(Image: Emma McIntyre)
½ Rosedale’s new oyster bar is all sideways glances, double kisses and how-do-you-know-so-and-so’s. The seafood-centred pub standards are almost as good as the people watching.
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All stories relating to seafood
Review: John and Sons, a new people-watching pub and oyster bar in Rosedale
Introducing: Rock Lobster, the new Ossington incarnation of the popular pop-up restaurant
(Image: Renée Suen)
Recently there’s been a slew of Toronto Underground Market vendors graduating to permanent operations. First La Carnita opened on College, then Fidel Gastro’s launched a food truck, and now Rock Lobster Food Co., whose first TUM appearance was only nine months ago, has opened up shop on Ossington. Co-owner and chef Matt Dean Pettit partnered with Darryl Fine (Bovine Sex Club, Shanghai Cowgirl) and Alan Thomson (Sotto Voce) to open the restaurant, which features a lobster-centric menu of comfort seafood sold at pop-up-friendly prices.
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Introducing: Red Fish, a new West Coast–inspired seafood restaurant on College
(Image: Megan Leahy)
Ever since brunch favourite Mitzi’s on College closed late February, Little Portugal residents have been crossing their fingers for a worthy replacement. Enter chef David Friedman and sommelier Jamie Duran, who recently left their gigs at Fishbar to open Red Fish, a new seafood restaurant, earlier this month.
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New Reviews: Hoof Raw Bar, Lamesa Filipino Kitchen and Edulis
A raw seafood bar, a serious locavore bistro and Filipino fusion downtown
Hoof Raw Bar 
½
926 Dundas St. W., 647-346-9356
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Jen Agg, the owner of the legendary hearts-and-tongues hot spot The Black Hoof, has opened up a seafood restaurant next door on Dundas West. She brings to her new place the same meticulousness that made her original restaurant such a success. The small room is gracefully ramshackle, like a polished-up Cape Breton seafood joint, which perfectly matches chef Jonathan Pong’s short all-seafood menu. The substantial cured fish board, arranged from delicate to powerhouse, includes standouts like buttery, fragrant albacore gravlax and chorizo spice scallops. Skip the overpriced raw oysters ($34 per dozen) in favour of the baked versions, which maintain their delectable brininess despite the toasty crunch of panko flakes and layer of rich, smooth foie gras. A wildly exuberant dessert closes the meal: deconstructed sponge cake set off by stewed rhubarb, freeze-dried caramel, salt flakes and rosewater jelly. The drinks are aimed squarely at fish lovers: spicy tomato cocktails and a dozen or so wines by the glass that come with more origin stories than Batman. Sharing plates $8–$22.
Lobster oversupply brings the Cadillac of shellfish to the masses
Lobster, lobster, everywhere (Image: Keven Law)
Lobster, that well-loved conduit for drawn butter and the go-to symbol for a posh meal, is becoming way more wallet-friendly. A Toronto Star article charts the crustacean’s journey from east coast bargain meal, to high-end dish, back to everyday foodstuff. The money fact: lobster is now cheaper than deli meat in some markets. Last week, oversupply pushed the price down to $2.50 a pound for fishermen in Maine and $4 in Canada (in December it hit as low as $3.25 to fishermen in Canada). The Atlantic provinces are bringing in some serious hauls: in 2010, the lobster catch weighed in at 64,000 tonnes, while in 1970 it was roughly 17,000 tonnes. Greg Roach, associate deputy minister in Nova Scotia’s Department of Fisheries and Aquaculture, believes “rigorous lobster management” is boosting the numbers. The bad news? Global warming may also be spurring the boom, and low prices are bad news for fishermen. Thus far, the lobster wave is already being felt in Toronto, and we expect the already popular lobster roll to cross over from seeming-ubiquity to actual ubiquity sometime this summer. (Side lobster note: the Drake launches its Sunday Lobster Fare menu this week, featuring one-pound lobster, one beer, a whack of sides and dessert, for $32.) [Toronto Star]
Hooked set to take over Sanagan’s old Kensington Market space later this summer
Hooked’s original Leslieville location (Image: Gabriel Li from the Torontolife.com Flickr pool)
Since it opened shop in Leslieville last year, home cooks and chefs alike have lauded Hooked for its resolutely sustainable approach to fish sourcing (a rarity in this non-coastal city) and its friendly and utterly unpretentious service. Now, seafood lovers unwilling to venture quite so far east are in luck: according to Toronto Life writer Denise Balkissoon, Hooked with be taking over the tiny Sanagan’s Meat Locker space on Baldwin Street in Kensington Market later this summer (Sanagan’s, meanwhile, is moving to the much larger space vacated by European Quality Meats and Sausages). [Twitter]
Summerlicious 2012: our food editor picks the top 10 offerings from this year’s Licious list
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.
