Brad's Montreal Odyssey -- Day 4, 13 Avril 2013

The fourth of the daily blogs, stressing food and drink, from Montreal!

The idea today was to get up and watch Everton flog Queens Park Rangers at a footie bar at 10 a.m. but the previous night's Scotch bar adventures sank that concept pretty quickly. Everton won 2-0, yay!!!!!!
I had to take care of some work things once I did get up, so I headed to what, according to a business card, was a Brulerie St. Denis location at 1587 Rue St. Denis near the University of Quebec at Montreal, the world's largest French-speaking university, in what they call the Latin Quarter - Paris' version is more distinctive. Montreal's seems scruffy more than anything else.
Unfortunately that location is now a Second Cup franchise, a much less distinguished coffee chain. However, they had a seat, WiFi, and coffee, so I took care of the work. The coffee was OK, the croissant pretty good. I wouldn't go out of my way for Second Cup but I wouldn't skip them if they were in my path, either. I feel the same way about, for example, Wawa hoagies.
Time for lunch, and Le Brioche Lyonnaise was just up the street and recommended by a guidebook. This pleasant French-style cafe has been around for 25 years and I can see why. I had a delicious Caesar cocktail - gin, Clamato, spices, like a Bloody Mary - to start, then enjoyed a classic Croque Madame - paneed ham and cheese sandwich with an egg on top - on REALLY good toasty bread like the kind I remember from Lou Mitchell's in Chicago but better. It came with a small but fresh and varied salad with sharp mustard dressing,
I enjoyed a glass of white wine, identified as "Vin Maison", and further attempts to discover precisely what it was seemed to confuse the pleasant if scattershot wait staff, so I gave up. Tasted like some kind of Chenin Blanc, a hint sweet. A small strawberry tart wound up a very enjoyable lunch.
The blog needed to be updated, so I hopped on the metro heading to the area around Concordia University, an area new to me, to explore and find a cafe. But I got off the Metro into a cloudburst of chilly rain and settled for the Starbucks 10 feet away. Their black iced tea, unsweetened, has become a mainstay with me. Have to say the staff at this one, at the Guy-Concordia Metro, was as friendly as I can remember any Starbucks crew being.
Blog done, still raining, I catch a cab to McGill University for a terrific all-Wagner concert by their impressive university orchestra.
What I hadn't thought about was dinner, and post-concert, 2130 or so, I am suddenly without any plans. I tried a few places that were "complet" - booked - before I decided to junk getting a reservation and make this night my trip to Schwartz's, perhaps Montreal's most famous place to eat with its legendary smoked meat sandwich.
Schwartz's is the real deal, no tourist trap. It sits along Boulevard St. Laurent, "The Main" in local lingo, and, frankly, looks like it could use a new floor, a fresh coat of paint and a general scrubbing of every surface in sight. But then I suspect it wouldn't be Schwartz's.
Schwartz's, which has some ludicrous name forced on it by the Quebec language police that  no one uses, has a counter down one side of a narrow room, family-style tables on the left. I sat at the counter and looked at a coffee pot that would have been old 40 years ago bubbling away.
The staff is old white Jewish men and a few younger men. There is absolutely no pretense to the service - "Waddaya have, guy?" - which was slap-it-down, wisecracking, witty, sassy, kind of like a Jewish Wiener Circle in Chicago and certainly had more character than most Philadelphia places along these lines. Patrons could speak English or French  or, one suspects, Swahili and not be abused unlike at certain racist Philadelphia cheesesteak stands. Bilingualism is a GOOD idea!!!!
Schwartz's offers a fairly extensive menu, including liver, chicken and steak, but everybody orders the same thing - smoked meat sandwich. It comes in a heaping sandwich on rye bread with a smear of yellow mustard.  It does not come with cheese; it's a Jewish deli, after all.
To me, it tasted like a richer, more intense and more flavorful version of New York deli pastrami. You order "lean", "medium" or "fat" - I had medium, which was moist and tender - and a chubby older man who looks like he's been in the same spot since he was 6 slices to order from a selection of huge chunks of, I suppose,  brisket. One. Awesome. Sandwich. Some might want more mustard, and there are big squirt-jugs of it on the  counter and tables.
I had one of the best dill pickles in years with it, along with a huge plate of fresh-cut fries - they had vinegar to dress them - and two servings of the "house wine", Cott's black cherry soda, which for a Philadelphian brought back fond memories of Frank's Black Cherry Wishiniak and, especially, Levi's Champ Cherry.
With tip, I spent $20 and was well-sated. Do not come to Montreal without hitting Schwartz's, which is open early and open late every night. I am told a queue is common, but I didn't have to wait.
Went home, had some cheese and wine as a nightcap. What started as an iffy day had been a blast.

Second Cup, 1587 Rue St. Denis, Montreal. Open all day, more or less.

La  Brioche Lyonnais, 1593 Rue St. Denis, Montreal, H2X 3K3. Open seven days, breakfast through dinner.

Schwartz's, or, if you insist, La Charcuterie Hebraique de Montreal, 3895 Boulevard St.-Laurent, Montreal H2W 1X9. Open 0900-0030 weekdays, 0130 Friday and 0230 Saturday.