My Weekly Adventures: The Calm Before the Storm

Welcome to the mid-April Weekly Adventures! Its a bit weird to call this the calm before the storm as we supposedly should have had a rain storm (there was a rainfall warning on The Weather Network) but it was a lot more mild than expected. Regardless, my meaning is that the first half of April was relatively calm but the second half of April is going to be crazy. I sometimes skip the month end April Adventures post because my life is going to be mostly work and more overtime work so just putting it out there in case, things get crazy. For now though, April was a little quiet, mostly because there weren’t any holidays and then nothing huge happened and I didn’t really do a whole lot of anything. Still, let’s see if I can rummage something to talk about. I will end with some little planning things I have set for myself in anticipation for some stuff down the line.

Restaurant ChuChai

I’m going to keep this short since I already did a small post on it before. ChuChai is a Thai vegan restaurant. It was a spontaneous visit to say the least while being in the area.

You can check out the entire Restaurant ChuChai post HERE.

Courses Thematiques Le Tour D’Horloge (& Old Montreal Stroll)

To be clear, my outdoor running season hasn’t started. I’ll talk about that at the end of the post. My friend’s that I help out has. This was a new one for him but it was a nice double race to start with a 5 km and 8 km. To be honest, I’m considering this one for next year, the 5km probably since its still early in the season and on the rare occasion, I’d have time to run in March. Either way, my friend did alright especially for the first outdoor races. However, I liked it mostly because I got to finally walk around during that time and take some nice pictures in Old Montreal. I work around the area but its not the same on a weekend morning or when its gloomy and stuff. The emptiness of it in some areas makes for some nice pictures. I only showed two with actual runners in the background. Talking about the race, the course looks pretty nice.

L’Instant at Casino De Montreal (again)

One of my friends are on a gaining casino points mission so its been all about taking advantage of the bonus points events so on the start of a gloomy weekend, we went out to have dinner. I finally got to try Fish & Chips there which was what I wanted to try last time but decided to choose the pasta instead. It was the special of the day and I don’t think its a permanent selection? I really don’t know the menu here at the L’Instant, the deli at the casino that well. Either way, it was pretty good. I only went to the casino to eat so it was pretty much in and out.

Upcoming Plans: Workout Plan

As the 2 months and one week countdown starts until my best friend’s wedding and I’m one of the bridesmaids, I need to lose some of my winter fat and get a little more in shape (at least to make sure that I can still get into the dress at the end of June. I have started walking the stairs to the office at our building and trying to not take the elevator. Its been  pretty nice. The project coming up is finding a cardio and weights workout schedule that I know that I can stick to and try to eat more healthier. I’d like to start clean eating again but I’m not sure that I’m totally ready for it. Either way, I’m going to gradually try to get back to a more balanced diet, more veggies probably. Gardening season also starts soon and weather is starting to be good for running so I’m looking forward to putting some outdoors activities in as well as in May, hiking starts. So, I’ll work it out accordingly. Especially going to try to add in using the park workout stations facilities to incorporate something different to the running path. I won’t do a segment specifically for workout (too many segments right now) but I will do some updates here. 🙂

Cute Kitty Pic

That’s it for this Adventures post!
Its been relatively calm lately and its nice since I’m enjoying the staying at home time.

Hopefully I keep up with posting (or getting things done in bulk beforehand) for the second half of April.

My Weekly Adventures: Birthday Post!

Welcome to the weekly adventures!

I’m 33 today! Just taking it easy like every other year. Some plans are postponed to next week and some keeping to this one. However, this post might seem a bit long although very suitable that its a food heavy post seeing as I love to try new things and hang out with friends over meals.

Festival G: Perles et Paddock

Kicking off was the replacement for Battle of Ingredients in March and we went to check out Perles et Paddock and their menu for the Festival G, a new festival in Griffintown area of Montreal. I’ve already talked extensively about it in a post before so I’m not going to talk too much about it.

You can find the post HERE.

Casino de Montreal: L’Instant

My office move finally happened after much delay. Its a whole lot of adapting and such. I have no pictures as I don’t really want to share that part of my life. However, after that early start, things wrapped up a tad early as well and my friend who eats some expensive meals at the casino wanted to redeem some points so picked me up from work and we went to eat at the deli there called L’Instant. I hadn’t been there since it had been renovated. I got the pasta quattro which is a fairly good deal at $15.95 for pasta (where you can choose out of 4 types of pasta, 3 kinds of sauce and 4 groups of ingredients), soup, garlic bread and a drink. I like the whole having a choice to DIY your own pasta.

