Somehow, between drinks and dinners and work and whatever, I forgot to blog about a quick two-day trip to Montreal for work. Between meetings I managed to try a few new coffee places (Tommy, Crew Collective & Café) and a new beer bar (Pub BreWskey), and grab a whisky at a familiar old hotel (Le Place d’Armes).
From one French-speaking city to another: we’ve off to France tomorrow!
Last Saturday Pearl Morissette hosted a 10th anniversary party for some of their wine club members. It was a perfect day, maybe the best Saturday we’ve had this summer. They poured tons of wine (and Burdock beer), auctioned special bottles & events, fed us delicious food, and let us hang out and meet one another.
We slept in a big, weird B&B. The owner brought us late-night pizza and we had an awkward breakfast conversation with the other couple staying there. We stopped for lunch at Redstone and I ate a pork chop the size of a small dog. We got food from Littlefoot Farm and cooed at their baby goats.
It was a pretty special event. It made all the brutal traffic on the way down here, and the way back, worth it. Thanks P-M.
Today was my birthday. My 42nd birthday, as it happens. It was a crazy weekend, though my birthday had little to do with that.
First up was a visit by brother #2 on Thursday. We met after work at the Keg near his hotel, and ate some piles of meat. After that Lindsay and I retired to Chez Nous where Laura poured us some off-menu treats.
On Friday, we were off to nearby Project Gallery Studios for an opening, after which we hung out with a couple of the artists and their friends at Aft until the wee hours.
Saturday morning we dragged ourselves out of bed, loaded up on breakfast and snacks at Bonjour Brioche, then drove north to the Hockley Valley Resort for a wedding. We got there in enough time to eat lunch at the wine bar and change for the wedding. The meal was excellent, and very long, and then the party started. We lasted until about midnight, then retired to our room.
When we arrived I discovered a surprise: Lindsay had gifts and balloons(!) waiting for me: a Secrid wallet, October by China Miéville, and a promise to go see Dunkirk next weekend. Whatta girl.
After some much-needed breakfast this morning we stopped at Adamo Estate winery (which is owned by the same people as the resort) to pick up a few wines we’d tried at the resort, then enjoyed the pretty ride home. The rest of Sunday was relaxing, eating, and watching GoT.
We spent Saturday and Sunday in Prince Edward County. I kept telling people I hadn’t been there in two years. I was wrong — it’s been three years. No wonder it felt like such a different place.
We left Saturday morning, arriving in Hillier around lunchtime. I reckoned our first stop should be wood oven pizza at Norm Hardie’s, but that plan blew up when the line of cars extended so far down the driveway we knew we wouldn’t get a table. We didn’t even stop, just did a U-turn and came up with a plan B.
Since we were right there we tootled down the road to Rosehall Run. I’ve had both good and bad experiences with that winery, so I wasn’t sure which we’d get. Turns out it was the latter. The tasting room was slammed. It was tough to get someone to pour for us, and when they did they handed us plastic patio glasses. You know, the ones with the thumb groove. We mentioned that to a few other wineries, who reacted with horror. We didn’t like much of what we tried, but did leave with a 2014 JCR Pinot Noir.
I figured we might as well start the journey down Closson Road, and we started at Hinterland. I warned Lindsay that there are often one or more woohoo-y bachelorette parties at Hinterland; sure enough, one was occupying half the tasting bar when we got there. The other half was subsumed by picture-taking tourists. This was not the county I remembered. This was not the peaceful experience I’d described to Lindsay over the summer. We contemplated leaving, but then managed to squeak into one corner so Lindsay could try the sparkling. She already knew she liked the Whitecap; she bought a 2013 Blanc de Blancs to take away. Suddenly, the tasting room emptied (after the bride forcibly extracted her future bridesmaid Caitlin/Caitlyn/Catelyn/Kaitlyn/Katelyn from the bar so they could continue their reign of terror) and the County was peaceful again.
We decided to eat lunch at the County Road brewery/restaurant next door, which wasn’t even there in 2014, but was now packed to the gills. We shared tomatoes with sourdough and local mozzarella, and beer bratwurst with pickles, and Lindsay tried a few beer samples. While there we met up with our friend Duarte, who lives in the County now, bought some beer, and followed him to our next winery: The Grange of Prince Edward.
