Aperitivo
655 Kanata Ave., Unit L2 (Kanata Centrum in the pedestrian zone near he Landmark Cinemas), 613-592-0004, aperitivo.ca
Open: Sunday and Monday 4 to 11 p.m., Tuesday to Saturday 11:30 a.m. to 11 p.m.
Prices: small plates/salads $10 to $16, large plates $18 to $26
Accessibility: no stairs at entrance or to washroom

It’s hard to know which superlative best describes Aperitivo, one restaurant among many in the massive Kanata Centrum shopping complex. Here are a few choices: best restaurant in the mall, best restaurant in Kanata, best gluten-free restaurant in Ottawa.

After two meals at Aperitivo this month, I think all three could apply. Still, with their qualifications, they don’t quite do justice to the restaurant, which may well be underestimated by Ottawa foodies at large because it’s not part of the downtown / Hintonburg / Wellington West dining scene.

Aperitivo is five years old. I reviewed it quite positively in December 2012 and recently thought a follow-up was due. But more impressive than its longevity, which the restaurant will mark with a party this Sunday, is the stability among its ranks. While staff turnover at restaurants in Ottawa’s core can be a near-constant churn, Aperitivo’s manager and co-owner Erica Fillipoff, chef Steven MacDonald, sous-chef Luca DeMarinis and several cooks have been there since day one.

“It’s a rare thing,” MacDonald, 41, told me this week. Asked for an explanation, he offered that his team is less hierarchical and its cooks have a lot of freedom to stretch out. “I rely on staff to come up with menu items and experiment,” he said. “They feel a sense of themselves in the restaurant.”

The cooking team’s good vibes are in full view at Aperitivo, as its kitchen is small and open. The restaurant, which years before had been a coffee shop, is quirkily wedge-shaped, seating almost 30 in a cosy space while 10 more can sit at the attractive bar beside the kitchen. The dining area is sandwiched between the bar and a just-for-show fireplace between orange and white accent walls. For longer stays, the grey banquettes are more comfortable than the chairs.  

Another constant since Aperitivo opened is its all-day menu’s focus on smaller, shareable, seasonal plates that often reflect influences from the slew of countries that border on the Mediterranean Sea. Like many Ottawa restaurants with higher aspirations, Aperitivo buys from local producers such as Acorn Creek Garden Farm and Mariposa Farm. 

For pre- and post-movie nibblers, there are cheeses, charcuterie (both made-in-house and brought-in) and preserved seafood (octopus, squid, sardines and mussels) from northwestern Spain. The latter offerings speak to Aperitivo’s au courant foodie cred, and they did tempt us. But we’ve passed on those imports in favour of kitchen creations, and have been consistently pleased by the craft, imagination and big flavours on display. Indeed, my fellow diners and I each time enjoyed the range of dishes we’ve sampled, but also disagreed on our favourites — that can only be a good sign.

There are appealing choices here for vegetarians, and two of my preferred dishes were meat-free (all $10). While too many mediocre beet salads over the years have left me blasé about them, Aperitivo’s rendition — which paired beets with oranges, goat cheese and lamb’s lettuce on a bed of thick roasted carrot and fennel vinaigrette — was not only a beaut to look at, but was also packed with equally vivid flavours. Roasted local heirloom carrots were elevated by a spice rub that included espresso and a bracing, concentrated green onion pesto.

Beet and orange salad at Aperitivo

Espresso roasted carrots at Aperitivo

Sweet and comforting were slices of acorn squash, roasted with honey and served with lots of double-smoked bacon, dollops of blue cheese and spiced walnuts. Grilled leeks needed a little more oomph or char to stand up to the punchy, mouth-warming Romesco sauce that came with them.

Acorn squash with bacon, blue cheese and walnuts at Aperitivo

Grilled leeks with Romesco sauce at Aperitivo

Seafood choices here were solid and refined. We eagerly scooped up nicely textured scallop ceviche ($18) with house-made tortillas, and found the dish skewed just a little sweet, although a hint of habañero heat mingled with the mango purée in the preparation. Squid ink paella ($26), studded with toothsome shrimp and rings of calamari and bolstered by the brightness of roasted red pepper, cherry tomatoes and saffron aioli, was the super-savoury dish that I most want to try again at Aperitivo. More casual, but still quite enjoyable, were juicy tilapia tacos (two for $12) with a mild fermented slaw and a big smear of rich jalapeño cream. MacDonald told me the tacos are Aperitivo’s top sellers. 

Scallop ceviche at Aperitivo

Squid ink paella at Aperitivo

Tilapia tacos with jalapeno cream at Aperitivo

Delectable duck breast ($24), cooked to a perfect pink, came with accompaniments  — curried apricots, harissa-perked chard and almonds — that nodded in the direction of Morocco. So did mild “kefta” meatballs of beef and lamb ($18), which benefitted from a mellow garlic sauce and especially from a zippy blend of herbs and cucumber on the side.

Duck breast with curried apricots and harissa chard at Aperitivo

Kefta meatballs at Aperitivo

Farinata ($14), a chickpea-flour pancake, is usually served unadorned in the south of France and northern Italy. But Aperitivo’s more complex, made-to-order version — created by DeMarinis, MacDonald said — came crisp and fully loaded, topped with fresh, fluffy ricotta, thinly sliced ventricina salami and an intriguing pepper-based sauce that brought sweetness and heat to the craveable dish. 

Farinata at Aperitivo in Kanata Centrum

Whether small, medium or large, desserts won us over. A lemony ice cream sandwich ($5) was split four ways for us to share. We then dove into a superior and less dense cheesecake in a jar ($12), topped with bits of meringue. The standout meal-ender was a sweet-and-savoury dark chocolate and whey caramel tart ($12) by cook Alanna Segger. Its crust, ganache and caramel were irresistible by themselves, and roasted grapes, more of that ricotta and olive oil put the dish over the top.

Chocolate tart at Aperitivo

I’ve twice been served by Fillipoff, whose pleasantness and detailed knowledge about Aperitivo’s food and interesting, non-LCBO wines (which Fillipoff chose for the restaurant) added to our enjoyment of our meals. Her commitment and pride in the restaurant became especially clear last month when she became a co-owner of Aperitivo, after she and partner Riley Gilchrist bought out previous owner Sean McCoy.

Aperitivo owner Riley Gilchrist and manager Erica Fillipoff

Returning to my initial question, I now think it’s more meaningful to consider Aperitivo not as the best restaurant in a certain category, but as one of the very good and even special restaurants in Ottawa at large. I see that the city’s Gold Medal Plates competition — the latest edition is Nov. 9 — has never tapped MacDonald and his crew to compete against downtown counterparts. That’s an omission worth rectifying, I’d suggest. 

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

Shanghai One
Unit C – 1872 Merivale Rd., 613-686-1380, shanghaione.ca
Open: Sunday to Thursday 11 a.m. to 10:30 p.m., Friday and Saturday  11 a.m. to 11:30 p.m.
Prices: most main dishes $12.95 to $18.95, more for seasonal and deluxe seafood  
Access: no steps to front door or washrooms

We entered Shanghai One, a huge restaurant in a mall at Hunt Club and Merivale roads, thinking that it looked very familiar. The menu, however, was dotted with mysteries.

Previously in this 6,000-square-foot space there had been another Chinese restaurant called Bashu. It had been open for less than two years, serving seafood, Sichuan and Cantonese fare, dim sum and more in a space that was as glitzy and big-box as some Somerset Street West Asian restaurants are down-at-heels and hole-in-the-wall. 

Shanghai One, which opened this fall, has retained the opulent look of Bashu as if it took over in turnkey fashion. Strikingly modern, ostentatious chandeliers hang above the bright dining room packed with black tables and narrow, cloth-covered chairs. At the back of the room, a large mural showing Shanghai’s skyline is new. The best proof that Shanghai One is not simply a rebranded Bashu is in the menu, which specializes in dishes from Shanghai, China’s largest city, buttressed by less esoteric Cantonese and Northern Chinese dishes, as well as dim sum staples.

There is, of course, a longstanding restaurant in Chinatown called the Shanghai, but its fare includes crowd-pleasing Chinese-Canadian and Asian fusion dishes. At Shanghai One, adventurous diners and Chinese expats can delve into more representative and even daunting dishes in which eels, sea cucumber and Dungeness crab (in Shanghai. the local hairy crabs are prized) are the stars.   

When I’ve visited Shanghai One and looked around to see which dishes the more knowledgeable eaters had ordered, I’ve most often seen bamboo steamer baskets filled with piping hot dumplings on the tables. These were what the menu refers to as “Shanghai juicy meat dumplings,” otherwise known as “soup dumplings” or xiao long bao. Inside each dumpling’s thin yet sturdy skin was a ground-pork filling mixed with gelatinized pork stock. The usual trick for eating these treats is to place a dumpling in one’s soup spoon, bite off its top, slurp out some of the soup and then anoint the rest with a bit of black vinegar before downing it. At Shanghai One, the xiao long bao were a highlight, and the best I’ve had in Ottawa, meaning not only the tastiest, but also the least likely to leak their liquids.  

Xiao long bao soup dumplings at Shanghai One

Those dumplings struck me as easy-to-like appetizers for old hands at Shanghainese eating and novices alike. Also accessible, if less tasty, were the overgrown, steamed “lion’s-head” pork meatballs in broth ($3.95 each). More challenging were Shanghai-style smoked fish ($10.50), a white-fish cousin to hot-smoked salmon, but soy-flavoured, more dense of texture and riddled with little bones, and Shanghai-style sautéed shrimps ($10.95), which came with shells and heads on, their crunchy exteriors sweetly flavoured, the shrimp meat inside less so.  

Lions-head steamed pork meatball at Shanghai One

Smoked fish appetizer at Shanghai One

Shanghai-style sauteed shrimps at Shanghai One

Other Shanghainese dishes that we tried supported the generalization that the city’s cuisine tends to the oily, sweet and salty. A server recommended stewed pork cubes and tofu skin in brown sauce ($15.95), which consisted of morsels of unctuous belly meat and enjoyably chewy tofu skin in a predominantly sweet sauce. Mindful of Shanghai’s love of eels, we tried a bowlful of eel meat, despite its steep price ($28.95), and found that the rich, flavourful fish stood up to its sweet-salty sauce.  

Pork cubes with tofu skin in brown sauce at Shanghai One

Sauteed eel at Shanghai One

To offset all of that protein, we opted for the simplicity and neutral taste of noodles with blackened scallions, oil and soy ($10.95), and garlicky snow pea leaves ($13.95), a bowl of which was massively portioned and generously sauced.

Noodles with scallion, oil and soy at Shanghai One

Dishes at Shanghai One pix by Peter Hum

We had hoped to try Shanghai-flavour scrambled eggs, after being told that the dish somehow mimics the taste of crab, but then we were later told that the dish wasn’t available, perhaps because the cook who could make it wasn’t in the kitchen. We might have opted to try a sea cucumber dish, but we were told immediately that the kitchen was out of that delicacy.

I’ve tried a few Sichuan dishes to see if there would be a spin on them at Shanghai One. Ma po tofu (the classic spicy mix of silken tofu and ground pork, $11.95) stressed the tingle of Sichuan peppers, but was less rounded and savoury in flavour and less viscous and more oily in texture. Fish-flavoured eggplant ($11.95) supplied jangling flavours and its sweet note was clear.  

Ma po tofu at Shanghai One

Fish-flavoured eggplant at Shanghai One

General Tao’s chicken ($12.95) was not good — too soggy and saucy and more sweet than spicy. An order of Cantonese fried noodles ($12.95) was massively sized, but pedestrian.

