Bagels and salmon for Good Friday

The bagel on these pictures comes from St-Viateur. Well of course, I am not the kind of expat who eats a bagel from anywhere else. Because bagels here and outside Montreal are a joke. Anyway, today is Good Friday, which means that I will eat fish. Out of tradition rather than devotion. I think putting fish on the menu on Friday is a perfect reason in itself to eat more fish, which is maybe the healthiest type of meat, and what more pleasant way to eat fish than as smoked salmon in a authentic, proper bagel that comes from Montreal. I don't fast often, but when I do, it is in a decadent way.

When I was in Montreal, this is what I would have at every Good Friday and in many "ordinary" Fridays too, as a treat. I cannot remember when I started doing it, I think it was Easter 1997, but once I did, I never stopped: I bought my bagels and salmon at St-Viateur on the day, then had them for dinner. Sometimes lunch too. In England, I tried to follow it, but the bagels here are so vile that I abandoned the tradition quickly. Instead I had fish and chips or some other fish. When I went back to Montreal, I resumed the tradition with bagels and smoked salmon. This year, as I have some stock of proper bagels, I will resume it. Feasting and fasting sometimes go hand in hand.