La Cucina Montreal

La Capicola

The exterior of La Cucina caught my eye several times on trips up St Laurent to visit other mile end / outremont eateries. The full panes of glass and the fact that there was no information about the restaurant online (or even a website) intrigued me.

I gave it a try on a cold December night without any idea of what to expect. The restaurant feels quite laid back and was not busy at all during my visit. My fellow diner and I were pleased to hear that they had two local micro brews on tap – particularly ones we had never encountered. We tried the Simple Malt blonde and red ales which are brewed by Brasseurs Illimités in St-Eustache, Quebec. The red was our favorite of the two, tasting clean and spicy. Although we both agreed the blonde was more interesting it certainly had a kick you don’t normally find in light ales. I also have to say we did find the beers on the pricey side. For $7.50 the pints didn’t feel like full pints and after our meal we went right around the corner to Montreal’s famous Dieu du Ciel brewery where we got bigger pints for 6$.

That’s neither here nor there, La Cucina is a restaurant after all so I won’t hold it against them. The menu is comprised mainly of pizzas and pastas. The wonderful wood burning brick oven enticed us both to go with pizzas (ranging from 11 – 16$). We ordered the Capicollo pizza and Italian sausage pizza. The Capicollo had roasted artichoke, black olives, garlic, capicollo salumi and mozzarella cheese while the Italian sausage was a classic roasted pepper, sausage and mozzarella pie. We traded quarters of each pizza and both were quite good and very filling. The crust was medium, not thin or thick and crunchy enough and the ingredients tasted fresh and well balanced.

Overall La Cucina is a great Italian eatery in a very central location (St Laurent / Laurier). The food prices are very reasonable and the service was great. It’s a good bet for diners seeking comfort food and in a calmer ambiance.

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