The Vancouver food scene has a lot of variety, but it takes a trip to a city like Toronto, or in this case Montreal to really understand what the west coast is lacking. There are some great deli's in Vancouver, many of which I have yet to try, but none of them have the cult following that we see with Schwartz's.
While on a work trip to Montreal, I knew even before I had booked my tickets of atleast one place I had to eat. I knew that this was a cash only institution, and was not set up to be a comfortable, or modern restaurant. That isn't why people go to Schwartz's, and I was going there looking only for one thing, Montreal smoked meat. This world famous symbol of the city bears resemblance to Pastrami, but it isn't identical. The seasoning is different, and in general contains much less sugar than its counterpart.
With the history lesson done, I found myself wandering Boulevard Saint-Laurent passing a host of ethnic restaurants ranging from Vietnamese, Japanese, Cambodian, as we would see in Vancouver, to Slovenian, Portugese and French which are unfortunately under represented in our great city.
I already knew my order ahead of time, as it seemed to be the choice of several others who have visited, or even frequented the joint. I went with the Smoked Meat Sandwich ($6.65), Pickle ($1.95), and Cherry Cola ($2.10). It seems to me the value of the sandwich does not extend to the sides, but I wanted the real Schwartz's experience and was unwilling to compromise.
I wasn't able to sit in the restaurant, so I took my food and found a park bench to enjoy it at. The meal was excellent. I was new to the cherry pop and pickle sides, but they went well with the sandwich.
I call it a sandwich, but in reality the meat was the main attraction. The rye bread, while good seemed to be there mostly to keep your hands clean, and the mustard did provide some zing, but didn't overwhelm the flavour of the smoked meat. Check out the elevation on this sandwich though! The meat was very tender, with an amazing flavour. I admittedly do not eat as much deli food as I would like to, so I can't vouch for the authenticity, but I imagine that with an 80 year history they probably wrote the book.
Schwartz's is a must try for anyone visiting Montreal. I was only there for a week, and didn't explore the whole city, but I would strongly encourage people to check out the neighbourhood surrounding Schwartz's, as the variety is hard to match and in my limited experience the food was better than what I found in the downtown core.
Summary:
+ Lives up to the hype
+ The sandwich has some serious altitude
+ They don't spread themselves too thin with a large menu
- Messy (I feel this is almost a plus)
- Busy, hard to find seating
Reuben decided to go with the Salmon Lox on a Pumpernickle Bagel. This was a satisfying choice as it had plenty of cream cheese, smoked salmon, red onion and capers. The bagel was also excellent.
