Has anyone been to this place in Montreal? It sounded great on the show.

I've eaten at APdC on four occasions. The first time was in 2003 when my wife and I were in Montreal on our honeymoon. Oddly enough even though we ate there a year before Tony discovered the place, it was Tony that led us to Au Pied de Cochon.

I had seen the episode of his Food Network show, A Cook's Tour, where Tony went to London. In that episode Tony ate "hooves and snouts" at Fergus Henderson's restaurant, St. John. I was looking for a restaurant in Montreal that had that same "use every part of the animal and waste nothing" philosophy as St. John. I found it in Au Pied de Cochon.

Au Pied is like a bar or a diner. It is crowded and noisy and can be uncomfortably hot with the wood oven going, especially in Summer. Despite that, everyone, whether customer, cook or wait person, seems really happy to be there. The excitement in the air is palpable. This is a place to party.

The food is outstanding. Together, my wife and I have tried the Cassoulet with the big confitted duck leg sticking out of it, the poutine with foie gras, the poutine with lobster, the giant lobster roll topped with salt cured foie gras, the raw seafood platter, the pickled deer's tongue, the cold cuts platter, the apple pie with foie gras, the blood sausage and foie gras tart, and the roasted pig's foot served on a bed of garlic cheese mashed potatoes and with these deep fried cakes made from bits of meat and cartilage left over from boning out the pig's feet. All of it was excellent.

The portions are big. I mean really big; Fred Flintstone big.

That sequence in the Quebec episode of NR where the chef, Martin Picard, tries to kill Tony with everything on the foie gras menu? That was only a slight exaggeration of his largess. Picard is magnanimous to the point of cruelty. His generosity exceeds the capacity of the human body to digest food. Consider this: Every dish Tony ate was a portion intended for one or, at most, two people. The time my wife and I ordered Cassoulet, they served us two of those monstrous earthenware bowls. One apiece. Eat there and I promise you will not be hungry the next day.