Crudessence

In an effort to expand my horizons in the word of veganism, I decided to drag my husband down to one of Montreal's most known vegan restaurants: Crudessence. Not only does Crudessence serve vegan only, the food is also completely bio, gluten free, and "alive". Alive meaning raw, or at least mostly raw.

We dined at the Crudessence on Mackay (there is also one on Rachel). We went on a Saturday night and even though we were only two I had made reservations. I highly recommend to do this because half an hour after we arrived, the place was packed.

Drinks

I think that the choice of drinks is one of the best thing about Crudessence. They have a wide variety of selections, including hot chocolate made with coconut butter and cashews as well as teas and tisanes. They also have a fun selection of juice mixes, smoothies, and elixirs, which are not cheap (6.25$ for 9 oz) but totally worth it in my opinion. 

Anthony had the Ruby Lips, which is a mix of apple, carrot, beet, and ginger topped with a watercress garnish. This is a beautiful mix of flavour which worked quite harmoniously.

I had the Kombu Mojito. This juice is more on the acidic side, which I very much enjoyed. It has pineapple, mint, lemon, and kombucha. Now I had no idea what kombucha was, so I looked it up after I had it. According to wikiepida, kombucha is a effervescent fermentation of sweetened tea that is used as a functional food and the kombucha culuture is actually a symbiotic colony of bacteria and yeast...Yummers! In any case, it was quite tasty and I would definitely have it again. It's good to have a dose of symbiotic bacteria and yeast once is a while.

Appetizer

Not knowing what to pick, we went for the Discovery plate, which is a mix of appetizers to sample.

The two tall shot glasses had the raw soup of the day, which was a carrot and apple soup. It tasted good. You can't really go wrong with carrots and apples though. There was some hummus, and a nut yogurt which, again, good but somewhat forgettable. 

I was also disappointed with the crispy kale. It felt like we had the bottom of the batch with very small broken pieces with little taste. I honestly have done a better job at home with crispy kale than what what served here. 

The maki rolls were good. They were made with sprouts and a vege pâté which tasted like salmon. I also enjoyed the faux-egg pâté, which tasted like the inside of a deviled egg. As you can see, the presentation is quite lovely and very pleasing to the eye. 

Main course

Crudessence is know for the Öm Burger, so my husband decided to try it out.

It doesn't look like a hamburger at all. The patty is a mix of vegetables, mushrooms, flax seeds and sundried tomatoes. The bread is chapati, (Indian flat bread) topped with a caper aïoli sauce which tastes like mayonnaise. For an extra 1.25$ each, you can get a slice of butternut squash cheese and eggplant bacon. For another extra 3.75$, your burger comes with a delicious salad. This dish was very good. You wouldn't mistake this burger for a meat burger, but the flavours were fantastic and satisfying  The salad was worth the extra money as it has many different levels of vegginess to it and is quite fun to explore.

I picked my main course for the specials menu. It's called the Samurai.

You can't tell much from the picture, but underneath all that greenery, there's a generous serving of soba noodles (buckwheat noodles) served with goji berries, kale, arami (type of seaweed), shitake mushrooms, and veggie balls. Unfortunately, I was not overly fond of this dish. The biggest problem were the soggy noodles. They were quite overcooked (so much for raw food) and therefore mushy and unpleasant to eat. The overall flavours were good and I enjoyed the veggie balls, but after experience fantastic Japanese restaurants like Kazu and Imadake, I suppose I was bound to be disappointed with Crudessence's take on Japanese cuisine.

Dessert

First up is the the blueberry un-cheesecake. Again, my husband hit the jackpot with this one. It was fantastic! The cheese is made from fermented cashews (again, yummers) and coconut oil and the crust is made with Brazil nuts and fig. I honestly thought that this tasted better than regular cheese cake, it was that good. I'm going to try to look up a recipe for this and attempt to duplicate it.

Next came my dessert: the Brownie. As much as I raved over the cheesecake, I wholeheartedly disliked this brownie. Raw cocoa, pecan, and walnut based. I suppose the rawness is what made it taste so dry. However, what I think was the most unforgivable about this dessert is the fact that the walnuts were rancid. For a restaurant that prides itself on fresh raw bio ingredients, this was very unfortunate. I'm glad I paid the extra 2.75$ for the ice cream side, because it was very pleasant and a good way to wash down the aftertaste of rancidness.

Service

Overall, the service was okay. Our waitress was very pleasant but overworked due to the busy evening. They only had two waitresses when they would have obviously needed a third. As a result, the service was a bit slow and the wrong dessert was brought to me at first (which, in retrospect, I should have kept). Again, I don't blame the waitress, she was really nice and knowledgeable about the food.

