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| - Okay. When it comes to restaurants, there's the good solid local places (Gracia Afrika is one, Mango Bay is another, Rotisserie Romados does a great job as well) and then there are the places that are transformative - it makes you forget where you are.
Take for instance, Agrikol. Win Butler and Regine Chassagne from Arcade Fire are partial owners, and the other partners are well-known restauranteurs in Toronto. The menu is Haitian - Chassagne's former homeland. The menu is expensive for the rather small portion size. The cocktails are just as pricey as the entrees. Yet, I will have no issues recommending this place for Montreal visitors. Why?
It's -2C outside and there is a pile of snow on Amherst street. Across the street is a tired looking casse-croute serving the same old shit. This place looks like a shabby pink and white townhouse. It's 5:56p and there is already a crowd forming up. Walk inside at 6p, there's merengue music, a gorgeous bar with carnival motifs all over, dual floor seating over a skylight, and the place looks like a townhouse in Port-au-Prince (or Havana) which allows you to have a conversation while the music plays on. The skylight allows natural light to flow in, and the white curtains cover any traces of the outside. Not that many restaurants in Montreal gives you the courtesy of not reminding you that you are here during the winter, where the price of 24 Stanley Cups is that you get to live in Father Winter's taint three months in a year.
How about the food? The cuisine here is pretty decent. If you go to ParkEx (or Flatbush in Brooklyn) and gun for the cheap Haitian you will get a large takeout container of something scooped off a steam table, and who knows how long ago it was made. Here, everything tastes freshly made. The Lambi (conch) is tender without being mushy, and the shrimp is just right (not rubbery) with a bit of veggies tossed in. Good plantains as well. The Mais moulu is a decent short rib stew with a polenta corn cake on the bottom, and lovely hass avocado on the side. The accras are familiar to anyone who ever had a hush puppy or an acaraje. It's a chickpea based fritter with some onions and spices inside, and goes well with their homemade mayo. The mayo also receive some of the bang-and-lift from the house relish.
Ah, that container of relish - it's basically cabbage and carrots pickled in a delicious jar of clear napalm - the Haitians calls it Pikliz, but restaurants in NYC simply call it "sauce". It's pure tropical fire - the product of shallots, thyme, cloves, lime and a few scotch bonnet peppers, and made in-house. Me and my wife polished off half a jar, and frankly, if we can bring it across the border back to NYC, we will.
As for the service, it's fast paced but warm and courteous, which you won't get in most Haitian joints.
The drinks are fairly expensive, but they do use top-shelf mixers. When my wife ordered the Coconut cocktail it was made with Appleton estates 12, coconut cream, passion fruit and Mandarin orange juice. Quite a nice smooth combination and rather deadly as well.
Yes it's expensive, yes the portions are small, but I'll totally go back again.
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