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TIFF can be the most exhausting event of the year—10 days of near constant drinking, schmoozing and stargazing, all, ostensibly, in the name of movies. Choosing the best parties requires insider intelligence and expert planning. Here, a highly discerning look at the festival’s hottest hot spots.
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It’s 4 p.m. on Friday, and you don’t have a dinner reservation. Still, there’s no need to fret (or waste your night waiting for a table). We just called some of the city’s hottest restaurants and found three that can squeeze in two for dinner tonight. Now it’s up to you to get dialing and snag a table before they’re all gone. Today: Edulis, Actinolite and Origin.
(Image: Shermeee)
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My wife and I were enjoying our 35-year anniversary at Scaramouche, until the young couple at the table next to us started photographing their food, distracting us with flashes every time a new dish arrived. My son tells me that these food bloggers take their work very seriously. I don’t care—they ruined our night. I was tempted to lodge a complaint. Should I have?
Meal, Interrupted, Summerhill
Farmer’s market season has arrived (Image: Kevin Ho)
Monday, July 2
(Image: Paul Dex)
The ongoing debt and legal issues at Captain John’s Harbour Boat Restaurant, the iconic marine eatery docked at the foot of Yonge Street since 1975, have finally shut it down. Owner “Captain” John Letnik owes $568,000 in back taxes, utilities and outstanding lease payments. Normally, the city would just seize the property and sell it after three years of nonpayment, but the fact that Captain John’s is a boat—with no engine, stuck fast in the muck—makes things a little bit tricky. The vessel will stay put for now, but Letnick has to remove the sign, gangplank and everything inside by July 27. And it looks like Chef Grant Soto (also known as Taylor Clarke) is already trolling for a new site for his gluttonous charity pop-up dinner. [Toronto Star]
One of Colborne Lane’s innovative concoctions (Image: Renée Suen)
Ten years in, Toronto’s loved (and loathed) bacchanalia of affordable dining is larger than ever, with 181 restaurants offering three-course prix fixe menus for $25, $35 or $45 from July 6-22. Despite common complaints—packed rooms, harried dining and more salmon and chicken than a buffet wedding—an ineluctable truth remains: Summerlicious is a good opportunity to sample new restaurants on the cheap. To that end, we’ve sifted through the overwhelming list of participants to find the most interesting dishes and the very best value. Start making your reservations now.
All aboard (Image: Renée Suen)
April 15 marks the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, and Titanic-mania has become pretty much unavoidable: there’s a memorial cruise retracing the luxury liner’s doomed voyage, a 3-D rerelease of James Cameron’s 194-minute epic and, inevitably, collectables from the Royal Canadian Mint. The culinary world is by no means immune to all this, of course. Food blogger Paula Costa (of Dragon’s Kitchen) has taken the event to her food-loving heart, challenging herself to recreate the 11-course first-class dinner from the eve of the vessel’s demise. Although the Kitchener/Waterloo–based food blogger has previously hosted similar Titanic-themed dinners with others (mainly of the second- and third-class menus), this was her first solo effort. The project, based on the recipes found in Last Dinner on the Titanic by Rick Archbold and Dana McCauley, was a year in making, with weeks devoted to testing recipes and sourcing ingredients used during the Edwardian period. In the end, eight guests were invited to partake in the dinner, which involved $400 worth of ingredients, three days of preparation and assistance from a few sous-chefs on the evening of service itself. See Costa’s entire Titanic feast—including a chunk of iceberg from off the coast of Newfoundland—in our slideshow »
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(Image: Khairil Zhafri)
Dear Urban Diplomat,
I moved to Toronto from Tokyo about a year ago. Maybe it’s just a difference in cultures, but no one shows up for my parties on time. Where I’m from, if an invitation says 8 p.m., you show up at 8 p.m. Here, some guests arrive an hour late and don’t even apologize. Often, I am too annoyed to enjoy myself. Any tips for handling this situation next time?
—Times Have Changed, CABBAGETOWN
Blondin’s tapioca course (Image: Gizelle Lau)
TBD is a monthly dining series that brings some of the city’s top chefs together with one of the foodie world’s current obsessions: the semi-secret pop-up dinner. Concocted by Dan Gutter (Drake Hotel, Auberge du Pommier, Susur) and designer Sukko Stach (Acadia), TBD offers one-time-only intimate dining experiences in a distinctive setting for no more than 12 guests. Past TBD dinners have featured Dustin Gallagher, Steve Gonzales and the guys behind Poutini’s. November’s TBD took place last week in a tucked-away private members’ club at the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair and featured Acadia chef Matt Blondin. For $150, the diners were exposed to Blondin’s wilder, more modernist side over 15 courses (with wine pairings).
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(Image: Dan4th Nicholas)
Dear Urban Diplomat,
My wife and I went with another couple to Celestin, where we’re regular patrons. The service was attentive, as always, and the food was superb. When the bill came, my friend took care of it, but I noticed he left less than 10 per cent for the tip. Mortified, I waited for everyone to leave the table, then threw down an extra $20. Unfortunately, my friend turned around in time to see me and said it was a slap in the face. How should I have handled this situation?
—More Money, More Problems, DAVISVILLE
(Image: Christopher Stevenson)
Baguette Pasta Fad Hot Sauce Lobster reinvented Carnivore cure Roast chicken Devilled eggs Patio for dessert
While most cubicle dwellers burrowed themselves away in the cool confines of their A.C.-blasting offices during yesterday’s hotpocalypse, Toronto Star videographer Chris So decided to make dinner—in his sedan. In a video worthy of Bill Nye, So takes the viewer through his suburban kitchen and out to his front yard, balancing both camera and seasoned eye of round. Setting up his car-becue with three different types of thermometers, So places the roast on the dash and plays the waiting game. Four hours later, the rather raw, leather interior–infused roast is removed from the 190° F confines. And while the meat itself only reached 131° F, So goes one step further and digs in, concluding the experiment with an unconvincing, “Hmm. Yummy.” Success? We’re not so sure, but we’ve got to hand it to him for trying.
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In response to the devastating earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan last week, a number of Toronto chefs and Ontario wine producers will be joining forces in a fundraiser on Sunday, March 27th, organized by Nobuyo Stadtländer, the business partner and wife of Michael Stadtländer.
Two neighbourhood restaurants serve up light-handed renditions of our rib-sticking favourites
(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. Read the rest of this entry »
(Image: Lorne Bridgman)
FOR A CINQ À SEPT Read the rest of this entry »
Devoted locavores should head to Beast after work Wednesday through Friday, when former Jamie Kennedy chefs Scott and Rachelle Vivian serve up nose-to-tail small plates—including pig’s head pappardelle for only $4. Lovely Quebec and Ontario beers for pairing are also just $4; a number of wines are $5 a glass. 96 Tecumseth St., 647-352-6000.
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