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Weekly Lunch Pick: the refined decadence of Splendido’s holiday tasting menu

Weekly Lunch Pick: Splendido’s European Retreat

The foie gras appetizer in Splendido’s luxurious European Retreat lunch tasting menu (Image: Matthew Fox)

December’s here, and that means cold weather and holiday decadence. Splendido, Harbord Street’s temple of special-occasion dining, has responded in its usual fashion: the $75 five-course European Retreat lunch special, available every Friday (and certain Thursdays) for the rest of the month. The pace and flavours of this marathon tasting menu are inspired by the Mediterranean, but the ease and luxury of the meal reflect chef Victor Barry’s attention to detail.

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The Dish

Opening

September 15, 2011 | 3:43 pm

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Introducing: Le Kensington, the new French bistro from the owners of Loire

(Image: Karolyne Ellacott)

Le Kensington Bistro, the second eatery from the owners of Harbord Street’s Loire (one of 2009’s best new restaurants), recently opened in the space that used to house La Palette, the market’s original French bistro (La Palette decamped to Queen Street last year). Owners Sylvain Brissonnet—who spent a decade as the sommelier of Langdon Hall—and Jean-Charles Dupoire—who put in hours at both The Savoy and The Berkeley in London—purchased the spot at the start of the year but were bogged down with lengthy renovations. Brissonnet tells us the pair “really wanted to do something very French” and are keeping the focus on their homeland’s cuisine.

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The Dish

Caffeine High

August 24, 2011 | 12:40 pm

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Sam James to celebrate his coffee bar’s second anniversary this Sunday with free lattes for all

Toronto espresso hero Sam James is celebrating his tiny Harbord Street coffee bar’s second anniversary this Sunday, when he’ll be dispensing free lattes and other drinks to all comers (if it’s anything like last year’s celebration, expect a line). Over at Post City, Jon Sufrin has written a coffee geek’s guide to what makes the place special. Some of it is standard issue bean-nerdery: James is picky about his portafilters and he treats his tap water before using it in his espresso machines. But some of it is definitely next-level: apparently he’s been taking sommelier training courses to help “realize my potential for tasting coffee.” That’s dedication. Read the whole story [Post City] »

The Dish

From the Print Edition

January 14, 2011 | 3:14 pm

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Modern comforts: Chris Nuttall-Smith takes on Woodlot and Ici Bistro

Two neighbourhood restaurants serve up light-handed renditions of our rib-sticking favourites By Chris Nuttall-Smith

(Image: Vanessa Heins)

The comfort food revolution has brought us much to be thankful for, including cheaper, more casual restaurants, and the glories of deep-fried mac-and-cheese, but it hasn’t exactly delivered a surge of culinary innovation. Spurred on by a sputtering economy, the comfort trend spawned a wave of barbecue joints, gourmet burger shops, neighbourhood pubs and by-the-book bistros, and it introduced childhood-evoking staples like cookies and milk to scores of restaurant menus where the “licorice root, three ways” used to be. It offered certainty when everything else around us seemed ready to collapse, not only for diners but for restaurateurs, too.

Comfort eating, like love and psychotherapy, is driven by equal measures of longing (for simpler times) and industrial-grade denial (s’mores are less fattening when they’re made with single-estate chocolate from São Tomé), powerful motivators both. So most chefs have been happy to feed our cravings without letting their own high-minded notions get in the way.

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The Dish

Opening

November 12, 2010 | 11:09 am

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Krispy Kreme is open for business at Bathurst and Harbord

Kids from Central Tech coagulate around the new Krispy Kreme (Image: Fraser Abe)

Long, long ago, there was a magical presence in Toronto, gracing food courts and office buildings like gleaming, artery-clogging jewels. We’re talking, of course, about Krispy Kreme, the American doughnut chain that shuttered its downtown locations in 2004 when stocks tumbled. Well, sweet seekers who have had to make do with Cinnabon, stale KK treats from the gas station or long drives to Mavis Road can rejoice: the chain has opened a tiny shop at Bathurst and Harbord, right across from Central Technical School.

