- Ladies and gentlemen, I am walking down the street
in the Little Italy neighborhood of Montreal,
and I'm very excited because we're going
to a classic Montreal casse-croûte,
a snack bar, serving things like burgers, hot dogs, poutine.
Now, why, would you say, is Lucas Peterson,
host of the Academy and Tony award winning 'Dining on a Dime'
coming to a casse-croûte, a humble casse-croûte?
Well, I will tell you, because this one
has taken the concept of the casse-croûte and perfected it.
(upbeat music)
[In French] - Nice to meet you. - Nice to meet you. I would like...
[In English] - No I won't, I speak--
- You can speak English (laughter)
- That was just, I'm trying.
Let's have a Big Mike and also get the Classic Hot Dog,
and then poutine.
- Large poutine?
- Large poutine, chocolate shake.
(lively brass instrument music)
Everybody loves poutine.
- Everybody knows poutine.
- Everybody knows pou--
or do they? - It's poutine, yeah.
- I mean-- - Poutine, how, wait,
I'm not saying it right,
how do you-- - Poutine [poot-zihn]
- La poutine. - So it's not poutine.
- No, poutine is very like, you know, we're in England.
- Okay.
- Where there's a piece of-- - We're drinking our
tea like this. - Yeah, exactly.
Poutine gravy. - Okay.
- It can be beef based, it can be chicken based,
fresh curds. - Cheese curds, yeah.
- And red potatoes is what we use.
It's not supposed to be crunchy,
it's supposed to be, it's like a potato salad.
It's the best potato salad you'll ever have in your life.
- A gravy and cheese salad.
- Yeah, it's potatoes. - I love it, I love it.
- I mean, it's a potato, this is where it started.
It's like eating a good carbonara, right?
- Oh, you gotta have it in Rome.
- You in Rome, right, I saw that episode.
- Oh man, that's some good ass carbonara.
- I can make it, I'm Italian, I can make it.
We make our own guanciale and all that,
but are you gonna have the real authentic one,
I'm gonna come close to it,
maybe in Vancouver they're gonna come very close to it,
but this is the birth place, it comes from Quebec.
- So tell me about this neighborhood,
this Little Italy neighborhood.
- Yep, there's a reason why obviously
it's called Little Italy because there was a huge
population that settled here.
They had butcher shops, they had bakeries.
There's a bit of everything, for everyone, that's so -
[In Italian: ce tutto per tutti] There's everything for everyone.
And you could've bought nails back in he day,
and now you got pots and pans and so on and so forth.
- Now, I don't know Montreal very well at all,
are there places like this?
- The casse-croûte as we know it,
is embedded in Quebec culture.
Every little town, or little village,
always has their shack à patate.
Or their cantine or their casse-croûte.
You know there's sandwiches, there's hot dogs, yes
there's poutine, that's what, poutine, coming from Quebec.
The first is from your typical diner.
There's an item, that's named after me
- What is it called?
- The Big Mike - The Big (laughter)
- I don't know why they call it the big Mike.
- I, I have no idea - I lost 20 pounds
Where would it, there's like something golden
- Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese,
pickles, onions--
- But everything from scratch
- On a potato roll?
- On a potato roll - There you go.
- You can't compare it because we just took that idea
from here and just kicked it up to another level, you know.
(bright music)
- Three of me couldn't eat all this food, $30 American.
This is the Big Mike.
I love the nice crispy edges on the burger patty,
that smash burger where you really, right into the grill
and you get those nice crispy edges.
And that's really nice on this meat patty.
A lot of pickles and a lot of sauce,
it's so important, to me, I love that in a burger.
This is a big burger, if I hold this right up
to my face for scale, this is a large thing.
Let's get into the dogs.
So the classic, the all-beef hot dog that they make here
in house and we've got what appears to be a nice
a nice slaw, which is very attractive to me,
'cause I like to have nice cold crunchy counterpart
It's a good dog.
Got a nice snap, that natural casing,
a little bit of smokiness.
At least for me what makes a hot dog what it is
I mean, it's like sense-memory, right?
It's when you first had a hot dog.
So when I was a kid, go to a baseball game,
you have a hot dog, and when you have that flavor now,
it just takes you back, and this is better than most.
Classic dog.
Let's get to the poutine.
We're not having our poutine, we're having a poutine.
Which sounds tougher.
Now, I grew up in Illinois, very close the Wisconsin border
and I love cheese curds.
What makes a cheese curd good,
and you can't obviously hear it,
but I can hear it in my own head,
and I can hear it in my back molars,
is I can hear that little squeak.
They're not going for some super, crispy, crunchy result.
You want that little wiggle, you want that little wobble,
in the fry, in the poutine,
cause you want it to be a little soggy, cause that's
it's so much more satisfying.
A little bit spicy, peppery gravy,
slightly squeaky cheese curds,
It's like Montreal's wrapping you in a little blanket
and just saying yes, come with me, let me show you the way.
I really hope you enjoyed this episode of Dining on a Dime,
from Chez Tousignant,
in the Little Italy neighborhood of Montreal.
If you'd like to watch more, please click here.
This is the poutine.
This is like Quebecois Portuguese food,
covered in this tangy cheese, spicy chorizo sausage,
and then it's also got this pulled chicken,
it's then doused in a hardy gravy and that special sauce.