General Tao’s Chicken at Shanghai One

As for a la carte dim sum here, the dumplings and rolls that we had one Saturday for lunch were generally not that refined, and included hits and misses. Deep-fried squid and other deep-fried items were surprisingly good, as were some well-seasoned pork ribs, but steamed dumplings were less consistent, and the worst of them were bland and already sticking to the bottom of the steamer. A fried scallion cake was overdone and oily, The dim sum dishes were also a little pricey for what we got.

Fried squid at Shanghai One

Salt and pepper ribs at Shanghai One

Rice rolls at Shanghai One

Barbecue pork buns at Shanghai One

Green onion pancakes at Shanghai One

Service here has varied from friendly to brusque, although the shift in demeanour may have varied with the amount of English the server spoke. Dishes generally arrived quickly from the kitchen.

The restaurant is licensed. Except for the egg tarts in the dim sum section, there seemed to be no desserts.

Egg tarts at Shanghai One

On its website and signage, Shanghai One touts itself as a fine-dining destination. That’s overstating things, I think, or at least valuing its decor over its dishes. I’m glad for its distinctiveness — sweetness, oiliness, and all — and there are dishes and dumplings I would happily eat again. However, those are in the minority.  

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Stofa
1356 Wellington St. W., 613-722-6555, stofarestaurant.com
Open: Tuesday to Saturday: 5:30 to 9:45 p.m., closed Sunday and Monday
Prices: starters $13 to $20, mains $25 to $35
Access: steps to front door, washrooms upstairs

At Stofa, which opened in early October on Wellington Street West, the name is Nordic, even if the food is markedly less so.

That’s a discrepancy that can be easily overlooked, though, given the refined pleasures of chef-owner Jason Sawision’s best dishes. He can roam all over the culinary map as much as he wants if it means we get to indulge in Stofa’s sublime seafood tower with Korean accents, or its pork loin main course that unites spaetzle, jalapeño and tamarind, or its impeccable passionfruit soufflé. 

With the food at Stofa, what stands out are the finesse and imagination that the kitchen brings to its eclectic embrace of ingredients and influences. The levels here of craft and thoughtfulness are high, and that’s as you would expect from Sawision, given that he worked for six years at Atelier, the cutting-edge Rochester Street restaurant that’s as avant-garde and acclaimed as any other in Ottawa.

The starters, mains and desserts on Sawision’s concise menu are not quite as provocative or groundbreaking as the esoteric creations on Atelier chef Marc Lepine’s 12-course tasting menus. But even if Sawision’s restaurant is more conventional, there are still fresh, technical flourishes, luxuries and, above all, quality, to set it apart from the pack and justify the splurging that can be involved.  

Jason Sawision in the kitchen of his new restaurant, Stofa

When I ate at Stofa last weekend, after our exemplary complimentary bread with artichoke dip quickly disappeared, we checked our wallets and then began with the two-tier seafood tower ($84). Packed with pristine raw and faultlessly prepared items, it was generous enough to serve as an grand appetizer for four of us. Among the tried and true (oysters with mignonette, plump just-cooked shrimp with cocktail sauce, tiny battered calamari with gochujang mayo) and somewhat less common (roe-topped potted trout, lightly pickled mussels escabeche, tuna gravlax, mellow scallop ceviche with passionfruit and wee lobster sliders), it was impossible to pick a favourite. In between the sophisticated bites, edamame-topped kimchi, spicy rice-cracker ribbons and pickled daikon reset our palates nicely. 

Seafood tower at Stofa

Much more minimalist, but still potent, was Stofa’s elegant foie gras appetizer ($20), a pretty composition that presented slabs of seared and en torchon liver with crisp waffles for scooping, some chicory crumble and the precise tang of sour cherries and kumquat confit.

Foie gras with sour cherries and confit kumquat at Stofa

Bison hanger steak at Stofa

 

Pork loin main course at Stofa

Duck confit ravioli with lentils at Stofa

Halibut main course at Stofa

Passionfruit soufflé and tonka bean ice cream at Stofa

Sour cream cake with pineapple, apricot-licorice sorbet, salty meringue and brown butter powder at Stofa

The dining room here, which seats about 50, has received a crisp makeover from the days when an Afro-Caribbean restaurant last called the address home. Now, the long brick wall is off-white and the comfy seats and banquettes are vibrant blue or black. Along the back wall is a cosy bar and a large window onto the kitchen. Decorated sparsely with a few paintings, and populated with efficient, black-clad servers, the room has a very neutral, essentialist vibe. It was the hubbub of a full room’s conversation that helped the restaurant live up to its name (Stofa is old Norse for “hearth” and is meant to symbolize a comfortable gathering place.)

When Sawision spoke to the Citizen last month, he referred to his cooking as “my own little cuisine.” The food at Stofa is already a bigger deal than that, and it should be an ongoing pleasure to see how the 35-year-old chef further develops his vision under his own roof. 

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

Spicy House
281 A Dalhousie St., 613-695-8889
Open: Monday to Saturday 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m., Sunday noon to 9 p.m.
Prices: up to $13.99 for large plates and soups
Access: steps to front door and to main dining area and washrooms

There’s a new restaurant in the ByWard Market whose very name will discourage some people from giving it a try, while others will fist-pump in anticipation of eating there.

It’s called Spicy House and to give potential customers even more fair warning or inducement, on its windows facing Dalhousie Street are photos of some ominously garnished soups, appetizers and main courses. 

Inside, the month-old, cheap-and-cheerful eatery serves from a laminated, picture-enhanced menu of about 10 appetizers and a dozen larger dishes served across the expanse of China, plus one Taiwanese dish and a Korean-style treatment of tofu. Clean and new, but frill-free in terms of ambience, the dining room is so scantily decorated that the only eye-catcher is a flat-screen TV that seems only to display images of a Sichuanese hot pot and of chili- and cumin-flecked lamb skewers. In all, the eatery’s a far and welcome cry from the fast-food sub place that was once at this address.

In the mood for a little mouth-searing, I ate lunch at Spicy House twice in the last week and was glad that I did. Not only was the food sufficiently, if not debilitatingly, spicy, it was consistently and quickly made and the flavour profiles seemed on-point to me and to my dining companion who has had similar fare in China.

Spicy House, however, did not strike us as the spiciest game in town. I ate with two friends with freakish appetites for chilies who wanted off-the-chart heat from dishes that they ordered extra-spicy, and they were underwhelmed. That said, a heaping bowl of vermicelli with beef in hot and sour soup left another friend a sweaty mess — he might as well have emerged from a sauna. My response was somewhere in the middle — I experienced the mouth-warming endorphin rush of chili-laced dining, drank lots of water, and thought most dishes delivered tastiness beyond heat. 

A final caveat before I go dish-by-dish: there’s a lot of offal on Spicy House’s menu. One of those friends who wanted to tear his head off with spiciness was absolutely innards-averse, and would have none of Spicy House’s beef liver, tripe or pork intestines. “Why not call this place Offal House?” he suggested. Let’s just say that at Spicy House, you can chose from two ways of eating adventurously. 

Among the appetizers, quite pleasant was the dish of sour and spicy shredded potato, in which the lightly pickled tuber made us think we were eating daikon. Mildly, but discernibly spicy and sour, the dish was a nice, palate-cleansing contrast between bites and slurps of other spicier fare.

Sour and spicy potato appetizer at Spicy House

Also easy to eat was the bon bon chicken, which mixed shredded meat with vegetables and a peanut-y sauce. We had hoped to also try spicy marinated duck wings (although I now wonder if they would have been braised rather than crisply deep-fried) and Korean shredded bean curd, but the kitchen had run out of vital ingredients.

Bon bon chicken at Spicy House

We tried two hearty beef noodle soups, each with its own level of heat and amount of offal. “Noodles with Taiwanese spicy beef sirloin” seemed to come with chunks of tender brisket and slabs of chewy tendon, in a star anise-spiked broth offset by a handful of daunting but chili condiment — an add-on that appeared on many an item. “Noodles with spicy beef niu-za” contained beef liver and tripe, plus chili oil that added not only a layer of heat, but also a slick mouth-feel that my friend more off-putting than the offal in her bowl.

Taiwanese beef noodle soup with a dollop of chili condiment at Spicy House

More plain was a bowl of Chongqing noodles, a Spartan dish that needed its chili topping to be swirled among its noodles to become interesting.

Chongqing noodles in the foreground and sour and spicy potato in the background at Spicy House

Among the meat-and-rice dishes, “spicy beef sirloin on rice with egg” satisfied its description and was, to the relief of my friend, offal-free. In a similar dish, chunks of spicy pork intestine “were rich and buttery,” said the connoisseur of “guts” who ordered them, omitting to mention their funky tang.

Spicy beef and egg on rice at Spicy House

Spicy pork intestines and egg on rice at Spicy House

Three dishes on Spicy House’s menu have “ma la” in their name, meaning that tingle-inducing Sichuan peppercorns should figure into their makeup. We tried the filling Ma La Ban stir-fry and enjoyed the range of ingredients — from spongy fish balls to chunks of gluten and potatoes to slices of sausage to slippery potato starch noodles to various mushrooms. I did want more numbing, floral Sichuan peppercorns, though.

Ma la ban stir-fry at Spicy House

At both of my visits, the lamb skewers, originally from northwestern China, were the last to land at our table. Their morsels of meat were small, tender and sometimes fatty, and were liberally seasoned with chilies and cumin. Requested extra-spicy, the skewers seemed to have been dusted with something like cayenne pepper. The heat-seekers were not impressed.

lamb skewers at Spicy House

Extra-spicy lamb skewers at Spicy House

The restaurant is not licensed, and it serves no desserts. There are of course, sweet options galore nearby, from the tiramisu and biscotti at Il Perugino, the Italian café next to Spicy House, to croissants and pastries at the French Baker around the corner on Murray Street, or even the Hong Kong-style ice cream-loaded bubble waffles at Golden Bubbles on William Street.

It is perhaps wrongheaded to think that that latter sweet indulgence would help some Spicy House fare go down, but it did work for me.

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

Orto Trattoria
151 – C Second Ave., 613-244-6786, orto.ca
Open: Monday to Wednesday 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. and 5:30 to 10 p.m., Thursday to Saturday 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. and
5:30 to 11 p.m., closed Sunday
Prices: lunch items $10 to $16, appetizers at dinner $7 to $20, pastas $17 to $25, mains $24 to $32
Access: no steps to front door or washrooms

You can’t keep a good chef down. But you can strikingly change the food that he serves. 

That’s my take after two dinners at Orto Trattoria, which opened in mid-October in the Glebe, where the Urban Pear had been until it closed in the spring of 2016.

It’s heartening to see any restaurant at all rise up in that narrow Second Avenue space, where much good food was served, especially in the 2000s under the Urban Pear’s original owners. But Orto’s arrival is particularly notable because it involves the return of veteran Ottawa chef Rene Rodriguez.   

L to R: Razmon Poisson, sous-chef, Rene Rodriguez, Chef and Marie Ford, pastry chef at Orto Trattoria in the Glebe in Ottawa.. Photo by Jean Levac

One of this year’s bad-news stories on Ottawa’s culinary scene was the sudden closure in early March of Navarra, Rodriguez’s acclaimed restaurant on Murray Street. For nearly a decade there, Rodriguez served vibrant, personal dishes influenced by his Mexican roots. Furthermore, Rodriguez won the title of Top Chef Canada on the 2014 season of that Food Network Canada TV show, and this year, on the Food Network show Beat Bobby Flay, Rodriguez prevailed against that U.S. mega-star chef.

For Orto, which is owned by Ottawa businessman Pino Guerra, Rodriguez has even enlisted sous-chef Razmon Poisson and pastry chef Marie Ford, who were part of Navarra’s last kitchen crew.

