Le Cartet Restaurant Review

*Sorry I’ve been a bit scarce lately, The Husband was really sick for the past two weeks and I’ve been playing nursemaid and doing the housework. But happily he is back on the mend so I should be back to my regular blogging frequency. :)

This past Saturday I went out with my friend Roxy and we ended up going to Le Cartet for brunch in Old Montreal. The place is surprisingly big and bright and they have a small section of food made to take out and some gourmet products.

When we arrived we waited around 5 minutes which wasn’t bad for a Saturday at 11 am. I had tried to call ahead to try make reservations but they don’t take them, ditto for a few other places I tried to call for brunch.

I’m a sucker for small details so I though that it was cute that the water came in a glass bottle. What can I say, when it comes to glassware I am easily impressed.

While their menu has a la carte items like French toast the highlight is a large set price meal with includes drinks and a “starter”, which was what we both ended up ordering.

To being we were served a square of bread pudding each. I really can’t say that I am a connoisseur of bread pudding but Roxy said it was good. It was cold which I found off putting but it wasn’t too sweet which was nice since I don’t like a sugar rush at breakfast.

The set price meal comes with freshly squeezed orange juice which was so good. The concept of juicing is sort of moot in Montreal unless you want to spend 6 dollars on fruit for one glass. Alas, fruit, especially citrus is very expensive here for the vast majority of the year. One time in the middle of winter I bought a small bag of cherries for which I ended up paying 13 bucks. Trust me, I almost choked after watching the cashier scan it through and seeing the price.

The meal also included a cup of Illy coffee. I had always read that Illy coffee is amazing but I found that it was just ok. It almost tasted like they had not used the right proportion of coffee grounds to water though. It took 15 minutes for us to get served coffee which did not impress me. In general we had a hard time flagging down the waiter for service even though we were in a table near the front, close to the kitchen counter.

I ended up ordering the “Le Cartet” brunch which included potatoes, ham, bacon, sausage, scrambled eggs, toast, butter, jam and some fresh fruit.

The savoury part of my meal was served in a super hot mini cast iron pan which was nice since eggs can cool down very quickly and the pan kept kept my meal nice and warm.

Roxy ordered the brunch “L’Atlantique” which came with a salmon croquette with an herbed yogurt sauce, a small salad, some fresh fruit, a dried fig, two kinds of cheese, a croissant filled with ham and an egg. Check out the photo that she took on the first try. My friend Roxy has an encyclopaedic knowledge of Montreal restaurants, maybe one of these days I’ll talk her into becoming a food blogger. Since I thought my meal had too much meat and she thought that hers had too little we ended up swapping items so we each had a taste of everything. Here are my notes on the different items:

-The eggs were ok, nothing special. I like mine either poached or cooked low and slow if scrambled. You could tell that these were cooked rather quickly on high heat.

-The meats were all good quality and cooked really well. The bacon in particular was nice and crispy.

-The beans tasted homemade since they didn’t have that awful cloying taste of canned beans and they did a good job of cutting the richness of the meat in my meal.

-The potatoes could have been more crispy but I suppose breakfast potatoes are always on the soft side.

-The bread was ok, but it was completely cold when it came to the table.

-The fruit was good quality considering that none of it was in season. It was a slice of kiwi, a slice of cantaloupe, a strawberry and some pineapple. I can’t eat pineapple or kiwi so unfortunately half of the fruit went to waste.

-The croissant was buttery and flaky and a perfect pairing with the ham. I had some of the cheese and it was nice an sharp.

-I really liked the salmon croquette. Roxy is not a fish person so I ended up with most of it and happily drenched it with the yogurt sauce. I could taste potatoes in it as well. It was breaded but didn’t taste deep fried or greasy.

All in all the food was tasty and the ingredients were of good quality. We both paid around 18 dollars with tax and tip which is a pretty decent price considering that it includes coffee and freshly squeezed orange juice. The service really could be improved since it shouldn’t take 15 minutes to get a cup of coffee at a brunch place. Overall I was happy though and will probably go back eventually.

I’ll leave you guys with some pictures that I took while we were walking around Old Montreal.

del.icio.us Tags: Brunch,Le Cartet

Homemade Gyros

I love Greek food but I don’t get to have it often. A few weeks ago I stumbled upon an Alton Brown recipe for Gyros and decided to try it (you can find it here). Honestly, Gyros was one of those things that I never thought about making at home since the meat is usually cooked on a vertical roasting spit but this recipe calls for making a meat loaf which suits me a lot more.

