Montreal's small, but well-frequented Chinatown is on La Gauchetière Street and around Saint Urban Street and Saint Lawrence Boulevard (boul. Saint-Laurent), between René Lévesque Boulevard and Viger Street (Place-d'Armes metro station).

The Chinatown is known as Quartier chinois in French. Hong Kong Chinese, especially, settled in the area. Over the years, Vietnamese, especially of Chinese descent—who were already French-speaking before arriving—have set up shops and restaurants in the area as well.

Many Asians frequent this place since the shops often offer products directly imported from China or Vietnam. These products are often unavailable at normal supermarkets.

During the Lobster Fest, the restaurants there are so crowded that it is impossible to get a seat if one has not made a reservation. During that period, lobsters are very cheap so everyone takes advantagem of the bargain and flocks the restaurants.

Eating in Chinatown

I. Restaurants

  Of the many different restaurants in Montreal's Chinatown, only 2 are of particular interest. The rest are more or less the same.
  

(i) The New Maison Kam Fung

1071 St.Urban, 2nd fl.
     Kam Fung used to be the largest Chinese restaurant in Chinatown, Montreal. I was told by insiders that they are the cleanest restuarant in Montreal so your chance of getting exotic germs is less likely than from any other restaurants in Chinatown. They used to be located at Clarks street just above Cote St.Antoine. Three years ago their lease expired and they had to move to a new location. I went there a couple of times after they moved and was not impressed. This summer (2005) I went there three or four of times during the Jazz festival and was duely impressed.Since then, I have been going back at an average rate of once every two weeks, each time trying out one new item on their menu. In my opinion they have regain their supremacy among the myriad of Chinese restaurants in Chinatown.
   Lunch time is dim sum time and you are well advised to go early. By noon the place is packed and lining up is the order of the day. Fortunately, some of the more popular dim sum dishes--Har Gow (Steamed Shrimp Dumpling), Sui Mei (Steamed Prok Dumpling) and possibly Wok Tei (Pan Stickers) are available as appetizers at dinner time.
   Their prices are about 10% more than the "quick-dump-and-serve" diners in China town but their quality and price are markedly better. Believe me, your extra 10% is well spent.
   Service is friendly and efficient and the waiters are adequately trilingual (Chinese, English and French). Some are even quadralingual (Vietnamese on top of the other three.)

   Now for the nitty gritty part.
    The nice thing about Chinese food is that you can always mix and match. Chinese eat their food communally. Different dishes are placed in the middle of the table and everyone shares the food. It is hard to go eat in a Chinese restaurant all by yourself-- you will have to go to a noodle and rice place for that (see review on noodle and rice in the main page). For Chinese food in a restaurant, it is the more the merrier. If you have a group of 4 to 6 people you can ask for the "packaged dinner" menu or the banquet menu (usually good for 10 to 12 people and ranging from a packaged price of 178 to 338 dollars *see example below)
    For four big eaters or six small eaters, ask for the Peking Duck and Lobster dinner package. This is a 78 dollar meal consisting of :

• One whole Peking duck in three courses:
• 1. Shredded cripy duck skin to be wraped in thin Chinese pancakes
• 1. Duck and dry scallop soup.
• 1. Duck meat stir fried with vegetables.
• One large lobster cooked with ginger and shallot.
• Stirred fried grouper fillet.
• Stirred fried baby bai Choi (baby Chinese cabbage.)
• Steam rice.
• Dessert

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   If you have a group of 10, ask to see the 218$ and 228$ menus. They are your best bet for a satisfying meal.

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   For lobster lovers, here is something that is not on the menu but is rather popular for people from Hong Kong. It is lobster served on a bed of noddles. The price is the regular season price for lobster plus 4 or 5 dollars extra for the noddles.