However, Orto isn’t so much Son of Navarra — where Rodriguez whipped up complex flights of fancy such as braised lamb in mole sauce and sometimes garnished dishes with crispy fried mealworms — as it is a sleek temple for Southern Italian cuisine made with requisite respect for big flavours and fine ingredients. Visual flair and the odd technical tweak do update traditional and even homey items and help support the upward-leaning pricing here. But Rodriguez, who is cooking five nights a week at Orto, said in an interview that making simpler food in which each ingredient shines — essentially what trattorias do in Italy — is a different kind of challenge.

“I’ve always loved Italian cuisine,” said Rodriguez, who trained at trained at Le Cordon Bleu in Ottawa, and who worked at such restaurants as Ironwood Cafe, ARC the Hotel, the Black Cat Café and Social before he opened Navarra. 

The best of Orto’s appetizers were both simple and simply delicious. Plump, toothsome, barely compressed meatballs ($11 for two, $20 for four) were stuffed with cotechino sausage and bolstered by a bright tomato sauce and fresh ricotta. Arancini (fried rice balls, $12 for three) were extra-crisp (perhaps a touch more than they needed to be), stuffed with mozzarella and joined by some refined accompaniments — basil gel, bits of pickled broccoli stem and guanciale (cured pork jowl). 

Meatballs with fresh ricotta at Orto Trattoria 

Arancini at Orto Trattoria

Fried eggplant at Orto Trattoria

White anchovy tarte flambée at Orto Trattoria

Octopus appetizer at Orto Trattoria

Most of Orto’s pastas — usually available in smaller and larger portions — were textbook-correct and satisfying. Eggy rigatoni carbonara ($18/$23) was indulgent, but cream-free, and flecked with more of that crisped guanciale. Hearty lasagna cooked in a cast-iron pan ($25) brought to mind the straightforward pleasures of Orto’s meatballs. Pappardelle ($19/$25) with mushrooms, herb butter, bottarga and fried sage came together nicely. The standout, both for taste and looks, was Rodriguez’s pillowy ricotta gnudi ($17/$23) with gorgonzola, pear, spiced hazelnut and brown butter.

Rigatoni carbonara at Orto Trattoria

 

Lasagna at Orto

Mushroom pappardelle at Orto Trattoria

Ricotta gnudi with hazelnuts, pear, brown butter, gorgonzola at Orto Trattoria

We also tried three of the kitchen’s mains, which allowed Rodriguez and his team to stretch out more. Rosy slabs of grilled tuna “piccata” ($32) leapt off of a plate shared with Israeli couscous that was generously lemony and spicy. Chicken breast, rarely thrilling elsewhere, was dressed up nicely in Orto’s saltimbocca treatment ($29), wrapped in crisp prosciutto and offset by an intriguingly honeyed parsnip purée.

Tuna piccata at Orto Trattoria

Chicken saltimbocca at Orto Trattoria

At Navarra, Rodriguez frequently showcased pig cheeks, putting the overlooked delectable, for example, in burgers or carbonara. At Orto, the buttermilk-brined, confit pig cheek ($27) I had was good, but not great. I thought that for texture and flavour I’ve had better, while other items on the plate, including truffled peach purée and assorted baby vegetables, outshone the meat.  

Buttermilk-brined confit pig cheek at Orto Trattoria

Pastry chef Ford’s breads and desserts were all commendable. Of the sweets, the spot-on lemon tart and dense and intense dark chocolate budino topped the tiramisu-based dessert and the hazelnut tart. It’s no coincidence that our preferences came with scoops of wow-worthy ice cream. 

Tiramisu at Orto Trattoria

Hazelnut brown butter dessert at Orto Trattoria

Lemon tart at Orto Trattoria

While the food at Orto can be as minimalist and rustic, the renovation of its space is much fancier. Orto seats about 40, with long, comfy banquette and larger tables beside the windows and tables for two against the mirrored wall, basically flipping the Urban Pear’s setup. Tables, settings and many plates are black, but globular lights overhead sparkle. Dividers with frosted glass separate the entrance and small back-room bar from the dining area.

At the back of the room, a chunk of wall is given over to Orto’s all-Italian collection of wines, and our well-trained servers were opinionated and knowledgeable when they spoke of bottles and by-the-glass options. 

After his Top Chef Canada win, Rodriguez spoke of wanting to open a tiny, authentic eatery dedicated to dishes from Oaxaca, the Mexican state where the Ottawa native spent much of his childhood. This week, he told me that goal has been put on ice and he’s more keen to see Orto land in next year’s list of Top 100 Canadian restaurants or enRoute magazine’s tally of 10 best new Canadian restaurants.

Rodriguez also has hopes of being on TV again and said he wants to audition in 2018 to be an Iron Chef challenger. But would he present himself as an Italian chef or a Mexican chef, I asked. 

“I would definitely do Italian, yeah,” he responded, before allowing moment later: “Or who knows? Maybe I’d do Mexican again.”

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

Bar Lupulus
1242 Wellington St. W., 613-759-4677, barlupulus.ca
Open: Monday to Friday 11:30 a.m. to late, Saturday and Sunday 5 p.m. to late
Prices: small dishes $14 to $16, mains $18 to $25
Access: wheelchair-accessible, including washroom on main level (other washrooms downstairs)

If you type “beer and” into Google, the auto-complete feature offers a few suggestions. Tops are “wings,” “tomato juice,” and “cheddar soup.”

Clearly, Google has never eaten at Bar Lupulus on Wellington Street West. At the nearly two-month-old gastropub, the fare runs to the fancier end of the spectrum. Think scallop ceviche, in which espresso figures into the recipe, a slab of roast pork shoulder with parmesan-bolstered potatoes and even pasta made with pig’s blood.

The elevated dishes are meant to pair well with a striking range of connoisseur suds, including 20 Ontario and Quebec craft beers on tap, served in various sizes and in high-end Teku glasses, plus scores of bottled choices including such exotica as dry-hopped sour ales, wild ales and grape ales. “The draught selection is very impressive. Lots of interesting stuff there,” says this newsroom’s resident beer buff, Vito Pilieci.

I wish I could tell you about the precise interplay between beers and dishes, but that would have been too taxing on my budget, as well as my liver. Instead, here’s my report on the 11 dishes (about two-thirds of the concise menu) that I sampled last weekend at Lupulus.

More often than not, the from-scratch food from chef Jeff Bradfield’s open kitchen was attractively plated and brimming with well-melded flavours that belied the size of the plates that contained them. Bradfield, who previously cooked at Social in the ByWard Market and who competed last month in Ottawa’s Gold Medal Plates contest, seems to be striving for food that can match the premium brews chosen by business partner Anthony Spagnolo as far as complexity and occasionally arcane appeal go.

Based on three raw-bar items that we tried, I’d be confident in choosing from that section of Bradfield’s menu. Beef tartare ($14) melded finely chopped meat with a chorus of umami-rich ingredients (anchovy, parmesan, a truffle-based condiment called tartufata and cured egg yolk) but the dish had enough perkiness and acidity so as not to be lop-sided. Scallop ceviche ($16) downplayed the usual acidity of those citrus-marinated raw seafood dishes, but succeeded by garnishing its mellow mollusc meat with salty hits of crisp pancetta and serrano ham and sweet, finely diced apple. Smoked salmon was transformed into rich rillettes ($15) offset by a sharp, fresh frisée salad that popped with pickled mustard seeds.

Beef tartare at Bar Lupulus

Scallop ceviche at Bar Lupulus

Smoked salmon rillettes and frisee salad at Bar Lupulus

While the piadina that I’ve seen elsewhere have been flatbread folded taco-style for a single diner’s easy handling, Lupulus’s piadina ($15) was served open and unfolded, and its array of toppings (sheep’s feta, tomatoes, onion and figs) made us not only share the tastiness, but also fight for slices. 

Piadina at Bar Lupulus

The only dish of the night that didn’t work was a salad that consisted of a pylon-shaped mound of pumpkin, root vegetables and Granny Smith apples in a large puddle of oil and pumpkin seeds ($14). All of its good attributes were overwhelmed by a punishing saltiness. (Maybe I needed to neutralize it with a punishingly bitter beer.)

Pumpkin and root veg salad at Bar Lupulus

Two pastas went their separate ways, but admirably so. A dish built around capellini and clams ($16) was deliciously savoury, enriched by the punch of fermented eggplant, sweet peas and the licorice hit of Pernod. Spicier and earthier was a bowl that combined slices of paprika-laced linguiça sausage with farfalle that had been spiked with pig’s blood ($16). A bright gremolata kept the dish from being too blood-forward. 

Capellini with clams at Bar Lupulus

Linguiça and pig’s-blood farfalle at Bar Lupulus

The smaller dishes here are sufficiently interesting that I could see eschewing mains in favour of sharing other items. That said, the slab of roast pork at the centre of one main course ($24), while fatty, was rich in flavour and nicely crisped, and its potato and slaw added even more heft and variety. The fish dish that night saw a salmon fillet, substituted for the branzino listed on the menu, and its fine vegetable accompaniments (broccolini, fingerling potatoes, a cooked-down sofrito) properly prepared.

Porchetta main course at Bar Lupulus

Salmon main course at Bar Lupulus

Bradfield likes to throw a bit of a curveball when it comes to desserts ($10 each), but we didn’t object. His dark chocolate brownie also contained gorgonzola cheese, although if the menu didn’t tell you, you might simply note an extra layer of rich, funky flavour in a deluxe dessert already enriched by figs and balsamic.  His apple-pie-like dessert was garnished with slices of fennel and beet, as well as salted caramel. Purists might flinch, but we welcomed the extras. 

Brownie with gorgonzola blue cheese at Bar Lupulus

Apple dessert with beet,fennel and salted caramel at Bar Lupulus

Formerly home to the Flying Banzini sandwich shop, the bar’s space has been stylishly renovated. It’s a much darker place, in which the bar’s massive bank of taps enjoy pride of place along one wall. Under wheel-shaped lighting, servers in heavy aprons patrol the floor.  

The Jack Ketch
1536 Stittsville Main St., Stittsville, 613-831-2624, thejackketch.com
Open: Tuesday 5 to 11 p.m., Wednesday and Thursday 11:30 a.m. to 11 p.m., Friday 11:30 a.m. to midnight, Saturday 5 p.m. to midnight, Sunday 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., closed Monday
Prices: appetizers $6 to $13, mains $18 to $26 
Access: steps to entrance on the side of the building

This year, I’ve had more good meals than usual in Ottawa’s suburbs. I’d happily send you to Orléans for Persian dishes at Persis Grill, Portuguese food at Caravela or barbecue fare at Meatings. It’s hard to top the South Indian cuisine and small plates that the Kanata restaurants Flavours of Kerala and Aperitivo respectively serve. 

Related

• Dining Out: Persis Grill review
• Dining Out: Caravela review
• Dining Out: Flavours of Kerala review
• Dining Out: Meatings review
• Dining Out: Aperitivo review

I hoped for similar satisfactions in Stittsville at the Jack Ketch, which opened Oct. 21 on Stittsville Main Street. After a lunch and a dinner there, I definitely see its potential. But I also think a few tweaks would improve some dishes. 

Behind this cosy place of less than 30 seats are chef Kevin Conway and server Allison Pearce — and as far as I can tell, that’s it. Kudos to Conway, who is from Stittsville and has cooked in Toronto and at Social, MeNa and Whalesbone in Ottawa, for launching a more personal, smaller-scale gastropub-style eatery in his home town.

The Jack Ketch is a narrow, simple place that gives visitors a view of Conway working in its modest kitchen as soon as they enter. There’s a wee bar of just a few seats, and beside it the grey-blue walled dining area with its wood banquette along one wall. There are some small paintings on the walls. I didn’t look too closely, but the impression I got was that fortunately, the ambience did not nod overly to the eatery’s notorious namesake — an English executioner of the 1600s who, as the stories go, was too incompetent to dispatch his victims quickly and made a gory, painful mess of things.

