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Zagat’s 2012 survey picks Toronto’s best restos and settles that pesky average tipping question

Scaramouche’s Keith Froggett (Image: Renée Suen)

Online restaurant review sites like Yelp and Urbanspoon may have cut into the crowd-sourced territory that Zagat once owned, but the yearly survey still has some clout—and the power to get diners in the door. The 2,266 food-loving Torontonians who voted in this year’s survey were crazy for Keith Froggett, giving fine dining restaurant Scaramouche top honours for food and also placing Scaramouche’s pasta bar in the top 10. But the winners weren’t all about linen tablecloths and tasting menus: The Burger’s Priest, with its epically greasy Vatican City burger, broke the top three for best food, while pan-Asian chain Spring Rolls was voted most popular restaurant (proving that democracy isn’t foolproof).

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The Dish

De-licious

January 9, 2012 | 3:15 pm

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Winterlicious 2012: Toronto Life’s picks north of St. Clair

WINTERLICIOUS 2012 | UPTOWN

The vast area north of St. Clair is well represented in Winterlicious this year. Here, our 14 picks.

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The Dish

De-licious

June 22, 2011 | 5:06 pm

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Summerlicious 2011: Toronto Life’s lunch and dinner picks north of St. Clair

SUMMERLICIOUS 2011 | UPTOWN

Summerlicious is well represented north of St. Clair. Here are the 16 Toronto Life picks for Leaside, Davisville, Don Mills and Yonge and Eglinton.

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The Dish

From the Print Edition

April 20, 2011 | 9:11 am

9 Comments

The sipper club: meet the city’s competitive cabal of top sommeliers

Will Predhomme belongs to a competitive cabal of top sommeliers who sniff, sip and spit their way through hundreds of bottles a week. They do this to help you decide what to drink with your dinner, while making you think it was your idea all along
By Jason McBride | Photography by Sandy Nicholson

One hundred and fifty-one people have reservations at Canoe tonight. Among these are many Bay Streeters, a couple celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary, dozens of people on dates, including the bar manager from Crush, and a young woman who plans to propose to her boyfriend over dinner. The two private dining rooms are fully booked.

Canoe, part of the ever-expanding Oliver and Bonacini empire, is routinely considered one of the finest restaurants in the city. Last summer, in a rigorous competition held by the Canadian Association of Professional Sommeliers, known as CAPS, Canoe’s head sommelier, Will Predhomme, was proclaimed Ontario’s best. Predhomme has devoted a third of his life—he’s 29—to wine scholarship. He now knows more about wine than almost anyone in Toronto.

Just after 5 p.m., the bar area begins to fill up with commuters sipping cocktails as they wait for the traffic on the clogged Gardiner, 54 floors below, to dissipate. One of the restaurant’s first guests, a retired trial lawyer, arrives. As a young female host escorts him to his large corner table, he puts an arm around her shoulder. “I don’t like to pay bills,” he says. “I want a fucking account. Last time I was here, I offered those ladies”—referring to the hosts who greeted him at his last visit—“$300 and told them to set up an account for me. And I still don’t have one.” He and his three dining companions, Canoe regulars, have brought in several bottles of their own wine, including a cabernet franc from the ex-lawyer’s private vineyard in Tuscany. When Predhomme arrives at the table to discuss the wine, the ex-lawyer, captivatingly bratty in a way that only the rich and sort-of-powerful can be, repeats his complaint. “Look, I spend about $50,000 a year at Bymark, and I’d do the same here if I had a fucking account.” Predhomme is unmoved, but gracious. “If you give me your contact information,” he says, “I’ll make sure that it gets to the right people.”

“You’ll get me an account?”

“I’ll look into it.”

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The Dish

De-licious

January 4, 2011 | 4:15 am

5 Comments

The Best of Winterlicious 2011: Toronto Life’s 62 favourite restaurants

(Image: Renée Suen, from the torontolife.com Flickr pool)

January is upon us, and for many hungry Torontonians, that means one thing: Winterlicious. The menus are less predictable than previous years—crème brûlée’s out, lentils du Puy are in—so even the ’Licious haters might have a reason to take advantage of the festival this year. We’ve already named the 12 menus that we think are the best bets, but that doesn’t begin to cover it. Here, find Toronto Life’s 62 favourite Winterlicious restaurants, complete with menus, reviews and reservation numbers.

Winterlicious runs from January 28 to February 10. Reservations are accepted from January 13 onward (January 11 for American Express users).

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The Dish

De-licious

December 17, 2010 | 3:49 pm

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The Winterlicious 2011 menus are out, so let’s compare them to previous years

By now, Torontonians are well-seasoned winterliciousers—and at Winterlicious 2011, we will be deftly dodging the wilted arugula and heading straight for the belly of the beast (preferably pork). Looking through the newly published list of restaurants and menus, there is plenty to be pleased about this January. Our popular “Best of Winterlicious” piece is coming out next week, but we thought we’d get a jump on things and take a look at how this year’s roster compares with last year’s ’Licous lists.

