text: If I could only have one meal in Montreal tres tragic it would be here First do not eat anything after your morning cafe and pain au chocolate even if you can only get a reservation at the bar THE BEST SEAT IN THE HOUSE We watched with amazement as one tantalizing dish after another rolled past us on its way to another happy table of diners Whole roasted legs de cochon on platters so large they required two servers to carry them out tables full of visiting chefs happy to have gotten a reservation plenty of noise and amazing aromas and service as if they knew you by namenFirst the little molten foie gras cube that despite repeated warnings shot droplets through my closed lips and onto my napkin We ordered the pigs foot more like half a leg and the canard conserve canned duck either one of which would have satisfied two diners and took our servers advice to have only half an order of the Poutine with Foie gras We decided after devouring it that it was the only bad advice we gotnWe could not possibly finish so we packed away a beautiful picnic to take on our climb to the top of Mount Royal then next day and moved on to dessert a classic Quebecois maple pudding which came out bubbling hot from the oven We walked nearly three miles back to our hotel in the Chinese Quarter deciding what wine and cheese to take along on the next days picnic and happy that birthdays come but once a year