Tay Do

First my friends talked her up, extolling her virtues to pique my interest. Some time passes, my hunger increased, and we decided to meet. Her appearance was cute; petite with a little yellow dress. As I got to know her, I realized there was much more to her than her simple exterior would suggest. We sat down, began talking; the wine was pouring freely. She told tales of her experience, the people she’d met, the places she’d been. Then my date with Tay Do became a little awkward, and things turned a little sour.

Tay Do the restaurant is situated just off the corner of St. Denis and Duluth with easy access to an SAQ. Like a lot of restaurants in proximity, it is a BYOW, without a corkage fee. Tay Do the city is located in Southern Vietnam, where the food is more heavily inspired by Chinese cooking and lends itself to sweeter preparations. I was unaware of this when I had chose to dine there or likely would have passed right away, as this has never been to my liking. Still, a Vietnamese restaurant touted for its authenticity that has general tao chicken (distinctly Chinese) on its menu seems odd to me regardless.

The menu offers quite a few selections, but mostly variations on a few of the same. The basic stir-fried vegetables, soups, and grilled meats are available, served with vermicelli or rice. We’d brought a fruitier white wine with us, so I decided on seafood; a trio of grilled brochettes and accompaniments. Grill, saute, curry or lemongrass were the options, and I somewhat regret not choosing curry, just to see if anything with heat is offered.

A slight annoyance perhaps, but our waiter, also our host, opened our wine bottle quite hastily before retreating and flecks of cork ended up inside and therefore in our first glasses that we ended up pouring for ourselves. As well, an ice bucket wasn’t supplied. For food that lends itself nicely to crisp and refreshing wines that serve better chilled, it would’ve been a nice addition.

The starter, house soup, was pleasant. A nice palate cleanser from the build up of coffee stains that had accumulated throughout my day. The broth was light and oh-so thinly thickened, just enough for mouth feel, delicately flavored with Vietnamese coriander, a hint of lemongrass and a few slivers of vegetables and greens with vermicelli. Shannon received the Imperial roll, which tasted of something best described as old-fashion potato chips. It was stuffed with the traditional fare of sprouts, cabbage, carrots, pork and shrimp but the deep-fried flavor was unmistakably overpowering with the taste of Old Dutch ripples. It was served with a light cabbage slaw that was best described as vinegary alone.

We drank our corky wines while surveying the room. From my vantage point, in a slightly elevated side room in the middle of the dining area, I could clearly see most of the restaurant, which is actually quite impressive for the price range. From the street, Tay Do looks like a tiny sit down, eat, get the hell out sort of place, barely hosting a dozen tables. Inside it is actually quite large, resembling the conversion of an older, but more luxurious home, to an Asian-inspired resto. The cleanly cut lines and Asian adornments make the whole place feel like taking a trip to a spa. On the mezzanine level, a steep drop from our table that I nearly knocked our wine bottle down to, is a large solarium with many more tables featuring bench seating. Plants feasting off the natural light lent a nice splash of color to the otherwise plain white walls.

As our meals arrived, so did several groups of people, and the noise level quickly escalated. Especially from our location, a small room which was sort of the meeting ground for acoustics, conversation was incredibly difficult. After a long week, the deafening ruckus was a displeasing addition to our meal. BYOWers yelled, “Looks like SOMEONE’S getting drunk tonight!” as a dozen bottles on four tables begin to go down like water below us. Other vacancies quickly filled in, service became less than attentive, and volume nearly unbearable.

My trio of brochettes were basted with a light hoisin flavored sauce. In between each piece of meat was either red bell pepper or red onion, both of which were extremely overdone, incredibly soft and almost bitter from char. My first skewer was an unidentified “poisson”, some sort of white fish that held up well to the grill. I found removing the fish somewhat difficult as it adhered to the skewer and flaked away under pressure. My second was a fairly generous skewer of scallops. This was slightly surprising and disappointing as I’d poorly translated “petoncles” to “octopus” and was curious as to how a skewer of octopus would be presented. This turned out to be the highlight, as the sweetness of the hoisin is actually quite nice with scallops, I love scallops, and I love scallops on the grill. The last was a skewer of shrimp, which were overdone, making them tough and took an unreasonable amount of manpower to pry from stick.

Shannon had ordered the aforementioned general tao, which was far from as thick and sickeningly sweet as most places would offer, but also lacked any sort of heat, just a sweet and sour five spice coating to the battered and fried chicken bits. Both of our meals were served with more of the cabbage slaw, turned salad with cucumber, tomato and lettuce. She chose the vermicelli - a wise choice as the rice I was served tasted of grill char and dirty oil and clung together in dry clumps as perhaps the worst specimen of steamed rice I’ve ever encountered.

We sat painfully for several minutes waiting our check, finished with our meal and annoyed by the change in atmosphere. For two our meal came to roughly $35 with taxes, so the price is clearly reasonable. Interac is not available for payment, though an ATM is located in the lobby, and all major credit cards are fair game.

Stir-fried or grilled meat with soup does not make a table d’hote, so they should not be labeled as one. A lot of soup options also came with a static soup starter, which to me seems awkward. By the end of the meal I grew very disinterested with vinegary cabbage, so some variety in that would also be nice. The decor is nice, though some sort of sound screens would be appreciated. I’m not trying to deter you from seeing this woman - er, eating at this restaurant - but she is not to my tastes. Though she is cheap, puts out in large quantities and likes the booze, so she might be to yours.