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The Sporting Life

Toronto is party central for pro athletes looking to dodge the limelight

Just one of the places to go after defeating one of Toronto's sports teams (Image: Señor Codo)

Toronto is the place to party if you’re a professional athlete. According to the Wall Street Journal, the uptight banker’s go-to social guide, our town has made a name for itself among MLB, NBA and even NFL players for its plethora of skin bars, bicultural girls, low drinking age and a woman named Mona Halem. According to Raptors forward Antoine Wright, Halem is “notorious” throughout the sports world for “assembling attractive party guests to fête nearly every franchise that comes to town.” The Journal details how the pros operate here, in a city once “decidedly off the sports radar,” without being followed by paparazzi. In the end, though, the article reads a bit like an advertorial for Ashley Madison. Three examples, after the jump.

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| Leave a Comment » March 15, 2010 | 11:35 am | Greg Hudson

Opening

A peek inside Parts and Labour, a new Parkdale restaurant that unites owners of The Social, Oddfellows and Castor Design

Parts and Labour: under construction (Image: Karon Liu)

First Cowbell, then Local Kitchen, and now this.

With the arrival of Parts and Labour, a hardware store transformed into a restaurant, the tail end of Queen West takes another step from weekend antiquing destination to social hub. Parkdale locals are excited about the new spot, and with good reason: it represents a new partnership between the owners of The Social, Castor Design and Oddfellows.

During a tour with Richard Lambert, one of the owners, we’re told that Parts and Labour is designed for “Social graduates who want to be more mature and don’t go out to clubs as much anymore.” He adds with a laugh, “We also have a no-electronic-music policy.”

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| 4 Comments » March 8, 2010 | 11:39 am | Karon Liu

Restauran-TO

Toronto is now out-partying Montreal

After years of being known for its rather conservative party scene, is Toronto finally getting its act together? Resto-lounge mogul Toufik Sarwa says yes; in fact, Toronto now outshines Montreal as the best party city in the country, he tells BlogTO.

Ten years ago, I wanted to get the hell out of here. Now you couldn’t push me out. Even New York has reached its nighttime apex, and there’s a feeling in Toronto that it’s continually evolving and still has room to grow…that’s a good feeling.
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| Leave a Comment » February 23, 2010 | 9:59 am | Jon Sufrin

In Print

Toronto’s five best microbrews

Local microbreweries are experimenting with bold flavours, creating surprising and original beers. Here, the best pints and where to enjoy them.

Arkell Best Bitter from Wellington Brewery (Photo by Daniel Shipp)

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| 7 Comments » January 25, 2010 | 9:26 am | Toronto Life Staff

Opening

Just Opened: The Hoof Café melds Grant van Gameren’s charcuterie with brunch favourites and bar food

Trot across the street: The Hoof Café overlooks the original (Photo by Karon Liu)

Last year, the Black Hoof’s tiny kitchen ignited the city’s love of carnivorous delights with its bold charcuterie plates and snout-to-tail ethos. Now, owners Jen Agg and Grant van Gameren are trying to make lightning strike twice with their imaginative take on brunch and bar snacks—both served at the new Hoof Café, located directly across the street from the original. “Everyone’s doing the same thing across the city,” says van Gameren, who finally has a kitchen larger than a janitor’s closet. “Why can’t you have rabbit or suckling pig eggs Benedict in the morning?”

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| 2 Comments » December 7, 2009 | 2:49 pm | Karon Liu

Opening

Terroni empire expands with a new wine bar on Victoria Street

Construction is under way in the space beside Osteria Ciceri e Tria as the Terroni empire begins work on its new wine bar, called La Bettola di Terroni, slated to open early next year. Vince Mammoliti, manager of Terroni’s Queen Street location and brother of Terroni co-founder Cosimo, says it’s “an informal space where exclusive wines can be enjoyed at an enoteca featuring rustic food along with some Terroni classics.”

Despite it being a separate concept, the new bar will share a kitchen with Osteria, so expect a similar menu of rustic Italian cuisine (we’re pretty sure that the no-substitution rule will be in effect here, as well). Martini Boys reports that the chef at Terroni’s Los Angeles location will be creating the menu, and the interior will be a collaboration between Andrew De Rosa and Ralph Giannone, who also worked on Le Select, Bar Italia and the Queen West Terroni.

