Tri Express

I am so proud of myself. Last night, I finally went to Tri Express, Montreal's worst kept sushi secret. How many people told me to go there - I have lost track. We had a late 8:30 reservation and had I known the place seats only about 20 (+ worst kept secret = packed), I wouldn't have got lost by going West instead of East out of the metro. By the time we realized we were walking in the wrong direction (+ already late = not good), I called to make sure we still had a table... and was told we'd sit at the bar.

An eternity later, we take our seat at the bar and here I am, taking my trench off, explaining to the waiter that I've neeevvveeerrr been so East in Montreal in my life (out loud and all) when ...

I see, behind me, Denis Gagnon.

*
*
*

And it's Karl all over again.

I turn around, quick, sit down and see Tri Du, the world-renowned sushi chef, in. my. face. Thank God he turned out to be funny, warm and unintimidating because all along I was smiling at him, thinking how will I have the courage to stand up, professional camera in hand, and ask Denis Gagnon for an internship autograph. Or picture. Then my Omakase 1 arrives. (The other fabulous thing about Tri is that unpretentiously their menu is online, so instead of spending half an hour in the restaurant making up my mind, I spend half the day at home thinking about what I'll want comes supper). And at the first bite, I understand why I spend so much energy locating this place, why I've been promising friends I'll go there, I even forget Denis Gagnon is behind me.

 Tri Du

sashimi à la manière de Tri

 all the orders passed in front of us and Monsieur couldn't help to take pictures

 hanging from the ceiling

 the bar, with all the ingredients in front of our eyes

 Buddha Maki and something else Saralina took

 my heavenly Omakase 1

 the Tri special sauce, the chef told me to use it as soya sauce

 St-Joseph, notice the white mushrooms

Monsieur took Quebec and Montreal, notice the asparagus

After all this bliss, we sipped some Japanese rice tea and I watched Denis Gagnon leave, red-faced and bombarded with texts about WHY I didn't talk to him.

Later I shared my excitement with the waiter, who said he's a regular but didn't know who he was. All I know is, next time I'm going to Tri, I'm ordering Omakase 3, CV in hand.