That’s hot in Toronto!
Pop quiz. When you think of Toronto what quickly comes to mind?
The CN Tower? Drake? Snow? Hockey?
While all of these images are certainly accurate, Toronto has become much more than a sum of its clichés. In fact, not only is Toronto Canada’s economic epicentre with a current yet growing population of 6.3 million, it is also becoming a hospitality juggernaut with the sector on a meteoric tear. In recent years, it has attracted such world-renowned chefs as Daniel Boulud, and David Chang as well as nurtured local food sensation, Chef Matty Matheson (who has just opened Prime Seafood Palace on the city’s Queen St. West to great acclaim). It is now being currently invaded by leading U.S. boutique hotel brands such as Ace Hotels, 1 Hotels, W Hotels and NOBU to accommodate the surge of hip, international tastemakers. Confirming the city’s rightful place in the globe’s upper echelon of the hospitality heirarchy, Michelin recently launched their first Canadian stars, in Toronto, with one two-star restaurant (Sushi Masakai Saito featuring its Edomae-style sushi) and twelve one-star restaurants. It is no wonder that Time Magazine recently named Toronto as one of the “world’s greatest places of 2022 “and “begging to be discovered”!
Go big or go home
First of all, in Toronto, size matters! No better example for this is Eataly Toronto which spans 50,000 square feet (4645 square meters) near Yonge and Bloor streets, the city’s main intersection. Here diners and food shoppers have a choice of 7 unique food counters, 5 sit-down restaurants, 2 cafés, an in-house brewery and a full Italian market, a bakery, fish monger and a butcher counter.
The Eataly concept was first launched in Torino, Italy with a mission is to “make high- quality Italian foods available to everyone, at fair prices, and in an environment where people can eat, shop, and learn.” Since 2007 they have gone on to launch over 25 stores in 10 countries.
When asked as to why Toronto was chosen as its location for its first entrée into the Canadian market, Nicola Farinetti, CEO of Eataly North America, stated “Toronto has an incredibly strong food culture and is home to the fourth-largest Italian population outside of Italy, making it a natural fit for a store location.”
Eataly Toronto’s sit-down restaurants (with an aggregate seat total of 454) offer guests menus to represent most desired plates of Italy. An example of this would be their Trattoria Milano which evokes mid-century Milano featuring the traditional cuisine of northern Italy such as the iconic Cotoletta alla Milanese which is prepared tableside. Other restaurants serve up freshly baked pizzas, fresh pastas, responsibly-sourced seafood while the Birroteca is its’ in-house brewery featuring an Italian Pilsner.
The Eataly “Mercato” attempts to replicate an Italian market complete with covered fruit and vegetable wagons, fresh pastas, cheeses, sauces, prepared meals-to-go, selected wines, fresh cut flowers, and cured meats. The sheer volume of daily visits is truly astounding and no one, absolutely no one, leaves Eataly Toronto hungry!
Further uptown in the northern part of the city, sits Stock T.C. in an Art Deco building which served as a post office from 1936-2014. This 20,000 square foot (1858 square meters) space has been transformed into an Italian-leaning grocery on one floor with a restaurant and bar on the upper two levels. Stock T.C. is a homegrown institution which evolved out of a friendship between the owners of two complimentary businesses. Cosimo Mammoliti is the founder and owner of the Terroni restaurant and cafe chain in Toronto while Stephen Alexander runs Cambrae one of the city’s most revered butchers and fine grocers. Over coffee one day, while at their neighbouring Queen Street West locations and watching our customers shuttle between their respective businesses, they said “wouldn’t it be great if we could just give them everything?’” recalls Alexander. Thus the idea was born to offer their packaged goods and prepared foods (and dining) all under one roof.
At Stock T.C., the main floor is a compact grocery with wide selection of extra-virgin olive oils, an epicurean’s range of balsamic vinegars, wines and also expands into an extensive butcher counter, bakery and pizzeria. However, the star of this level has to be their lively deli counter where hearty sandwiches are made to order and prepared salads are sold by weight. Prepared meals offered here are not limited to Italian influences such as Pasta Al Forno, cannelloni and lasagnas but included Steak Bourguignon Pie, Chicken and Truffle Pies, Aussie Pie (Alexander hails from Australia), and all vacuum-sealed for home preparation.
On the second and third levels are the 280 seat Stock Bar which expands to 500 seats during the warmer months by populating the spacious rooftop terraces. Here the menu includes mouth-watering rotisserie chicken, sustainably farmed steaks, favourite dishes from other Terroni locations such as their funghi assoluti salad, in-house crafted pastas and thin crust pizzas all of which are made using ingredients found on the main level.
Sector domination
In Toronto, not only does size matter but so does sector domination. Scratch through the ownership surface and one soon discovers that the city’s varied hospitality sector is dominated by handful of players. Oliver and Bonacini Hospitality, Liberty Entertainment Group, INK Entertainment Group and Gusto 54 Restaurant group are the most prominent. Collectively these organizations own and manage about 53 of the city’s top restaurants. This scalability has been driven by the economics of synergies, talented executive chefs’ abilities to helm multiple locations, as well as investments by private equity funds and partnerships with real estate developers. Success breeds success which helps to attract and retain the hospitality industry’s top front and back-of-house talent.