I’d been to The Grange before and hadn’t been impressed, but either their wine has improved or my palette has, because a few months ago we shared a bottle of their Estate Cab Franc and loved it. Duarte gave us the grand tour and we tasted through their wines; we eventually left with three bottles of the 2013 Estate Cabernet Franc, two of the 2012 Brut Rosé, a 2013 Estate Chardonnay, and a magnum (!) of the 2014 Pinot Noir / Gamay. The tasting room was mad — we were definitely getting the stinkeye from others who weren’t receiving the same personal attention, and there were no fewer than three bachelorette parties present — but it was a wonderful stop.
We drove down Closson with the intention of stopping at Closson Chase, but the swarm of cars out front warned us off. Instead we drove a little further to the peace and quiet (and delicious Pinot) of The Old Third. We chatted, reveled in the beautiful (and calm!) barn, and bought a bottle of their 2015 vintage. We were finally finding our County groove.
Our last winery of the day was one I’d never heard of until a few weeks ago (hot tip from Laura at Chez Nous Wine Bar) called Domaine Darius. The grounds look like a hobbit’s garden, while the tasting room, a small underground cave, does nothing to dissuade you from that comparison. But the wine? The wine was fantastic. So unexpected, and so different (for the most part) from what I’d expect in the County. We tasted all three they had on offer (2016 Gewurztraminer, 2016 Chardonnay, and 2015 Cuvée red blend), and bought two bottles of each.
Our plan was to head to our AirBnb in Wellington, but we’d been told about one last must-visit: Parsons Brewing, just north of Picton. We took the back roads and found a much bigger operation than I’d expected: a restaurant with a huge outdoor space, families milling about, a bottle shop, and a small bar where we parked ourselves. Lindsay tried a flight, but my favourite was definitely the Grandpa Miguel’s coffee stout. I ended up buying a bottle of that and the Rinda Rinda to take home with us.
Finally, we opted to retreat to our AirBnb, which sat right on Lake Ontario. We had an hour or so to relax, and spent most of it on the back deck. I was done driving for the day, thankfully.
Dinner that night was at Wellington stalwart East & Main. We split the salad and beef carpaccio. I had the pork chop; Lindsay had the pickerel special. We had all this with an outstanding Closson Chase 2014 KJ Watson Pinot Noir. Creme brulee and bread pudding and coffees to finish it off, and we were finished. On the way home we were robbed by a cab driver from Cronkie’s Cab Company, who charged us $25 for driving us 900 metres. So much for the county vibe.
Determined to have a good time anyway, we went back to driving ourselves the next day. First up: Norman Hardie, attempt #2. We arrived just a few minutes after 11, having skipped breakfast to make sure we were good and hungry. We each got a pizza (which meant we had far too much, and took a whole one with us in the car) and baked in the sun, because the kid who seated us didn’t understand that by ‘cover’ I meant ‘shade’ and sat us where there was decidedly neither. Only after we hurriedly finished, already sunburned, did we see the breezeway with shade. Anyway. We went to the nice, cool tasting room and bought two bottles: the 2015 Cabernet Franc and 2015 Cabernet Franc Sans Soufre.
From there we fumbled around the back roads a bit before landing at Trail Estate. The last time I was there they’d just opened; now they’re a bit of a fancy operations, having also landed Hardie’s former assistant winemaker as their own. We liked everything they poured, and took both a 2016 Wild Ferment Riesling and a 2015 Cabernet Franc.
Our last winery of the trip was Closson Chase, now happily uncrowded. We picked a few samples and sat ourselves the beautiful (shaded) backyard, enjoying the wine (we bought a 2014 South Clos Chardonnay and a 2014 Churchside Pinot Noir), playing with a dog named Bella, and taking in the beautiful view. It was a perfect note on which to end our County visit.
On the way out of town we stopped for some dirty roadside ice cream (which is to say, the best ice cream) and made it back to Toronto without much hassle. All that was left to do was unpack everything and tuck away the age-worthy bottles for another day.
