and we're back! Two reviews, food and drink!

Cafe Montrose

Finally got a chance to check out Cafe Montrose and I have to say, the overall feel was wonderful! Very cozy and intimate, yet very friendly and open. You could tell that the staff has been working together for a while and they either ARE family, or have definitely become family at this point and that kind of service trickles all the way down to the customers, both new AND old!

You could most definitely tell that there were many many regulars and locals that frequented the place and that's always a good sign! Gwen, our waitress for the night, was amazingly friendly and had the most endearing accent and way about her!

Between Gwen and Sonia, we had excellent service. Sonia was not as personable, but you knew that she cared about the food, it's ok, she had a very european feel to her in the kind of no nonsense way about her. Again, Gwen was so downright friendly and inviting, it was like walking into their home.

Besides the excellent belgian ales ON TAP there (boy that could be dangerous for me), the food was very french-heavy, but quite tasty.

We started with Croquettes de Fromage that had sooo much cheesy goodness it was great! The mouthfeel was much more like a creamcheese as you would expect, but so much more complex in flavor. Much more meaty, yet silky creamy...

I had the Lapin aux Pruneaux (rabbit), and although I'm not generally a fan of fruits and such in my sauces, you really have to classically pair rabbit with that and it goes so well. The rabbit was not gamey in the least and cooked very well with plenty of fat still on to provide just that bit of mouthfeel that makes you go mmmm...

My friend had the Large Moules curry (large because I knew I'd be eating some!). I'm not a fan of curry and although I didn't really think the curry was all that fantastic, my friend enjoyed every bite she could until she was just too full to take any more. For me, the curry was pretty typical, with a bit too much salt, but otherwise good. I would like to try the cream sauce next time I go for sure as the mussels were very good underneath the curry!

13 Celcius
13 Celcius is a very trendy kind of wine bar that you would typically expect in midtown. Although there were plenty of the 'be seen, get seen' crowd here, I was unexpectedly surprised to see that the crowd was very diverse with older and younger, soccer mom, 20 something hipster...

The staff was very attentive and very accomodating. Mike took care of our wine selections and since I was there with a regular, he knew what she liked and hit it on the spot. We had a nice australian grenache that, although was a little sweeter than I typically like, was matched very well to the dry and breezy air of the night (it really was a beautiful night to sit outside and chat while uncorking a bottle).

One of the other staff, Shannon, was sooo nice and down to earth and she really felt like a bit of an oddity in the mix of people there that night. Everyone else felt a little on the snooty but still will talk to you side.

It was a nice surprise to have the owner of the bar greet us outside (Ian, with his gf Jennifer I believe it was) coming from a gala of some sort. I would have never known he was the owner, he put off a business friendly attitude and was more than happy to stop and say hello, never once mentioning and or acting like the place was his. I thought he was just another regular who had stopped in for a drink!

I would say it's not quite the down to earth spot that I really enjoy sitting around and chatting at, but for a slightly upper end affair, it would definitely fit the bill. The grenache was 30 bucks, so not bad on prices either.

If all the staff were like Shannon, that would definitely make the difference!