Year of the lunch

Simple and delicious seafood is the key to
Milos’s $20.09 midday menu

by BARTEK KOMOROWSKI

I have long been curious about Milos, reputed as the most fancy and expensive Greek restaurant in Montreal. It always seemed out of reach price-wise until a friend mentioned that they do a prix fixe lunch, priced according to the year—that is, with the decimal point between the second and third digits, making this year’s price $20.09.

For my lunchtime visit to Milos, I recruited my Icelandic roommate, a man weaned on the bosom of cod who is a stern authority on the freshness and quality of seafood, on which this restaurant prides itself. We arrived at Milos at 12:30 p.m. on a Wednesday to discover that the rather large restaurant was almost full. We had not thought of making a reservation, which Milos takes for lunch. Despite this strategic error, the efficient staff managed to seat us within five minutes, albeit on a small mezzanine slightly below the main floor, which put us at eye level with a partially exposed female posterior a few steps away.

Undeterred by this spectacle, we proceeded to consult the menu. At first glance, the choices seemed a bit pedestrian (lentil soup, spanakopita, tomato and feta salad, smoked salmon with lemon and capers). In a fit of fiscal irresponsibility, we opted for two deluxe appetizer options, both of which cost an extra $10 but seemed more interesting than the rest: grilled octopus, purportedly “sashimi quality” and from the Mediterranean; and a crab cake, said to be made of fresh Maryland blue crab meat.

The octopus was served simply—a wine marinated, char-grilled tentacle was sliced into little, flat cylinders and served on a bed of mild onions, accompanied by a tangy lentil salad. It was very good—the texture was pleasantly firm and not rubbery in the least, and the outside was nicely charred. The crab cake, however, really stole the spotlight. It did not look like much when it arrived at the table—a lopsided, beige golf ball, accompanied by a small chafing dish of mayonnaise and the tiniest dollop of fava beans. It turned out to be a delicate and fluffy, almost soufflé-like suspension full of silky, flavourful strands of crabmeat—a joy to eat. The Icelander approved.

For our main course, we selected the tuna burger and the tsipoura, which we were told is a small fish native to the Mediterranean, apparently flown in fresh from Greece. The tuna burger featured a dense and overcooked puck of finely minced tuna, packed into a thin, soft white bun and garnished with a daicon radish salad. The daicon imparted a bit of much-needed moisture but ultimately failed to animate this disappointingly flavourless sandwich. Daicon in a tuna burger strikes me as a good idea, nonetheless—its crunchiness could have been a good counterpoint to the patty, had it contained rare tuna. On the positive, we were both delighted by the julienned zucchini fries that accompanied the burger.

The other main, the tsipoura, was quite good. The fish was grilled whole and served de-boned. It was attractively presented, the two boneless sides of the fish butterflied on the plate, sitting between the head and tail and drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with a few capers. The Icelander found the freshness and the preparation of the fish to be quite satisfactory. The outside was slightly charred and delightfully crispy while the inside was tender and flaky. The olive oil and caper garnish complemented but did not mask the fish’s delicate flavour. We washed this down with privately imported Greek white wines of superlative quality and, at $12 and $14 per glass, commensurate price.

For the desert, included in the price, there were two options: almond pear pie and yogurt “martini”; we selected one of each. The former was good but forgettable. The latter, which, true to its name, was served in a martini glass, was quite delightful. Two walnut sized scoops of dense, slightly salty labneh-like yogurt were topped with a couple of sweet and aromatic slivers of candied orange zest doused in a honey-like, orange perfumed syrup. Along with a pair of thick, sweet Greek coffees, this made for a good ending to an overall enjoyable lunch, insipid tuna puck notwithstanding.