Brunch is such a funny concept. Yes, we all understand that it’s the meal between breakfast and lunch. It often consists of foods that you might consider a bit too heavy to eat for breakfast, but push eating that dish a couple of hours, it’s perfectly acceptable to eat before lunch. Is brunch time based food? Or it is food relegated to the weekend that’s an excuse to day drink before noon? In any case, it’s definitely a western thing. See dim sum, pho, grilled fish and steamed egg in dashi. Except for the big chains, it’s only been in the last little while that we’ve been lucky enough to have restaurants that offer brunchy things daily – Janine, Regine, Pointe Claire Deli, and Tommy to name a few. This week, I checked out the newest spot serving daily breakfast and brunch in Verdun, Millmans.
Verdun
What do you know about creampuffs? Besides the fact that that was my nickname in gym class all through high school, the only thing I know about creampuffs is that I can crush about 15+ of the frozen profiteroles that come in a bucket from Costco. While still frozen. This week I visited Verdun. Home to some of my favourite restaurants Hong Mere, Blackstrap, Street Monkeys, and Janine – I recently was put on to a local spot in the neighbourhood who was making a variety of flavours of cream puffs and ice cream sandwiches. This week I went to Alice & Theo to check out the city’s newest purveyor of artisanal creampuffs.
I’ve said it in the past (and literally two articles ago) that one of my favourite comfort foods is a sandwich. The humble sandwich. You can literally make a sandwich with anything and it can be considered a snack or a meal. Do you have freshly sliced cold cuts and provolone and day-old baguette? Make a sandwich. Sliced POM and American cheese? Make a sandwich. Random challah roll and last night’s leftover general tao chicken? BOOM, SANDWICH. I appreciate restaurants and cafes who list sandwiches on their menus, but there’s a special place in my heart for spots that specialize in it. Where the sandwich sits front and centre on the menu and everything else is periphery. I was told about this sandwich shop in Verdun that’s serving up delicious Italian sandwiches, so I checked Out Bossa on the Wellington strip.