Who loves seafood? We love seafood! So when we were invited to try one of Montreal’s iconic seafood restaurants, our response was “when do we eat”. To be fair, this place has been on our dining wishlist for a little while now, so we were beyond delighted to spend an evening at Maestro SVP. Located at 3615 St-Laurent Blvd, Maestro SVP has been serving up amazing seafood dishes since 1992. Cited as the original Montreal oyster bar, they offer a wide selection of the best oysters on the market.
After meeting our delightful host and owner, Ilene Polansky, and getting a little history and a quick walkthrough of the menu, it was time to start our meal. We decided to start with some bubbles, in the form of a bottle of prosecco. But you cannot eat in an oyster bar without having an oyster cocktail, we tasted the spicy vodka oyster shot.
Now it was time to eat, our dinner began with the absolutely best, tastiest, most divine serving of calamari we have ever tasted. If you have never had calamari, this is the place for your first tasting. If you love calamari, you have to try this dish. Our second appetizer was the shrimp served with goat cheese and topped with ginger maple syrup. What a mix of flavour, the combination made for a delightful dish we would order over and over again.
We could not go to an oyster bar and only have shots, we needed to try the oysters. For the connoisseurs, there is a full menu on the back wall of the daily selection available to patrons. We were lucky enough to have yours picked for us, as it was just too hard to choose. The staff at Maestro SVP is ready to recommend the type of oysters that would suit your taste. We tried the Beausoleil, but also the most amazing oysters we have ever sampled. They were so big the shell barely fit in our hand. After getting over the confusion of how to eat an oyster of this size, we decided to just jump in and go for it. Not only were they delicious but we also had great fun eating them.
It was now time to move on to the main courses, swordfish, and sauteed shrimps. We love a good swordfish, but sometimes restaurants miss the mark on this dish as it can be tough. This was definitely not the case at Maestro SVP, the fish was seasoned and cooked to perfection. Served 
with mango salsa and black garlic mashed potatoes, it made an unbelievable taste combination. The shrimps were sauteed in a light garlic sauce and served with green beans and the fluffiest risotto we have ever tried.
Finally, it was time for dessert, upon reading the menu we found a dessert named ecstasy. How can you not try a dessert called ecstasy? But we also needed a second choice, it was not hard to decide as there was also a tres leches cake on the menu. Both dishes were different but also somewhat the same. The ecstasy was chocolate cake topped with chocolate and banana ice cream and very appropriately named. The tres leches cake was served with caramel and banana ice cream. Both were delicious, good thing we love banana ice cream.
We loved meeting the wonderful staff at Maestro SVP and enjoyed an amazing meal. Our only regret was we waited too long to try this iconic Montreal restaurant.