On Canada Day I was sitting in Your Father’s Moustache, a Halifax bar I haven’t been to in fifteen years, listening to some blues. The lead singer of Joe Murphy and the Water Street Blues Band — Joe Murphy, presumably — interrupted one of his songs to talk about Canada Day, and how this 150th anniversary isn’t so cut-and-dried. He talked about the aboriginal peoples who were here for thousands of years before settlers arrived, before Confederation. It seemed an odd, but apt, place to hear it. I smiled and nodded. Lindsay applauded. Then we drank our drinks and listened to more blues.
Let me back up though. First: we weren’t in NS to listen to live blues. We were there for a planned vacation, not an unplanned whirlwind trip like two weeks ago, mostly to see my nephew graduate high school, but also to visit our families who live there. We’d flown out a week before Canada Day after eating a big, rushed brunch from Bonjour Brioche, and landed in Halifax in time for dinner at Lindsay’s mom’s house. We stayed there that night and rested up for a road trip.
We’d all wanted to visit the Annapolis Valley wineries — me again, them for the first time — for quite a while, and it worked out nicely since a cottage Lindsay’s family likes is down that way. So we took two cars out toward Wolfville, ate at the excellent Port Pub in Port William, bought some Sea Level beer from their store (the cashier, it turned out, is the daughter of my friends M+LK), then hit some wineries.
After driving by Lightfoot & Wolfville and seeing that it wasn’t yet open, we started with Luckett Vineyards, which I hadn’t been to. I knew they had a beautiful setting, but I’d heard less-than-stellar things about their wine, so we were pleasantly surprised that we felt compelled to buy a bottle of white (Ortega) and red (Black Cab, a blend).
Next we drove to L’Acadie, which I’d visited years ago. When we arrived the place was overrun by passengers of the Magic Winery Bus, but we were spirited aside to a barrel where we tasted all five of their sparkling wines. They were hits with the ladies, and we left with some sparkling rosé after enjoying a few quiet moments post-bus-departure.
Next up was Gaspereau Vineyards, but as we approached we saw the bus again, so we sped on to my most coveted visit: Benjamin Bridge. It wasn’t easy to find, and we pulled in just as they were closing up, but they suggested we stop back the next day. We promised we would, and drove back to Gaspereau. Which was a gong show. My memories of this vineyard were of a quaint, scrappy contender, but this place was overrun by hordes of people ordering gimmicky samples (e.g., dessert wine in chocolate shot glasses), shirtless goons, pushy parties, etc. It was pretty awful. I couldn’t even stay in the tasting room. Pretty views though.
Our winery visits ended there, and we drove on to the afore-mentioned cottage. I was more than happy to get out from behind the wheel, play some frisbee and ping pong, eat soem steak, drink some beer (from Sea Level) and wine (the Luckett red and the L’Acadie sparkling, which I sabred open), cook smores at the fire, and boil myself in the hot tub.
After a feed of fluffy pancakes Lindsay and I made good on our promise to return to Benjamin Bridge. This time it was empty when we arrived, and we sat down for a tasting. Their sparkling is just world-class, and to try it in that setting was simply extraordinary.
We weren’t quite done with the Valley yet, so we stopped at Luckett on the way out for lunch. Pete himself sat us at our table, and a nice server soon moved us up to an even more picturesque 2-top before our food arrived.
Before long we were back in Bedford, then into Halifax for a brief visit with my mom & dad, then back to Bedford for a feed of pasta which pretty much knocked me out.
Tuesday got off to a bit of a slow start, just hanging out and eating leftovers and doing a bit of work and sampling beer in the back yard.
Before long, though, we were driving downtown to meet Lindsay’s dad at the Stillwell beer garden just off Spring Garden Road. What a spot. What a lovely spot. I had two pints, and some snacks, and we all had some caramel/activated charcoal + vanilla swirl soft serve ice cream (a mouthful in every way) before heading back to Bedford and taxiing to the local Italian spot: Il Mercato. I’d been to the old one on Spring Garden, but this one exceeded expectations. We drank Taittinger, shared starters (shrimp, mussels), ate beef tenderloin and ravioli and rack of lamb, drank a lovely bottle of Antinori 2012 Chianti, forced in dessert, and all but rolled home and fall asleep whilst watching the latest John Oliver.