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The Dish

Opening

October 25, 2010 | 1:37 pm

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Introducing: Ici Bistro, Harbord Street’s little restaurant that could

Jennifer Decorte and J.P. Challet at Ici Bistro (Image: Davida Aronovitch)

Ici Bistro is open for business. No, really.

Two years after they signed the lease on 538 Manning Avenue, J.P. Challet and Jennifer Decorte’s modern French bistro is finally serving dinner. The official grand opening isn’t until mid-November, but the place has its liquor licence and has been packed for the past week. All of its 24 seats are reserved for the next 14 days, too, thanks to the restaurant’s very long and public fight for survival. Guests have graffitied a wall with well wishes, and neighbours have even brought gifts. One local couple has booked three times in Ici’s first week of operation. “It’s the only restaurant we’ve ever worked at where everybody hugs each other,” says Decorte. “It’s like a family.”

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The Informer

August 6, 2010 | 12:05 pm

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Toronto’s six most memorable neighbourhood naming smackdowns

The city of Toronto's official breakdown of neighbourhoods (Image: City of Toronto)

Toronto: city of neighbourhoods, multiculturalism and, to a lesser extent, bureaucracy. These three attributes collide most often when it comes to naming or renaming Toronto’s diverse enclaves (140 by the city’s last count). And collide they did last week when a group’s efforts to change part of the Danforth Mosaic to Little Ethiopia were dashed. The minor controversy got us thinking about all the other Hogtown ‘hoods that have seen residents bicker and quibble over the proper term for their turf. Here, the six most memorable.

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The Dish

Aprons & Icons

June 3, 2010 | 10:56 am

3 Comments

J.P. Challet leaves the Windsor Arms (again) to pick up the pieces at Ici Bistro (again)

A farewell to Arms: J.P. Challet bids farewell to the Yorkville institution (Image: windsorarmshotel.com)

Master chef J.P. Challet is leaving the Windsor Arms Hotel’s Prime just five months into his tenure—and nine years after doing it the first time. His company Jean-Pierre and Co. unceremoniously pulled out of the steak house after a deal to take over the hotel’s food and beverage program fell through. Challet served his last supper for the Arms at a 2,000-person function at Exhibition Place last Sunday and is now looking to restart construction on his once-hyped Harbord Street project, Ici Bistro.

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The Dish

From the Print Edition

April 8, 2010 | 4:00 am

55 Comments

Best New Restaurants 2010

This time last year, the future looked awfully grim. We braced for restaurant closures and recessionary menus, but 2009 was surprising. Though we lost some good places (Perigee, Truffles, Alice’s and Gamelle, in particular), and mac-and-cheese quickly wore out its welcome, it was an exciting time to dine out. Anxious restaurateurs dropped corkage fees and slashed wine markups, while chefs cooked up imaginative prix fixe menus. It suited our mood as well as our wallets: these days, Torontonians want informality. We’re still hungry for local produce and nose-to-tail dining, chefs are once again finding inspiration in Italy and Japan, and the city is finally beginning to develop a serious cocktail culture. Most encouraging of all is the number of new restaurants opening. Here, the best of the vintage.

By James Chatto, Photographs by Brendan Meadows and Ryan Szulc, Illustrations by Jack Dylan

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The Dish

Deathwatch

February 25, 2010 | 1:00 pm

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City gives thumbs-down to community pizza nights and fun

Christie Pits's pizza shack (Photo by Jamie)

First there was the liquor license debacle at Ici Bistro to prevent Harbord Street from turning into Skid Row, then the moratorium on Ossington restaurants and bars. The city’s latest target in its War on Fun? The much-loved community pizza oven at Christie Pits Park.

Two years ago, a group of parents gave new life to an abandoned park shack that housed a 10-year-old oven. Since then, Christie Pits fills with people on Friday nights enjoying a slice made by a volunteer group called the Friends of Christie Pits, along with a city staff worker who mans the oven. But, as the Star reports, the city is cracking down on irregular rec programming. If the Friends want to keep pizza in the park going, they’ll have to pay for a $100 permit each week and cover the cost of the city staffer.

