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| - LOL. How to describe this place.
I was wandering around Montreal with a friend, and we decided that we were really hungry. It wasn't quite dinner-time, so we thought that we'd share a paella, wander around some more, the get the real dinner.
When we entered the completely empty restaurant, there was a dude, clearly a staff, chilling in the corner. He ignored us, we stood awkwardly for about 5 minutes, when another dude (probably the owner) came out of the kitchen, and directed us to a table.
We asked him how big a typical paella was. He indicated with his hands, "Pretty big." So we ordered one paella and one appetizer to share. Then he told us that actually, no, the paellas are very small, and we would never be full with just one paella. We told him that it was just a snack (pointing out that it was barely 4pm). Then he told us that the paella that we chose wasn't as good as this other paella that he would like to recommend to us. He of course pointed to the most expensive paella on the menu, but oh boy, were we onto you!
We declined his recommendation, at which point he continued to press various other appetizers on us. We declined all of them (go us!), at which point he sulked into the kitchen.
The bread that came with the meal was cold and greasy, the appetizer (garlic shrimp) was pretty good, but then the paella was disastrous. The mussels in the paella weren't cleaned properly, and I could see the beard hanging off of them. Gross! The flavours were so bland and we were both disappointed. We ended up leaving more than half the food on the "tiny" paella. When we were done, the owner-dude came with a big fake condescending smile, asking if we would like the dessert, and that he would give it to us for free.
There was something very untrustworthy about it, so we declined, paid and got out of there as soon as possible. That was definitely new but not an experience that I'd like to repeat!
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