In December 2021, Eater Montreal made its selection of the Restaurants of the Year, “celebrating some of the best in new dining to grace Montreal since January 2020.”
It picked 6 restaurants, among which Café Chez Téta, as one of the 2021 Eater Award Winners for Montreal.
The winners were chosen for making “their mark on Montreal’s vibrant dining scene over the past two years, even as the unprecedented crisis unfolded all around.”
“The luminous next-generation Lebanese café,” as Eater Montreal called it, was actually established to pay tribute to a Lebanese grandmother who influenced her grandson with her amazing traditional cuisine.
That is chef Antoun Aoun who decided to open a restaurant with his partner, Lebanese dietitian Mélodie Roukoz, to carry the legacy of his Teta’s traditional cooking all the way across the oceans to Montreal.
And they did, with such loving attention to detail, in decor and food, that their homey and tasteful Café Chez Téta made it in barely a year to be awarded among the best new restaurants in Montreal.
“The name of our café honors the childhood memories associated with the warm and friendly welcome from my grandmother,” Chef Antoun shares on the café’s website.
But it is more than a café. The concept integrates the Lebanese culture in their offering of third-wave coffees along with traditional Lebanese delicacies, food, breakfast, and of course Lebanese coffee with cardamon aroma, a treat that hasn’t been as commonly around as it used to be in Lebanon.
Faithful to a point, the variety of wine is also Lebanese.
The menu includes traditional mezza and side dishes like Hummus, Baba Ghanouj, Tabbouleh, Fattouch, and of course the Lebanese iconic Manousheh in its variety of zaatar, cheese, and Keshek. Sfouf and halva brownies are also part of the dessert menu.
That Lebanese charming spot on the Plateau of Montreal has been a buzz for its delicious food and its welcoming decor of open-kitchen, rusty-red touches, walnut wood furniture, and marble surfaces.
For the Lebanese in Montreal, that spot in the vibrant Plateau is a place that reminds them of home.
