Objective: Exchange home-made sauerkraut for home-made fig jam
Where?: DNA Restaurant – fancy contemporary restaurant in Old Montreal – 355 rue Marguerite d’Youville
When?: Happy Hour
Why? (Besides desire for sauerkraut): 1/2 price on all Canadian bottles of wine from 5-7pm
Ultimate Goal: Cabbage Rolls
Mission Log, Thursday, January 27, 2011:
18:00: Arrive at DNA (Fancy Contemporary Old Port Restaurant).
18:05: Contact arrives.
18:10: Chat with bartender and chef about wine and food selection. They suspected nothing.
18:15: Start drinking amazing bottle of Hidden Beach. Very professional.
18:20: Amuse-Bouche arrives – lamb tartar. Still no trade effected. All part of the stealth.
18:30: Bartender walks away.
18:31: Trade executed. Ginger confit added to sweeten the deal (1 litre of sauerkraut was not a fair trade for 125mL of jam). Negotiations – peaceful.
18:35: Continue to eat and drink so as to not arouse suspicion.
20:00: Leave restaurant.
Mission: Accomplished.
I needed sauerkraut to make vegetarian cabbage rolls for a friend’s party, and when you know a good cook who makes his own sauerkraut by the litre (or the dozen litres) you just don’t go to the supermarket. You find something he wants, and you trade. From all my summer preserving I thought he might enjoy some fig jam to go with his home-made sourdough bread. So the arrangements as to the exchange were made (see above) and everything ran smoothly. I’ll admit, when he arrived I was dying to say, “Did you bring the stuff?” because the situation was already so ridiculous. Who goes to happy hour at a very upscale Vieux-Port restaurant to exchange preserves? Us, that’s who.
So one glass in, when no one was looking, we very casually took our mason jars out of our bags and made the switch while the “Mission: Impossible” theme music played in my head. Much more civilized than jumping out of helicopters…
Next post: How to Make Vegetarian Cabbage Rolls
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