March Birthdays Group Celebration

Last Saturday, we had a big family party as the whole in-laws side (almost) has their birthdays in March, just like myself. We got together for a delivery chicken meal like previous years and spent time just catching up and chatting. Its always a nice time with family to just hang out. We’re all busy with our own lives so we take these moments when we can.

Plattsburgh US Grocery/Snack Haul

Market 32 by Pricechoppers

Walmart

Target

Last Sunday, I headed out with my friend to Plattsburgh to do a little grocery run. It was more for snacks and such and it was to pick up some goodies for the husband’s birthday. We had an early start so came back fairly early as well. We went to Target where I stocked up on some Spring & Easter Oreos, Easter Lindt bunnies, some L’arabar flavors that we don’t have in Montreal and some Pressed Coconut Coconut Water. The coconut water isn’t here either the last time I checked. Next stop was Walmart where I kept it fairly tight as I picked up unfrosted Pop Tarts (which I don’t get why isn’t in Montreal), Birthday Oreos (they are my husband’s favorite), and some Love Crunch granola which are super expensive and much smaller package. Last stop was Market 32 by Pricechoppers where I picked up some discounted Kind bars. They were $10 for 10 which is, even after exchange, a better deal. I’m stocked up for snacks for at least 2 to 3 months now.

Restaurant: Le Belle et La Boeuf

For the husband’s birthday, I took him out for a long-awaited date together. We rarely go eat out together unless its for film festivals or something so we wanted to go try something new. I already posted about La Belle et La Boeuf HERE.

Birthday Breakfast & Marché Jean Talon

Every year for my birthday, my friend takes me out for a big meal. Although I get to choose any breakfast place, I can’t seem to get past going to Le Cartet which is super delicious. My fave is their Brunch Canton which I absolutely love. The ham is so awesome and the sausages are good. Its really great. I probably talked about it in previous posts but still, if you are in Montreal, like breakfasts and want somewhere delicious in the Old Montreal area, this one is definitely one to consider and probably go to.

Marché Jean Talon

Westrose

After that, we had some parking left so we headed to a new bakery that opened around the corner that I walk by to go to work called Westrose and picked up a loaf of bread for my husband. We took a quick run to Marché Jean Talon. I haven’t been there since at least 15 years ago. I remember going when I was really young so it was nice to head back. I didn’t buy a ton of food since we still had stuff at home but got so beautiful looking brussel sprouts and since I can’t eat most cakes and don’t want to bake a cake for myself, I decided to pick up a strawberry-rhubarb pie at Creations Madeleine. Its a really delicious pie.

Its my Birthday so shameless selfie time 😉

That’s it for this Adventures post!
It was a bit overloaded with stuff but hey, promise April will be much less adventurous!

My Weekly Adventures: Recharging

Welcome to this Weekly Adventures! I’ve been in recharging mode before the crazy April work month starts. I took a day trip with the husband and then just finished off a few days off this past week. Its been all about recharging (and burning some of my leftover vacation time from last year).

Ottawa Day Trip – Shopping Haul

Lush – Shampoo Bar

T&T

Disney Store

LCBO

I was super stressed at the beginning of the month and needed a day out of town as a little refresher. After some debate, we ended up doing something familiar to us and headed to Ottawa for a day trip. It was the normal rundown with a stop at Rideau Centre, a stroll through Byward Market and then a grocery run at T&T Supermarket. Above is a little haul that I had.

Sugar Marmalade & Herbal Jelly

I have been having these skin breakouts (hence the partial reason there has been no vids) and changed up my skincare routine and eventually gave up and went to Sugar Marmalade to have some herbal jelly which technically helps counteract the effects. I haven’t had it there but it was done pretty well.

A Beautiful Bouquet & Old Navy Haul

This last Saturday was the first day of a 5 day weekend and the first mini vacation in a while. I celebrated by buying some tulips at the florist to revive some springtime feeling in the house. Its a pretty nice mesh of colors. Its a nice burst of colors as well.

After that, the husband and I went for a little shopping time together which sparked by buying some cat snacks and accessories because its our darling cat’s 9th birthday. We did end up seeing that Old Navy had opened there and caught a decent sale. I managed to find some pants for half price and for a buy one get second one half price, a t-shirt. Mine was the Sonic the Hedgehog, which I think its so awesome.

