48 Hours in Quebec City - Part 2 - Visited 8/25-8/27/2017 2.5 - 3.5 Forks

Cassis Monna & Filles 721, Chemin Royal, Saint-Pierre-de-l'Île d'Orléans                           3.5 Forks

If you have the time, I would recommend that you rent a car while you are in Quebec City so that you can explore some of the other sites that are a short drive away.  One of the places that's talked about a lot is Ile de Orleans, which is their version of wine country.  But let me be clear, it is absolutely nothing like Sonoma or Nappa but if you set your expectations a bit lower, there are a few nice places to check out here.  It's fairly rural and much more spread out than Holly and I anticipated, so I recommend that you stop by Cassis Monna first to grab a bite to eat as well as to a map to plot out your way around the area.

While Ile de Orleans may not be on the same level of other vineyard towns, Cassis Monna and Filles is definitely unique in its own sense in that it's mainly focused on the black currant.  They have an adorable restaurant and ice cream shop on the first floor as well as a tasting room and small artisanal store down below where you can buy bottles of wine.  There are several picnic benches out back where you can relax and take in the lovely view of the river as well.  It's such a lush and relaxing setting to be surrounded by.

I never really thought of black currant very much but it's delicious.  The tasting we did was great and the store is something you would find in Brooklyn - lots of jams and other mason jar preservatives that I seriously contemplated buying.  As expected, the menu in the restaurant focuses on the black currant.   You can get salad with black currant, quiche with black currant, sandwiches with a black currant jam or a pulled pork sandwich with black current wine in it.  Holly and I opted for the popcorn chicken with black currant honey ($8 CAD).  It's essentially fried chicken bites and lots fries on the side - so it was a lot of fried action.  They were salty and addictive and I couldn't stop popping them in my mouth.  I felt like a kid again eating chicken fingers or nuggets for lunch.  It was served with salad that had black currant dressing but it was a bit too sticky and sweet for me.  I would have preferred a basic oil/vinegar dressing but I guess that's not what you go at a place like this.

Overall, the food was basically bar food with a cute twist to it.  The food isn't amazing by any stretch but the surrounding area is a lovely respite from the all the tourists (and yes, there are plenty of tourists here too) and it's worth trying out some of the sweet delicious wines. It's 3 forks for the food but 4 forks for the scenery and overall cuteness.  Total bill:  $20/pp with tax and tip

Photo Credit:  Yelp

Le Moine Echanson  585 Rue Saint-jean, Quebec City                                                             2.5 Forks

This review really breaks my heart because all the reviews online were so positive.  It's less of a full blown restaurant and more of a wine bar that serves tapas style food.  But the Yelp pictures and other blogs called it inventive and super creative.  Sadly when we went, it was a really suboptimal experience.  

As with most places in Quebec, the menu seemed to change daily based on what they have but for some reason the night we went they had practically nothing on the menu.  The menu looked a bit small to begin with but they only told us that they were out of 2 of the 4 entrees only after we sat down and ordered some wine.  When your menu only has 4 entrees and you're out of half of them, you should either say something before your guests sit down or go down to the market and figure something out asap.  It's not like we came at 11pm at night, we were there at 8pm on a Saturday when it should have been prime time but the place was barely full (should have been a sign) and the waiter had said that they had a unusually busy Friday so they were left with few options for Saturday.  That sounds like really poor planning to me.  

Similar to L'Affaire Est Ketchup, this place looks like its run by 3 guys in total but that's still not an excuse.  While it's mainly a wine bar, if you're going to have a food menu, you should ensure it's enough food to carry you through the night.  Since we had ordered wine we felt guilty getting up and leaving, so we ordered a few snacks to nibble on.  Unfortunately, we were so annoyed that nothing really sounded all that great.  I opted to get a half dozen oysters and then we also got the fried eggplant appetizer.  Holly asked if they had a meat and cheese plate since we saw it online and they said they could put something together (why not put that on the menu?!). 

I will say that the oysters were quite good and that's what carried this review.  I would have preferred them to have been chilled instead of at room temperature oysters but they were plump, briney and shucked well.  If I knew my night was going to consist of only oysters and wine, I probably would have had a much more favorable opinion of this place.  Next we got the fried eggplant which turned out to be steamed eggplant with no seasoning or flavor to it.  Even though I love eggplant, this was totally void of anything on it - a little soy sauce, sesame oil and scallion would have made a huge difference. What was even sadder was the meat and cheese plate - it only consisted of some sliced hard sausage and goat cheese with some soft bread.  It's hard to call it a plate when you only had 1 of each.  The waiter was really nice and kept asking us if we were ok but we felt really bad expressing any disappointment.  I wanted to give him some feedback but in the end, we just paid our bill and left.  

If expectations were set in the beginning that they didn't have much food, I probably would have had a much different opinion of our experience.  If you're looking for a funky organic wine bar, this is your place but if you're looking for a culinary wonderland, definitely ask before sitting down. Total bill:  $33/pp with tax, tip and wine

Photo Credit:  Yelp

Sapristi  1001 Rue Saint-Jean, Quebec City                                                                                 3 Forks

Since our flight back to NYC wasn't until 3pm, we were able to squeeze in one more meal before we left and honestly, I wasn't all that jazzed about it.  It's not that the food in Quebec City was terrible (it wasn't), it just wasn't as exciting or innovative as I thought.  At the end of our 48 hours there, we didn't want many more fried food or frankly disappointing experiences.  We wanted something simple and reliable. What's more reliable than Italian food?

We went back to the Petite Champlain area an if you go even further down the steps toward the river there are several outdoor cafes with a nice view.  We ended up randomly picking this place based on Yelp feedback.  It was honestly a fine meal and like the rest of our trip, nothing incredible but a very solid option.  Unlike our last dinner, the menu here was quite extensive.  They had a wide variety of pizzas, pastas, salads, flatbreads and other entrees.  Since I had essentially eaten my weight in fries on this trip, I went for the beef tartare ($20 CAD) and a french onion soup ($8.50 CAD).

The french onion soup was tasty but over salted a bit and could have used more cheese (but then again, you can never have enough cheese).  The beer tartare was a nice respite from all the fried food and it was served with chopped up fillet of beef, shallots, dijon mustard and pine nuts along with some thin toasted bread.  I was disappointed by the lack of egg but eating this felt much cleaner and healthier than any of the food I had consumed in the past 36 hours which was pretty much cheese and fries.

The pastas and pizzas looked great and I would say those are probably their stronger suits - but there are literally tons of other restaurants that look and feel exactly the same as this place on the same side street.  I'm bummed that our culinary adventures stalled a bit on this city but it's still a lovely place to visit and everyone there was very friendly and kind.  I would recommend it as a relaxing weekend getaway from the city and hopefully as time goes by, there will be more going on in the food scene. Total bill:  $ 30/pp with tax, tip and drinks

Photo Credit:  Yelp