La Banquise

Poutine at Four in the Morning

3.5 of 5

La Banquise has been on Rachel Est since 1968, and it keeps the lights on around the clock. It closes on Christmas Day. That is the entire holiday schedule. A restaurant that never sleeps in a city that rarely does is performing a public service, and Montreal treats it accordingly.

The menu runs to roughly thirty poutines, up from two in the early eighties. Start with La Classique, because you should know the baseline: fries, curds, gravy, the holy trinity of the small hours. Then branch out. The T-Rex is built for carnivores. La Rachel is named for the street outside. La Poivrée brings pepper to the gravy, and L'Italienne goes where you would expect. Lately they have been pushing LA GOAT, goat cheese, ground beef, apple and red onion under the house sauce, which reads like a bet and somehow pays out. Wash it down with a craft beer and stop pretending you came for salad.

Nobody here is trying to impress a critic. The cooks and the counter crew feed whoever walks through the door, at whatever hour, at the same speed and with the same shrug. That is democracy with gravy on it. Go after midnight, when the room is at its best and its least sober.

Order this: La Classique, T-Rex, La Poivrée, LA GOAT, with goat cheese, ground beef, apple and red onion
The damage: $
Go: After midnight, when the line is honest
Find it: 994 Rue Rachel E, Montréal, QC H2J 2J3