Gelati in Old Montreal

Les Delices de l'Erable at 84 Rue St Paul west in Old Montreal is as its name implies a retailer of all things maple. But what we love about the place is it gelati counter. They of course always have a few that contain maple syrup (or maple chunks...one of my favorites) but they have a wide assortment of fabulous fruit gelatis (today's strawberry was incredible and jerry always loves the 2 scoops for price of 1 coconut gelati). We've been going there for years and have noticed that they have a reduced assortment these days (we really miss the meringue ice cream they used to sell in the summer) and they sometimes run out before they close in the evening. Hope this is just a temporary glitch and not a sign of financial issues, because their closing would be a true loss to the neighborhood.

So if you are out and about in Old Montreal, do me a favor. Get yourself to Les Delices de L'Erable and have yourself a couple 0f scoops...you'll thank me for it!

Rain Stopped, We Rose in Search of Food

What a great evening after a dreary day. Due to rain and wind, we decided to forgo participating in the Grand Masquerade Parade (more on this later) instead opting for dinner somewhere cozy. We headed out to the Notre Dame West area we explored the other afternoon. In a single block area (the 2500 block) there are 4 restaurants: Joe Beef, Liverpool (with as yet no sign...but no table either...they were booked for the evening...so who needs a sign?), Limon (a Mexican restaurant) and La Toulousaine "maison du Cassoulet" (house of the cassoulet). Joe Beef and Liverpool were booked so we opted for la Toulousain and lucked out. A cozy place that reminded us of little neighborhood bistros in Paris. Annette had the house speciality cassoulet (du Languedoc). A cassoulet is a long-cooked stew (about 10 hours) made with white beans and in this case duck, pork, garlic sausage and a sausage from the Laguedoc region. It was EXCELLENT. Annette can't wait to come back on a cold, snowy day and enjoy that dish again. Jerry had bavette du boeuf (steak that we think was pan fried/braised with a shallot/burgundy wine reduction). As Jerry said he likes a restaurant where they actually cook not just heat the meat up! After dinner we headed back to Old Montreal for some gelati from our favorite (outside of Italy) gelati store...Les Delices de L'erable (maple delicacies, it's other offering are desserts made from maple syrup and maple syrup, naturally). We were expecting more people in Costumes as the Grand Masquerade was supposed to be on...well it turned out it had been rain delayed (so a good thing we went to eat!). We walked a few blocks and found the parade
just starting.



AND we are talking a wonderfully BIZARRO parade...creepy costumes...choreographed zombies of all sorts. i think my dalmatian coat costume would have looked as dorky as this fellow in the scooby doo outfit at the end of the parade.

Most were a bit more ghoulish: