Bar B Barn recipe lives on in a new restaurant in Montreal’s West Island

Since 1967, the Bar B Barn restaurants were known in Montreal for serving up chicken, ribs and fries. The restaurants may be closed, but the recipe lives on in a new place.

Fernando Benliro worked at the Bar B Barn in the West Island for 15 years as a chef and remembers how to make their famous ribs.

He now cooks those recipes, and uses the same equipment, at his family-opened restaurant “Cuisine Philippine Fernando” on Sunnydale in Dollard des Ormeaux.

“Somebody has asked the recipe. But I told them I don’t have a recipe – it’s all in my mind!," he told CTV News.

The restaurant serves traditional Philippino food, with their homemade garlic hot sauce, but these days, Benliro says the rib racket is drawing crowds.

“When The Bar B Barn closed. He asked the owner if he can take some of the equipment and the owner told him, take what you want!,” said Maria “Leni” Benliro, co-owner of Cuisine Philippine Fernando.

The restaurant also uses an over-stock of yellow, branded boxes and bags from the Bar B Barn restaurant, which customers love, Fernando Benliro says.

“People from different communities come in for the ribs,” he said.

“Bonding over food and memories is universal.”