When asked to spill further details, Mammoliti says La Bettola is still largely a work-in-progress and tells us more information will be given out in the New Year.

| Leave a Comment » November 25, 2009 | 4:10 pm | Karon Liu

Deathwatch

Queen West fixture the Cameron House is up for sale

Prince, Blue Rodeo and Ron Sexsmith are among the musicians who have played at the Cameron House (Photo by Alfred Ng from the torontolife.com Flickr pool)

The Cameron House, the bar of all trades near Queen and Spadina, is up for sale. The rather spare listing woos potential buyers by saying that “the hippest neighbourhood in Toronto awaits your style and imagination.” Purchasers can apply their style to the long-standing culture venue and boozery for a cool $2.9 million—a far cry from the $2 price tag it had back in 1981, the last time the 80-year-old building was sold. The structure and land are both on the market, a package that includes nine bedrooms that were frequently occupied by musicians who played in the bar. Operating owner Cindy Mathews, who took over her share of the Cameron House in 1989, told the Globe and Mail that the decision to put the place on the market had been coming for six years and that she hopes the new owner keeps the place alive. “We would love to see it continue forever, and we hope that it might. Everybody’s going to have time to reminisce. It’s not going away overnight.”

• Toronto’s Cameron House on the market [Globe and Mail]
• A Queen West institution could be yours—for a cool $3 million [Eye]

| 2 Comments » November 23, 2009 | 11:14 am | Matthew Fox

Bottoms Up

Just Opened: Dolce Social Ballroom, condoland’s new dance club, goes after 30-somethings

The ladies of Dolce (Photo by Karon Liu)

The ladies of Dolce (Photos by Karon Liu)

Yet another dance club at King and Bathurst awaits downtown condo dwellers who made it to this side of the recession with some cash in their pockets. Dolce Social Ballroom, which opened this past weekend, is the latest venture from Travis Agresti—the man who, at 22 years old, linked up with Vince Carter to open Kai and Inside Entertainment Complex (all three are now history). Agresti is back, having spent 16 months and $2 million merging an Indian restaurant with a derelict lounge to create Dolce, a venue aimed squarely at mature partiers (dubbed “sophisticats” in press materials). “It seems there is a lack of nightclubs for the 30-something crowd to let loose in. You’ve got kiddie-land on Richmond and pockets here and there on Ossington, but that’s about it,” says Agresti, himself 28 years old. “We’re trying to discourage the younger crowd who spray champagne and go wild.”

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| 14 Comments » November 17, 2009 | 11:59 am | Karon Liu

In Print

It’s official: gastropubs are the new tapas bars

The new locals: the Queen and Beaver (Photo by Jessica Darmanin)

“Food and pubs go together like frogs and lawn mowers,” wrote the unswervingly provocative British restaurant critic A. A. Gill. “Pubs don’t do food; they offer internal mops and vomit decoration.” He didn’t entirely mean it, of course: the same article ends with a declaration of passionate love for a dish he had encountered in a London pub—a thick potato soup with a large island of pressed foie gras melting in the middle. But as a general observation it seems sound enough, in Canada as well as in England. Anyone who has accidentally ordered a meal in one of our fake Irish or English chain pubs knows the fried snack food and industrial meat pies are as phony and mass-produced as the pissy commercial beer and the Sherlock Holmes decor.

• Read the rest of James Chatto’s column from the November issue of Toronto Life »

| Leave a Comment » November 5, 2009 | 10:20 am | James Chatto

Read All About It

America’s best coffee, unilingual DineSafe rules, World Pasta Day

San Francisco's Blue Bottle Coffee Company comes recommended by GQ (Photo by Roshan Vyas)

• In its November issue, GQ travels the States to pick America’s best coffee shops. Blue Bottle Coffee in San Francisco scores high marks for its siphon coffee (it should—the machine costs $20,000), along with famed L.A. and Chicago coffee house Intelligentsia. Bizarrely, the article ends by negating everything it has already stated, telling readers to simply “shut up and drink it.” [GQ]

• In the wake of the Ruby Restaurant closure, BlogTO questions why the guidelines for the city of Toronto’s DineSafe program are offered only in English. The garbage disposal calendar comes in various languages, as does the city’s official newsletter. Even the TTC offers 70 languages on its switchboard. What gives, DineSafe? [BlogTO]

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| Leave a Comment » October 25, 2009 | 11:15 am | Fraser Abe