Baccanalle
595 Montreal Rd. (back of the Phenix Building), 613-859-6297,
baccanalle.com
Open
: for takeout and delivery Thursday to Saturday from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m.
Prices
: whole roast jerk chicken dinner $45, mains $16 to $18, $5 or more, depending on distance, for deliveries through Love Local Delivery
Last week in this space, I raved about a roast chicken dinner that struck me as pretty close to definitive. That bird from Absinthe in Hintonburg was the stuff of intense cravings, moist and well-seasoned throughout and made even better by its mushroom gravy.
But at the risk of seeming fickle, I’m confessing this week to a new favourite poultry treat. I’m seeing stars over the delicious and economical roast jerk chicken from Baccanalle, a tiny but potent purveyor of Caribbean-inspired food on Montreal Road.
If my life’s last meal were to be a roast chicken, I might well order it jerked. I’m all in when it comes to that intoxicatingly savoury and sometimes incendiary marinade, powered by Scotch bonnet peppers, allspice, green onions and more. When I saw that Baccanalle offered a roast jerk chicken dinner to go for $45, it struck me as a must-order and I wasn’t disappointed.
Baccanalle’s bird wasn’t as full-on fiery as the jerk pork that I’ve had in Jamaica, or the now legendary “atomic” jerk chicken that chef Frederick White served us at the now-shuttered Flavours of the Caribbean in Lowertown. That nuclear-level dish memorably incapacitated a colleague of mine in a 2015 spicy-food duel, reducing him to a bent-over, near-heaving mess. (Pain notwithstanding, he enjoyed the chicken.)
Resa Solomon-St. Lewis, Baccanalle’s chef-owner and an Algonquin College culinary grad, made a more mellow but nonetheless complexly flavoured jerk chicken that elicited primal appreciation from all of us when we tore it apart last weekend. Its earthy, house-made marinade was slathered not just on the chicken’s exterior, making its skin something to fight over, but also inside the bird, contributing to meat that was worth picking off the bones.
Our chicken came nestled on a generously portioned bed of rice and beans (or rice and peas as they say in the Caribbean), which further contributed to the glowing heat in our mouths. Sides, chosen when I placed my order online a day in advance, included corn on the cob with spiced maple butter, packets of superior fried plantain chips from the local company Laborde Foods, and Baccanallle’s fine “Jamocha me crazy” brownies.
Solomon-St. Lewis also prepares freezable containers of cold pulled jerk chicken, a tub of which made for a fine staple in my fridge days after our al fresco dinner. I was inclined to eat its well-herbed and chili-flecked meat straight from the tub for some instant relief of my pandemic blues.
While Solomon-St. Lewis’s family is from Trinidad and Tobago, she makes some mean Jamaican-style patties, which were meaty and not greasy. We can also recommend Baccanalle’s thirst-quenching house-made sorrel drinks.
Jamaican beef patties from Baccanalle.
An order of blackened chicken underwhelmed a little bit, simply paling in comparison to the the more vibrant jerk preparations.
All that chicken aside, Baccanalle does have items to vegan customers, and even has a listing for “Baccanalle Vegan” on Uber Eats. The frozen “Anima” chickpea vegan curry that we tried was big-flavoured and teeming with vegetables, but was also on the mushy side after it had been thawed and then reheated.
Still, I would be curious to try more of Solomon-St. Lewis’s prepared items. She has grown her business steadily over the last five or so years, building a clientele through appearances at various farmers’ markets from Beechwood to Kanata. Her three-table bricks-and-mortar location, called Capital Fare Cafe, shut because of the pandemic, but she now is concentrating solely on her Baccanalle brand from that east-end kitchen.
If you’re picking up from Baccanalle rather than ordering its food to be delivered, be warned that it’s a little tricky to find. The business is at the back of the Phenix Building on Montreal Road, which has its own ticketed parking lot but is free for 15 minutes. You can phone Baccanalle to let them know you’re there to receive your food curbside.
It’s a bit of a rigmarole. But what isn’t during COVID-19? Just do it for the jerk chicken.