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For Tofu and vegans , there are plenty of choices one of which is not on the English menu but you can ask for it by describig what it is. This is the "round (disc-shaped) tofu served with stirred friend baby bean leaves at 15.95$

  

(ii)Mon Shing
     This is a small restaurant with closely spaced tables, non-smiling waiters, not-so-clean rest rooms: a typical Chinese restaurant that offers good food at a low cost. This establishment is packed almost every night so you need to go there either before 6:30 or after 8:30 in order to avoid a line up. Their loss leader is lobster special offered at about the same price as you would pay for an uncooked lobster at a fish store. (Only one per table, the second one is at regular price.) Not well known, but very good, is their pipa-duck : A kind of roasted duck but more on the sweet side than the regular roasted duck, which is more on the salty side. If you can read Chinese, you will find all kinds of exotic food written on on stripes of papers, pasted along the walls. One of these, I think, is an endangered species: the sea turtle. I like their mutton on a hot pot but my wife detests mutton so we usually settle for duck, fish and chicken. If you are not fat conscious like my wife, the jelly fish with sliced pig-knucles is a treat. We find their complementary soup of the day fantastic but we have not figured out who is qualified to get that for free. I think it depends on whether you order a regular meal or just rice and noodles. Check with the waiters but be prepared to deal with feinted ignorance to the fact.
Mon Shing is located on the south side of La Gauchitiere just west of the intersection between La Gauchetiere and St.Urban.

Furama

The Restaurant "Furama" moved from the second floor of a hotel farther East to its present location at Clark street just below Rene Levesque a few years ago. I was never very impressed by their food. They are more expensive than Ruby Rouge and Kam Fung but slightly below par. I had a bad experience with them on Father's Day 2003 when their place was packed. They simply could not handle the business and we waited for over an hours before telling the waiter we were leaving. When we were leaving we notice many tables whose guests came before us still had no food on the table. The management had simply fumbled the ball that day. I am not going back there any time soon. You can try your luck if you want to.

VIP

Many people like the small restaurant , the "VIP." "VIP" was opened by a "Miss Montreal" many years ago. I don't know if she still owns it. I have been there a few times before but I cannot see why so many people think the place is wonderful. The food is certainly much cheaper than other places but the restaurant looks untidy and unclean and the food is not particularily much better than the other restaurants.

Soup Tonkinese

Chinatown nowadays is proliferated with the Vietnamese Noodle Soup houses (Soup Tonkinese.) They are all practically the same so you may as well randomly choose one if you want to have the noodle soup that day. Although the price is cheap, there is actually very little solid in the soup. You may be better off going to Dobe and Andy's (see below under "Noddles")for a bowl of "BBQ Duck with Noodles."

Dim Sum

For Dim Sum, both La Maison Kam Fung, as well as the new restaurant, "Ruby Rouge", that have taken over Kam Fung's old premise are good. On weekdays, if you go to Ruby Rouge and order before 10:30 am, you get a special discount-- they want to move you out before the lunch time crowd gets there.

Rice and Noodles

Dobe and Andy : 1071 St.Urban, (Place Du Quartier)

I cannot possibly see why some Montreal food reviewers give lavish praises to some of these noodle establishments where the quality is definitely between inferior and atrocious. For good quality rice and noodle, you have to go either to one of the several places recommended in the main page. Noodles , or to a good restaurant such as La Maison Kam Fung (see top of the page.) If you are budget minded, there is a small rice and noodle diner in China town you can go to. For less than ten dollars (tax plus tip) you can have a satisfying bowl of noodles in soup, a plate of fried noodles with meat and veggies or a meat on rice. Or if you are a big eater, order one of their regular noodles and a side dish of beef brisket (if they don't understand you, try "beef stew Chinese style" and if they still don't know what you are talking about, say these two words very slowly "Ow Nahm" . If you are not the squeamish type, try the curry-squid or lamb stew. If you like Chinese BBQ meat, then try any one of their noodles or rice with BBQ Duck, BBQ Chicken, Roast Pork and BBQ Pork. The noodles in soup is a complete meal by itself since it comes with noodles (starch), meat (protein), soup (liquid) and vegetable ( your daily fiber intake.)

   I was there on Oct 3rd and they were undergoing renovation. They were putting in a steam dim sum section. I believe they are trying to pick up the stray customers from Pastries Delise which has recently gone under (or sold out for the valuable store-space value, I don't know which is which.)
Like Pastrie Delise, Dobe and Andy also sells Chinese buns and bread of all kinds.