To start off with: garlic, dried marjoram, rosemary, oregano, salt, pepper and grated onions. Make sure to wring your grated onions in a dishcloth or else they will give off too much liquid and the meatloaf might not hold together well.

After I had mixed the ground lamb in I put it on a baking sheet to cook. When making meat loaf I usually put a rack on top of a baking sheet, cover it with aluminum foil, spray it with Pam and then poke small holes into the foil. This allows the air to circulate better and the fat to fall down below.

While that was in the oven I started on the tzatziki sauce. You grate a cucumber and then wring it out in a dishcloth to get the liquid out. Keep in mind that the longer you leave the sauce in the fridge the better it will taste so if you can make it ahead of time do so.

Then you add Greek yogurt, salt, pepper, lots of garlic, lemon juice and mint. I also added dill afterwards.

All mixed together.

All gyros need tomatoes, cucumbers and sliced red onions as an accompaniment.

I actually have a rather hard time finding Greek pita bread at my supermarket, they tend to usually just have flat Middle Eastern style pita but this weekend I was in luck.

I put in a meat thermometer into the lamb to make sure it was cooked properly. Some of the juices puddled on top of the meat which looks a bit weird in the picture but the meatloaf was cooked through.

One big difference between this recipe and the gyros you will get in a restaurant is that the meat in these is a lot less dense so you will have to cut the meatloaf in fairly thick slices so it doesn’t fall apart.

To assemble them I cut two slices of meat, piled them along with some tomatoes, onions and cucumbers on top of a warmed pita bread (I just microwaved them for 10 seconds) and spooned on some tzatziki sauce.

These were good. I was really craving Greek food so I was really happy with these. The flavour of the meat is pretty much spot on what you will get in a restaurant. The texture is of course different but it is still tasty which is what counts. I piled on more tzaziki sauce after I took this picture since it is pretty much my favourite part of eating gyros. With the garlic and the raw onions this is not first date food but happily I am married so I get to eat smelly food whenever I please. This was surprisingly fast to make, the prep was maybe 15 minutes in total and it is a very easy recipe to make for a crowd since it doubles easily.

del.icio.us Tags: Greek Food,Gyros

Flourless Nut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

This past weekend I had a craving for chocolate chip cookies in the evening but I didn’t feel like dragging out the mixer and making a huge mess. I had seen a gluten free cookie recipe in a magazine that week so I was inspired to try to make flourless chocolate chip cookies and came up with the following recipe. You cannot mess this up and it literally takes 5 minutes to put together with minimal mess. Within 20 minutes from start to finish you can be eating hot chocolate chip cookies out of the oven.

To start off you need a cup of your favourite nut butter. Because of the husband’s nut allergies I always end up soy nut butter but feel free to use whatever you want.

I decided to go with chocolate soy nut butter for extra chocolate.

Next you add between 3/4 to 1 cup of brown sugar. If you’re using unsweetened nut butter I would use a cup. Since I was using pre-sweetened soy nut butter I added 3/4 of a cup. If you want add a splash of vanilla extract. As well, you need 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda.

I also added roasted soy nuts.

And oats in addition to chocolate chips.

In total I added around a cup of extras. Feel free to add whatever you want: dried fruit, different nuts etc. I ended up using two eggs to help everything come together. If you want to add more than a cup of extras add a few more tablespoons of nut butter and another egg.

Everything all mixed together.

I then used my trusty mini ice cream scoop to make small cookies. They went in the oven at 350 Celsius for roughly 12 minutes until the edges started to brown.

Be careful not to overcook them since they can get hard very quickly.

 

I was pleasantly surprised by these cookies. They were nice and chewy and in spite of my fears that they wouldn’t come together they had a great texture. There are a lot of gluten intolerant people now and this would be a great recipe to make if you’re baking for someone who can’t have gluten. Most oats can contain traces of gluten so I would leave them out and add something else instead in that case. The fact that this recipe is so fast and easy to make is a huge plus. I’ve been bringing them to work as a snack and even after a few days they are still chewy.

del.icio.us Tags: Chocolate Chip Cookies,Gluten Free

Fried Mozzarella Sticks

While I love the finer things in life I am also an ardent fan of pub food. One of the things The Husband and I love are fried mozzarella sticks and I can confidently say that if you haven’t had one, you haven’t lived. They’re ridiculously easy to make and are an integral part of any sports related junk food menu.