Managing multiple locations does not mean that quality has to suffer. Take as an example Liberty Entertainment Group’s recent Michelin star for their Don Alfonso 1890 (located on the 38th floor in the city’s Harbour Castle Hotel) and previously awarded first prize as the “best Italian restaurant in the world outside of Italy” as well as “best meal of the year” (by 50 Top Italy). Oliver and Bonacini’s Corporate Executive Chef, Anthony Walsh, who oversees the culinary direction of 32 properties not only in Toronto but from coast to coast, has received numerous awards, including gold medals from Taste of Canada, Black Box, Salon Culinaire and the Ontario Hostelry Institute. In 2016, he was named Chef of the Year by Foodservice & Hospitality Magazine. Their flagship restaurant, Canoe, recently celebrated their 28th anniversary of featuring haute Canadiana cuisine and is located on the 54th floor of the Ludwig Mies van der Rohe designed TD Bank Tower with a panoramic view of Lake Ontario
Performance in a glass
Increasingly Torontonian hospitality patrons are not satisfied with typical food or drink presentations. They are seeking a little pizzaz or entertainment with each dish served or drink presented. No better example of this exists in the city than Bar Chef. Condé Nast Traveller listed Bar Chef as one of “the best bars in the world” while the New York Times called Frankie Solarik, the owner, chef and founder, a “legendary experimentalist”.
Located in the city’s Fashion District which is where the city’s clothing manufacturers used to dominate but now houses an eclectic collection of bars, restaurants and boutique hotels, Bar Chef could not be more non-descript from the exterior with nothing but a black curtain and a large candle shining illuminating the reservation book that sits on a pedestal. Bar Chef is an imbibing destination not a place one simply stumbles across.
Guests enter a mood-altering atmosphere that is entirely candlelit so that guests are encouraged to focus on their olfactory senses and the aromatic experience. Here a drink is not a drink but rather an experiential event. No one sums it up better than Solarik himself who states that “our goal is to engage our guest into an immersive, memorable, nostalgic and emotional drinking experience. Our objective is to challenge the conventional notions and boundaries of the cocktail experience.” Job done!
The drink menu at Bar Chef includes such names as Orchard in Bloom (spruce tip infused gin, fresh cucumber, thyme, white flower and green cardamom bitters, St-Germain, calvados and green apple foam, egg white, cream, and fresh lemon) or their signature cocktail that started it all, the Vanilla & Hickory Smoked Manhattan (Crown Royal Special Reserve, vanilla infused Cognac, cherry and vanilla bitters, hickory smoke, smoked hickory and vanilla).Sure you can also order a gin and tonic here (if you dare) but you may be asked which of their 5000 homemade bitters you might want to add to it. The more elaborate drinks are prepared in the back kitchen using dry ice, smoke bubbles, aromatic foams, and liquid nitrogen as just a few of their alchemy techniques. This prep bar is part high-end kitchen, part floral garden and part laboratory.
Experiential dining entertains
Not only do drinks in this city steal the show but food here is also ready to perform. One legendary destination for experiential service is Chef Susur Lee’s Lee Restaurant on King St West which features Chef Lee’s French and Chinese fusion cuisine.
Here the revered Signature Singapore Slaw is the show-stopper. The Singapore Slaw is meticulously tossed tableside while the server lists each and every of its 22 ingredients (such as “crispy taro, crispy vermicelli noodles, edible flower petals, sunflower-sprouts, jicama, lotus root, goji berry” to name a few) and all meshed with a plum dressing. Chef Lee found inspiration for the Singapore Slaw from a traditional meal served in Singapore where friends and family would gather to celebrate Chinese New Year’s and everyone would bring some food. Mixing ingredients came naturally in this environment and hence came the beginnings of the Singapore Slaw. Over 100 of these are sold per night at Lee’s.
Chef Lee, originally from Hong Kong, was named the first foreign chef to be granted The Red Chef’s Hat Award in Qing Dao, China. When asked what he finds interesting about being a restauranteur in Toronto, Chef Lee says “What I love most about owning restaurants in Toronto is how densely populated the city it is with so many different communities and cultures all coming together. The mix of commercial and residential downtown core makes for a very lively environment.”
Boutique hotel hospitality reigns supreme
For Torontonians out for the evening, an increasingly common destination involves one of the nearby boutique hotels where evening hospitality draws not only the hotel guests but for locals looking to kick up their heels.
While Michelin-starred Chef Daniel Boulud may not strike one as a nightclub impresario, yet his d/bar in Four Seasons Hotel is one of the places to be seen on any given evening (and not only during the Toronto International Film Festival!) Stepping into d/bar, is sight to behold with its 20-foot floor-to-ceiling glass windows attracting some of the city’s poshest patrons until the wee hours. Cocktails are straightforward and potent such as house creations like The Pink Perk which is a heady mix of Stolichnaya vodka, strawberries, and prosecco.
Alternatively, back in the Fashion District where 1 Hotel Toronto has recently opened its doors offering both its main floor Flora Lounge (a “sustainable sanctuary” of lush plants and repurposed wood furniture) as well as its Harriet’s Rooftop which features a live DJ on most nights along with a Mediterranean-leaning menu as well as a stunning panoramic view of the cityscape. Here hotel guests who mingle with neighbours from the myriad of nearby condos cannot help but to think that they are enjoying the hottest room in town!
The pulse emanating from Toronto is palatable. No wonder the world is flocking here to eat, drink and dance while the locals are proud to call it their own!
This is an article that was written for a German-based hospitality magazine called FIZZZ. Please click on the link to check out the original version.
By A.J. Twist