More appealingly, the connection to England pops up on Conway’s menu in some smaller dishes that we’ve had and enjoyed. The slab of pork pie ($12) that we tucked into as an appetizer was a spot-on delicious, meaty indulgence with a rich, melting crust. More pork pie is probably what I’d be most craving on my next trip to Stittsville.

Pork pie at the Jack Ketch

Conway’s riff on “angels on horseback” (a cooked oyster hors d’oeuvre, $3.50 each) was fine. He chose to fry rather than bake the oysters, and he bolsters them with a spicy chutney-like jam speckled with pork belly.

Fried oyster with pork belly jam at the Jack Ketch

We also liked Conway’s homespun snack of minced Matane shrimp, mildly flavoured with mace and cloves and served with toast ($5), which played on the British classic of potted shrimp, minus its usual “lid” of congealed clarified butter.   

Unpotted Matane shrimp at the Jack Ketch

Kedgeree, an Anglo-Indian dish consisting of flaked fish, rice, parsley, hard-boiled eggs and curry powder, pops up on Conway’s menu too, but converted into fritters for an appetizer ($13). Ours were crisp, but the sample I tried really needed its mayo-based sauce as it seemed heavy on batter and very light on fish.

Kedgeree fritters (Salt fish with mild curry, rice and grated hardboiled egg, breaded and fried served with apple mayo) at the Jack Ketch

At a lunch visit, we tried three items that are also on the dinner menu. Best was the impressively tall six-ounce “hangman’s burger,” dressed to the hilt with bacon, aged cheddar, crispy onions and more and served with thick, plank-like fries ($16). Vegetarian, barley-based risotto ($16) was lacking in flavour and excitement, while spicy Buffalo-style Cornish hen ($16), was seriously over-sauced and the hominy that came with it was not hot. 

Burger and fries at the Jack Ketch

barley risotto at the Jack Ketch

 

Buffalo Cornish hen at the Jack Ketch

We had better main courses at our dinner visit. The standout, and the cheapest of three reasonably priced dishes, was a thick, chunky portion of maple-glazed pork loin  ($20) that was juicy and flavourful and well supported with Brussel sprouts and an intriguing savoury pastry stuffed with white beans. (Here, a little proactive describing by Pearce would have helped.)

Pork main course at the Jack Ketch

Pan-roasted trout ($22) was not bad at all, but even better was its hearty bed of du puy lentils mixed with bits of chorizo and mussels. We had high hopes for duck ravioli with duck confit in duck broth, topped with cured duck egg and pistachio ($22), but felt the dish could have been improved upon. The ravioli were the stars on the plate, but the broth in particular didn’t wow us, and while the nuts as a garnish loomed large, the cured york shavings seemed underplayed. 

Trout main course at the Jack Ketch

Duck ravioli and confit at the Jack Ketch

Three desserts (all $8) were uncomplicated, homey concoctions, as old-fashioned as the retro patterned dinnerware beneath them. I thought the milk chocolate tart topped the cake-based choices (blueberry grunt and pouding chômeur) for depth of flavour and interest.

Milk chocolate pie at the Jack Ketch

Pouding chômeur at the Jack Ketch

Blueberry grunt at the Jack Ketch

At the tiny bar, a few local beers are on tap. Cocktails, including “flips” — smooth, frothy mixed drinks of yore that contain beaten egg — are reasonably priced at $9 and $10. The wine selection covers main varietals each with a single bottle, and six-ounce pours are available for between $7 and $13.

In all, despite some mild downs along with the ups, I have a generally favourable impression of the Jack Ketch. Given the shortage of interesting alternatives nearby, it deserves the benefit of the doubt. If the place can raise its game just a bit, it could be a really solid choice in Stittsville without any qualifications.

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews 

Meat Press Creative Charcuterie and Sandwich Shop
45 Armstrong St., 613-695-7737, meatpress.ca, twitter.com/MeatPressShop
Open: for sandwiches Tuesday and Wednesday 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., Thursday and Friday 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. (takeout only after 5 p.m.), Saturday 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. (brunch is also served); for dinner Thursday to Saturday 5 to 10 p.m.; closed Sundays and Mondays
Prices: sandwiches $9 to $12, charcuterie boards and mains $20 to $28
Access: steps to front door

I wanted my final restaurant review of 2017 to be a positive one, and chose my dinner out last weekend with my fingers crossed. Friends and I tromped over to Meat Press, the high-end sandwich shop on a backstreet in Hintonburg.

Opened in the fall of 2015, Meat Press is admittedly not everyone’s ideal restaurant. As its name suggests, Meat Press might be enough to send vegans running away screaming with chef-owner Étienne Cuerrier’s focus on making myriad and delicious animal-flesh products. 

Two years ago, I was very impressed when I reviewed its lunch-time soups, salads and sandwiches. This year, Cuerrier, formerly a chef at Soif wine bar in Gatineau, began serving dinner three nights a week, as well as wines and beers. So, last Saturday, six of us entered his warm, woody, cosy shop for some meaty indulgences. (Well, at least all of us except for the pescatarian.) 

Cuerrier’s dinner menu, which changes each week and can be previewed on its Twitter page, is typically concise, but filled with a range of intriguing, made-from-scratch options.

Last weekend’s first page was dedicated to five boards laden with cured meats (made in-house or brought in) and cheese or focused on red meat, poultry, seafood or seasonal vegetables. Page two included five specialties, of which three were main courses, a dessert, and beverages including local craft beers by Dominion City Brewing Co. and Tooth and Nail Brewing Company, which is practically around the corner from Meat Press.  

We grazed on four of the boards. The cured meats and cheese plate for one ($21) was filled with winning items, not the least of which were Cuerrier’s capicollo, plus some poached pear and fine honey that brought sweetness into the mix. 

charcuterie and cheese board at Meat Press

Our pescatarian friend enjoyed her array ($23) of tuna tataki plus two fried treats — sole fritters and crisp soft shell crab. In hindsight, though, she and the table ought to have ordered a vegetable board as well, given how flesh-forward and veg-less the other options were.

Fish and seafood board at Meat Press

The “bovine” board ($20) contained the only items that left us a little cold. Its fried sweetbreads were up to scratch, but I thought the coarsely chopped tartare could have been more refined in terms of flavour and texture, while the bone marrow, presented without brightening elements such as parsley and capers, struck me above all as disappointingly over-roasted, cooked far beyond the spreadable lusciousness I associate with marrow.  

Bison tartare, sweetbreads and bone marrow at Meat Press

All was right, however, with the duck board ($28). Duck rillettes were chunky and brimming with flavour, slices of duck-breast prosciutto were impeccable — tasty and rimmed with soft, flavourful fat — and duck hearts were much more delectable and spicily seasoned than they were chewy.

Duck rillettes, duck prosciutto and duck hearts at Meat Press

Duck also shone in Cuerrier’s cassoulet ($28). A purist would say that the Meat Press rendition of the classic bean-and-meat casserole from the south of France was amiss with its proportions, which usually balance beans and meat. Cuerrier’s cassoulet assembled a near-perfect confit duck leg (Oh, for crisper skin) and smoked duck breast with a great spicy pork sausage and a scattering of beans in a lightly sweetened duck stock reduction. If my pals and I were to return to Meat Press and if the cassoulet was available, we might well be unanimous in choosing it.

Cassoulet at Meat Press

That said, steak frites here would be a very solid and satisfying pick, based on the juicy, deeply flavoured Enright Cattle skirt steak ($27) that came with great fries, great slaw and a rich Béarnaise sauce.

Steak frites at Meat Press

Pork stew ($20), with shreds of pork hock and plump meatballs in a no-frills ragout, was comforting, homey and quintessentially French-Canadian.

Pork stew at Meat Press

All of our carnivorous exploits left us with no room for Meat Press’s only listed dessert, a maple chamomille crème brûlée ($7). Determined to be thorough, I returned earlier this week for lunch, when we sampled that item. If, like Amélie Poulain in the movie of nearly the same name, you delight in cracking the caramelized crust of a crème brûlée, then that aspect of Meat Press’s dessert meets expectations. I did think, though, that the dessert was a little more eggy and a little less creamy than I like.

Crème brûlée at Meat Press

Before the crème brûlée, we tried three of Cuerrier’s hefty sandwiches on his homemade buns. The smoked duck breast and smoked beef sandwiches ($12 and $9 respectively) topped the porchetta sandwich ($9.50), if only because the nonetheless tasty latter sandwich was a little more unwieldy to eat and heavier on the slaw than the meat. 

Smoked duck sandwich at Meat Press

Brussel sprouts and smoked beef sandwich at Meat Press

Porchetta sandwich at Meat Press

Perhaps the best compliment that I can give Cuerrier and his shop (which also sells tourtière, smoked duck breast, duck confit and other items to go) is this: It brings to my mind Montreal’s renowned and gloriously meat-centric restaurant Au Pied de Cochon, but without its practically debilitating excessiveness. Here, in Hintonburg, it is possible to thoroughly enjoy the culinary pleasures of the flesh, but without being a total glutton about it.    

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

In 2017, I scoured from Stittsville to Aylmer to Wakefield to Orléans for delicious, memorable dishes, and I didn’t do too badly at all. 

Of course, new, upscale restaurants in Ottawa’s downtown dining districts — places such as Sur-Lie and Oz Kafe in the ByWard Market, Stofa on Wellington Street West and Orto Trattoria in the Glebe — provided thrills.  

But further afield, there was also La Maison Conroy in Aylmer, plus a wave of more casual eateries such as Flavours of Kerala in Kanata, Meatings Barbecue and Persis Grill in Orléans and Xiang Zi in Nepean. The latter was one of many in a wave of cheap and cheerful Asian restaurants that opened this year in Ottawa.

Established eateries that I visited, such as Aperitivo in Kanata the renovated Albion Rooms downtown and the funky Le Hibou in Wakefield, also chipped in.

Looking back at my 100-plus meals out this year, I found that many of my favourite dishes came from the above-named restaurants. Below are my faves in a dozen categories.

But first, a few provisos. I’m not singling out Ottawa’s best dishes or even the best items at these restaurants. Also, some of these items are no longer available — menus, and even chefs, have changed. Still, these plates (and bowls) best pleased my taste buds and esthetic sense in 2017.

BEST SMALL PLATE

– Octopus: harissa braised with kimchi, labneh, black garlic and squid ink tempura at Le Hibou

At Le Hibou in Wakefield, an octopus was a harmonious, multicultural success packed with surprising components. With a tender, harissa-braised tentacle came house-made kimchi, Middle Eastern strained yogurt, hits of house-fermented black garlic and crunchy, squid ink-infused tempura bits. We scraped the plate clean so that none of then-chef Arif Khalid’s tasty efforts would be squandered. Honourable mention: The squid-ink paella at Aperitivo.

BEST SOUP

Wonton soup at Xiang Zi

At Xiang Zi, hidden in a strip mall’s parking lot on Meadowlands Drive, the meal-sized wonton soup was simply a knockout, brimming with more than a dozen meaty, think-skinned pork dumplings in a splendidly savoury broth bolstered with scatterings of seaweed. Honourable mention: Northern Vietnamese-style pho at Chez Anh.

BEST SNACK

Pork pie at the Jack Ketch

At the Jack Ketch in Stittsville, a slab of pork pie was a spot-on delicious, meaty indulgence with a rich, melting crust. Honourable mention: Empanadas at Petit Peru in Gatineau’s Hull sector.

BEST ASIAN DUMPLINGS

Deep-fried then steamed green onion ginger beef dumplings at Hung Sum

At Hung Sum, the re-opened dim sum emporium on Somerset Street, the kitchen goes the extra mile with its green onion ginger beef dumplings, which are deep-fried to give some crispness to their wrappers and then steamed to bolster their internal juiciness. Honourable mention: The soup dumplings at Shanghai One.

