Verdun Beef: The guinguette-inspired ecosystem of the Sud-Ouest

“If you can open a butcher shop, and have your own quality meat, that’s taking it to another level in my opinion. That was the idea and challenge of what we have here,” says Charles Garant of Verdun Beef, a midday espresso in hand.

Sitting in the dining room of the neighbourhood butcher shop at a hard wood table, it’s clear this isn’t the average butchery: It’s a room lined with a wall of wine and decorated with a farmhouse touches like stitched paintings and sculptures, but it’s also a space that marks a natural progression:

Neighbouring the wine bar Verdun Beach opened by Garant and his partners Marc Fradon and Philippe Jacquelin, they’ve been joined by Anaïs Marchand and Simon Généreux-Vien of the Primavin wine agency, and chef & head butcher Yann Vadaru Chi Santos to open the new spot in March 2024.

“Having Yann in the kitchen, with their experience in butchery and in restaurants, lets us navigate that space that’s both butchering and cooking,” Charles adds.

What started with the wine bar inspired by French guinguettes, democratized and open-air spaces outside urban centres to drink and eat inexpensively in early 20^th century France, has now extended into a space that puts the group closer to the sources of their menu.

“Butcher shops give you proximity to the whole animal; we receive 1,000 pounds of beef, pigs every week… you get as close as you can get to a farm to table operation, and it can supply the restaurant next door, but it brings you something you don’t get to see everywhere in the city.”

Farm to (our) table

Building off the nightly revelry at Verdun Beach, Verdun Beef provides daytime operations that provide grocery options to people in the neighbourhood alongside a tidy casse-croûte menu of sandwiches and charcuterie.

Even as Charles is speaking, a few tables had been occupied by midday diners enjoying wine and snacks by the window and in the sunlit dining room for 30 (including a line of street-facing stools).

A refrigerated counter filled with wagyu and angus beef from Quebec and Hudson, chicken from Trois-Rivières, and pork from Saint-Patrice-de-Beaurivage hums nearby—focused on these animals for the time being, offerings at Verdun Beef will grow as demand does. Separating them is a floor-to-ceiling selection of goods that range from chips and conservas to preserves and seasonings. Across from that, a selection of prêt-à-manger options made by the kitchen.

“The butcher is the biggest part of it, but we also do lunch and we happen to have a lot of wine, so we suggest you take a bottle with what you eat,” Charles says.

“We want to get on that train where people can pick up packages with charcuterie, their wine… everything you need to go by the water or stay on the street for an apéro (unwinding before dinner with a drink and snacks), and we want to play with it.”

Cycles of day and night

That said, Verdun Beef isn’t beyond hosting parties of its own.

Coming from the wine bar’s guinguette DNA, the butchery’s primed to offer its own take: Special events and chef invitations, cultural exchanges over butcher’s table dinners, and hopes to invite farms to sell their own vegetables when Wellington is pedestrianized in the summer.

“The definition of it is basically that you eat well, you drink well, and you dance well… textbook-wise, it’s what we do,” Charles explains.

The dance, while something that could break out between clients, also extends to the collaborative spirit of the owners.

Having worked in restaurants for so long, collaboration’s in the owners’ blood, and having a space like Verdun Beef helps unlock them. With a street free of cars, that’ll make for an extra 40 seats for both Verdun Beach and another 40 for Verdun Beef on outdoor terrasses; the possibilities for parties extend from méchoui to Acadian and Quebecois-style épluchette de blé d'Inde.

“From wine bar to wine agency and now a butcher shop? We like to think it all feeds each other. It’s an ecosystem, and we do a lot of community events and want to be part of the community… and Verdun’s a treasure in the city that not all Montrealers realize is here.”

A home not far away from home

At its core, the consistent thread running throughout the connected projects is to go all-in on what’s local.

“The butcher shop made sense for us,” Charles says. “How do you get a project to evolve without doing a copy-paste? We wanted to stay around the neighbourhood, so we wanted to figure how to stay within Verdun’s ecosystem without cannibalizing it, and how we could add to it,” Charles says.

“We want to represent Verdun the best we can. We like that cool element the area has; it’s laid back here. You’re in Montreal, but you’re also in a village where people know one another.”

“I love it. I live across the street. I’ve spent every second of my life here for the past four years, and I’m just getting more and more with it. I can be part of something here, and bring something here that didn’t exist at the time.”

That said: The next possible project for the neighbourhood may be a fishmonger.

Verdun Beef is located at 4800 Wellington Street, next door to Verdun Beach.