Last year, we accused the MICHELIN Guide of forgetting 11 of our favourite restaurants. Apparently, they were listening: they've added two of last year's "forgotten" restaurants, Hélicoptère and Asteur, to their list of "recommended" local restaurants.
In addition to that list the world-renowned dining guide is slowly building a roster of starred and Bib Gourmand Montreal restaurants, and we applaud it; but the city's dining scene has moved so quickly that a whole new class of omissions has emerged.
Here are 15 of our unmentioned faves, from holes-in-the-wall to world-class gastronomic destinations.
Pasta Pooks
6704 Rue Clark, Montreal, H2S 1P1
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What began as Luca "Pooks" Labelle Vinci's cult pasta project has grown into a proper Little Italy restaurant without polishing away any of its lovable weirdness. Fresh pasta is still made by hand every morning, and the short menu changes constantly according to season and whim. You might start with silky baccalà whipped with olive oil and spread over grilled polenta before demolishing agnolotti del plin stuffed with veal and pork, ricotta-and-spinach ravioli swimming happily in butter or whatever ragù happens to be bubbling away that week. There are also hoagies, a surprisingly serious Philly cheesesteak and natural wines galore.
Grille-Nature
11798 Boulevard Salaberry, Dollard-des-Ormeaux, H9B 2R8
Grille-Nature brings together David McMillan of Joe Beef fame and former Maison Publique chef Derek Dammann for a gloriously flame-happy restaurant in the West Island, built around great ingredients and very little fuss. Seafood, market vegetables and responsibly farmed meats dominate, with the fire turning out things like rotisserie chicken and charcoal-grilled sausage with poached pear and fried sage. Naturally, there are serious cuts of beef too, but calling this a steakhouse undersells it considerably. Add an eclectic wine list, a big welcoming bar and McMillan's unmistakable knack for making a room feel instantly lived-in. Worth crossing several boroughs for.
Chez Jean-Paul
1141 Rue Bélanger, Montreal, H2S 1H6
Chez Jean-Paul walks that very Montreal line between "serious cooking" and "please don't make me put on a jacket." Chef-owner Isaël Gadoua, an alum of Joe Beef and Paloma, leans into seasonality, charcoal, offal and the kind of combinations that sound slightly bonkers until they hit your palate. Recent menus have featured Rimouski sea urchin with a butter recalling Sunday roast chicken, duck hearts with foie gras parfait, grilled Arctic char with orange sauce and trout roe and a pork chop aged for 50 days. Order à la carte if control is important to you; otherwise, tell Jean-Paul to decide and let the kitchen send seven to nine courses. Let fate hold the reins tonight.
Claire Jacques
8111 Rue St-Denis, Montreal, H2P 2G7
Osteria Berto
7331 Avenue Henri-Julien, Montreal, H2R 2B1
Osteria Berto only opened in May 2026, but its kitchen comes with considerably more mileage. Chef Riccardo Bertolino spent years running Maison Boulud after training under Daniel Boulud, and here he channels all that French fine-dining precision back toward the Italy of his youth. Translation: this is an osteria where the seemingly simple stuff has had a lot of thought put into it. The pasta alone makes the case: stracci alla finanziera layers hand-cut sheets with white ragù, maitake, guinea-fowl liver and sweetbreads; tortelli verdi pair buffalo ricotta with aged Parmigiano; pappardelle might arrive with porcini, rosemary and summer truffle. Sommelier Isabel Bordeleau takes equally good care of the bottles. MICHELIN inspectors, sharpen your pencils.
Le Grand Comité
1445 Rue Bishop, Montreal, H3G 2E4
Downtown desperately needs more places that feel like actual neighbourhood restaurants, and Le Grand Comité understood the assignment. Chef Rémi Lemieux has worked at Massimo Bottura's Osteria Francescana and Éric Ripert's Le Bernardin, but the cooking here doesn't strut around showing off its passport stamps. Instead, Québec ingredients get dressed up as deeply comforting bistro food: chicken-liver mousse with mead and radish, farm vegetables under tarragon sabayon, stuffed cabbage with Gaspor pork, cod with potato, egg and saffron, or simply steak-frites with pepper sauce. Desserts have a mischievously local streak, too: an Orange Julep-inspired île flottante sits beside something billed as a "Montreal cheesecake." High technique, low attitude. We approve.
Alma Montreal
1231 Avenue Lajoie, Montreal, H2V 1P2
Tucked into the sweetest street in residential Outremont, Alma is your fine dining escape to Mexico. Chef Juan Lopez Luna venerates corn in all its forms with almost every sophisticated dish, from starter to dessert. They offer a tasting menu only; you can choose the normal mode or the extended version at 9 courses. Don't let your greed win over, the normal 5-course experience is enough to feed even the hungriest hippo! You will travel through planes, valleys, mountains and seaside towns with transportive flavours ranging from an impossibly fresh fish crudo (served as a whole beautifully sliced fish) to a smoky and atmospheric take on pozole.
