Chef-owner Bruno Beaudoin (Image: David Ort)
The Artisan Baker, a new bakery café at Yonge and St. Clair, opened with little fanfare last week right beside the space left vacant when grab-and-go shop Le Panier Rouge closed. Chef-owner Bruno Beaudoin began his culinary training in France when he was only 13, and left a career in hotel management to launch the restaurant. It took exactly six months from the day casual Italian restaurant Passione pulled up stakes for Beaudoin to renovate the space, with the help of Glen Peloso Interiors. The 40-seat café is a very midtown Toronto take on Paris, with wall-mounted Edison bulbs and seat-to-ceiling tufted banquette backs. Toward the rear of the restaurant are display cases from which Beaudoin dishes up what he calls “food with a European flair but using Canadian products.”