BEST NON-ASIAN DUMPLINGS

– Gnocchi a La Parisienne: braised rabbit with sweet peas, housemade ricotta, local tomatoes, sunflower gremolata and chicken jus at La Maison Conroy

At La Maison Conroy in Aylmer, chef Kyle Mortimer-Proulx’s gnocchi parisienne with braised rabbit was a must-order, not only far superior to the too-often gummy renditions of gnocchi that I ate elsewhere in 2017, but also blessed with a delicious savoury broth. Honourable mention: The ricotta gnudi with gorgonzola, pear, spiced hazelnut and brown butter at Orto Trattoria.

BEST VEGETARIAN DISH

Eggplant with chickpea and fennel stew at Oz Kafe

At Oz Kafe, chef Kristine Hartling featured charred baby eggplant with a hearty chickpea and fennel stew, sautéed greens and the flavour hits of slow-roasted tomato, green olive tapenade and sunflower romesco sauce. Honourable mention: The dry tofu in chili oil at La Noodle.

BEST MEAT PLATTER

The family platter served at Meatings, featuring St Louis Pork Ribs (counter clockwise from lower left), Smoke Chicken, Pulled Pork, House Made Pickles, Deep Fried Cornbread, Grandma’s Pecan Tarts, Grilled Cornbread, Urban Onion Buns, 14 hour Smoked Brisket.

The family platter at Meatings got barbecue right, acing chicken, pulled pork, and especially notoriously hard-to-cook beef brisket, which was thick-cut, savoury and moist with well-rendered fat. Included side dishes such as smoked beans and mac and cheese appealed too. Honourable mentions: The beef-and-chicken combination special for two at Persis Grill, the charcuterie board at the Albion Rooms.

BEST SEAFOOD 

The two-tier seafood tower at Stofa included shrimp, oysters, scallop ceviche, mussels escabeche, lobster sliders, potted trout and calamari plus miso popcorn, spicy rice crackers, kimchi, and pickled daikon

At Stofa, chef-owner Jason Sawision’s two-tier seafood tower was packed with pristine raw and faultlessly prepared items, from oysters with mignonette and plump just-to roe-topped potted trout, lightly pickled mussels escabeche, tuna gravlax, mellow scallop ceviche with passionfruit and wee lobster sliders. Honourable mentions: West Coast seafood boil at the Albion Rooms, tuna piccata at Orto Trattoria.

BEST SPICY DISH

Elayil Pollichathu Salmon cooked in a banana leaf at Flavours of Kerala, pix by Peter Hum

By a nose, my pick is the elayil pollichathu (salmon slathered in a thick, tomatoey spice paste and cooked in a banana leaf) at Flavours of Kerala, even if other delicious dishes there such as the pepper lamb and beef vindaloo are more incendiary. Honourable mentions: Tandoori lamb chops at Coconut Lagoon, Taiwanese beef noodle soup at Spicy House, fried chicken with chilies at Full House. 

BEST POULTRY

Cassoulet at Meat Press

In the meat-forward cassoulet at Meat Press, near-perfect duck confit and smoked duck breast were the stars. Honourable mentions: Kanthari kozhi at Flavours of Kerala, Duck confit at Social, pollo a la brasa at Petit Peru.

BEST RED MEAT 

Ontario Venison with sweet potato flan, Tokyo turnips, puree, candied pecans, apple chocolate juniper jus

At Sur-Lie on Murray Street, venison was sophisticated and exemplary with sweet potato flan, Tokyo turnips, candied pecans and chocolate juniper jus. Honourable mentions: Nagano pork rib chop at Oz Kafe, Iberico pork shoulder at La Maison Conroy, grilled goat at Jambo Restaurant.

BEST DESSERT

Chocolate tart at Aperitivo

At Aperitivo in the Kanata Centrum Shopping Centre, the dark chocolate and whey caramel tart was impeccable on its own, and roasted grapes, house-made ricotta and olive oil put the dish over the top. Honourable mentions: Passionfruit soufflé served with tonka bean ice cream at Stofa, and madhurakatti “bread pudding” at Flavours of Kerala.

THE RESTAURANTS

Aperitivo, 655 Kanata Ave., Unit L2, aperitivo.ca

Flavours of Kerala, 1104 Klondike Rd., Unit B, flavoursofkerala.com

Hung Sum, 939 Somerset St. W., facebook.com/HungSumRestaurant/

La Maison Conroy, 61 rue Principale, Gatineau (Aylmer sector), lamaisonconroy.com

Le Hibou Kitchen & Bar, 757 Riverside Rd., Wakefield, cafelehibou.com 

Meat Press, 45 Armstrong Rd., meatpress.ca

Meatings Barbecue, 2807 St. Joseph Blvd., meatings.ca

Oz Kafe, 10 York St., ozkafe.squarespace.com

Orto Trattoria, 151-C Second Ave., orto.ca

Stofa, 1356 Wellington St. W., stofarestaurant.com

Sur-Lie, 110 Murray St., surlierestaurant.ca 

Xiang Zi, 1121 Meadowlands Dr E.

Related

• Peter Hum's best bites of 2015
• Peter Hum's best bites of 2016

phum@postmedia.com
twitter.com/peterhum
Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

Kuidaore Izakaya Bar and Grill
420 Preston St., 613-422-7537, kuidaoreizakaya.ca
Open: Monday to Thursday noon to 11 p.m., Friday and Saturday noon to midnight, Sunday 5 to 10 p.m.
Prices: small plates $15 to $15, raw dishes $6 to $20, ramen $11 to $15 
Access: steps to front door

As long as I’ve been on this beat, which is nearly six years now, I’ve wanted an izakaya to open in the Ottawa area and thrill me with its Japanese small plates.

Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto — never mind Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka — are blessed with izakayas (Japanese pubs with affordable, interesting food). “But Ottawa lags behind them,” I wrote — in May 2012, no less.

That month, I gave a mixed review to an Elgin street restaurant, matter-of-factly called Izakaya, which less than three years later became the Waverley. A year later, I wrote, in less-than-thrilled terms, about Haru Izakaya in Gatineau, which is still open. In terms of local izakaya action, until very recently, those two businesses, which embraced Asian fusion dishes beyond an izakaya’s mandate, have been the full extent of it.

So, when Kuidaore, which calls itself an izakaya bar and grill, opened last November on Preston Street, where the Korean restaurant Le Kim Chi had been, I wondered, but with reservations, if it would provide the full-on izakaya experience I’ve been waiting for.

I’ve eaten three times there, and my bottom line is that I like Kuidaore, but wish I liked it more. My fondness for the place would increase if there was a little more precision and sparkle to its food, and if it went deeper into the kind of dishes that make an izakaya an izakaya.

You could say that with its extensive menu, Kuidaore places at least three bets. It serves about a dozen kinds of sushi, plus 10 more raw-fish dishes, such as tartares and poke bowls. Its kitchen offers 10 kinds of ramen, which, like sushi, isn’t usually so fulsomely offered at an izakaya. And then there are 20 items such as gyoza dumplings, tempura dishes and other deep-fried items that step into izakaya-fare territory. 

As widely as I ate at Kuidaore, I came across some dishes that satisfied, but didn’t wow and items that were alright, but prompted at least a little nitpicking. In Kuidaore’s favour, I should say that I think its prices are in line for what you get.

The ramen soups ($11 to $15) that I’ve sampled were respectable, with none of their components terribly amiss. Certainly, they were the hearty, warming options best suited for a January deep-freeze. But I did think that the broths for the tonkotsu black and tan tan (spicy) ramens could have been more deeply flavoured and rich.

Tonkotsu black ramen at Kuidaore

Tan tan ramen at Kuidaore

Karaage ramen at Kuidaore

Some simple Japanese staples here — miso soup ($3) and crisp, unoily deep-fried shrimp ($9) — were well-made and clearly worth ordering again. Chicken karaage ($7) were large, well-fried and tasty deep-fried morsels, but also a little fatty. Gingery pork gyoza ($6.50) were nice, but would have been better with a more marked finishing sear. 

Shrimp tempura at Kuidaore

Chicken karaage at Kuidaore

Pork gyoza at Kuidaore

Of two more filling options, the pork cutlet with curry and rice ($13) was up to scratch while the okonomiyaki ($10) struck us as a bit odd. While that Japanese savoury pancake isn’t exactly refined eating, the version at Kuidaore, made with bacon as its protein, was particularly sloppy and too-sweetly sauced, and it bewildered us with julienned cabbage on top of the pancake rather than inside it.

Tonkotsu (pork cutlet), curry and rice at Kuidaore

Okonomiyaki (Japanese savoury pancake) at Kuidaore

The chef’s 10-piece choice of sashimi and nigiri ($20) was a mixed bag. The unadorned raw fish and seafood tasted fine, although pieces of salmon seemed a little overly wet and two pieces of surf clam were marred by a bit of grit or sand. Better were the samples of salmon, mackerel and white tuna, some sauced and lightly torched, on rice. (I could have put white tuna in quotation marks because last fall’s report by Oceana Canada found that in four of five cases in downtown Ottawa, “white tuna” was in fact escolar, an oily fish that the conservation-focused charity derided as “the laxative of the sea” because it can upset stomaches. We were fine, though.) 

Assortment of sushi at Kuidaore

We also tried two more raw-bar creations. The tuna poke bowl ($13) struck me as under-dressed and lacking in salt and acidity, but its rice and crunchy elements were good. The geisha roll ($15), a special concoction featuring crab, shrimp, avocado and cucumber, was enjoyable, although the taste of the torching done to the topping of shrimp and crab was strong.

Tuna poke bowl at Kuidaore

Geisha roll at Kuidaore

Skewers make up a separate category on Kuidaore’s menu and we went for sticks of marinated, grilled squid, quail eggs, which had been battered, and chicken heart ($3 each, more or less). They were take-it-or-leave-it items. 

Skewers at Kuidaore

We only tried one of Kuidaore’s desserts, a serving of deep-fried black sesame ice cream ($8). While the serving was massive and the ice cream was a hit, the coating itself didn’t do much for us — better would have been the straight-up ice cream for $5. 

Deep-fried black sesame ice cream at Kuidaore

Food aside, Kuidaore, which seats about 30 people, appealed strongly with attentive, easy-going service and a modern but uncluttered renovation that gives pride of place to a striking mural featuring icons of Japanese pop culture from Godzilla to Gundam to a samurai to a geisha to origami cranes. The sound system plays spirited Japanese rock and pop, and if any more enticements to a younger crowd are needed, there are creative cocktails, a few Japanese beers, a half-dozen sakes, and the option to combine beer and sake as $5 “sake bomb” cocktails.

It occurs to me that I’ve left explaining Kuidaore’s vowel-heavy name for last. It’s a Japanese expression meaning “to eat oneself bankrupt.” says the restaurant’s website. Kuidaore is more of a pleasant, middle-of-the-pack place, I think, and my bank account won’t be in any danger unless the eatery upgrades to the izakaya of my dreams.

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

Calabogie Brewing Company this week unveiled a nitrogen-infused version of its popular Brown Cow Milk Stout, which may be the first nitro stout in a can by an Ottawa-area craft brewery.

The nitrogen carbonation process lends an extra creaminess to the beer that makes it more like a draft poured in a pub. “It gives it a lot more body, a lot more velvety smoothness,” said Calabogie sales rep Danny McCallum, who showed how to pour the dark, chocolate-coloured brew at the launch party, held Wednesday at Ottawa’s Craft Beer Market.

As he demonstrates in the video, you have to shake the can for a few seconds before opening it to activate the nitro. “It goes against everything we’re taught about beer,” he said. After a good shake and an “aggressive pour” into a level glass, you can see the nitrogen working its magic to produce a perfectly formed head.