Another lazy morning. In what would turn out to be an all-seafood day, we began our meals with bagels + salmon + cream cheese, then left Bedford for my family’s farm. Partway there we stopped at Catch Of The Bay at Masstown Market, where the fish and chips had drawn raves from both my brothers. They were not wrong.
From there we turned down the old shore road along the Minas Basin, rather than the highway, so I could show Lindsay the sights. We admired the view, stopped at That Dutchman for cheese, powered through a downpour, and stopped at Diane’s for clams and ice cream. Yes, we’d just eaten lunch an hour before, what of it?
We arrived at the farm, said hi to the dogs and my parents, and once my brother and his family got home, hung out with them drinking the wine and cheese we’d brought.
We awoke to find some absolutely delicious brown bread and coffee instructions. Bless my family.
We hung around for a bit, then did a little tour of the farm, then drove to Amherst for some groceries, then visited my old high school to see my nephew graduate, then celebrated my parents’ 49th wedding anniversary, and finally had a celebratory beer with brother #2. One down, two to go. (Just kidding.)
On Friday we did a quick run to Truro with my mom, through thick fog and some absolutely pounding rain. While we waited for my mom’s appointment to finish we zipped into town and checked out Novel Tea, a bookstore / coffee shop. There were cool books and lovely curios and nice coffee and tasty snacks and Dylan/CCR on the speakers and I never wanted to leave. But leave we did, and pick up my mom, and drive back through more pounding rain to the farm, where we played crib (Lindsay beat me and skunked my dad) and came to a party for my nephew and had late night drinks involving a pork sword.
Canada Day. I started it in the place where I feel most Canadian — the farm. It keeps calling me back. I couldn’t live there, but I love it more each time I go back. Same with the province as a whole. I find I miss it more each year.
We said our goodbyes and drove back to Halifax, passing through yet another brutal rainstorm, then fog so thick we couldn’t see the harbour from the bridge. With less-than-expected traffic we got to our hotel and checked in just long enough to get cleaned up before heading out. We grabbed a (disappointing) coffee and some books from Trident before meeting up with Lindsay’s dad and brother at Your Father’s Moustache.
Which brings us back to where we started. I’ve had a complicated view of this Canada 150 celebration. Not that I don’t love my country, or believe strongly in it — I absolutely do, and am incredibly thankful that I live here. I cannot think of another country I want to live in, honestly. But we have to confront the things that are problematic about our country, and at the forefront of that is how we European settlers (and all those who followed) treated, and continue to treat, those who lived here first. And as much as we should celebrate the milestones of a mostly successful, mostly peaceful nation, throwing a year-long party for the 150th anniversary of what was, in fact, the drawing of lines by white settlers with no particular right to draw them (other than the right gained through force) just highlighted this particular sickness at our core. Look, I’m incredibly proud to be Canadian, but I want to be even more proud because we take a hard look in the mirror, accept that we can’t absolve ourselves of this particular sin, and look for ways to heal. So all that to say: we didn’t celebrate Canada 150 quite as patriotically as some did (and god bless), but I’m not sure the stumbling-drunk goons in the Sheraton lobby or the people at the Deadmau5 concert in the Commons were nailing it either. There was a range, we were in it (not against it), and I love Canada as much today as I did last week. So.
</rant>
Anyway. We walked back toward the hotel and stopped along the way for magazines at Atlantic News and a grunter (aka, mini-growler) of beer at Tidehouse before chilling hard at the hotel. We were resting up for dinner at Bicycle Thief, a restaurant we’d tried to go to our last time in town before something came up and derailed us. It was a mixed experience, frankly. The good: great table, nice server, delicious tuna tartare starter, very good seafood pasta second course, and good (if huge) mains. The bad: blah wine recommendation (I really need to trust my own judgment more), and a table of loud, obnoxious yobs next to us.