A Date with my Mom

To kick off the time off, I had promised my mom a few weeks ago to take her to the buffet at the Casino de Montreal so that’s what we ended up doing for lunch. I’ve never been there at lunch so it was interesting to say the least. The selection was alright and the food was pretty decent as well. Although I couldn’t eat any of the desserts other than the meringue and biscotti, the last platter is my mom’s and she enjoyed it. There was pancotta, creme brulee, lemon cake roll and a sugar tartlet. We did end up going to play some slots and walk around a little before heading back home. It was a nice afternoon out to say the least.

Ultimate 2000s Blogathon Done

Finally, the last thing that happened was the almost 4 weeks of Ultimate 2000s Blogathon concluded officially yesterday. If you missed any entries or didn’t know it happened and wanted to see the reviews or check it out, you can find all the links to the entries HERE.

Cute Kitty Pic

That’s it for this Weekly Adventures!
I had a good time recharging and probably will have a few more days to recharge to fill in a week off combined.
It’ll be nice since April is going to be the hell month!

Restaurant: L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon Montreal

If you want to see last year’s L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon recap HERE.

Located in the Casino de Montreal, L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon is tucked in a little downstairs corner accessible by elevators at one end of the casino. Different from last year is how it was bustling and full of action this time with tons of customers there. After last year’s experience, I was a little more knowledgeable about how to approach this year’s dinner so was a little less ambitious. If you had seen last year’s dinner, it took well over 3 hours, this wasn’t really that much more different.

In terms of decor, there wasn’t much change. I’m back at the same time after all so I do wonder if the decor changes especially in the display case with the seasons. Maybe one day, I’ll go not in autumn.

Green Tea

Due to the rainy weather outside and a rather under the weather feeling like a cold was creeping in, I ended up vouching to get a green tea. This is a Japanese green tea recommended by the waitress for us. It tasted great. I don’t usually drink Japanese green tea but this one definitely was a treat.

Bread

The breads here are also quite good. This time, we had the baguette one the left and the bacon and mustard braid on the right. Not shown here but my friend got two other ones which had dairy products in it. One was a flaky cheese one I believe and I can’t remember the other one right now.

Amuse Bouche

A refreshing starter amuse-bouche to kick things off. Tonight’s starter, the dairy free option, I assume since my friend got something different but he also had the 7 or 9 course seasonal discovery tasting menu. This amuse-bouche is a eggplant topped on one side with a red pepper and the other one is topped with a zucchini (or maybe eggplant) chip? I can’t remember anymore. But I can tell you that it tasted really good. I’m not much of an eggplant fan. I really just eat it for its health benefits on a daily basis but this was really lovely.

Tasting Portion Dishes

Like I said in the beginning, last year’s tasting menu traumatized me to my core. Not that the food wasn’t good but the duration and the sheer amount was just way over what I could handle. So this year, I went a different route. I asked the suggestion of the waitress to tell me what would be a good approach and she gave me a very accurate one of taking 3 tasting portion which should be enough and went along with her knowledge and suggested the ones that she knew could be modified to be dairy-free or already was dairy-free. With that I chose three (with her help):

Le Homard

Le Homard – Lobster over mashed avocado tart  and pomegranate arils

My first choice when I first saw my choices was this one. Avocado tart and pomegranate and lobster all sounds so fresh and delicious. From the presentation to the delicious balance of flavors to just the crispy different texture of the pomegranate seeds and little bits and the crunchy fresh vegetables and the lobster was such a delight. Not to mention of course the creamy avocado tart base.

La Morue Noire

La Morue Noire – Stewed Black Cod with “Malabar” peppercorn, baby spinach

The star of the show, my friends. I picked this one because the waitress highly recommended it. Normally, this one would have a frothy creamy coconut foam. Mine is just coconut sans the cream for the obvious lactose intolerance issue. With that said, this dish is absolutely heavenly. I kid you not, the cod is done so perfectly.

L’Agneau

L’Agneau – Quebec lamb ribs with eggplant and lemon pulp confit caviar

Talking about the final dish in my selection is the lamb. I’m starting to realize that I have a tendency to get lamb whenever I go out, mostly because I wouldn’t eat it at home. This was done the perfect doneness. The eggplant caviar as they call it is really delicious along with the eggplant chips which are both very good. Paired up with the lemon pulp, it worked so well together. The only thing I wasn’t a big fan of based on personal preference is the date puree thing. I’m personally not a fan of dates so it didn’t quite appeal to me. Overall, the whole dish worked together really well.

Dessert

La Bulle – Blown sugar ball with coconut cream, fresh coriander sorbet

The original La Bulle is made with yuzu lemon in the menu. However, this version is dairy-free version so its made with coconut cream. I have to say that the coriander sorbet is somewhat of an acquired taste that took a moment to get used to but it cuts through the sweetness from the coconut so it works out well.