The verdict

Would I go back to Crudessence? Obviously, if I had ordered my husband's menu choices I might have said yes. However, due to mushy noodles and rancid nuts, and a 110$ bill, I have to say that I would not purposely go back at my own initiation. I would gladly try it again if I'm invited and hopefully make better menu choices. I believe Crusdessence has a lot of potential, but is easily a hit or miss experience.

Thai shrimp dumpling soup

This is a long recipe, but worth it. Anybody who likes Thai food and shrimps will fall in love with it. Every time I've done it, it's been an amazing hit, with lots of oohs and aahs from my dinner guests.

This recipe is inspired greatly by the shrimp dumpling soup in the Diva Cooking recipe book from Victoria Blashford-Snell and Jennifer Joyce. Mostly, I've changed the flavour from a Tom Yum soup to a red Thai curry soup. It's relatively easy to make if you have a food processor, but there are many steps involved. Don't be put off by some of the more exotic ingredients, you can find almost all of them in larger supermarkets. And if you have an Asian market nearby, all the better.

Step 1: The curry paste

The base of this soup and basically what gives it it's distinctive flavour is a red Thai curry paste. You can, of course, buy it at the supermarket, but I like to make my own. Believe me, you will taste the difference and there's something very satisfying about making curry from scratch.

Ingredients

• 3 to 6 chilies, seeded if you prefer less heat
• 2 tsp coriander seeds
• 1 tsp of cumin seeds
• 1/2 tsp paprika powder
• 1 tsp of ground turmeric
• 4 shallots
• 4 garlic cloves
• 1 inch piece of chopped ginger
• 4 cilantro roots (make sure you buy cilantro with the roots still attached)
• 2 tbsp chopped cilantro stocks
• 1 tsp of lime zest
• 2 lemongrass stems (trimmed, white parts only) or 3 tbsp of lemongrass paste
• 1 tsp of shrimp paste (found in Asian supermarkets, can be substituted with anchovy paste)
• 2 kaffir lime leaves (you can find these at Loblaws with the GDion spices)
• 2 tbsp of vegetable oil

Kaffir lime leaves

Lemongrass

Toast the seeds on a dry frying pan over medium heat until fragrant and ground to a powder. Place all of the ingredients in a food processor.

Before

Process until smooth. Don't worry if there are still some chunks left, mine never gets completely smooth. You can add a bit of water if it's the paste is too thick.

After

Keep in an airtight container in the fridge until ready to use. The curry paste should last around 2 weeks in the fridge.

Step 2: The shrimp dumplings

What you will need to feed 4 greedy people or 6 regular people.

Ingredients

• 2 garlic cloves
• 2 inch piece of ginger root
• 2 shallots
• 2 pounds of raw shrimps, shell on (very important)
• 2 egg whites
• 2 tsp of cornstarch
• 4 tbsp of chopped fresh cilantro
• salt and pepper

Peel the shrimp and set aside the shells for later. You will use them in your stock.

Place the garlic cloves, ginger and shallots in a food processor and pulse until finely chopped. Add the rest of the ingredients and process until it forms a rough paste. Chill until needed.

Yummy shrimp purée!

Step 3: The stock, part 1

Next step is making your stock.

Ingredients

• 1 tbsp of vegetable oil
• reserved shrimp shells
• 8 cups of water
• 2 inch ginger root, chopped
• 6 garlic cloves, sliced
• 1 handful of cilantro stalks, chopped

Heat the oil over medium heat and add the shrimps shells. Cook until shells are pink.

Add the rest of the stock ingredients. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low and cover. Simmer for 20 minutes.

Strain the stock into a bowl and discard the solids.

Step 4: The stock, part 2

Now that you have a flavourful liquid ready for your soup, it's time to add that wonderful paste you made earlier along with the finishing touches.

Ingredients

• 1 tbsp of vegetable oil
• 3 tbsp of Thai red curry paste
• 1x14oz can of coconut milk
• 4 lime leaves
• 2 tbsp of Thai fish sauce (available in Asian section of food markets)
• juice of 1 lime
• 1 cup of fresh mushrooms, chopped (Enoki mushrooms are wonderful in this recipe, but you can use shitakes, brown shimeji, or whatever you like)
• 1 can of baby corn, drained and cut in half
• 1 handful of basil leaves, torn
• 1 handful of cilantro leaves, chopped

Heat the oil over medium heat in the saucepan. Add the curry paste and fry for roughly 1 minute. Add the stock from part 1 and the rest of the ingredients except the basil and cilantro. Bring back to a boil and simmer for 5 minutes.

Now it's time to make the shrimp dumplings. Using a teaspoon and sightly moist hands, form the shrimp mixture into little balls and drop them into the simmering soup. Cook them for a few minutes until the balls float to the top.

Ladle into bowls and garnish with basil and cilantro and you're done! You won't believe how tasty it is, especially after all that hard work. I've tried many soups in Thai restaurants and this tastes just as good if not better.

Savour every bite!