Much better was the new wine bar next door, Little Oak. We stopped in for a drink after dinner, and loved it. The decor, the laid-back feel, and the outstanding wine selection. Lindsay had a nice California Syrah, and I had a gorgeous Contesse de Cherisey Meursault 1er Cru 2014 pour from the Coravin. This will be a regular stop for me anytime I’m in Halifax from now on.
We had a big ol’ lie-in in that Sheraton bed, trying to sleep off all the food. (It didn’t work.) Our only real plan for the morning was to visit the Seaport Farmer’s Market. And man, did we: coffee from Java Blend, a pretzel, crepes, jerk chicken, a bbq pork bun, noodles, groceries for lunch, and local salt to bring back to Toronto. All while staring out the window at the ginormous aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower anchored off George’s Island, and the Chilean tall ship Esmeralda, whose crew had mustered on deck as they departed.
Stuffed and sufficiently-Halifaxed, we checked out, drove to Bedford for a few last visits (and games of crib), and drove to the airport for our flight home. The flight was unremarkable, except that they were serving Aberlour on the second leg, and we got to see the giant rubber duck as we landed in Toronto.
When your job requires you to spend a few days in Lisbon, you book-end that with a few days for yourself. And you ask your Lindsay to join you. We left on Saturday the 22nd.
After a little Uber hiccup we sailed to, and then through, Pearson. We ordered a bite at the wine bar near our gate (some of which went missing; RIP lox plate) and I had my last sip of Canadian wine — Southbrook Chardonnay — for a while.
We had to book economy class, so we knew it was going to be a cramped 7+ hours. We didn’t know quite the adventure we were in for through. Just before we took off the flight attendants switched someone into the window seat next to us, who’d originally been at the back of the plane. We crammed our legs into the seats and tried to watch movies to pass the time and ignore the German family behind us who kept bashing our seats. I managed to finish Hacksaw Ridge and we were trying to watch Office Christmas Party at the same time when the lady in the window seat had to puke. And puke she did, including in our row a little bit before she got to the washroom. The flight attendants cleaned it up before she came back and took her seat…and then puked again later. It made for a disruptive movie-watching experience, but hey…at least we weren’t puking. Or covered in puke. Still…not the best transatlantic flight I’ve ever had.
We landed in Frankfurt pretty early, cleared customs, and then hung out in that shitty airport for three hours waiting for our connection to Lisbon. It was too early to even get a decent currywurst. The less said about FRA, the better.
Our flight to Lisbon was MUCH better — no one sat next to us, so we could spread out a bit, and even got an hour or so of sleep. We arrived a few hours later in sunny, warm Lisbon. I’d arranged for a driver to pick us up, and he drove us to our AirBnB near Belem. We settled in, showered, made a plan for the day, and set out.
We walked to Enoteca de Belem to have lunch, but they were full up so we made a dinner reservation instead and kept walking. We walked past the Jardim de Belem, past the bustling Pasteis de Belem, past the huge & beautiful Jeronimos monastery, and along the waterfront past the impressive Padrao dos Descobrimentos. We finally stopped and had a drink and lunch at A Margem, in the shade because it was so sunny and warm. (Suck it, Canada.) After a while we walked back, wishing we had cash for the vendors who sell wine and and craft beer by the river.
We took a short nap, then got ready for dinner. We couldn’t have picked a better place for our first Lisbon meal either: Enoteca de Belem was amazing.
That grouper will absolutely end up on my list of best things I ate in 2017. Anyway, we decided we needed more dessert. We were too late to buy any Pasteis de Belem, but got some other custard tarts nearby. We walked home, ate tarts on our little balcony, and looked up at the stars. Not a bad first day in Lisbon.
We needed a work day, so we got up pretty early and moved on to our second hotel: the Corinthia Lisbon in Campolide. We ordered a little room service, admired the place, and did a bit of work. Eventually we got hungry and went round the corner to a real, legit Lisbon feedbag: A Carvoaria where we ordered way too much food (veal short ribs with chickpeas and french fries, cod with boiled potatoes and boiled egg, aka bacalau, and so on) and a beer (our choices: “Beer, dark beer, or imported beer.”) before crawling back to the hotel and attempting more work. At least we were working outside where it was beautiful.
