The Canadian Coffee Break brings together some of the finest Canadian minds in Southern California every week for a topical, lively round-tablesque discussion over very dark coffee. Won’t you join us.
TOPIC #9: Diners, Cafes, Coffee Shops…
Please compare and contrast the oldschool cafes, diners and coffee shops of your respective hometowns to those available to gurgitators in los angeles. Where would Gottfried Helnwein (by way of Ed Hopper) stage the Boulevard of Broken Dreams, Canadian edition? If it’s old, sort of crusty, visually interesting, still standing and the coffee is reliable, consider it fair game.
Marc
In the fatalistic social climate of the Referendum-era in the Plateau region of Montreal, it often seemed like there was nothing to do but eat breakfast. In our Halcion® daze we would all hang out all day at Gabby’s punk rock breakfast eatery, eating tofu huevos rancheros, and listening to Slayer (these were before the days of Flick). Gabby’s eventually got turned into a pretty rocking vegan coop called Aux Vivres although you didn’t find much of the original clientele there. Folks would also go to Pines for their super greasy “god like potatoes” (the secret of which was chicken fat), and next door to a place that I think was called Millies just like the famous LA eatery (although I may be mistaken). The whole scene was kinda tragic in a romantic way. Later on though as the scene started to move north along “the Main” (as we called St Laurent Boulevard), up towards Mile End, places like Senzala opened up and the scene started to change somehow. A fresh new batch of Anglos came streaming in to replace my generation, and the Anglo-Bohemia I had come to love and hate was being born again, with all-day breakfasts becoming a thing of the past, replaced.
