The Pastrami Chronicles, Volume 2: The Non-Pastrami, Toronto Edition

The Corned Beef House on the corner of Adelaide and Widmer specializes not just in corned beef but in, as much as one supposes a Toronto establishment can, the Montreal smoked meat sandwich (which is really a smoked corned beef sandwich but who's minding particulars like "meat" vs. "beef"?). A French restaurant on some corner of Bloor near Honest Ed's also boasts of this two-sandwich specialty. So the conclusion is obvious: The Montreal smoked meat sandwich is made to stand in for a pastrami sandwich. And it appears, much like its beleaguered cousin south of the border, it gets tripped up by non-Kosher infringements on its Kosher sanctity.

The Montreal smoked meat sandwich with hot mustard on dark rye, at the Corned Beef House, is tasty enough but it lacks that unexplainable whiff of Ashkenazi bliss that kosher pastrami is imbued with. It's so fatty, it's hard to dry it out yet it doesn't retain the juiciness one would think it would hold onto. That being said, it isn't that bad. It has the reminder of a good kosher pastrami on rye and that's good enough. It's something close to Katz's Deli in that regard. Next time, Pennypacker will see what the Jewish section of Toronto offers and then we'll really get down to a bissele pastrami competition on a future edition of the Pastrami Chronicles.