With its notes of vanilla, chocolate and espresso, the regular Brown Cow Milk Stout (5.5% ABV) is one of  Calabogie’s best-selling brews during the fall and winter months, when beer drinkers turn to darker, more heartwarming concoctions. The nitro version makes it even more delectable as a dessert beer; the luxurious mouthfeel lends a milkshake-like decadence.  

The nitro stout will be available in a four-pack at the Beer Store in January. In the meantime, you can buy it at the brewery in Calabogie, about an hour west of Ottawa, priced at $3.50 for a 473 ml tallboy can.

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Chahaya Malaysia
1690 Montreal Rd., 613-742-0242, facebook.com/chahayamalaysia
Open: Tuesday to Thursday 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. to 10 p.m., Friday 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m., 5 p.m. to 11 p.m., Saturday 5 p.m. to 11 p.m., Sunday 5 p.m. to 10 p.m., closed Monday
Prices: main dishes up to $18 
Access: one step at entrance, washrooms downstairs

On the other side of the window, the temperature was close to -20 C. The wind gusted. Yet somehow, the six of us were happily digging into a big bowl of ice kacang, the Malaysian shaved-ice dessert, its frigid main ingredient sweetly mitigated by condensed milk, red beans, peanuts and more.

To do otherwise would have broken the spell cast by the previous, delicious courses at Chahaya Malaysia. The 33-year-old restaurant, Ottawa’s only Malaysian eatery, left us feeling tropical, not quite sweltering, but notably warmed by spices, and definitely well-fed.

I’m embarrassed that during nearly six years of restaurant reviewing, I hadn’t had a proper meal at Chahaya Malaysia (which my predecessor last reviewed in 2006) until earlier this month. Maybe it fell off my radar because of its low-key nature or its out-of-my-way Montreal Road location. Maybe I took it for granted because of its longevity. Fortunately, I recalled the eatery when my first cousin once removed and his new wife, Grace, who is Malaysian, recent visited Ottawa.

It could only help to have a Malaysian expat eating shotgun, bolstering my take on Chahaya Malaysia, I thought. That said, a complete newcomer to Malaysian food, which fuses Malay, Chinese and Indian influences, would do just fine at Chahaya Malaysia. The restaurant is run by chef Subut Abdullah and wife Margaret, who proudly provides guidance regarding the menu as she takes orders. The food has scarcely changed since the Abdullahs opened their first location in the Glebe in 1985.

Subut Abdullah, chef-owner and his wife Margaret Abdullah of Chahaya Malaysia on Montreal Road with (clockwise from left) shrimp chips, Javanese beef rendang, rice, mee goreng, chef’s special chicken, house-made chili sauce, chili shrimp, chicken in coconut sauce

Margaret also gave us a primer on the spice levels of dishes that we would share, family-style. Chili-emboldened eating is a point of pride at Chahaya Malaysia, evident in the sizeable containers on each table of house-made chili sauce — “two-star” heat, said Margaret — and in the menu’s three-star dishes. That said, of 70-odd dishes on the menu, just three are designated with three stars.

We snacked on some on-the-house shrimp chips until our only appetizer, six superior skewers of satay chicken, beef and lamb ($13.70) with some savoury house-made peanut sauce, arrived. Soon after, a first wave of dishes, and then a second, landed to complete a multi-protein run of the menu.

Satay skewers at Chahaya Malaysia

Jumbo shrimp curry ($18) was blessed with plump, tender seafood and an uncommonly savoury gravy. Given a pre-meal mini-lesson from Margaret, I suspect the umami delights of that and other dishes were due to the kitchen’s skillful use of belacan, Malaysia’s version of fermented shrimp paste, which like fish sauce or anchovies can be pungent when dormant but which amps up the deliciousness when properly deployed.

Shrimp in coconut sauce at Chahaya Malaysia

Chicken kurma ($14.75) was more mild of flavour, but still tasty. Like all of Chahaya Malaysia’s chicken dishes, it exclusively used boneless white meat, nodding to Canadian preferences rather than serving chunks of bone-in bird as Grace grew up eating.  

Chicken kurma at Chahaya Malaysia

Pepper lamb ($18), a creation of Subut’s rather than a typical Malaysian or Indonesian dish, Margaret said, was our only stir-fry and a fine one at that.

Pepper lamb at Chahaya Malaysia

At the request of the spice-averse at our table, we knocked a star off of the chili fish ($17.50), which featured haddock filets in a thick, deep red sauce. Everyone appreciated the complexity of flavours here, which were sweet and savoury and not just incendiary. The leftover sauce would be lovely the next day at home on an omelette, Margaret advised.

Chili fish at Chahaya Malaysia

Javanese beef rendang ($16), a milder, but still teeming-with-flavour cousin of the more mouth-searing Malaysian beef rendang, was a long-simmered dry curry of fall-apart meat.

Javanese beef rendang at Chahaya Malaysia

We finished everything with lots of basmati rice and not even a quibble. Then, gluttony drove me to order Malaysian “mee goreng” fried noodles ($14). Grace told me that back home, the street-food version of that dish would be made with instant noodles, and she was pleasantly surprised to see Chahaya Malaysia’s fancier version, which she quipped included “premium noodles.” 

Subut Abdullah, chef-owner and his wife Margaret Abdullah of Chahaya Malaysia on Montreal Rd with a selection of food for Peter Hum review. Photo by Wayne Cuddington/ Postmedia

For dessert, in addition to the ice kacang ($5), we had chunks of deep-fried plantain ($4). “Pulled” tea ($4.50) — Malaysian tea with condensed milk, dramatically aerated by Margaret with an arms-outstretched pour between teapot and glass — was a sweet meal-ender.

Ice kacang at Chahaya Malaysia

Pulled tea at Chahaya Malaysia

I can think of only a few caveats about Chahaya Malaysia to share. First, the food tastes amazing, but looks more homey. But then, Subut told me he is more or less self-taught as a chef, having acquired his kitchen skills as a young domestic worker cooking for a Malaysian diplomat in Ottawa. For him, cooking is about taste, and even love, and less about any spatters on a plate. “You put your heart into your cooking. Everything will be good,” he said.

I’ll also mention that the lunch buffet at Chahaya Malaysia, which I tried last year, was good, but nothing like the full-tour dinner that knocked us all out. 

The front half of the dining room that seats 60 or so is my preference over the darker back half. Over all, the restaurant is cosy and old-fashioned in a quaint, charming way. It’s decorated with Malaysian artwork on its walls and batik on its tables, but its layout reflects the building’s past as a Chinese-Canadian restaurant. 

For some, it will matter that there are nearly 20 vegetarian dishes available here, or that the meat dishes are halal. The restaurant a few years ago gave up its liquor licence, even if it slightly hurt its business, which Subut later told me was “up and down, like a roller coaster.” Non-alcoholic beers are available, which pair well with the food, Subut said.

When we left, Grace told Subut “Terima Kasih” — “thank you” in Malay. He replied “Sama-sama”  — meaning “same to you” or “you’re welcome.”

She told Subut that his food was not only authentic in its flavours, but also better than what she had eaten on recent trips home to Malaysia.

Subut, who is 56, told us that younger generations of Malaysians don’t cook as well as he and his elders do. That prompted Grace to reiterate her gratitude, as aptly expressed for Ottawa’s restaurant-goers as for her countryfolk.

“Thanks for not changing,” she said.

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

Hunter’s Public House
4750 Bank St., Unit 1, 613-822-7171, hunterspublichouse.ca
Open: Monday to Wednesday: 11 a.m. to 10 p.m., Thursday 11 a.m. to 11 p.m., Friday 11 a.m. to midnight, Saturday 10 a.m. to midnight,
Sunday 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.
Prices: mains $15 to $26
Access: no steps to front door or washrooms

Findlay Creek, the sprawling new development on Bank Street south of Leitrim Road, is most likely some years away from being a dining-out destination. 

Ottawa’s more established suburbs have their special draws. I’d happily venture to the eastern edge of Orléans for some kebab-heavy Persian fare, or to St. Joseph Boulevard for excellent barbecue staples. In South March, there’s South Indian food worth the drive, plus classy small plates at Kanata’s biggest mall. But for now, in the mall that’s the commercial hub for Findlay Creek, familiar franchises reign.

The notable exception, though, is Hunter’s Public House, which opened in October 2016. I ate there there three times in the past week, and while the fare has been a little hit-and-miss, the restaurant does set the bar for what the fledgling neighbourhood offers for an agreeable, casual night out of food and drink. 

Owned and operated by Charles and Amy MacInnis, the eatery has some clear focal points in terms of its offerings and ambience.

Craft beer is a big deal here, with an imposing chalk board showing scads of locally brewed choices, either on tap on in bottles or cans. Food-wise, the menu mixes snacks and appetizers that sometimes nod to the MacInnis’s East Coast roots, along with sandwiches, salads and assorted, occasionally beer-infused, mains, the most interesting of which were “copper-pot” stews.

Making a play for the hundreds of nearby families in Findlay Creek, the pub is large, high-ceilinged, brightly lit and child-friendly, with not just a kids’ menu but also Trivial Pursuit cards at the table and crokinole boards that come off the walls for games on Sunday afternoons. There are trivia nights on Thursdays and on Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights, live music wafts from the bandstand in the corner. A patio currently awaits springtime.  

We were almost always pleasantly surprised by the starters here. Tops were tacos made with crisped, meaty slices of pork belly and hoisin and Sriracha sauces ($13), a respectable  transposition of the Asian pork belly buns that were popularized by Momofuku and then went viral. 

Pork belly tacos at Hunter’s Public House

Deep-fried items both small and large were reliably tasty, un-oily and full of crunch. That went especially for the shrimp-and-pork wontons that came with sweet Halifax donair sauce ($12),the sweet-and-savoury slices of beef short ribs ($14), and the hot-and-sour sauced General Tsao’s cauliflower ($11), even if the cauliflower was a bit lost in the batter.

Wontons with donair sauce at Hunter’s Public House

General Tsao’s Cauli at Hunter’s Public House

Beef rib appetizer at Hunter’s Public House

If you haven’t hit your threshold for deep-fried food, then the fish and chips ($15) — two big chunks of breaded haddock, chunky fries that are better when ordered extra-crisp, some not-as-good apple-radicchio slaw — could be the way to go for a main. 

Fish and chips at Hunter’s Public House

At least, we preferred the haddock to several of the sandwiches, including a mediocre, skimpy roast beef dip ($13) in a circular bun unsuited for dipping in the Beau’s Lug Tread Lager au jus, and the pricey Big MacInnis burger ($19) that was let down by thick-cut bacon that was a chore to chew and generally didn’t seem like that huge an improvement on its much cheaper inspiration available elsewhere in the mall. 

Roast beef dip at Hunter’s Public House

Big MacInnis burger at Hunter’s Public House

A better sandwich featured moist, buttermilk-brined fried chicken ($16), made with white meat. Again, kudos to the staffer running the deep-fryer.

Bacon-wrapped pork-and-beef meatloaf ($17) was hearty and flavourful, but also a bit dry, and both the fried smashed potatoes and especially the Beau’s Lug Tread Lager demi-glace were overly salty.

Meatloaf at Hunter’s Public House

The copper-pot stew of steak, stout and stilton ($16) appealed with its seam of blue cheesiness and puff pastry. Its seafood counterpart, made with haddock, salmon and shrimp and topped by a big chunk of battered haddock ($16), was another unassuming satisfaction. 

Steak, stout and stilton in a copper pot with onion soup at Hunter’s Public House

Seafood bubbly in a copper pot with beet salad at Hunter’s Public House

We tried both stews with upgraded sides rather than the stock choices of daily soup, salad, fries or smashed potatoes. The onion soup was thin on flavour, we thought. Better was the beet and pecan salad.

