3) The Saint Lawrence Marine Eco-system is an estuary habitat modelled on the Gulf of Saint Lawrence.

I’m strangely drawn by the creatures under the sea

I thought it was cute, le bf though it looked like Gollum LOL

Section 4) A polar area that is divided into Arctic and Antarctic.

Being penguins in the Arctics :D

Their cute little waddle reminds me of Happy Feet (:

On our way out we found this giant bird just chilling at the exit. No big deal. I really wanted to touch it!

After taking a small food break in the Biodôme cafeteria, we headed towards the Botanical Garden. The day was glorious and the sun was blazing. After 10 minutes of walking, though I was all sweaty from the heat, I was pleasanlty surprised to see all the big plant sculptures from the Montreal International Mosaicultures (MIM) 2013 Show Exhibition. 50 participants from 30 different countries are showcasing their works which reflects the different cultures of their countries, using the theme of Land of Hope as an inspiration while incorporating several sub-themes:
– Interdependence of man and nature
– Humankind’s positive actions for the environment
– Species and ecosystems that are endangered or at risk
– Nature in the urban environment
– Beauty and fragility of life on earth

Here are some photos of the ones I liked, taken during our 3 hour walk in the humongous garden:

Belgium • Province of Hainaut •
The Insects’ Garden

Aquatic Garden

United States • Atlanta • Fragile Frogs!

China • Shanghai • A True Story!

Japan • Tokyo-Shibuya • Hachiko, the Loyal Dog

1 Japan • Hamamatsu • Hamamatsu, City of Creativity: Looking Toward the Future Through a Symbiosis of Man and Nature

Canada • Val d’Or • Near the City of Gold

Spotted this little guy on the road in Shade Garden. He doesn’t look impressed.

Chile • Easter Island • Guardians of the Island

Canada • Montréal • Spirits of the Wood – Coventina

England • (Heather Jansch) • Hope and Odyssey

Canada • Montréal • Mother Earth

France • Comesse’s Butterfly

Malaysia • Hands Up!

Malaysia • Hands Up!

Canada • WWF • Ambassadors of Hope

Japan • Okinawa • Small Clownfish and Anemone

It was too hot to keep the shirt on :P

Canada • Montréal (Albert Mondor) • The Garden of Glass and Meta

Canada • Verdun • Upheaval

Canada • Repentigny • The Bridge Between Generations

France • Department of Moselle • Memories of a Childhood Dinner

Canada • Nunavut Cape Dorset • Nanuk

Madagascar • All in a Row

Canada • Mercier–Hochelaga-Maisonneuve and Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie • The Heart Tree

Canada • Montréal • The Man who Planted Trees

The exhibit is open until September, so I highly recommend who ever happens to be in Montreal to go visit it. Not only are all the sculptures beautifully made, each of them come with a small story describing the meaning of the work, which was interesting to read. Plus, since the sculptures are quite sparsely spread, you can easily spend 2-3 hours walking around, which is quite the work out! (My legs were sore for 2 days straight after lol)

My number one (:

Follow Me to Montreal

Some new Follow Me photos up from my weekend trip back to Montreal, featuring Biodôme and other awesome places (:

I’ll probably try to do a post soon with more photos, there were quite a bit since it was a beautiful weekend and we spent a good amount of time visiting places. So stay tuned!

Mot du Jour

So despite of my incessant attempts of keeping my French up to level, it’s true that I felt that recently I feel my French slowly slipping away as I’m trapped as a busy computer science student in the English-speaking Waterloo for another month before returning back to Montreal.

Fortunately my caring bf has agreed to teach me a word everyday to help with this endeavor, which I would like to share with everyone. Hopefully it’ll help me to better remember it (:

To start off of this new trend of mine:

Canicule (nf)  

   (=chaleur)   scorching heat

   (=vague de chaleur)   heat wave

   Ex. On dit que ce sera la canicule la semaine prochaine!

Fellow Me :)

Mini update in the Around the World section from the weekend trip in Montreal a couple of weeks ago. I liked how they turned out :D

Vieux Port, Montreal, QC, Canada

Foodporn for Daddy’s Day

We couldn’t do much on Father’s Day this year due to the pouring rain, and since I was leaving Montreal to go back to Waterloo the next day. So we decided to just go low-key and grab dinner at the Bâton-Rouge near my house. It was my first time trying this restaurant, and everything was quite delicious. The portions were pretty big though, we couldn’t finish all the desserts! (Which was surprising to me since le bf is an eating-machine :P)

Salad: Caesar Salad

Soup: Canadian Cheddar

And the boys love their meat:

Daddy: Prime Rib

Le bf: BBQ Pork Back Ribs and Chicken

Mommy & I: Two-Tail Nova Scotia Lobster Dinner

I shared a lobster main course that was on their featured menu, the portion was more than enough since we were all sharing our plats between the 4 of us anyways (there were so much fries!)

Dessert: Mango Cheese Cake

Dessert: Heavenly Cheese Cake Trio

Leo the Cat

So as I promised my lovely sister, I’m featuring her cat Leo on the blog today!
As you can see he’s quite fashionable, dressed in a pink Polo shirt and all.
This shirt is actually made for human babies… I guess you could say that Leo could lose a few pounds :P

Polo cat!

Food Porn

I had the most delicious tiramisu and cheese cake at this cute vintage coffee shop called Brûlerie St-Denis on Côte-des-Neiges:

I miss real food like this now that I’m back to school :(

Then Vs Now

Our attempt at one of those then-versus-now photos that are oh-so-popular these days :)

Check out the Photography section for more photos!

Canada’s not too shabby either, eh?

Spent a pleasant afternoon walking in the Parc du Centenaire in Dollard-des-Ormeaux (: