Sinfully delicious

>> Au Cinquième Péché’s French
cuisine caters to your inner glutton

by A.J. KINIK

For those of you reading this who may be linguistically challenged, cinquième péché translates as “fifth sin.” For those of you who may be biblically challenged, or who haven’t seen David Fincher’s Se7en in a while, the reference here is to the Seven Deadly Sins and specifically to the fifth of these abominations: gluttony.

Why would one name one’s restaurant after such a thing? Well, the answer would probably require a whole history of Quebec before, during and after the Quiet Revolution that, fortunately, we don’t have the space for here. What you should also know, however, is that in French the fifth Deadly Sin is known as gourmandise, which is a term that apparently used to strike fear into the hearts of true believers, but now has a fairly harmless ring to it. I mean, who in their right mind doesn’t want to be a gourmand? Especially when places like Au Cinquième Péché make it so easy.

Visit Au Cinquième Péché during regular hours and you’ll find a charming miniature bistro (right down to the black and white tiled interior and the requisite framed black and white photographs of Paris in its early-20th century heyday that grace the walls) that specializes in contemporary cuisine Française with true Nouvelle-France flair. Visit it between 11:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. on Wednesday through Friday and you’ll get all of the above plus some daylight and an absurdly inexpensive lunch special.

I’d been hearing rumours about Au Cinquième Péché’s lunch special for a while, but, frankly, I really wasn’t prepared for just how good a deal it is. Get this: you get a three-course table d’hôte menu, with coffee or tea thrown in for free, and the price tag sets you back a mere $13–$18. Nice portions too. No skimping. No kidding.

On a recent visit, our party showed up and found the appetizer options to be a sweet potato and carrot soup on the one hand, a mesclun salad on the other. It being a raw, miserable day out, I opted for the warmth and comfort of the soup and soon I was glad that I had. The soup that arrived was no middle-of-the-road sweet potato and carrot soup—this was a deep, rich soup with perfect texture, that had been dressed with finely minced chives and just a few artfully scattered drops of a mysterious dark-green oil. We all took turns sampling the soup’s lovely flavours and trying to solve the mystery but the best we could come up with was a stab in the dark. Avocado oil? Nope, as it turns out there was a reason we were passing that bowl around and savouring it so: it was hemp seed oil. As far as we know the mescaline salad—sorry, mesclun salad—contained no illicit ingredients. It did however come with sliced grapes, mango, and an Asian-inspired dressing with hints of sesame oil and rice vinegar and it was exceptional.

There being three of us, we were able to sample almost all of the entrées on the menu, the sole exception being a vegetarian penne dish that passed by our table looking so inspired that it almost got one of my dining companions to change her mind about her skate wing. In the end, though, she held fast and was glad she had. Her skate ($15) came expertly seared and adorned with a bright persimmon vinaigrette and some beautiful braised fennel, and the plating was bold. At $16, the bavette plate would have been more than acceptable had it just been a simple steak frites combo, but instead, Au Cinquième Péché’s kitchen turned it on its ear, accompanying the perfectly cooked hanger steak with rapini, stewed lentils and a tantalizing tapenalgues, a briny, tapenade-like concoction made with seaweed. Finally, the braised veal tongue ($18) was incredibly tender, and it came served on a bed of sautéed Savoy cabbage, with a delicate beet purée surrounding it. In other words: three for three.

At these prices, Au Cinquième Péché’s end-of-the-week lunch special is almost beyond criticism, but they’ve gone ahead and put together an adventurous, ultra-high-quality menu anyway. The only sin would be to miss out on the fun.