Overall, L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon Montreal is a great dining experience. It offers fantastic cuisine, comfortable ambiance, flexible with their dishes to accommodate allergens as well as great service. Its honestly one of the restaurants that I love going to. It is quite pricey but worth every penny.

Dinner: L’Atelier du Joel Robuchon (Casino du Montreal)

L’Atelier du Joel Robuchon is a fine dining restaurant located in Casino de Montreal specialized in intricate French cuisine. As I mentioned in the Weekly Adventures before, my friend treated me to a meal there. Finding the way to the Casino is going to be the easy part, however, remember to look for the indications on the floor to get to the restaurant. Its a little up of going up and then taking an elevator down to its own little corner in the Casino.

 Cocktail- Coco Hennessyto (I think that’s the name)

I think thats how you spell it. This beautiful cocktail had some avocado puree popsicle topped above it along with some coconut milk and other fun ingredients. It is a fabulous and delicious twist on the mojito.

Bread starter

As far as fancy restos go, this place gave you a platter of bread choices. My friend specifically had two cheese breads and they thoughtfully put it on a separate plate to not contaminate the other selections. In the big platter, there are mini baguettes, croissant-like buns, some ham stuffed bread and a spelt bread. I tried the mini baguette and the spelt bread.

Before we continue, I want to share what we took. I ambitously went for the “Experience” Tasting Menu. My friend took the “Seasonal” Tasting Menu which had two extra plates. I would later realize that eating bread was not recommended with the amount of food and the length of time it took to finish this meal. The length was 4 hours. Talk about an experience, right?

Do note that I will use the dishes listed in their menu and when I remember to list the changes they made for my lactose intolerance. Let me tell you, I gave the kitchen a run for their money judging from watching at the seat how they convened at the table. French restaurant and no dairy products except for butter is not exactly easy. As for my friend’s choice, I’ll see if I can share his instagram post for it.

To begin…

Velvety Jerusalem Artichoke Cream with Toasted Hazelnuts 
Replaced with…this (because I can’t remember what it is)

However, I do remember it being incredibly delicious! The flavors and the everything was so perfect. Now if someone from the L’Atelier du Joel Robuchon lands here and sees this, how about you tell me what this is? (Fat chance of that happening, but hey, its a shot, right?)

Le Crabes des Neiges
Snow crab with finely juliened sweet and sour turnip with clover and rosemary honey

Possibly one of my faves of the evening went to these little snow crab layers of goodness. It was a mystery how to keep it together to eat but I made my best effort and its just so awesome.

Le Foie Gras de Canard
Duck foie gras royale, tasty apple and raisin variation fine Le Carminee jelly

Of the most loveliest presentations for this mean, however, I have to confess that I’m not a huge fan of foie gras so I do partially blame the heaviness of this piece regardless of having the toasted slices or the currants to accompany. It was delicious if it was about half of this size. But foie gras is a very personal preference sort of food so if you like it, this probably is a decent amount.

La Chataigne
Fine chestnut veloute with smoked bacon over a delicate celeriac cream
replaced by this Artichoke dish cooked three ways with cayenne pepper

To be honest, I have never eaten any foamed stuff before tonight. We’re more the diner and bistro sort of people. We love a nice meal here and there but nothing like these fine dining haute cuisine sort of things. However, as an entry point, this artichoke was fantastic, given that I haven’t eaten artichoke either before. There was a fried variety that was great, and the puree bit on the bottom was nice and I believe the foam is also the third way to make it. Its garnished with cayenne pepper and some sriracha mayo or something like that. It had a definite spicy hot punch.

Le Blanc de Fletan
Halibut filet with anise-flavored shellfish broth

About this dish, I had to walk around a little before eating. The fish was delicious and it had this lovely fennel seafood bits around it including mussels and shrimps. It was made so very good. We rarely cook halibut but the broth and the whole thing was paired so well in terms of flavors. The seafood broth was absolutely on point.

Le Cochon Gaspor
Roasted pork rib, tenderloin glazed with jus over herb risotto

The replacement here is that risotto is usually made with cheese however, they made this risotto with olive oil. Unfortunately, I only took two bits of the tenderloin before I felt like I was going to get sick from overeating even after walking around and standing about. I’ll talk about the experience at the end which I think contributed a lot to why ordering for meals like this one is different from ordering a la carte.

Back to the meal, this dish was very good. The pork was done so awesome. It was tender and juicy and the sauce was fantastic. I would have wanted to finish this one if I wasn’t so full. My friend did help me finish it and he loved it a lot.