We decided to have dinner in Chiado, so we caught an Uber — which are incredibly cheap in Lisbon, by the way — to Sommelier Lisbon. It started out a little weird, with a slightly awkward server, but it picked up as the evening went on and a second host took over and taught us a lot about Portuguese wine. Besides, any place with a wall of 9 Enomatic machines has to be pretty good, right? I’ve captured our meal below; regrettably I didn’t capture our wines exactly, and their menu isn’t online to jog my memory.
Another cheap Uber back to the hotel and we were more than done for the night.
Big time sleep-in. Big time room service breakfast order. Big time work catch-up following. Once again we worked at the hotel until mid-afternoon or so. Our plan was to Uber back to Belem, to see the Museu Arte Arquitetura Tecnologia we’d not had time to see our first time in Belem. First, though, we got some pizza and sushi (!) with a view at Este/Oeste in the lovely Centro Cultural de Belém.
We walked back toward the MAAT along the main Belem drag, past the hordes at Pasteis de Belem, and finally arrived at MAAT — which was closed. It was a national holiday (Dia da Liberdade) but we’d thought the MAAT would remain open. We did sit and enjoy the view from the riverbank outside, and climbed on the roof for lovely views of the city, but left a little sad. This had been the one museum we’d both really wanted to see.
Sightly dejected, we got a taxi to Cerveteca, the oldest and highest-rated beer place in Lisbon. It was this amazing little room with a solid 12-beer draft selection, and a huge number of cans and bottles for sale, both drink-in or take-away. Apart from a really weird single mixer thing happening all around us, we had an amazing time. We had a tasting flight and three shared bottles, buying three more to enjoy over the rest of the week:
After that we needed some serious food, and a quick app-look suggested a walk uphill to A Cevicheria. There’s almost always a line; we only had a ten minute wait, during which we were served an enormous gin + tonic from the takeout window and chatted with another couple from Toronto. Soon we were seated at the bar, ordering the tasting menu. I only remember bits and pieces of what we ate, but I do remember that it was GODDAMNED OUTSTANDING.
I spent my Wednesday at the conference; Lindsay spent hers working. We met back at MAAT after, since my conference was nearby. Once again, luck was against us: it was open, but only one exhibit was on. Still, it was a good one: Utopia/Dystopia. After that we took a LONG walk to dinner, but that length paid off in a few ways: first, we finally walked past Pasteis de Belem when there was no crowd, so we were able to experience them fresh and warm and holy shit are they ever amazing when they’re fresh and warm; second, we walked past the beautiful Torre de Belem and Monumento Combatentes Ultramar.
Just past that was Darwin’s Café, a slightly odd and slightly stuffy (at first, anyway) restaurant. We ate SO much though: grouper wrapped in puff pastry with coriander, dried tomato pesto and salad; veal carpaccio with rocket and parmesan; black spaghetti with stewed squid, bacon, mushrooms and parsley; and Portuguese garlic sausage risotto with fried egg. There was no room for dessert. Just an Uber home.
Day two at the conference for me, and more work for Lindsay. Once the conference wrapped and I got back to the hotel we grabbed our bags and took off to our third and final hotel of the trip, the Santiago de Alfama in the oldest part of town. What a stunning little hotel: a beautiful room, cute little courtyards and a rooftop terrace with a beautiful view, even a glass floor looking down at old Roman stairs discovered during construction.
We thought we’d look around a little before dinner, and walked toward the Castelo de Sao Jorge. Along the way we stopped in at Winebar do Castelo and, well…we never made it to the Castle. This place was great: a handful of tables in a triangular room, with an extremely helpful owner who used samples to narrow in on what we liked and what we didn’t, and fed us glasses from there. We had a couple each, and left for dinner, promising to return the next day.