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The Dish

Aprons & Icons

June 15, 2010 | 2:52 pm

2 Comments

We ask the top chefs at Toronto Taste what’s in store at George, Splendido, Scaramouche and the rest of the city’s hot restaurants

This past Sunday marked the 20^th anniversary of Toronto Taste, the annual event that unites Toronto’s food lovers and food makers for a day of innovative cooking, tasking and fundraising for Second Harvest. 60 of Toronto’s top chefs—including Jason Bangerter, Donna Dooher, Chris McDonald, Mark McEwan, Anthony Walsh and Anne Yarymowich—doled out top-notch cuisine to an estimated 1,600 guests at the ROM. We caught up with the chefs and asked them what’s in store for them and their restaurants this summer.

The Dish

De-licious

December 23, 2009 | 3:02 pm

7 Comments

Winterlicious 2010: the list of restaurants is out

(Photo by John Hritz)

It’s that time of year again, when sniping begins over the dozens of menus featuring new (and often unexciting) ways to prepare house salad, chicken and a trio of sorbet. That’s right: the Winterlicious list is out, and it’s 150 restaurants strong.

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The Goods

Shop Talk

December 16, 2009 | 12:43 pm

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Just opened: Hugo Boss debuts Yorkville flagship

A look from the Boss Black fall collection

The Mink Mile’s newest resident is Hugo Boss. The office wear outfitter recently opened a store on Bloor Street, where Bemelmans bar once stood, and fêted it last week with an A-list party catered by North 44° and attended by the likes of Atom Egoyan, Suzanne Boyd and Shinan Govani.

The hoopla is over the company’s first Canadian flagship, which has been designed in a new Hugo Boss look to be adopted by all future flagships across the world. The space is awash in greys, creams and black, which makes for an impressive, if a bit sterile, first impression. Halfway through the shop is a grand circular staircase underneath a modernist chandelier of rectangular hanging lights.

The merchandise will appeal most to high-rolling businessmen with an affinity for golf. Downstairs, there are a rainbow of polos ($95) and a flashy golf bag ($550) and umbrella ($185); upstairs is the suiting boutique, which carries younger, slim silhouettes, as well as more traditional cuts. We spotted a gorgeous slim-cut blue wool blazer, in the vein of Etro and Paul Smith, with a light blue polka-dot lining ($695). Aspiring Gordon Gekkos can pick up the Boss brand humidor, loaded with three Cohibas and sporting a leather exterior ($2,895); it’s one of only two available in Canada.

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The Dish

Opening

October 9, 2009 | 12:47 pm

6 Comments

Just opened: Buca

Rob Gentile hangs with his meats (Photo by Karon Liu)

The brains behind Brassaii, Jacobs and Co. and soon-to-be-opened The Saint are adding yet another restaurant to their empire, this one tucked away in the alley beside Cheval on the ritzy King Street strip. The week-old Buca is serving Italian fare by executive chef Rob Gentile, a former sous-chef at One, Bymark and North 44°.

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The Dish

De-licious

July 17, 2009 | 9:11 am

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Final throes: Where to find a table during the last weekend of Summerlicious

Follow the orders of this menu from Mildred's Temple Kitchen and indulge in the last days of Summerlicious (Photo by jbcurio)

The menu at Mildred's Temple Kitchen orders us to indulge (Photo by jbcurio)

The dog days of Summerlicious are here, and with reservations down at top restaurants across the city, many tables are sitting empty at some of the city’s finest spots. This might be the first and last time anyone will be able to walk into North 44 without a reservation, eat for under $50, and walk right out. After the jump, all a hungry diner needs to know about how to nab a last-minute seat at the 10 most popular restaurants from our Best of Summerlicious list.

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The Dish

De-licious

July 9, 2009 | 2:01 pm

28 Comments

Summerlicious reservations down at top restaurants

We’re halfway through the annual gastronomic bonanza known as Summerlicious, when droves of thrifty gourmands and aspirational epicures descend upon the city’s finest dining rooms. Or not.

Alex Evans, manager of Célestin, estimates that 30 per cent fewer customers have dined at her restaurant during this year’s fest. “Everyone I know who’s participating is telling me their business is way, way, down,” she says. There’s consensus across the board: Didier, North 44°, Auberge du Pommier and Centro, arguably some of the city’s most sought-after tables, are all reporting quieter phone lines and lighter reservation books.

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The Dish

Pantry Raid

June 19, 2009 | 9:38 am

3 Comments

Stalk market: Rhubarb is finally in season—here are five ways to experience it

In the pink: Ontario's rhubarb is at its prime (Photo by FotoosVanRobin)

Spring’s first two gastronomic stars (fiddleheads and ramps) are already out of style and season, which means that punch-packing rhubarb is all the rage. But even this resilient vegetable—its season peaks in June and usually spans into July—is getting scarce with the shortage of June heat. C5 chef Ted Corrado (who’s busy preserving rhubarb for a rainy day) says that his source has already dried up. Here, a look at what some epicurean alchemists are doing with the great red stalks.

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The Dish

De-licious

March 10, 2009 | 10:16 am

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The most popular Winterlicious menus of 2009

With data collected from Torontolife.com’s “Best of Winterlicious” feature, we’ve figured out the fan favourites of this year’s dining festival. After all the hoopla attached to 2009’s Winterlicious, it’s nice to know that some things never change. From an Oliver & Bonacini institution to one of city’s beloved boutique hotels, here are the top 10 Winterlicious menus viewed by Torontolife.com readers.

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