Birbante
5386 Boulevard St-Laurent, Montreal, H2T 1S1
This Mile End spot offers pure northern Italian trattoria fare. With a decor that's light and bright with white marble-top tables and red velvet banquettes, you'll want to try owners Pierpaolo and Davide Sansone's bruschetta selection: the spicy nduja is addictive, as are the fantastic fresh anchovies. The endive salad is the perfect balance of bitter, crunchy and sweet, with its grilled orange dressing that sings with the fennel. Pasta lovers need to try the creste di gallo, and for mains the steak with sautéed local mushrooms and smoky green pesto is truly yum.
Hang Bar
686 Rue Notre Dame O, Montreal, H3C 1J2
Okay, it's a supperclub in Griffintown, with all the glitz, glamour and wafting aftershave that can imply, but it's also an aesthetic spot to savour one of the best Vietnamese soups in town. To call it a phō may be a bit misleading because this one is both high-class and petite: it's made with Wagyu strips that are melt-in-the-mouth and a broth that is concentrated full of incredible umami. That's just one of the dishes that Marlyne Tran will impress you with, though: the Vietnamese-style marrowbone is an amazing twist on the French appetizer (it's served with a killer chimichurri), the hai hau ribs are a fave and the beef salad (herbaceous with sawtooth coriander and rice-patty herb) is arguably the best in town.
HENI
2621 Rue Notre-Dame O, Montreal, H3J 1N9
It's classy, it's moody, it's Heni. This Little Burgundy restaurant blends influences from Southwest Asian and North African countries into a heady mix of high-fragrance foods, each more prettily presented than the other. With a distinct focus on local ingredients, Heni's beautiful mélange is ripe for discovery again and again: think lobster tails spiced with ras el hanout, or fish brightly spiced with green chili, tahini and pickle turnip, all plated with the most sublime finesse. Save yourself the trouble of choosing and just go for the four-course tasting menu, designed to share. There's even a vegetarian version.
Restaurant Bar Vivar
533 Avenue Duluth E, Montreal, H2L 1B1
Chef-owner Georges Greiche has written a love letter to Spain, and its name is Bar Vivar. He's distilled all the sunshine of Barcelona into this casual Plateau bistro with a soccer-focused Euro-sports bar in the front and classy resto in the back. Saddle up to a blue leather banquette and relish some light Spanish fare redolent of the kind of casual insouciance we might associate with Joe Beef, Greiche's alma mater. Paper-thin slices of jamón Iberico de Belotta with a gorgeous drizzle of olive oil, a hearty plateful of sardines with boquerones, stuffed squid and Galician-style octopus, a lobster-topped tortilla espanola… yes, please.
Fleurs & Cadeaux
1002 Rue Saint-Urbain, Montreal, H2Z 1K6
The fact that it's a hidden gem is half of the fun. This Japanese snack bar nestled in Chinatown feels like the kind of place you go to meet a sexy date, all mood lighting and mystery. Chef Tetsuya Shimizu will do his own seduction of your taste buds with his blackened duck that's aged for three days in white miso (soooo aromatic) or his delightfully puffy fried soft tofu with daikon and mushroom broth. If you want to just dive into the sake and share little tasting plates, go for a selection of the freshest sashimi in town and a few of the okazu dishes; and don't skip the sea urchin mousse, scooped up with shrimp chips. It punches above its weight.
Papito Restaurant
1425 Rue Saint-Alexandre, Montreal, H3A 2G6
Family-dining is the vibe at this large, casual eatery in the centre of the city, where the team from the nearby Furco and Café Parvis serves up succulent meats and sides so delish you'll want to spoon up every last morsel. In an effort to create a circular economy and avoid food waste, this resto group has its own farm and shares kitchen tasks. The stunning decor is also part of an effort to recuperate: the tables are made from old school benches, for example. Bring a gang of friends and share the charcoal-grilled spatchcocked chicken and the Blue Dot ribeye from PEI with a side of chimichurri or Hollandaise, and don't leave without trying the Parm-topped eggplant drizzled with honey.
Bar Henrietta
115 Avenue Laurier O, Montreal, H2T 2N6
This wine bar on the cusp between Mile End and Outremont is a quiet but mighty force in the food department. What may appear as simple bar foods reveal themselves after a bite or two to be of next-level caliber, with one of the most delicious beef tartares in town, a tender-issimo sweet'n'sour grilled octopus with roast potatoes and herbaceous mayo, and a sophisticated scallop dish with green grapes and sorrel. All around you, locals will mill and buzz and yap and cheer, making for a super fun ambiance to sip away an evening.
Gia Vin & Grill
1025 Rue Lenoir, Montreal, H4C 2Z6
Chef Janice Tiefenbach nods to the Abruzzi region of Italy with her menu packed with tasty grilled meat skewers, fresh oysters and generous selection of antipasti, not-coincidentally all fantastic enjoyed with copious amounts of wine. Go classic with the fennel, chicory and anchovy salad, or experience the sweet bitterness of castelfranco lettuce paired with juicy pear and crunchy roasted hazelnuts, gorgeously paired with creamy Gorgonzola. There are always a couple of pastas to choose from too, which go great with the grilled brochettes or the shareable bistecca in this airy, casual Saint-Henri hangout.
Here is a list of the MICHELIN star restaurants and more details are found in this article featuring all Montreal restaurants included in the MICHELIN guide.