Les 3 Brasseurs

Les 3 Brasseurs, or “The Trois Bras,” as I like to call it, is a chain of microbreweries based in France that has spread out from the fermented bosom of the motherland to 4 locations in Montreal’s most high traffic areas: Ste-Catherine, St-Denis, St-Paul and Crescent streets. Apparently they’re also opening up shop on Yonge street in Toronto some time this year. I am usually skeptical about a chain of anything, especially those that focus entirely on areas tourists frequent. It seems like a reasonable stigma, since all too often I’ve found that these places tend to be catering to convenience over quality. However, Les 3 Brasseurs is different — it’s kind of cool — and not in the feeling less hip unless you’re a hipster sort of way.

Through panes of glass you can see the exposed installations of huge copper microbrewery equipment. It’s not a facade, it’s there because they actually brew all the beer on the premises. It’s nice to know my beer went straight from the holding tank to my glass. I could’ve walked over and touched the brew master, if I wanted to. The tables are a little wobbly, but the chairs are comfortable, especially after a few pints. When the place gets busy, it feels intimate, rather than crowded, and it’s nice to have that comfort if you’d like to sit for a while.

The menu and decor well emulate a French brasserie environment, being neither bar nor restaurant, but a perfect harmony of both. It is done in a way that can be appreciated by those seeking pizza and wings or someone, like myself, who was happy to see pork hocks braised in beer on the menu. I ordered this with a pint of blonde and sipped away happily while chatting with Shannon and watching the creepy-headed Just for Laughs characters walk by. Soon after, toe-tapping to great bar music (Bloc Party, The Killers and Modest Mouse in succession), we ordered the maple syrup beer as well, which is individually bottled. The blonde was good, but a touch bitter for my tastes. What do I know though, since it just won a gold medal. The maple beer tasted very, very faintly of maple, like how honey brown lager tastes vaguely of honey. I wasn’t sure how much we could drink before we started pouring sediment into our cups, but I think we were averaging around $5-6 a pint, which is pretty reasonable, I think.

Shannon had ordered a burger, which came with fries. The burger was quite impressive; rich, meaty and flavorful and sandwiched between a wonderful roll, but the fries left a bit to be desired. They were crisp, but lacked a hand-cut feel or any real distinguishing characteristic from a bag of frozen potato sticks. My meal arrived bearing little resemblance to its picture, but I mean that in a good way, not like a big mac. Instead of an entire pig leg flopped down on a plate, I had two enormous shanks sitting on top of sauerkraut with a huge baked potato and accompaniments. I finished half the sauerkraut and a single shank before tapping out. The shank was delicious, pulling easily from the bone, from hours of being slow cooked in the same beer we were drinking. The beer lent a subtle, and definitely enjoyable, flavor to both the meat and the fat. For $12, this is a hell of a bargain, since you can easily feed two with this meal. Actually, two and a dog, since I gave my leftovers to a street kid outside the Berri-UQAM metro.