The Dessert

The original was a chocolate creameux with crumbled biscuits and cocoa sorbet which was replaced by something of a coconut delight. The sauce around it was really good. Then the whole feeling of cracking open the sugar coat around the coconut mousse or some sort of so satisfying. I usually find coconut has this tendency to be overpowering in its sweetness but in this case, it liked it a lot. This dessert felt like an experience in the whole eating journey.

Finally, as the bill was being paid, they brought us some little tidbits of sweetness. My plate had a fruit jelly and a nougat.

For my friend’s seasonal tasting menu, here’s his instagram post on it.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Ron GK Law (@rlaw1978)

OVERALL…

L’Atelier du Joel Robuchon was a pretty great experience. The food was impeccable from both the presentation and the flavors. It was very unique. The service was fantastic. They tried their absolutely best to accommodate to what I wanted. The tasting menu was a hard task to put together and they did a fine job. Kudos to our waitress and the kitchen for that. The cocktail was also incredibly original and I actually wanted to figure out how to make one at home. The experience of it all was nothing short of pure awesomeness. The atmosphere and the decor were beautiful and yet still had somewhat of a casual vibe.

However, if I were to go again, I wouldn’t order from the tasting menu. While I do enjoy my food and like to take my time, having a meal that lasts from 7:30pm to 11:30pm is not my idea of absolute fun even if my friend and I are long time friends and we always have stuff to talk about. Its more the idea of sitting around eating or waiting for food. With that said, because I had so much time for my body to digest every course, I felt my fullness much faster, resulting in how I just couldn’t eat anymore by the time the last course came around. Looking back at the pictures, it was a truly gastronomical experience which also means the portions are small. If they came swifter, I would have been able to eat through the whole thing (I believe, since I’ve never tried). With that said, if I were to go again, which I hope to take my husband for a nice night out one time, I’d go for the a la carte menu so both the kitchen and myself will not have any headaches over the lactose intolerance.

L’Atelier du Joel Robuchon is a great experience and if you are a foodie into the fine gastronomical cuisine, this is somewhere you should try for sure if and when you are in Montreal provided you don’t have children under 18 as its in Casino de Montreal.

My Weekly Adventures #54

November is finally upon us! Christmas is a little over a month away. Daylight Saving Time has kicked in but its always nice to get that extra hour. Montreal had their first little snowfall. Our roof is finally done and over with. Eco logs are ordered and shipping to us soon, luckily we have some leftover from last year. Its all shaping up to some fun times. That is a great thing after all the craziness in October. It also seems that not doing NaNoWriMo was a good call although doing it for the last few years now makes this year feel weird and oddly empty from having that creative outlet.

Anyways, I’ve rambled enough. Its felt busy but apparently not really….

MTL a Table 2017 (aka Battle of Ingredients substitute)

 

Battle of Ingredients takes a break in November as we change our gatherings to dinner outings for MTL a Table 2017. The original plan was for one restaurant which I covered HERE. This past weekend, we went to a second one all thanks to incredibly generous friends. Another great night that I will share later this week.

We are now planning our Christmas December gathering for Battle of ingredients. What do you eat as tradition for the holidays?

Haute Cuisine at Casino de Montreal

My friend’s half marathon season ended with his last race in Oka. Like previous years, he treats me to dinner to thank me for helping out. I am incredibly grateful for this running theme of generous friends. I help people because they are good friends of mine but its nice to feel appreciated as well. He took me to a fine dining French cuisine in the Casino of Montreal called L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon. Its so incredible that I have to write a post for it so that is coming up.

Wrapping Up and New Segments

Last time I talked about a surge of things sitting in backlog watched and needing to be reviewed and even talked about the immense about of movie reviews and TV binges. All still remains true. I still have a few screeners both short films and full features to review. One has been needing to get released but I can’t seem to word it correctly that I’m happy with. TV Binges are a little better but still wanting to get the Gilmore Girls seasons done. The goal this month is catch up.

In the spectrum of what I’ve done this past two weeks, I have decided the general rundown for the holidays marathon with a featured franchise, alt christmas movies and probably holiday movies (Hallmark and others depending on Netflix availability). Also, I have started a new segment for Sundays called Sunday Lists which are essentially lists of faves or best to worst. If theres something you would like me to rank, just comment below or shoot me an email. These lists will be updated whenever there is something to new to add.

Cute Kitty Pic

Upcoming:

• Restaurant recaps
• Movies and shorts reviews
• Book reviews

That’s it for this Weekly Adventures! 🙂
What have you been up to?