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The Dish

Rumours & Rumblings

January 15, 2010 | 4:37 pm

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J.P. Challet to take over at the Windsor Arms

We hear that George Friedmann of the Windsor Arms has asked local legend J.P. Challet and his team to take over the Yorkville hotel’s food and beverage service, including a reinvention and possible renaming of its main restaurant Prime. No dates have been confirmed for the takeover, and questions remain about the future of Challet’s most recent project, Ici Bistro (but it appears that recent plumbing problems might keep the Harbord Street hot-spot-that-never-was closed for the time being). Check back next week for full details.

[Update: The full story on Challet's move to the Windsor Arms is available here.]

The Dish

Restauran-TO

January 7, 2010 | 2:49 pm

10 Comments

The Harbord Guide: 25 spots that are giving the strip a good name

Coffee kid Sam James pulled shots in the city’s finest brew houses.

Once-sleepy Harbord Street leaped into the spotlight last year when it became the setting of Toronto’s latest NIMBY vs. business debate. Citing residents’ rights, crime and the strip’s uncertain future, deputy mayor Joe Pantalone tried to keep a new restaurant—Ici Bistro, helmed by famed chef J.P. Challet—from getting a liquor licence. His intervention may have had the opposite effect he was looking for: Torontonians turned their focus to the south Annex and realized that Harbord isn’t as stuffy (or dodgy) as the councillor would have them believe. With its gradually expanding array of shops, galleries and cafés, Harbord is fast becoming a destination for diners seeking an alternative to Ossington and Queen West. We take a look at 25 seminal spots, old and new, along a street in transition.

(Sam James photo, Jessica Darmanin; Harbord Bakery thumbnail, Danielle Scott)

The Dish

Restauran-TO

October 30, 2009 | 10:52 am

7 Comments

Ici Bistro gets its liquor licence; Joe Pantalone calls it the “beauty of democracy”

After winning over Annex residents and fighting a protracted battle with various bureaucracies, chef J.P. Challet and his partners are being granted a liquor licence for their latest restaurant, Ici Bistro. The news came down late yesterday and can be taken as a victory for cooler minds. The licence itself has a few provisos—15, to be precise—that include a ban on video arcades and loud music. But perhaps the key condition of the licence is that it cannot be handed down to any new business on that property without another hearing with the Alcohol and Gaming Commission. This should be good news to deputy mayor Joe Pantalone, who opposed boozing at the bistro out of fear that a yet-unheard-of sleaze spot might one day move in, peddle hooch to local teens and tear the community asunder.

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The Dish

Restauran-TO

October 7, 2009 | 3:17 pm

3 Comments

Joe Pantalone maintains his tough—and lonely—stand against merlot

Joe Pantalone: city councillor, benevolent shepheard (Photo: joepantalone.org)

Joe Pantalone: city councillor, benevolent shepherd (Photo: joepantalone.org)

Being a city councillor is a tough job—just ask deputy mayor Joe Pantalone. Fresh from killing Ossington’s buzz, he now finds himself on an increasingly lonely crusade to deny a liquor license to J.P. Challet’s new Harbord Street bistro, Ici. Ostensibly, Pantalone wants to ensure a bad precedent isn’t set and that the license doesn’t stay with the venue if the restaurant closes, causing the whole street to descend into a crime-ridden hell (you know, again).

While 285 people signed a petition in support of the alcohol bid and have voiced their support to Pantalone’s office, the councillor isn’t swayed.

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The Dish

Restauran-TO

September 21, 2009 | 1:17 pm

25 Comments

Beaujolais brawl: Will granting a liquor licence to J.P. Challet’s Harbord Street bistro bring down the neighbourhood?

Battleground bistro: Joe Pantalone cites alcohol availability as a reason to prevent the opening of Ici (Photo by Quinn Dombrowski)

Battleground bistro: will wine corrupt the youth of Harbord Street? (Photo by Quinn Dombrowski)

It’s unusual to see a Toronto councillor acting against the wishes of his constituents, especially with an election looming, but it seems as if Deputy Mayor Joe Pantalone has chosen that lonely path. As we first reported in July, the issue concerns the liquor licence for Ici, the 22-seat bistro that renowned chef and educator J.P. Challet and his partners hope to open at the corner of Harbord Street and Manning Avenue, where their catering business is already operational.

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