Bread is Pain

Last year I ended up celebrating my birthday noshing on a sample of Reservoir’s menu of the moment and drinking a couple pints of India pale ale. It seemed fitting that this time around, to celebrate another milestone in my own ‘maturity’, I would try La Salle a Manger, the restaurant that Reservoir’s head chef graduated to last year.

If you have ever visited Reservoir and wondered what La Salle a Manger would be like, you would not be wrong in assuming that it is more or less a magnified carbon copy – but that’s a good thing. Reservoir shines at turning a tiny, humble space into a great brasserie, serving up a seasonal menu created from quality ingredients. La Salle a Manger picks up where Reservoir could not deliver due to their location’s constraints. A larger kitchen and more staff means a much more diverse menu, and a larger dining room (salle a manger) accommodates more patrons where Reservoir would’ve had to turn them away.

Sort of. On the busier nights, La Salle a Manger is booked solid, with back to back reservations for every seat in the house. We showed up a bit early for our reservation and our reserved table was still occupied, and took over two spots at the bar instead. This gave us a nice view of the kitchen and meat fridge, open on display through a window cut in its side, showcasing the house made charcuterie.

Although the sausages certainly looked appetizing, I was having a craving for seafood, so I settled on the scallop ceviche with chipotle ($15) as an appetizer. Our waiter explained that several dishes are featured to share, one of which was a mackerel dish that sounded great. Mackerel is one of my favorite fish, so I was happy to see that this was available for one, and added that to my tab for $24. This narrowly edged out my previous decision to try the “farotto”, a risotto made of spelt, that featured a vegetable I cannot remember, could barely properly pronounce and had no English translation for. Some sort of long-winded root.

Sitting at the edge of the bar (the only respectable place for lefties like myself, in my opinion) I felt quite comfortable, but the rest of the seating seemed a little tight in spots. The section behind us resembled a giant, communal picnic table, and I was hard-pressed to determine whether or not it was a group event or wedged together diners. The multi-toned woods, chalkboards and hanging lights give a nice ambiance, but this is easily ruined if you’re elbow to elbow while trying to lift a fork to your mouth, I suspect.

That was somebody else’s problem though, not mine. I happily munched on a hearty, warm slice of bread studded with hazelnuts and dried fruit, smeared with melted butter, and nursed my Manhattan. It would be later that I discovered that cocktails are priced at $11, but an extremely generous beverage was had.

The ceviche comes accented in an oversized bowl, topped with thinly slices of various greens, carrot and cilantro. When I managed to work everything into a single bite, this dish was a real treat. The smoky heat from the chipotle was a perfect flavor note, especially considering I had forgot it being mentioned on the menu. “What is that?” I wondered out loud, until it struck me that I had ordered the dish in part because of that. The martini must’ve gone to my head. Every so often I would get a bitter tang from one of the vegetables, something that I failed to place exactly, somewhere between cucumber peel and celery, maybe strips of endive?

The mackerel arrived with tiny roasted potatoes (grelots) and a generous portion of braised pork belly, an inventive take on surf and turf. The skin cracked between my teeth and gave way to the oily, tender flesh, instantly bringing a smile to my face. Perfectly cooked and extremely hardy, the pork belly was an ironic addition to the plate, as I had ordered a meal of fish expecting light fare for my unaccommodating belly, and ended up leaving as stuffed as I’m anticipating to be over the holidays.

La Salle a Manger is the first restaurant I’ve eaten at in a while that makes me want to go back and eat through the menu; an impossible task, as the menu is updated on a daily basis. This is a terrible dilemma, as Visa recently thought it so kind as to double my already ridiculous credit card limit. If nothing else, I look forward to returning to La Salle a Manger and sampling the duck tartare – one I’ve been told is so great that a vegetarian consumed a portion of it in its entirety after just one, brave taste. We’ll see if this is true or not, but at this juncture, it certainly seems possible. In my experience, Samuel Pinard can do no wrong.