All stories relating to Quatrefoil
Trend We Love: adorable restaurant power couples
Tobey Nemeth and Michael Caballo of Edulis
A surprising number of buzzy new restaurants have opened in recent years that are owned or operated by married couples—and in honour of Valentine’s Day, we’re using their amped-up awe factor to give the staid, wholesome mom-and-pop image a mushy makeover (we just can’t help ourselves!). Here, a look at nine of Toronto’s cutest restaurant power couples.
The Momofuku Effect: How David Chang took over the city’s menus long before Momofuku even opened its Toronto doors
(Photographs courtesy Momofuku)
The New York mastermind behind Momofuku is one of the most copied chefs of the last decade. His brand of fusion—Asian street food elevated to fine dining—has been inspiring Toronto chefs for years. In fact, if you’ve eaten at the restaurants below, chances are you’ve already tasted Chang’s influence. Here, eight Momofuku signatures and their Toronto counterparts.
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Weekly Eater: Toronto food events for October 29 to November 4
Thomas Keller appears at the Isabel Bader Theatre on Tuesday to promote his new book Bouchon Bakery (Image: Toby Canham/Getty Images Entertainment)
Monday October 29
- Monday Night Dinners at Local Kitchen and Wine Bar: Every Monday night, Local Kitchen serves a $40 prix fixe menu of Italian fare with half-price wine bottles and no corkage fee. 1710 Queen St. W., 416-534-6700. Find out more »
- 86’D with Ivy Knight: Sample Muskoka Harvest Ale while you carve up a pumpkin for the jack-o-lantern contest. The Drake, 1150 Queen St. W., 416-531-5042. Find out more »
- Piola’s Monday Night Mixer: Piola’s weekly aperitivo Italiano, with cocktail and beer specials and complimentary snacks. 1165 Queen St. W., 416-477-4652. Find out more »
- Burger Mondays: Enjoy $5 burgers and $5 pints on Mondays, 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Gladstone Melody Bar. Gladstone Hotel, 1214 Queen St. W., 416-531-4635. Find out more »
- The “F” Word Revisited: Few chefs are more skilled at simple elegance and pure flavours than Gordon Ramsay. Explore some of his more approachable recipes with chef Angie MacRae. No yelling or throwing pots involved. Dish Cooking Studio, 390 Dupont St., 416-920-5559. Find out more »
- Harvest Fermentation—Kraut and Kimchi Variations with Kate Lienweber: Start fermenting the way your grandmother did. Also learn the holistic health benefits of home fermentation that have been a part of food culture for generations. The Depanneur, 1033 College St., 416-828-1990. Find out more »
Flavour of the Month: Eight locavore chefs on what to do with their favourite farmers’ market finds
For a few short weeks every year, farmers’ markets are flush with obscure fruits and vegetables you’ll rarely see in grocery stores. We asked the city’s most fanatical locavore chefs for their favourite finds and dead-simple prep tips.
Top Chef Canada exit interview, episode 6: quickfired
This season, we’ll be chatting with each week’s eliminated chef after they get the boot (or, rather, after their boot-getting episode airs—this stuff was recorded months ago).
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Top Chef Canada season two contestants announced; here are your six Toronto chefs
(Images: Food Network Canada/Insight Productions)
UPDATE: Check out our recap of episode 1 »
With the sophomore season of Top Chef Canada set to premiere on March 12, Food Network Canada has finally introduced the 16 chefs hoping to cook their way to $100,000 (and, lest we forget, a GE Monogram kitchen). The group (which, perhaps responding to feedback about season one, is a tad more multicultural) once again contains six Torontonians, among them Marben’s Carl Heinrich and Ruby Watchco’s Ryan Gallagher. Tasting the food will be new host Lisa Ray, alongside head judge Mark McEwan and resident judge Shereen Arazm and a spate of guests that includes culinary personalities (Top Chef Masters winner Marcus Samuelsson) and sundry celebrities (handyman Mike Holmes, actor Alan Thicke, Kenny vs. Spenny’s Spencer Rice). We round up the Toronto contestants, starting with Victor’s David Chrystian »
Best New Restaurants 2011
This year’s crop of restaurants, from a million-dollar dining room to a brazen burger joint, pushed Toronto’s culinary culture in creative, comforting and blessedly cheap directions. Here, the 10 new spots that are redefining the way we eat, drink and play in the city
The Year in Dining: our chief critic dishes on the city’s big food trends
Crostino with egg from Brockton General; Cheese from Enoteca Sociale; Bitter greens got some love; Beau's craft beer from Zócalo; Porchetta and Co.'s sandwich
Three GTA hot spots make it onto En Route’s list of the best new restaurants in Canada
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En Route’s annual best new restaurants list is out, and it contains good news for the culinary scene in and around Toronto. A few deserving but predictable downtown spots have made the cut: Buca, King West’s rustic Italian joint, is at number nine; Local Kitchen, Parkdale’s rustic Italian joint, sits at number four. As for quasi-Toronto mentions, Singhampton’s Haisai takes the top spot—just as it did for us—while the Scaramouche vets at Dundas’s Quatrefoil came in seventh.
Just Opened: we review seven of the city’s new restaurants
Hotel comforts, inhalable grilled cheese and epically hot servers
(Image: Lorne Bridgman)
THE COUNTER
550 Wellington St. W., 416-640-7778
Set within the glamour of the Thompson Hotel, this something-for-everyone, 24-hour diner comes across like a yokel cousin at a society wedding. The decor is bafflingly incoherent: velvet damask and cheap faux-wood tables, Cuban floor tiles and smoked mirror accents. The food is inoffensive: a caesar salad that meets the dictionary definition but only just (dried parmesan crumbs, flavourless croutons), hand-cut fries, a $29 sandwich called “obscenely large muffaletta,” strawberry pie that’s lost somewhere between the flaccid crust and red glaze. Read the rest of this entry »
The buttermilk fried chicken and double-battered onion rings are both good bets; “iceberg wedge,” smothered in mild blue cheese–buttermilk dressing, is refreshingly simple.
