Quebec City has a much smaller footprint than the greater Montreal region. They are way less bilingual than Montreal too. The result is that there is not a ton of Quebec City foodies posting restaurant recommendations on english boards.
There are always people asking for recommendation in this fair city though so here is my “standard” list of recommended Quebec City address (could be usefull!)
Laurie Raphael:
Restaurant from Daniel Vézina, one of the first “celebrity chef” restaurant I’ve heard from the Quebec Scene. He is more “Chef” than “Celebrity” however and is the sole Quebec representative of the Normand Laprise/Fred Morin/David McMillan/Martin Picard/Daniel Boulud/Daniel Vezina “Montreal boys club”. High flying, high class locally sourced foodie experience.
Le Saint Amour
High class french restaurant. Main competition to the Laurie Raphael.
Le Continental
Institutional french Quebec City restaurant. Its been there forever. Old old school formal french. Tartare and cesar salad table made, crèpe suzette flambéed on a little cart, some of the meat and fish options are flambéed and filleted table side.
Le Moine Échansson
Intriguing restaurant. Some tourists have been a bit letdown after a visit. More of a wine bar? Still on my list though.
L’affaire est Ketchup
Quebec slang meaning, roughly, “Everything’s ok”. From what I’ve heard, a gang of young pirate chef decided to open a high flying foodie restaurant using home cooking appliance in a low maintenance/low brow environment. The quality of the food and the lack of pretension seduced a lot of people and its now one of the hot table in Quebec City.
Patente et Machin
Following the success of its iconic restaurant, the crew behind “L’affaire est Ketchup” opened another low brow sister restaurant ("Patente & Machin roughly means “Thing & Gadget”). Same unassuming service, same focus on food.
Chez Ashton
You can’t always eat in high flying restaurants all the time. Sometimes, you need a greasy spoon. Ashton is a classic Quebec City chain. When a Montreal talks about his famous poutine to a Quebec resident, the later will often ask “Yeah, but did you try the poutine at Ashton?”. Not having tried it apparently invalidates your opinion.
Chez Victor
Solid, unassuming local familly pub grub restaurant recommended my former Quebec City resident friends
Sapristi
Some of my friends had a great meal there. Italian pub grub with homemade pasta. Nothing “gourmet” but solid quality that will not burn a whole in your wallet,
La Boite a Pain
Good bakery with some sandwich option, for when you need something to eat on the fly or if you want to take great pastries back to the hotel.
JA Moisan
Not a restaurant but a very interesting old school store!
If you are looking for pubs “La Barberie” is a very well known microbrewery with a great reputation! Its the pride of Quebec city!
I’ve also been to L’oncle Antoine and its a great pub with a great ambiance!
Craig Laban, food critic for the Philadelphia enquirer, made 2 articles on the Quebec City food scene and Quebec cheese:
There was this article in the New York times