Introducing: De la Mer, the Bayview fishmonger’s outpost on Roncesvalles
(Image: Natalie Swiercz)
“Would you like to enjoy an oyster while you browse?” De la Mer co-owner David Owen asks a tot-toting Roncesvalles mom, while his partner, Blake Edwards, tends to the queue of customers that stretches to the end of the narrow shop shortly after opening. De la Mer is the second outpost of the duo’s Leaside location. The fishmonger has become a fast favourite in the quickly gentrifying neighbourhood, due in large part to the highly knowledgeable staff, who are more than happy to offer tips on cooking their wares. The complimentary perks, such as free citrus, fresh horseradish and dill, don’t hurt either.
Introducing: Buster’s Sea Cove, Toronto’s first seafood-focused food truck
Buster’s Sea Cove owners Tom Antonarakis and Quinten Tran (Image: Gizelle Lau)
With lobster rolls seemingly showing up everywhere this spring, the timing couldn’t be better for the city’s first seafood truck, brought to you by the owners of 20-year-old Buster’s Sea Cove fish fry in St. Lawrence Market. At present, the truck can most often be found during lunchtime (11 a.m. to 2 p.m.) at the corner of Queen and Jarvis. Owners Tom Antonarakis and Quinten Tran decided on a food truck concept for Buster’s Sea Cove about a year ago, after Tran spent time in California and saw the mobile dining trend picking up steam in Toronto. The vehicle was up and running at the beginning of May, just in time for the Street Food Block Party.
Introducing: Hoof Raw Bar, the new seafood addition to the Hoof family
The sign that greets passersby on Dundas West was designed by David Glantz (Image: Renée Suen)
For many Toronto food lovers, Hoof Raw Bar, the latest eatery in Jen Agg’s burgeoning Dundas West mini-empire, came out of left field when it opened a couple weeks back. But Agg tells us that she’d long wanted to open a space to serve oysters, and had been throwing around the idea for a seafood-focused restaurant since last September. She and her husband began the DIY construction work on the former Ferreira photography studio in November, but didn’t get down to the heavy lifting until January of this year—all while Agg was running the neighbouring Black Hoof and Cocktail Bar.
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Three top sustainably caught fish (and where to get them in Toronto)
For ethically tortured piscivores, trawling the fish counter can be like walking a minefield. Here, three sustainably caught fish to bait your hook
The Top Chef Canada exit interview: episode 5, hamming it up
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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Dan and Kristin Donovan of Hooked launch Canada’s first Slow Fish chapter
“The power we have as consumers is tremendous!” says Hooked’s Kristin Donovan (Image: Signe Langford)
Good, Clean and Fair. That’s the battle cry of Slow Food International, the Italy-based organization with a mandate to enlighten everyone to the joys and importance of real (i.e., non-industrial) food and give proper respect to the unsung heroes who produce the stuff. Sure, some dismiss it as a sort of conscience-assuaging supper club for the well-to-do, but the group, founded in 1986 by Carlo Petrini, does have a mandate to give back to the community at its core. Recently, Slow Food extended its reach to include food taken from the sea as well. Slow Fish is about supporting artisanal fishing and introducing eaters to neglected and often delicious fish species, while asking them to think about the state of the planet’s waters—and Toronto’s Hooked is leading the charge.
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Introducing: Catch, the Rushton’s new seafood-themed sister restaurant on St. Clair
Inside the newly renovated Catch on St. Clair (Image: Meaghan Binstock)
A year and a half after St. Clair fixture Filippo’s ended its more than 20-year run, the paper has finally come off the windows to reveal Catch, a new seafood restaurant. Owner Frank Pronesti had already made his mark on the St. Clair West restaurant strip as owner of The Rushton and one of the original partners at Ferro. After a year-long renovation that left nothing of the original space aside from the exposed brick, the elegant 40-seat room is a far cry from its predecessor. Pronesti has assembled a team stacked with East Coasters to execute his Mediterranean-inspired concept.
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