Fukurō takes its name from the Japanese word for owl, and the choice is deliberate: this is a den for Montreal's night birds, born of late evenings, shared memories, and a simple wish to bring people around the same table. Set on Mont-Royal Avenue East, it works in the register of Asian tapas — small plates, ordered as you like and paced as you please — assembled by a head chef who spent years travelling and living across the continent, in Japan, Vietnam, Thailand, China and beyond. What he brought back is a menu that keeps faith with each dish's country of origin rather than blurring them into a single "fusion" accent, so that a Thai salad tastes like a Thai salad and a Cambodian grill like itself. Like the art that rotates on the walls, the carte is treated as something alive: new dishes arrive as new experiences and old nostalgias suggest them.
The eating begins gently, with edamame and wakame salad at $8, miso or tom yum khar in vegetarian ($7) or seafood ($10) versions, tako wasabi — raw octopus marinated in soy and wasabi, with crisp sheets of nori ($10) — and bánh bao at $9, soft steamed buns with coriander and pickled daikon and carrot, filled with grilled lemongrass pork, beef or chicken, crisp fried fish, or tofu. The tapas proper are the heart of the place: papaya som tam with dried shrimp, long beans and peanuts in a garlic-tamarind-lime dressing ($19); eight pan-fried chicken gyoza ($16); takoyaki with spicy mayo, teriyaki and bonito ($16); Viet chicken wings tossed in golden garlic and the grandmother's sauce, at once sweet, savoury and hot ($18); house chả giò ($12); shrimp tempura ($16); dandan noodles thick and chewy under a creamy sesame sauce, pork and homemade chilli oil ($18); and tofu agedashi in a soy-sake and kombu broth ($14). Larger plates follow for those who want them — Vietnamese-style bò lúc lắc ($30), red chicken and green tofu curries ($25 and $22), flame-grilled octopus in nam jim jaew ($29), garlic shrimp ($26), Cambodian steak tirk prahok ($38), and a sizzling teriyaki served on a hot plate with the protein of your choosing, from tofu at $22 to steak at $36. Dessert keeps the same easy spirit: sesame-battered fried banana with vanilla ice cream, salted caramel and coconut cream ($12), a triple chocolate mousse cake, or a tiramisu with house berry compote (both $11).
Cocktails are written into the restaurant's own subtitle, and the list is built to be drunk alongside the food rather than before it, with a well-judged run of alcohol-free options for those not drinking — the Mango Tango, with honey, mint and lime soda and a citric gochugaru salt rim ($10), the blackberry-and-ginger-beer Berry Blossom ($10), and the Jade Garden of lemon, cucumber, lemongrass, mint and pandan tea ($9). The beer follows the same logic, pairing Asian classics — Tsingtao and Singha in bottle at $9, Asahi Super Dry by the tall can at $11 — with Quebec's own Boréale on draught across six taps, lager, IPA, rousse, Pilsner des Mers, Blanche des Cimes and noir, at $7 for 300ml and $9 for 500ml, plus two Boréale zero-alcohol cans at $8. The wine list is short and deliberately singular, running from a Côtes de Provence rosé by Domaine de la Navicelle and a Trevigiana prosecco (both $50) through a Tribaut Schloesser brut réserve ($98) to a Beaujolais orange wine from Sébastien Besson ($145) and a bottle of Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin ($240).
The room fills up in the evenings and stays full, and there is often music in it: recent Saturdays have brought the Samuel Lechasseur Trio back for three hours of live jazz, guitar, double bass and drums played to a room passing plates around. That is Fukurō in miniature — food carried home from a decade of travelling, drinks poured with equal care whether or not there's alcohol in them, art on the walls that changes, and a warmth that lasts well past dinner. An address for night owls, and a small, well-travelled corner of Asia on Mont-Royal.