indoors, a lot of the families love to do, you know, activities together like this. go to the cottage. go ice fishing. you know, it, like, gets you out of the house. and it s very much a family thing. anthony: like many of their ilk, they d seek one of the temporary small towns of sled-borne cabins, drill a hole in the ice, and wait. but these are not normal men. so is quebec better than the rest of canada? fred: obviously. david: it s not that. yeah. sure. anthony: i mean, no, come on. diplo you you you didn t you didn t have to think about that long. fred: no. anthony: now, wait a minute. now, are strippers paid hourly here? is that right? it s not a tip system? fred: it s yeah. it s considered an art. a performance art. anthony: it s considered a performance art. so how does that work? you don t you don t tip your stripper? david: you pay per song. you pay per song at the strip joint. anthony: you pay per song. david: yeah. and then you can get a dance
luxurious sleeping compartments, a bar car with liveried attendants. david: when you look at the menus of all all the what how people used to eat on trains, that s all inspiration of how we cook in the restaurant. you know? anthony: casserole with sweetbreads and fresh peas with béarnaise sauce. roast leg of lamb, currant jelly. fred: very nice pictures in the book the dining by train book of a guy holding the turkey, cutting the turkey. anthony: right. fred: when you order a drink anthony: right. fred: it comes from a bottle made out of glass into a glass made out of glass. anthony: right. fred: which is kind of cool in our day and age. anthony: it comes back to service, doesn t it? fred: yeah. anthony: oh, thank you. we are presented with a perfectly serviceable omelet. there may no longer be a smoking lounge with brass spittoons, but this does not mean a traveler has to suffer. so you always travel with a truffle shaver? david: well, during tru
but no. these hardy culinarians of the north like to frolic in the snow and ice. more accurately, they like to obey their genetic québécois imperative to risk dental and maxillofacial injury by skating around, slapping at a hard disc, trying to drive it in each other s general direction. i believe they call this sport hockey. this is not in my blood. do you s do you skate? david: yeah, we grew up on rinks like this. anthony: does everyone in in quebec? uh, it s pretty much obligatory? here s your stick, kid. david: yeah. what else do you do? there s no reason to live here if it s no hockey. anthony: hockey rinks pop up all over this city to accommodate montrealers desire to risk teeth, groin, and limb. and right behind fred and dave s restaurant, joe beef, a pickup game of chefs, cooks, and hospitality professionals is underway. some of these guys, to put it charitably, are a little long in the tooth to be out there swinging sticks at each other and, uh, uh, skidding
some salmon. gravlax of char. solomon grundy. beets and eggs. anthony: look at that. [ david speaking french ] anthony: unbelievable. look at the aspic work. fred: this is smoked eel and potatoes inside. [ man speaking french ] salmon pastrami. anthony: and wait a minute. this is super classic. david: oeuf en gelee. anthony: and this, oeuf en gelee. egg in aspic. soft boiled or poached egg in clear gelatin-set broth, classically garnished with white ham, tarragon leaves, black truffles. oh, my god. i was pretty sure that i would live the rest of my life without ever seeing this again. delicious. but tonight, after a full week of franco-canadian full-on assaults on our livers and our lights, fred and dave thought it would be both delicious and merciful to take advantage of the somewhat lighter and insanely delicious fare by their brilliant chef, omar, who is from pakistan.
anthony: it s one thing to have to work outside in this winteriness, but it takes a strange and wonderful kind of mutant to actually find it pleasurable. like, well, these two gentlemen. do you like the cold? i mean, by you i mean the québécois. fred: it cleans the streets of ebola. anthony: the cold? fred: yeah. david: yeah. the frigid cold keeps the riffraff out of the city, for sure. anthony: fred morin and david mcmillan. restaurateurs, chefs at the legendary joe beef, bon vivants, raconteurs, historians of their beloved great white north. princes of hospitality. and what do men like this do for fun when the rivers turn to ice three-feet thick? when testicles shrink and most of us scurry for warmth and shelter? if they were like so many other canadians, they would go ice fishing on the st. lawrence river. david: the cabin fever induces in the québécois family. because we are confined, perhaps, to spend so much time