 

First of all, obviously, a block mozzarella cut in finger width pieces. You could use cheddar but mozzarella is the standard for this recipe.

Next you set up your breading line: flour, eggs and bread crumbs.

For this recipe I actually used corn flake crumbs. Usually I am not the biggest fan because they have the faintest sweet flavour but they’re perfect for this since when fried they turn extra crispy. I also added dried parsley, salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder and paprika.

After breading the sticks I put them in the freezer for half an hour. You cannot skip this step or else you will end up with a puddle of melted cheese when you try to fry them. If you leave them in a little longer and they start to freeze you will still be ok.

I put in half an inch of oil in a pan and quickly fried my mozzarella sticks. They really do not take very long, 30 second tops per side. You have to watch them carefully so they neither melt nor burn.

Usually I make marinara sauce with this but this time we just ate them with chili sauce. These are rich, they are of course, solid cheese and even I can’t eat more than a couple at a time. The Husband, happily inhaled quite a few of these while watching the Superbowl. They are so good, crispy on the outside and gooey and melty on the inside. Best eaten hot soon after they come out of the pan.

del.icio.us Tags: Cheese,mozzarella sticks,superbowl

Pear, Blood Orange and Vanilla Bean Jam

They say that necessity is the mother of invention but sometimes cheapness can also do the trick. There is this artisanal jam that I love, but unfortunately it is super expensive for a teeny tiny jar that lasts for three meals. Given than 3$ dollars worth of jam per occasion is a little beyond my income bracket I decided to do the next best thing and make my own.

I remember my parents making jam after we had gone strawberry picking as a kid but I had always found the idea of sterilizing jars a bit daunting. Since I don’t have any of the equipment to make jam on a large scale I decided to make one jar’s worth and keep it in the fridge so I could skip the whole canning process.

I bought random pears and let them get super ripe then peeled, cored and sliced them. Pretty much any kind of pear will work, although maybe not so much Asian pears since they are less sweet.

I had originally planned to use grapefruit segments but since they had blood oranges at the supermarket, first time they’ve been on sale there, I decided to use them instead. As well I squeezed the juice of two lemons and added that to the pears.

I decided to zest the lemons, grapefruits and blood oranges and chuck that into the pot.

The blood orange segments.

Vanilla Beans.

I split the vanilla beans and scraped out the seeds and added them to the fruit. I also added the pods to the pot.

The sugar. I didn’t bother measuring it. I also added a splash of water.

I stirred the pot and let everything bubble away for half an hour or so. You’ll notice that I didn’t add any pectin. All fruit has pectin, some more than others and I just decided to depend on the pear’s natural pectin to thicken everything up.

My kitchen smelled amazing at this point, like the world’s best scented candle. I came back and stirred the pot every five minutes or so to make sure that nothing was sticking. I also gave it a taste at this point and added a bit more sugar.

I really should not have added that splash of water. The pears threw out more liquid than I had been expecting and after 45 minutes of cooking I was fretting that it was not thickening up enough. The husband suggested that I mash some of the fruit up to see if that would help.

Mashing everything seemed to do the trick. The blood oranges turned everything a nice pinkish-red colour and you can see all the flecks of vanilla seeds throughout the jam.

I cooked the jam until it was getting thick but was still fairly liquid as I knew it would thicken further as it cooled down.

I poured everything into a tall mason jar that I had and put it in the fridge. I decided to leave the pods in there to infuse the jam further.

Now that I know how easy and good making jam from scratch is I might quit buying it from the store. The flavour is excellent with a perfect mix of sweet citrus, mellow pear and fragrant vanilla. I’ve been eating it mixed into Greek yogurt for breakfast and on toast. I’ve had my bottle in the fridge for a couple of weeks and it is still keeping well. One word to all of you low cal people out there, do not try to make this kind of jam and skimp on the sugar as it helps to preserve food and prevent spoilage. Once I’m finished this bottle I am going to try experimenting with different flavour combinations, I’m thinking of trying raspberries and Grand Marnier next.

del.icio.us Tags: Jam