Chipotle seafood linguine ($21), while cooked beyond al dente, was otherwise well-made and nicely stocked with shrimp and mussels.

Chipotle seafood linguine at Hunter’s Public House

Of three house-made desserts (all $7 each), fluffy cheesecake and stout-infused brownies impressed more than the ho-hum monkey bread.

Cheesecake at Hunter’s Public House

Brownie at Hunter’s Public House

Monkey bread at Hunter’s Public House

In the end, while the food at Hunter’s might not be sufficiently exciting or novel to lure high-expectation foodies from beyond Findlay Creek, they seemed enticing enough to draw in the folks from the neighbourhood that kept the pub busy each time I visited. If you live nearby, or happen to be in the vicinity, I’d say it’s worth popping by.

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

Gandhi’s Village
113 Mann Ave., 613-569-2121, gandhisvillage.com
Open: Tuesday 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. and 5 to 9 p.m., Wednesday 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. and 5 to 9:30 p.m., Thursday to Saturday 11:30 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. and 5 to 10 p.m., ​Sunday 1 p.m. to 9 p.m., closed Monday
Prices: up to $20 for dishes that come with bread or rice
Access: no steps to front door or washroom

“If patience is worth anything, it must endure to the end of time,” Mahatma Gandhi said. If only we’d been able to muster that level of patience when we ate at Gandhi’s Village.

Opened last September, the humble and even a little dishevelled 26-seat eatery on Mann Avenue in Sandy Hill serves South Indian fare, which ranks highly on my list of mouth-thrilling cuisines. During my three dinners at the eatery, we sampled both satisfactory dishes and duds. But most frustratingly, slow and amateurish service consistently detracted from our meals.

Gandhi’s Village seems to be pretty much a one-man operation, with an owner-chef — “David,” says a server, “Chef Sweety,” says a handwritten message on a takeout menu — who often appears in the dining room, sometimes taking orders, assisted at times by that well-meaning, but untrained server. At my first visit, pakoras took more than 90 minutes to land at our table, despite our repeated inquiries, and well after the slow, one-by-one succession of main dishes — at least our final bill was discounted to acknowledge the gaffe.

At another visit, no water was provided until it was requested, after some good, and reasonably prompt, samosas were downed. At my last visit, the owner initiated the transaction for me to pay with a card, but left midway so that I had to make the machine issue my receipt.

After two dinners that dragged on, I made a point last week of placing my order when I reserved my table, basically spotting the kitchen an hour, I thought. But if the chef took advantage of that head start, it didn’t make much of a difference. 

And yet, despite — or perhaps thanks to — delays in the kitchen, the chef, working from a halal-approved and perhaps too-large menu, is able to prepare some robustly flavoured and well-sauced dishes, although they will usually be rustic and even thrown-together in look and feel.

Most deep-fried appetizers were alright, including those long-to-arrive pakoras, plump samosas and some more intriguing bondas, which seemed like loose potato croquettes. Lentil fritters (parippu vada) seemed overly crunchy.

Onion pakoras at Gandhi’s Village

Samosas at Gandhi’s Village

Bonda (fritters) at Gandhi’s Village

Vada at Gandhi’s Village

One of the best items I tried at Gandhi’s Village was a quirky freebie appetizer. The chef came to our table and asked if we would like some deer meat, on the house, which he explained had been a gift he received from a hunter friend. The meat was well seasoned with South Indian spices, and served simply, bereft of sauce, but with diced onions. If only other dishes had been as clear in their preparation and appeal.

Among several meaty curries, we preferred the lamb chettinadu, which delivered good heat and complex flavours. Kerala beef curry was similarly tasty, but its meat was chewy. Chicken curry, which was bone-in, zinged with flavours, but seemed overly salty. Duck moilly boasted a savoury gravy, massive chunks of potato and toothsome meat, although the meat had to be separated from flaccid duck skin even though the menu referred to “skinned duck.”  Shrimp konkan was mostly sauce, which was creamy and flavourful, but short on its too-small shrimp.

Lamb chettinadu at Gandhi’s village

Kerala beef curry at Gandhi’s Village

Chicken curry at Gandhi’s Village

Lamb chettinadu at Gandhi’s Village

Shrimp konkan at Gandhi’s Village

Duck moilly at Gandhi’s Village

Eggplant and potatoes fry was a soft, interesting dish. A mild mixed vegetable curry seemed muddled in terms of its ingredients and flavours, although there was a discernible sweet note.

Eggplant and potatoes fry at Gandhi’s Village

Mixed vegetable curry at Gandhi’s Village

With the curries came house-made paratha — relatively thick and lightly oily or buttery fried flatbreads. A few were too singed for my liking.

Parathas at Gandhi’s village, pix by Peter Hum

Gandhi’s Village offers a notable range of 10 or so dosas (crispy rice-and-lentil crepes) with fillings including shrimp, calamari and chicken. I tried the standard masala dosa with a potato filling and a Hyderabad dosa made with mung dal, which was surprisingly dark and earthy. They were not bad, but they did seem to be made with a heavier hand that dosas I’ve had elsewhere. 

Masala Dosa at Gandhi’s Village

Hyderabad dosa at Gandhi’s Village

The restaurant is not licensed. It has no desserts, although a mango lassi was thick, sweet and delicious.  

If my experience attracts more than it dissuades, then I’d say you would do well to come to Gandhi’s Village with a scintillating conversationalist and without any pressing appointments after dinner. Perhaps better still, order takeout.

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

Brothers Beer Bistro
366 Dalhousie St., 613-695-6300, brothersbeerbistro.ca
Open: Monday 3 to 10 p.m., Tuesday to Friday noon to midnight, Saturday 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 a.m., Sunday 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. 
Prices: small plates $9 to $17
Access: Steps to front door

Bellies, legs, wings, ears, cheeks, tongues, hearts and marrow — all go down easily and tastily at Brothers Beer Bistro.

The Dalhousie Street restaurant, which opened in 2012, has recently arrived chef Steve Mitton to thank for its new embrace of less-fancy cuts of meat and organs. Meanwhile, the veteran Ottawa chef, 47, has the eatery to thank for his return to the kitchen.

“I just needed to get behind the stoves again,” Mitton told me last week. 

Mitton established his reputation as a maestro of meat during his eight-year run at Murray Street, the celebrated restaurant that for eight years was a few blocks away from where Mitton now works. Murray Street, which was acclaimed as one of Canada’s best new restaurants in 2009 by Air Canada’s EnRoute magazine. closed at the end of 2016, and Mitton spent most of last year doing catering, event planning and pop-ups for the Whalesbone Group of restaurants.

I was very keen on Mitton’s food at Murray Street when I wrote about it in the fall of 2013. After two dinners at Brothers Beer Bistro this month, I’m just as pleased with the fare from his latest kitchen. The biggest difference between the two restaurants’ menus is that on the savoury side, Brothers serves no main courses and focuses on rich, but unfussy small plates, with most reasonably priced at $15 or less. In all, it’s tempting to think of Brothers Beer Bistro under Mitton as a more affordable and smaller-scale, but no less tasty, Murray Street.

Indeed, a few Murray Street dishes have come over to Brothers, namely crispy, meaty duck wings in an espresso-stout barbecue sauce ($15) and a dessert of S’mores in a jar ($8) that hides a chocolate-porter pudding under its torched marshmallow canopy. Also, the second page of the Brothers menu lists several kinds of charcuterie ($8 each), and those meat products also helped put Mitton and Murray Street on the map. While the selection was larger at Murray Street, I can vouch for the assertively smoked duck and especially his more mellow ham at Brothers. Indeed, the nuanced flavour of his ham will ruin the store-bought stuff for you.  

Duck wings at Brothers Beer Bistro

S’mores in a jar at Brothers Beer Bistro

Smoked duck and smoked ham at Brothers Beer Bistro

In all, we’ve tried almost three-quarters of the menu’s 20 small plates and came away with some favourites that fit the description of rich animal protein matched with a fine sauce worth sopping up and a palate-cleansing bright or acidic garnish.

They included a meaty chunk of pork belly ($14), braised with a light Asian accent (five-spice powder) and served in a puddle of fantastic sauce and offset with peaches and green onions. Also making us swoon was a luscious slab of smoked trout ($16)  served with confit potatoes, a soy-brown butter vinaigrette, pickled beets and salted onions.  Of several sandwiches, tops for me was a deluxe, double decker smoked meat sandwich ($17) made with O’Brien Farms’ brisket, Tomme De Savoie cheese, Juniper Farms’ sauerkraut, light rye and Russian dressing.

Chef Steve Mitton of Brothers Beer Bistro

Smoked trout at Brothers Beer Bistro

Smoked meat sandwich at Brothers Beer Bistro

Crisply and cleanly fried nuggets of rabbit ($12) were not super-exciting on their own, but they were well-balanced by kimchi and a plum sauce with a spicy edge.

Rabbit nuggets at Brothers Beer Bistro

Decadent richness on bread won us over with locally grown Le Coprin mushrooms on toast ($15), with semi-soft, buttery Le Ballot cheese and a brandy cream sauce, as well as Mitton’s escargots and raclette cheese served on a roasted marrow bone ($16) that brimmed with the spreadable, dripping, unctuous stuff.

Escargot and cheese on bone marrow with toast at Brothers Beer Bistro

Mushrooms on toast at Brothers Beer Bistro

Among the more outré items, a “tartare” of smoked duck hearts ($14), smoothed with goat-milk yogurt and bolstered by cabbage and horseradish slaw, was interesting and pleasant, if, in the end, salty. Mitton showcased soft, braised soft beef tongue in a whimsical, downmarket “guédille” (a Québécois hot-dog bun creation, $14), complete with fries in the bun. 

Duck heart tartare at Brothers Beer Bistro

Tongue sandwich at Brothers Beer Bistro

O’Brien Farms’ beef cheeks topped broad noodles in Mitton’s shrunken riff on beef bourguignon ($17). Beef rib meat starred in a beef dip sandwich with a superior sauce. 

Roast beef dip at Brothers Beer Bistro

With Mitton’s duck confit on a pancake ($17), for all its crisp skin and succulent flesh, I experienced an unwelcome Au Pied de Cochon Sugar Shack flashback, which is to say I thought it was overly sweet. Maple syrup lovers might disagree.

Duck confit at Brothers Beer Bistro

We thought that the po’ boy sandwich of heavily sauced smelts was sloppy and lacking in a flavour reward, and those duck wings were just alright.

The rundown above might be enough to make a vegetarian run screaming from Brothers. I can recommend the goulash, which subbed in mushrooms and lentils for the usual beef, and without much of a setback. The menu also lists a beet salad and Welsh rarebit as meat-free, although both involve cheese.    

Lentil and mushroom goulash at Brothers Beer Bistro

Of Mitton’s desserts, the one I’m craving is his flourless chocolate cake ($8), smartly supported by sour cherries, caramel corn and a just-right corn-cereal ice cream. With so much good stuff on the plate, it made other desserts seem incomplete.

Chef Steve Mitton of Brothers Beer Bistro in Ottawa, January 29, 2018. Popcorn icecream. Photo by Jean Levac/Ottawa Citizen Assignment number 128459

In keeping with its name, the restaurant of 70-plus seats boasts a long and discerning list of draft and bottled beers. It’s ambience, however, is far from elitist, with generic woodiness and overhead ducts offset by a brick wall covered with mirrors. Country music played on the sound system during one visit. Service was slack then, with a dirty sharing plate handed out at our table. The next time, service was good, but not special.

Back at Murray Street, one of Mitton’s biggest indulgences was serving special-order pig’s heads, as per one of his über-carnivore heroes, chef Martin Picard of Au Pied de Cochon in Montreal. When I asked Mitton whether those heads might one day be served at Brothers Beer Bistro, he said yes.

