Aidan Nulman
Apr 23, 2026
325F is a gem!
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--°C|Monday, September 7, 2026
The Mano Cornuto team takes over a new Griffintown room with small plates, a deep list of wines by the glass, and a kitchen that stays open for the nighthawks.
With a DIY interior, approachable wines and an evolving menu, Éléphantine takes its cues from the neighbours.
They only moved next door, but the move is much bigger than that.
Everyday dining is losing ground, so restaurants are betting that craftsmanship, storytelling, and spectacle can make a night out feel worthwhile.
French technique, Southern ingredients, and Montreal influences.
At this new members-only bar in Old Montreal, joining is free but admission is vetted—a bid to create a more social, less predictable night out.
The Mano Cornuto team takes over a new Griffintown room with small plates, a deep list of wines by the glass, and a kitchen that stays open for the nighthawks.
With a DIY interior, approachable wines and an evolving menu, Éléphantine takes its cues from the neighbours.
They only moved next door, but the move is much bigger than that.
Everyday dining is losing ground, so restaurants are betting that craftsmanship, storytelling, and spectacle can make a night out feel worthwhile.
French technique, Southern ingredients, and Montreal influences.
At this new members-only bar in Old Montreal, joining is free but admission is vetted—a bid to create a more social, less predictable night out.
At 325 F, Bryan Rajarison cooks from memory, family, and a cuisine that rarely travels this far.
April 22, 2026 · 3 min read
The Main is reader-supported. Subscriptions are what keep us independent. Five dollars a month — the restaurants, the guides, the weekly bulletin, and what to do each weekend. Support us today.
Discover the places mentioned in this story
Bryan Rajarison has been cooking since he was eight years old. By fourteen, he was working in elder care centre kitchens. At twenty-three, while still studying design and architecture, he opened a small, warm room on the edge of the Plateau: 325 F. There are personal projects aplenty in Montreal from chefs who leave one life behind for another, but 325 F happens to be the only authentic Malagasy restaurant in North America (not counting the Malagasy food truck Ralibera in NYC). He’ll tell you this without much fanfare, only confidence.
"There's a lot of Malagasy people I'm meeting for the first time (through the restaurant,” Bryan says. “It's really nice to gather the community in Montreal."
The name 325 F carries the whole story: 325 is the number of his childhood home. F is for Florencio, his middle name, which is also his father's name. There’s Fahrenheit as well, the temperature register of a working kitchen.
It's a family restaurant in the most literal sense: his parents helped out nearly every day when it first opened, and his dad still comes in on weekends. "It's great to learn from my dad at this age," Bryan says. "It's a blessing, I think, to have them both."
His parents arrived from Madagascar in the 1990s. Bryan was born in Montreal, raised between two worlds, and fed on recipes that stretch back further than either. His grandfather, who was of Indian origin, rarely went to restaurants and opted to cook at home, and those dishes passed to Bryan's father, and then to Bryan.
At 325 F, Bryan Rajarison cooks from memory, family, and a cuisine that rarely travels this far.
April 22, 2026 · 3 min read
The Main is reader-supported. Subscriptions are what keep us independent. Five dollars a month — the restaurants, the guides, the weekly bulletin, and what to do each weekend. Support us today.
Discover the places mentioned in this story
Bryan Rajarison has been cooking since he was eight years old. By fourteen, he was working in elder care centre kitchens. At twenty-three, while still studying design and architecture, he opened a small, warm room on the edge of the Plateau: 325 F. There are personal projects aplenty in Montreal from chefs who leave one life behind for another, but 325 F happens to be the only authentic Malagasy restaurant in North America (not counting the Malagasy food truck Ralibera in NYC). He’ll tell you this without much fanfare, only confidence.
"There's a lot of Malagasy people I'm meeting for the first time (through the restaurant,” Bryan says. “It's really nice to gather the community in Montreal."
The name 325 F carries the whole story: 325 is the number of his childhood home. F is for Florencio, his middle name, which is also his father's name. There’s Fahrenheit as well, the temperature register of a working kitchen.
It's a family restaurant in the most literal sense: his parents helped out nearly every day when it first opened, and his dad still comes in on weekends. "It's great to learn from my dad at this age," Bryan says. "It's a blessing, I think, to have them both."
His parents arrived from Madagascar in the 1990s. Bryan was born in Montreal, raised between two worlds, and fed on recipes that stretch back further than either. His grandfather, who was of Indian origin, rarely went to restaurants and opted to cook at home, and those dishes passed to Bryan's father, and then to Bryan.
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325F is a gem!
Bryan Rajarison has been cooking since he was eight years old. By fourteen, he was working in elder care centre kitchens. At twenty-three, while still studying design and architecture, he opened a small, warm room on the edge of the Plateau: 325 F. There are personal projects aplenty in Montreal from chefs who leave one life behind for another, but 325 F happens to be the only authentic Malagasy restaurant in North America (not counting the Malagasy food truck Ralibera in NYC). He’ll tell you this without much fanfare, only confidence.
