The Garden @ Eleven
11 Jarvis Street
416-981-1919
Dinner for two with all taxes, tip and a bottle of wine: $150

It’s an ordinary night out with the girls and we decide to try a restaurant getting plenty of mixed reviews of late; Eleven. When we arrive, the sign out front reads ‘Eleven’ so we know we’re at the right place. It’s not until we sit and read the first line of the menu that we realize we’re in a completely different restaurant. With a new chef, a new menu and a new name, owner Steve Lee has once again reinvented 11 Jarvis Street and called it The Garden @ eleven.

Continue reading A Stroll Through The Garden »

Foxley Bistro and Bar
207 Ossington Avenue
416-534-8520
Dinner for two with all taxes, tip and wine: $120

It’s been over a week now since I visited Foxley Bistro and Bar, Chef Tom Thai’s über caliente restaurant on Ossington, just south of Dundas, and I still don’t know quite what to think about the place.

Arriving just after 6pm on a Wednesday, the room is already close to full. My guest and I are told we can sit where we like, but when we opt for the only standard-height table remaining, we are warned that we may need to shift over and take the chairs closer to the wall in order to accommodate an additional diner who may or may not be joining the party behind us. While I don’t much like the idea of having to interrupt my meal and switch to a chair that is certainly not one that I would choose given my druthers, what am I going to do? Make a scene and refuse? Perhaps this seat-juggling could be avoided if Foxley took reservations. But, alas, they do not.

The menu is an intriguing list of Asian meets Latin. Preparation for my visit has revealed that the food is “Asian tapas”. Sort of. The intention is for guests to share the dishes. Tough luck if you’re dining solo, I suppose.

Continue reading At Least the Food’s Good »

Bliss Restaurant & Bar
5875 Airport Road
Mississauga, ON
905-678-5433 or email bliss.torontoairport@hilton.com

With its faded blue shell, passersby may not know that the Airport Hilton has recently completed phase one of its transformation into a contemporary and innovative space. Although these new changes may appeal to business and leisure travelers, food enthusiasts would be more interested in the new in-house restaurant and lounge. Designed by Cecconi Simone Inc., the open design of Bliss Restaurant & Bar incorporates the warmth of muted earth tones. The addition of personal TVs imbedded into the banquettes and sheer linen dividers help provide a sense of privacy to those who want to escape from their busy surroundings.

Continue reading A Blissful Discovery by the Airport »

Supermarket
268 Augusta Avenue
416-840-0501
Complete dinner for two with all taxes, tip and wine: $80

I really wanted to like Supermarket. But from the outset of our visit, things just didn’t seem to be working well – from the 10 minute wait for our reserved table; the waitress spilling drinks at another table; the table behind us being rushed out while still waiting for food because they needed the table for another reservation; the longer-than-acceptable wait we had for service and for pretty much any food or drink we ordered, to the three comped drinks that they messed up – everything seemed to go wrong for Supermarket.

Continue reading Mediocre Market »

Fred’s Not Here
321 King Street West - Main Floor
416-971-9155
Dinner for two with all taxes, tip and wine: $160

According to the restaurant’s name, Fred is never here. But it doesn’t matter because Fred’s Not Here is still good without him! My first encounter with this fancy restaurant was a date. We actually had dinner at Red Tomato, the restaurant located in the basement of Fred’s; they’re owned by the same person which means that they have similar food on their menus, but then again, some different items and a totally different experience. I have always been a fan of restaurants with odd or artsy décor, so the dark walls with murals depicting strange scenes combined with an elegant chandelier made me wanted to try this restaurant out.
Continue reading Fred Wasn’t There but I Was »

First of all, apologies to Royal Ontario Museum CEO William Thorsell, architect Daniel Libeskind and Michael Lee-Chin whose name is on the place, but I just can’t bring myself to like the new Crystal addition. I’m one of those silly people who really like old buildings, and standing both outside and inside the lobby of the addition, I get an odd sense of uneasiness and vertigo, and feel very much like I’m in some sort of 1960s spy movie. I kept expecting Bond villain Ernst Blofeld and that cat to come strolling around a corner.

