Here's this week's round-up of the latest local food and restaurant news...
Openings:
- After a couple of weeks of private parties and exclusive events, art deco supper club The Roosevelt Room (2 Drummond Place), featuring food by executive chef Trevor Wilkinson, will be open to the public on November 7th.
- A franchise in the now defunct Ho-Lee-Chow chain has been rebranded as HLC Great Chinese Food (175 Dundas Street East).
- Twisted Bagel (3500 Bathurst Street) is opening this week, taking over from a former location of What A Bagel.
- Israeli-based coffee chain Aroma Espresso Bar has opened a third GTA location in the Yonge-Eglinton Centre (20 Eglinton Avenue West).
- 1800 Degrees (3058 Bloor Street West) is a new steak and seafood house a bit west of Royal York.
- OMG Baked Goodness (1561 Dundas Street West) is now serving up both sweet and savoury hot-from-the-oven treats on the northern edge of Parkdale.
Coming Up:
- Lynn Crawford has returned to Toronto from NYC, apparently leaving her position as Executive Chef at the Four Seasons behind. And if the rumours are to be believed, she's taking over Citizen (730 Queen Street East) from her pal Rod Bowers as of January 1st, with plans to give it a new look and name.
- Now that their liquor license has been granted (yay!), Ici Bistro (538 Manning Avenue) should be open before the end of the year.
- The new restaurant from Ed Ho of Globe Bistro now has a name - globe earth (1055 Yonge Street) - and an estimated opening date of mid-November.
- The second - and slightly closer to downtown - location of renowned kaiseki restaurant Hashimoto will be opening November 18th in the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre (6 Garamond Crescent), with owner/chef Masaki Hashimoto opening the new room and the original in Mississauga on alternating days. The added convenience will come at a price, however: while the original offers several set menu options ranging from $80 to $200 per person, the JCCC location will only have a single 8 course option at a spendy $300.
- Cloud Free Agent Espresso Bar (968 Queen Street West), a cafe that has an affiliation of some sort with Cloud Advertising Agents, is set to open mid-month near Queen and Shaw.
- Kale Eatery, the vegan café and salad bar in the Annex location of Noah's Natural Foods, is expanding to a new stand-alone restaurant at 2366 Yonge Street.
- The second location of John's Italian Caffe - or third, if you count John's Classic Pizza on College - is in the works at 1048 Bathurst Street near Dupont.
