Earlier this year, we had a dealer event in Montreal where we unveiled some new speakers from Focal. The group that I was with involved about 25 people and my colleague Todd was in charge of coming up with dinner options for the group for the two evenings we'd be dining with our dealers. He came up with a popular bistro in Montreal's Old Port area - Le Local.
Louis-François Marcotte was a local chef who helped produce cooking shows in Montreal including the popular BBQ Cooking with Louis. His production partner, Richard Dorval, was also involved with restaurants in the Montreal area. Marcotte and Dorval were involved in a couple of restaurants before opening Le Local in 2008. A year later, Marcotte and Dorval split with Dorval keeping the restaurant and installing Olivier Belzile as the chef of the restaurant. In 2012, Dorval was joined by his daughter, Marie-Lou, as a co-owner of Le Local.
Le Local is located on Rue William, just up from the Cité du Havre neighborhood where many of the old St. Lawrence piers were located. (see map) It was about a 10 minute car ride for us from the hotel to the restaurant and we were seated right at 7 p.m. at a long table in the bar area of the restaurant.
The main dining area could be classified as urban contemporary with a large accent on wood paneling and sleek lighting. The lighting was muted but sufficient enough to see around the place. There was an outdoor patio for dining, but a storm had come through earlier in the evening and with it some cooler weather so they had it closed down for the evening.
Since we were in a large group, we had a prix fixe menu rather than getting to order off the regular menu. The choices were a braised beef dish served on a bed of rice and squash puree, a New Brunswick salmon served with grilled broccoli fleurettes in a cauliflower cream puree, and a cheese ravioli dish that was served with duck confit.
I got the braised beef entree. It was a chunk of beef, slowly cooked and covered in a wine sauce. It was - in a word - delicious. The beef was tender and full of flavor. I'm normally not big on squash, but the puree went very well with the beef. This was a great dinner.
The New Brunswick salmon (above right) featured a large chunk of salmon that had a deep fried salmon chip garnished on top. The broccoli surround the salmon resting on the cauliflower cream puree. A small bit of a tapenade made from roasted garlic, black olives and anchovies was off to the side. The two dealers near me who got the salmon said it, too, was very good.
One of the guys across the table from me got the cheese ravioli with the duck confit (pictured right). Slices of parmesan cheese covered the confit that was mixed in with some arugula with the cheese ravioli resting in a brown gravy. It actually looked a lot better than it was described on the menu, but I was pretty happy with my braised beef dish.
And we drank a lot of wine - a LOT of wine - at Le Local. Their wine list was extensive and pretty impressive. Most of the wines listed were of French or Italian origin. I wish I would have taken a picture of the label of the red we had. It was full bodied and very good.
There were some other things on the Le Local menu that I would have liked to have tried - the grilled AAA-rated (next to the very top rating for Canadian beef) flank steak with a spicy barbecue butter sauce and the salmon tartar in a lime truffle oil are two that popped out at me when I was reading the menu after dinner. But what I had with the braised beef was fine enough for me that evening. The food was eclectic and interesting. The service was impeccable. There were little to no hiccups in taking care of 25 diners all at once. Le Local would be a place that could offer a nice romantic dinner as well as handling a large party. (Photo courtesy EatWell Montreal.)
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