Bistro · Shediac, New Brunswick · Since 2018
A French-style bistro in a nineteenth-century house on Main Street. Cocagne Cape oysters, ten lobster dishes, a cellar that runs from Magnetic Hill to Chablis, and one of Canada’s largest board game collections, a few steps from your table.
The table
The kitchen cooks the coast it stands on: oysters from Cocagne Cape, lobster from the Shediac Lobster Shop, herbs from La Ferme Spirale, and a house pilsner brewed with Les Brasseux d’la Côte. The recipes travel further afield, then come home.
Fresh pasta, made in the house.
Lobster, shrimp, and bay scallops folded into a warm cheese-and-garlic dip, with toasted naan. Best weathered in company.
Seven Blue Pearl oysters from Cocagne Cape, on the half-shell, with a house mignonette and lemon. The poem ends badly for the oysters. Supper ends rather well.
Atlantic scallops, lobster, and cold-water shrimp in a shallot and Chardonnay cream, under a gruyère and potato gratin. Worth following to the end of the earth.
The room
The house was built in the late 1800s for a pharmacist, and has since been a monastery, a family home, and a boulangerie. Now its bay windows frame long lunches. Playing cards hang from the ceiling, the tables are named for them, and a gallery of curious creatures by Dieter Kirsch keeps an eye on dessert.
The games
The shelves are sorted by kind, from family classics to heavyweight Euro games, one game to a table at a time. Ask the guild for a suggestion. Play is $10 a table, and free when everyone at the table orders a main.
Private dining
Low light and close quarters, for tables with something to discuss.
A♦Bright, block-built, and impossible to be solemn in.
7♦For birthdays, board meetings, and afternoons that call for another pot.
K♦The bay windows, the hanging cards, the stopped clocks. All yours.
A♥Mentioned in good company
Visit
About twenty minutes from Moncton. Reserve on OpenTable, or try your luck at the door.