Dinner was at Restaurante Bastardo, a recommendation from Lindsay’s friend. It took a while to find, and then it took the service a while to find itself, but the food was good. We shared the “street food” (bao, pork confit, radish spaghetti, yogurt sauce) and ceviche (shrimp, octopus, coconut milk, corn cream). Lindsay got the catch of the day (which was a river fish I can’t remember) with clam risotto and coriander sauce; I had the “Mr. Piggy 2.0” (slow-cooked pork cheek, parsnip, garden cress, Port). We split the crumble (almond quindim, apple, strawberry, crème anglaise) for dessert.
Our last full day in Lisbon. It felt like we’d been there for a month, and also like we’d just arrived. We started slow: breakfast in the hotel, working in the room for a while, and drinking a bottle of sour ale in the hotel’s courtyard during a break.
Finally we went out to see the city a bit more. We were hungry, so we headed out for lunch. All the places marked on my map were closed, though, so we ended up at a place called Maria Catita. It was definitely touristy, but still worked out pretty well: our shrimp starter was tasty, and then we shared this enormous seafood feast cooked in a copper pot called a cataplana. We split an order for one person; it ended up being too big for us to even finish. Our server gave us some ginja and sent us on our way.
We walked to the Praça do Comércio, hid in the shade for a bit, got some gelato, and then hired a tuk-tuk to take us up the hill(s) to the castle. There, or more accurately at the shops just below, we bought a few things to bring home, and then returned to the Winebar do Castelo. We intended to bring wine home with us, and thought it better to buy it from a place where we could taste everything first. We spent a long time working through tasting flights; even knowing what wine we’d like the day before he still brought us nine samples, of which we decided to buy five. He thanked us with a glass (okay, two glasses) of Taylor Fladgate 40 year old port. My god. What a beauty.
We continued the pre-dinner drinking on the hotel’s rooftop terrace, finishing off one of the bottles we’d brought from Cerveteca, before getting ready for dinner at Tágide. God, what a lovely restaurant, what excellent service, what a beautiful view, and what a final meal in Lisbon:
I really wish I could remember the wines we had, or would stop trusting restaurant websites to carry them. They were both spectacular. Anyway, back at the hotel we finished off the night back on the rooftop terrace, drinking the final Cerveteca beer.
Somehow I mis-set the alarms (both of them) so nothing woke us up. Luckily I woke up around 7:15, and we scrambled to get ready. I checked out; Lindsay grabbed croissants and a turnover from the restaurant. We met our driver who dropped up at the airport. Not long after we were checked in and on our way home. A stop in London, a much-needed visit to the Park Plaza lounge at Heathrow, and then the long flight home. No puking this time, mercifully. We watched Miss Sloane, I watched Silence while Lindsay worked, and then we watched the brilliant first scene of Inglourious Basterds as we landed in Toronto. Customs, luggage, taxi, yada yada, and we were home. The wine, thankfully, made the trip unscathed.
All in all, it was an incredible trip. Honestly, I didn’t have terribly high hopes for Lisbon, but it was amazing. I’d place it in my five favourite international cities.
Boa noite Lisboa. Nos veremos novamente.
When I was in London a few weeks ago the route my taxi took to my hotel traversed a route I’d not taken before in previous visits. This time we drove along the Thames, and across the river lit up at night I could see the Battersea power station. It’s a massive thing, known to me mainly as the image from the cover of Pink Floyd‘s Animals album.
It prompted me to listen to the album on the flight home, and again once or twice since. Even forty years on it’s still a sharp economic criticism — not of communism, as the animal/pig-themed title echoing Orwell would suggest — but of unfettered capitalism. Open Culture covered it yesterday, suggesting that rather than losing something over the years, it’s become even more relevant.
And after a while, you can work on points for style.
Like the club tie, and the firm handshake,
A certain look in the eye and an easy smile.
You have to be trusted by the people that you lie to,
So that when they turn their backs on you,
You’ll get the chance to put the knife in.
I just got home from the better part of a week in Europe (England, Sweden, and Germany, specifically) for work. Before/between meetings, this is what I got up to:
I just got home from Montreal. I am very full, and slightly sleepy, after this past weekend. So much fun. I flew in Thursday night, very much in need of relaxation and a few days with Lindsay. I had a nice easy ride from the airport, then we ordered pizza and put our damn feet up.