"There's a lot of Malagasy people I'm meeting for the first time (through the restaurant,” Bryan says. “It's really nice to gather the community in Montreal."
The name 325 F carries the whole story: 325 is the number of his childhood home. F is for Florencio, his middle name, which is also his father's name. There’s Fahrenheit as well, the temperature register of a working kitchen.
It's a family restaurant in the most literal sense: his parents helped out nearly every day when it first opened, and his dad still comes in on weekends. "It's great to learn from my dad at this age," Bryan says. "It's a blessing, I think, to have them both."
His parents arrived from Madagascar in the 1990s. Bryan was born in Montreal, raised between two worlds, and fed on recipes that stretch back further than either. His grandfather, who was of Indian origin, rarely went to restaurants and opted to cook at home, and those dishes passed to Bryan's father, and then to Bryan.
Ninety percent of the menu at 325F traces directly to that lineage. The remaining ten percent is where Montreal sneaks in, mostly in presentation: the plating, the visual language of the dishes, signalling the influence of a city Bryan grew up watching cook.
Malagasy cuisine is harder to categorize than most. The island sits in the Indian Ocean off the east coast of Africa, and its food reflects centuries of migration and trade from East African, Indian, Chinese, French colonial, and Arabic spice routes.
325 F’s menu speaks to it all if you know where to look and taste: The Tamatave soup, for instance, named after a port city on Madagascar's east coast with a large Chinese immigrant population, arrives as a fragrant broth with wontons, thin noodles, smoked pork, and sliced omelette. It's a breakfast dish in Tamatave, Bryan explains, every restaurant there serves it. Here, it functions as one of the menu's anchors.
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Bryan Rajarison has been cooking since he was eight years old. By fourteen, he was working in elder care centre kitchens. At twenty-three, while still studying design and architecture, he opened a small, warm room on the edge of the Plateau: 325 F. There are personal projects aplenty in Montreal from chefs who leave one life behind for another, but 325 F happens to be the only authentic Malagasy restaurant in North America (not counting the Malagasy food truck Ralibera in NYC). He’ll tell you this without much fanfare, only confidence.
"There's a lot of Malagasy people I'm meeting for the first time (through the restaurant,” Bryan says. “It's really nice to gather the community in Montreal."
The name 325 F carries the whole story: 325 is the number of his childhood home. F is for Florencio, his middle name, which is also his father's name. There’s Fahrenheit as well, the temperature register of a working kitchen.
It's a family restaurant in the most literal sense: his parents helped out nearly every day when it first opened, and his dad still comes in on weekends. "It's great to learn from my dad at this age," Bryan says. "It's a blessing, I think, to have them both."
His parents arrived from Madagascar in the 1990s. Bryan was born in Montreal, raised between two worlds, and fed on recipes that stretch back further than either. His grandfather, who was of Indian origin, rarely went to restaurants and opted to cook at home, and those dishes passed to Bryan's father, and then to Bryan.
Ninety percent of the menu at 325F traces directly to that lineage. The remaining ten percent is where Montreal sneaks in, mostly in presentation: the plating, the visual language of the dishes, signalling the influence of a city Bryan grew up watching cook.
Malagasy cuisine is harder to categorize than most. The island sits in the Indian Ocean off the east coast of Africa, and its food reflects centuries of migration and trade from East African, Indian, Chinese, French colonial, and Arabic spice routes.
325 F’s menu speaks to it all if you know where to look and taste: The Tamatave soup, for instance, named after a port city on Madagascar's east coast with a large Chinese immigrant population, arrives as a fragrant broth with wontons, thin noodles, smoked pork, and sliced omelette. It's a breakfast dish in Tamatave, Bryan explains, every restaurant there serves it. Here, it functions as one of the menu's anchors.
The Main is Montreal's city magazine. We write the stories about this city nobody else is telling.
We're independent and reader-supported. Your support keeps us going.
Your email costs you nothing and opens the rest of this story now. It also means the next one reaches you on a Thursday, instead of disappearing into a feed.
No password. No payment. Opens instantly.
Already a member? Sign in
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From our archive.
Alex Cohen and Raegan Steinberg are combining dinners with breakfast classics to the 48-seat Arthus Dinette in Monkland Village.
Chef Chouchou Jia spent years cooking in French and Italian kitchens before opening their first restaurant, and the result is unlike anything else in town.
The chefs behind Dobe & Andy and Buboy decided all the neighbourhood needs is a solid source of steamies and poutine.
Three cafés redefining specialty Vietnamese coffee through heritage, fusion, and first-gen identity.
Owner Jermaine learned to cook from his grandmother in Jamaica at six years old. Everything at Boom J's still carries those teachings.
A quietly confident Little Italy bistrot from Montreal restaurant alum puts chef Darcy Gervais-Wood front and centre.
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325F is a gem!