• Jordan Barry ©️ Seven Days
• Razor clams with green tomatoes and horseradish

I learned an important language lesson during a three-hour meal last fall at Montréal's Mon Lapin. The menu of roughly a dozen small plates was entirely in French, and, on the advice of several Vermont chefs and winemakers, I ordered almost all of them. But one dish, which promised "couteaux," was puzzling enough to give me pause and led to an animated exchange of words and gestures. Turns out the Québécois word for "knives" also means "razor clams."

• Jordan Barry ©️ Seven Days
• Mon Lapin's menu and Picniquette from Pinard & Filles

To be honest, the restaurant and wine bar at 150 rue Saint-Zotique Est in Little Italy could convince me to eat anything, especially when paired with a glass of grape-and-apple piquette from Québec's Pinard & Filles. In May, Mon Lapin — whose name translates to "My Rabbit" — topped the 2023 list of Canada's 100 Best restaurants. "It's elusive, that sweet spot between being a special-occasion restaurant and a no-occasion let's-grab-a-bite kind of place," the write-up gushed, "but for five years Mon Lapin has occupied just that ethereal zone."

For folks coming from Vermont, dining at the top-ranked restaurant certainly feels like a special event — and reservations are recommended. But it's become a go-to eating adventure for many of Vermont's top industry pros.

"Honestly my favorite place to eat in the world," Vivid Coffee owner Ian Bailey said of Mon Lapin. "It's like going to a concert where the experience almost transcends music."

• Jordan Barry ©️ Seven Days
• Beef tartare

Kathline Chery, cofounder of Fletcher's Kalchē Wine Cooperative, said her dinner there last summer was "by far a top-three meal experience of my life."

Both Bailey and Chery recalled eating the croque-pétoncle — a scallop mousse sandwich that looks like a grilled cheese at first glance, served with the crust cut off — paired with a sparkling Sicilian wine made entirely from figs. Their overlapping memories would be strange at a place where the menu changes daily and the wine list ranges from under-the-radar Québécois producers to the hottest-of-the-hot natural wines. But coincidentally, they happened to be at Mon Lapin on the same August evening, seated at different outdoor tables.

"By the end of the night, they brought out a round of digestifs for all of us to imbibe in together — including our server, who had just finished her shift," Chery said. "The casualness of it all made it feel familiar, like we were with friends, even though I knew we were at this world-class restaurant."

• Jordan Barry ©️ Seven Days
• Strozzapreti maison

Jordan Ware, chef at Burlington's Hen of the Wood, has been dining at Mon Lapin since 2019, when the restaurant was still tiny; it has since expanded from 36 to 55 seats. Originally, Mon Lapin was part of a group of Montréal restaurants that grew out of Joe Beef, founded in 2005, which specializes in Lyonnais cooking defined by "exuberant immoderation, a blend of the haute and the gluttonous," according to the New Yorker. The collection of restaurants in the Little Burgundy neighborhood now includes Le Vin Papillon and Liverpool House, among others. Former employees Vanya Filipovic, a sommelier with ties to Vermont, and Marc-Olivier Frappier, a chef, took full ownership of Mon Lapin in 2019. Chef Jessica Noël, front-of-house manager Marc-Antoine Gélinas and sommelier Alex Landry are also now co-owners.

• Jordan Barry ©️ Seven Days
• Sourdough-brined chicken with hakurei turnips and caviar

Ware has followed Filipovic and Frappier since their Joe Beef days. "It was cool to see that team branch off and do their own thing," he said.

A fluke crudo with cherry tomatoes was a highlight of Ware's most recent visit. It had brown butter in it somewhere, he said — which doesn't naturally go with raw fish — "but it was perfect."

"When you go there, everything tastes good, but it's not super fancy," Ware continued. "The wine is good; the servers are gracious; the music's loud. It's exciting, and people are having fun all over the restaurant."

I had a similar experience: As the dishes progressed from razor clams to gnocchi fritti, housemade strozzapreti, local beef tartare and sourdough-brined chicken, my glass filled with another local treat: a gamay from Dunham's Domaine l'Espiègle. It wasn't fig wine, but it was an unexpectedly delightful taste of Québec.