I needed a lazy, lie-about, do-nothing day. I got it on Friday. Man, it was nice. We grabbed some groceries, made a nice little breakfast of scrambled eggs with basil and tomato, sausage, fried potatoes, Belgian bread, and mimosas. After that we just hung out, watched TV, drank beer, played chess, ate leftover pizza, and tried to stay warm. Somehow we killed a whole day like this before going to dinner at Maison Publique. We’ve had a number of killer meals there, but this one was near the top of the charts. We had cocktails, house-made capocollo, pork belly salad with kimchi, garganelli grenoble, and a chicken pot pie the size of a chef’s hat. We had all this with a bottle of Domaine Queylus 2013 Signature Pinot Noir. We finished things off with a pot de creme and a pair of whiskies (Lagavulin 8, Glengoyne 10) before the staff surprised us with housemade ice cream. Helpful, since the rich food and whisky had given us a bit of heartburn.
Our heads hurt a little after that dinner, frankly, but we still got up early and had another lazy-ish morning. We had a bit more on the agenda this day though, the centerpiece being Péché Day at Dieu Du Ciel, where DDC offers a dozen or so one-off variants of the world famous Péché Mortel. First we wanted another Montreal staple: a smoked meat sandwich. We uber’d against the cold to St. Laurent, but skipped Schwartz’s and instead hit Main Deli across the street, which had no lineup, no cramped tables, and (arguably) better smoked meat sandwiches.
We felt a little full-sleepy from lunch so we stopped in at Dispatch Coffee, where both the decor and espresso were top-notch. We ducked back outside into deep freeze to catch another Uber, arriving at Dieu du Ciel. There was a huge lineup inside, extending another dozen or so outside, and the line was moving much less quickly than our hands and feet were freezing in the -35° cold, so we bailed. So did my battery: it was so cold that my battery suddenly drained from ~80% to 0% in seconds. We got ourselves home with a plan to warm ourselves before heading back out to dinner.
Unfortunately some sudden illness came over Lindsay; luckily she has a remarkable ability to know in advance when she’s gonna vom. And she did. So our planned dinner at Le Filet was out. Luckily Lindsay’s roommate was cooking chicken and vegetables, and offered to share. To round out the meal I girded myself for a quick excursion to the nearby Metro to pick up some white wine. While there I noticed a special 4-pack of Péché Mortel, including some of the variants they would have served at the brewpub…so I bought one and had myself a little mini-Péché day. The peach one was decent, as was the special edition (made with a lighter coffee), but the bourbon barrel-aged variant was tops. Meanwhile we had a lovely meal and fantastic conversation and listened to loads of good music which, several drinks in, turned into a bit of a dance party. Until 2am.
Between the late night and losing an hour to daylight savings chicanery, we woke up a little later than planned. We pulled on some clothes and went straight to The Sparrow, once again back on The Main, for some brunch. We’d timed it perfectly too, taking the last available table; a long line formed shortly after we sat down. Brunch was excellent: Lindsay had a hot toddy(!) and house-smoked trout with spinach & green onion pancake, soft boiled egg, beet salad, and whipped crème fraiche. I had shakshuka: two poached eggs in a Moroccan-spiced tomato sauce, with merguez sausage and sourdough toast. We ended with three fresh, tiny donuts: lemon curd, nutella, and pb+j. Then: back out into the cold.
We bought some Fairmount bagels, withdrew some cash, grabbed espressos and a churro at Barros Luco, and did a little shopping before getting to Dieu Du Ciel just as it opened. We’d hit on a nice little compromise: most of the one-offs were gone, sure, but the one I’d really wanted — the Péché Latte imperial coffee milk stout — was still there. It was beautiful, sweet and creamy like a dessert. Lindsay had a Rosée d’Hibiscus.
We split a sample of a few more, and finished with a final glass (a Paris Thé saison with green tea for me; a Nativitor Weizen Bock for Lindsay) before ducking back out into the Arctic. We knew we’d need a little more food, so we got burgers from Burger de Ville and Ubered home. I showered and packed; we ate and watched a few minutes of TV. Then it was off to the airport and home.
Skirl | Dan Dickinson 