Continue reading C5 and The Food Studio - Hungry at the ROM »

Shanghai Cowgirl
538 Queen Street West
416-203-6623
Dinner for two with all taxes and tip (no beverages): $60

On our way to an art exhibit opening on Queen Street West, my friends and I decided to stop somewhere for a quick bite. We pass by Shanghai Cowgirl every time we walk along Queen Street, and each time I would quickly peek inside and make a mental note to come here and try it out. After receiving a recommendation from a friend, we finally paid the place a visit.

Continue reading When a Cowgirl Goes to Shanghai »

Bocca on Baldwin
26 Baldwin Street
416-348-0731
Dinner for two with all taxes, tip and wine/beer (no dessert): $65

The great thing about Baldwin Village is that you have your pick of cuisines. It’s a fun treat to stand on the corner and pick a country, and by extension, a restaurant, or vice versa. Recently we wandered into the neighbourhood with some friends we were treating to dinner and stood in front of each place trying to decide. We opted for Bocca on Baldwin, mostly because none of us had been there before.

I was familiar with the space in its previous life, the fun but somewhat rundown Dessert Sensations Café. The building has since been completely gutted and renovated and is now an airy space full of gleaming wood and light.

Continue reading Bewildered by Bocca on Baldwin »

The Rectory Café
102 Lakeshore Avenue, Ward’s Island
416-203-2152
Dinner for two with all taxes, tip and beer: $75.00

Canada’s Aboriginal people regarded the Toronto Islands as place of repose and spiritual renewal. The Mississauga First Nation, understandably enough, still lays claim to the area; for the Islands offer a tranquil escape from the tumult and stench of the city centre. On a heavenly June day, I and my lady friend use bicycles to explore its leafy pleasures.

After pedaling around the island’s perimeter, searching for the ghost at Gibraltar Point, taking in the charming cottage gardens on Algonquin Island, and playing strenuous nude volleyball at Hanlan’s Point, we are ready for rejuvenating food and drink. And so we coast along the boardwalk to the Rectory Café on Wards Island, one of only two lakefront buildings that survived demolition by the city in 1960s.

Continue reading By Ferry to the Rectory »

Susur
601 King Street West
416-603-2205
Dinner for two with all taxes, tip and four Salty Dogs: $300

My friend Max gently reminds me, as my birthday approaches, that I’d totally forgotten to get him a present last year. Never let it be said that I’m a welcher. But I am an opportunist. Inspired by the win/win theorizing of the comic-book villain Yellow Claw who once quipped, “perhaps the heads of two could fall with but a single stroke,” we find ourselves opening our wallets to a six-course tasting meal at Susur ($110) as a joint birthday present to each other.

Continue reading High-end Meal Earns High-end Price Tag »

Manyata Courtyard Café
55 Avenue Road (Hazelton Lanes)
416-935-0000
lunch for two with all taxes, tip and wine: $95

First, an admission. I used to be a mallrat. Back in the 80s I would spend hours on a Saturday afternoon parked by the planter outside the Le Chateau in the Halifax Shopping Centre, vying for a glimpse of a salesclerk named Philip Pilgrim, who just happened to be the spitting image of John Taylor from Duran Duran.

Once I became a grown-up, I expected that my days of hanging out in a shopping mall and people-watching were long gone. I eschewed food-courts for real restaurants, and traded in my Bonne Belle lipsmackers for MAC and Chanel cosmetics.

So it was an odd sensation this past Saturday upon finding myself seated in the Manyata Courtyard Café to realize that I was, more than twenty years later, hanging out at the mall. Except, I really don’t remember the mall of my youth being this bizarre.

Continue reading Scenes From a Mall »