New Year's Eve - Part I

---

Jerry slept in a bit so I went down to breakfast by myself, while he finished getting ready. It has been snowing on and off today, which didn’t matter because we were only above ground for maybe a total of 15 minutes today. Spent most of our time in the museum, metro or underground.

The only thing we did today was go to the Museum de Beaux Arts. It was an easy metro ride, but we really could have used the underground and walked there, hindsight is 20/20. The museum was in three separate building all connected by underground passages. The first section had a special exhibit that we did not see. We did get a pleasant surprise as there was no entry fee, for whatever reason all regular exhibits were free admission. The rest of the first building was devoted to the decorative arts, basically furniture and the like. This is Jerry’s favorite part of any museum, when we were in Paris he spent an entire morning in the museum dedicated to the decorative arts while I was at a cooking class. Jerry took a couple of pictures of his favorite pieces. The next and main building was your more traditional art museum, we did skip the modern/contemporary art section, I am really not a fan, and have to be in the perfect mood to wrap my head around it. There was a large section covering renaissance, baroque, gothic and middle age art. A little of this goes a long way, although there was one that we both liked, and we both came upon that conclusion separately.

The next section was a small gallery devoted to the Napoleonic era. From there we were off to the impressionist, post-impressionist and cubist eras. Impressionist are of course my favorite give me Matisse, Monet, Degas, Renoir, and of course Van Gough any day. Now on the other hand, I can live without Picasso. We spent a good 4 hours in the Museum. There was also a building entirely devoted to Quebec and Canadian art, but we had hit our limit. This section was in what was a church, we did want to see one thing and that was the largest collection of Tiffany stained glass windows outside of the United States. Unfortunately, they were in the concert hall and it was not open to the public.

We took a brief break at the museum cafeteria so Jerry could get a bit to eat, since he did not have breakfast. He had what we have a lot of when we are in France, baguette, ham and cheese. The only difference was they put it in a panni press, in France it is just a grab and go cold ham and cheese sandwich.

After the museum we headed to Chinatown, to have a try at the most popular dumpling house in Montreal. The simple truth is that the best dumplings (pot stickers) you will ever have are at Brandy Ho’s in San Francisco, we have never had anything else come close. But according to Fodor’s Qing Hua are supposed to be some of the best there are. We got there around 4:30 which was the perfect time, because the crowds have not yet started to arrive. They were clearly setting up for a rush. The service is slow, but they are hand rolling each order, none of them are pre-made. They have about 45 different types, each order is 15 dumplings and you can mix up to two different types per order. You can have them boiled, steamed or fried. We went with fried. They do not come with any sauce so all the flavor is inside the dumpling. The price range is from $7 to $10 depending on which type you order and a bit extra to mix and match and have them fried. The place only takes cash or Canadian debit cards, and if you pay in US dollars you are going to be a big looser as they exchange at 1 for 1, and it is really more like $.70 on the Canadian dollar. Anyway back to the dumplings, Jerry had an order of chicken curry and shrimp, egg and green onion. I had lamb and coriander and shrimp, pork and leeks. They were very good but not quite to Brandy Ho’s standards. The overall flavor was really good but definitely made to please the masses as the spice level could have been a bit higher for our liking. What really makings Brandy Ho’s head and shoulders above the rest is the garlic sauce they are served with. The short answer here is they were some of the best dumplings we have had in a very very long time.

That was our day, we walked back through the underground to our hotel. I sent Jerry to the store for evening wine and I went to the ATM machine for New Year’s Eve funds. On my way there I walked through a wedding setup, the reception is in the space between our building and the next, all part of the underground now. It looks like a very formal wedding. Reminds me that tonight is my mom and dad’s 50^th wedding anniversary and not that they read this, I wish them a very happy anniversary, perhaps my older sister Elise can pass that on to them.

Our evening plans do not begin until 9:30 dinner at a Jazz Club, I will continue that story in part two of New Year’s Eve.

---

Comments

[andrea vaughn]

yummy dumplins!
Happiest New Year, world travelers! Such a good idea to go traveling at holiday time, maybe except all the other travelers?? Nice of you to mention Brandy Ho's, been a long while since one of those luscious "dumplings" and cant see ever having another until they learn how to make them gf. heh, entirely doable. looking toward part 2...xoxo