They would just have to be smaller, continued Mitton, who already has his sights set on heads from the suckling piglets of Fermes St-Canut / Gaspor in the Laurentians. “They’ve got those nice little heads that are perfect for two people to eat for dinner,” he says.

So, if you exhaust the considerable appeals of Mitton’s small plates, you might one day be able to book a head.

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

I Cook Persian Cuisine
731 Ridgewood Ave., 613-695-3004, icookpersiancuisine.ca
Open: Weekdays 11:30 a.m. to 9 p.m., Weekends noon to 9 p.m.
Prices: main courses $13.99 to $24.99
Access: no steps to front door, wheelchair-accessible washroom
Note: Vegetarian, gluten-free and dairy-free options available

The consistency of the Persian cuisine that I’ve sampled over the past few years, in a handful of modest strip-mall eateries from Kanata to Orléans, has been really striking.

Here’s what I’ve come to expect: a focus on kebabs that are reliably moist, tender and flavourful, a supporting cast of intriguing stews in which sour and herbal notes often feature, and fluffy white and saffron-tinged rice in abundance. All dishes will be reasonably priced and leftovers are likely.

The latest restaurant that admirably fits this bill is the straightforwardly named I Cook Persian Cuisine, located in a wee, easy-to-miss strip mall across from Mooney’s Bay.

I Cook Persian Cuisine opened almost a year ago, where TNT Smokehouse had been. The neighbourhood has lost baby back ribs and pulled pork sandwiches, but gained Iranian dishes flavoured with pomegranate paste and walnuts, cinnamon-tinged savoury stews and more. 

The property’s interior has just as significantly changed. The restaurant seats perhaps 70 or so, in a well-lit room split in half into a dining side filled with comfy banquettes and a bar side. (Although alcohol is banned in Iran, it is served at this Iranian restaurant.) In terms of ambience, the restaurant seemingly plays down its foreignness, and I’ve heard its piped-in music switch from Middle Eastern folk to Bruno Mars, perhaps depending on the clientele.

What’s varied less is the quality of the food, which was well-made and unfussy when I twice had dinner here. There were one or two dishes that I thought somewhat less of, but considerably more that I’d happily eat again.

I’d look forward to more of the house-made naan bread, a meal-starter on the house that has emerged warm and tasty. Of several dips, we’ve enjoyed the eggplant and yogurt spread (kashk e bademjan, $7.99), which was warm, mellow, comforting and studded with walnuts. We would have welcomed more intense flavours and even some smokiness, given the menu’s mention of “BBQ eggplant.” Still, we found the dip perked up a bit with some tart ground sumac from the shaker on the table.

Eggplant yogurt dip and nan bread at I Cook Persian Cuisine

Well-seasoned, soft-skinned mantu beef dumplings ($6.99 for six) needed no such help. Their ground beef interiors were sufficiently flavourful and the tangy sauce that covered the plate was a nice add-on.

Mantu (beef dumplings) at I Cook Persian Cuisine

Persian noodle soup (ash reshteh, $4.99) was a mild, herby concoction thick with beans, lentils and noodles, while red lentil soup ($3.99) was a simpler potage with a bigger kick of flavour.

Ash Reshteh at I Cook Persian Cuisine

Lentil soup at I Cook Persian Cuisine

Of several stews that I’ve tried here, I’d give top marks to the fesenjoon ($15.99), which immersed chunks of chicken breast in a heady pomegranate paste mixed with cinnamon and walnuts, and to the ghalieh mahi ($17.99), which starred moist salmon in a punchy sweet-and-predominantly-sour sauce enlivened by tamarind. Both stews won us over with clear, distinctive flavours, although in our books, the fish stew, as well as the eatery’s butter chicken ($14.99), did not live up to the menu’s note that they were “medium-spicy.”

Salmon stew and fesemjoon (chicken stew) at I Cook Persian Cuisine

Interestingly, when it comes to stews, I Cook Persian Cuisine offers a few that I’ve not seen at other Persian restaurants, namely vegetarian renditions that substitute tofu or soya chunks for chicken or beef. 

Of the restaurant’s lamb dishes, my least favourite was the lamb shank ($16.99), which was less interesting than the rice with dill and lima beans that came with it. Mind you, I’ve had the exact same gripe about lamb shanks with rice at another Iranian restaurant in Ottawa.

Lamb shank at I Cook Persian Cuisine

Lamb kebabs, however, were much better, their flat, oblong chunks still juicy and improved by their marinade. Chicken kebabs with an overlay of saffron were just as good. A combination plate of the two kebabs ($30.99) seemed like an especially good and sharable deal. With these and other mains, plates of fluffy basmati rice helped us to feel stuffed.

Lamb kebab and chicken kebab with roasted tomato at I Cook Persian Cuisine

Of two house-made and typically Persian desserts, I preferred the saffron pistachio ice cream ($5.99 for three scoops) to the very floral milk pudding ($4.99).

Rice pudding and saffron ice cream at I Cook Persian Cuisine

Service has been attentive and kind, especially at the end of dinner earlier this week, when our server offered us Persian tea, which was lightly tinged with cardamom, on the house. “Before going outside, it’s better to be hot,” the server said as she brought the steaming tea.

The restaurant was very quiet that night, but perhaps after the weather warms and once Mooney’s Bay attracts swimmers and volleyball players, I Cook Persian Cuisine will see more customers filling its tables. By and large, its dishes are more than worthy of a bigger following. 

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

Morals Village
3987 Riverside Dr., 613-736-6503, cqdz.ca
Open: daily from 11:30 a.m. to 11 p.m.
Prices: soup bases $2.50 to $8, weekdays all-you-can-eat $25.99, $19.95 for seniors over 65, $13.95 for children under 13, weekends add $2
Access: no steps to front door or washroom

In the south-western Chinese megacity of Chongqing, there are reportedly more than 50,000 hot-pot restaurants — or roughly one for every 600 people within its population of 30 million, in case you’re counting.

In Ottawa, we have just three restaurants specializing in Chongqing hot pot (also called Sichuan hot pot, since Chongqing until 1997 was part of Sichuan province, and perhaps descended from Mongolian hot pot, because the Mongols, some say, were China’s first hot-pot enthusiasts).

I’ve not been able to visit the three main hot-pot eateries — that many hot-pot meals in close succession might have been too much food and too many chilies for me. But for now, I can say that Morals Village, the largest, newest and most expensive of Ottawa’s hot-pot options, provided a sumptuous, spicy, all-you-can-eat, evening out.

Launched last fall in the mall at Riverside Drive and Hunt Club Road that’s also home to Ottawa’s T & T Asian supermarket, Morals Village is part of a six-location chain in Canada, just as its major hot-pot rivals on Merivale Road, Liuyishou Hotpot and Little Sheep, are franchise and chain operations respectively. 

Seating almost 170 people, Morals Village is a sleek, well-lit, comfortable place of red and gold, with large abstract murals along the back wall. For a first-timer, there’s a lot to take in, from the dizzyingly extensive menu to do-it-yourself cooking over individual induction cooktops embedded into tables, to the array of dipping-sauce ingredients at the sauce station. Fortunately, the routine becomes clear pretty quickly, especially because the restaurant, as on the busy Friday night when I visited, can be filled with attentive servers assisting customers. 

The foundation for hot-pot meals is the soup base that goes in the pot. At Morals Village, there are more than 10 of them, from four signature spicy ones to mushroom, corn, herbal and tomato soup bases for those who like it tepid. Rather than limit yourself to a single soup base, you can pay a bit more for a pot that accommodates two soup bases. I tried the medium original spicy soup base and found it added plenty of kick to ingredients without being debilitating, as well as the mushroom soup base, which I thought was a pleasant, savoury counterpoint. 

At Morals Village, diners pay for their choice of soup base (between $2.50 and $8) and then pay a flat fee for all-you-can-eat items to dunk in their bubbling hot pots. The buffet costs $26.99 for adults, $19.95 for seniors and $13.95 for children under 13, with an extra $2 added on weekends and holidays, such as the upcoming Chinese New Year.

So, you do best to come very hungry and willing to allocate some time — the maximum is two hours, according to the restaurant’s rules — to eat your money’s worth. On the Friday night I went, there seemed to be plenty of young Asian couples out on dates.

After choosing your soup base, it’s time to choose ingredients. The illustrated Morals Village menu lists pages and pages of them, from thin slices of meat, which arrive at tables in partially frozen curls, to leafy vegetables, mushrooms, seafoods including shrimp, squid and mock crab, wontons, dumplings, tofu products, and an assortment of noodles. For homesick Chinese and other adventurous eaters, offal, including beef tongue, tripe, duck giblets and pork blood tofu will appeal. For splurgers, there are luxury items that come at extra cost, such as slices of wagyu short rib ($35) or kagoshima pork ($7) and Alaskan snow crab legs ($19 for eight pieces). 

Morals Village restaurant in Ottawa Monday Feb 12, 2018. Tony Caldwell

Once those items have been ordered, it’s time to mix up a dipping sauce. The station in the centre of the dining room is filled with ingredients, plus a card that lists several recipes. I went with a Beijing-style blend of thick, sludgy sesame paste, garlic and green onions, which was tasty, but also filling in its own right, countering a glutton’s efforts to maximize input from the buffet.  

Before we began hot-potting, we had appetizers — crisp but room-temperature vegetarian spring rolls from the dipping-sauce station plus an crispy Sichuan pork, whose breaded meaty morsels were noticeably dosed with floral, lip-tingling Sichuan pepper.

Then, our ingredients arrived, eventually blanketing our table, and we dialled up our induction burners so the hot pots simmered. In went the meats, which turned colour and were ready to eat in seconds. Shrimp dumplings took longer. The spicy soup base, larded with chilies, chili oil, garlic and green onions, brought its own kind of heat to the hot pot, although I know a spicy-food maniac who would have liked it spicier.   

Ingredients cook in a hot pot at Morals Village restaurant in Ottawa

We also tried the wagyu short rib to see what the fuss and expense was about. The meat was richly marbled, super-tender and full of flavour, but I wouldn’t call it a must-order, given so many all-you-can treats available.

My dining companion, who has eaten enough hot pot in Chongqing to go out on a limb, tried the purplish blocks of pork blood tofu. “I didn’t let it cook enough. It’s cold in the middle,” he said. “It’s definitely an acquired taste. It tastes like iron. The texture is very nice.”

With the sole exception of “Japanese crab meat,” that was in fact pollock, every ingredient we tried was top-notch and fresh. The only gaffe was an order of cheese-stuffed meatballs brought instead of lamb meatballs. Also, the kitchen was out of lamb skewers.

The restaurant is not licensed, which struck my friend as odd since beer went so well with his hot-pot meals in China. At Morals Village, a large bar dispenses fruity drinks featuring pear, strawberry and sour plum, for example, and those dotted many a table. For sweet desserts, there were mini-buns dipped in condensed milk and cones of soft-serve ice cream.

My friend further contrasted his Chongqing hot-pot dinners with his visit to Morals Village. He fondly recalled eating at much smaller hot-pot places, sometimes outside in the swelter of summer, ordering from similarly extensive, if less luxurious, menus, and cooking food in bigger, communal hot pots. There were fewer soup bases — perhaps just very spicy, not spicy, and herbal options. 

He gave Morals Village very high marks, as did I, although I had nothing to compare it to. We both look forward to return visits, and to giving Ottawa’s other hot-pot options a go.

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

Guru’s Inspired Food Bar
1123 Wellington St. W., 613-695-8999, gurusinspired.com
Open: Monday to Friday 10 a.m. to 10 p.m., Saturday 11 a.m. to 10 p.m., Sunday 1 p.m. to 8 p.m.
Prices: most single-serving items between $11.50 and $17
Access: no steps to front door or washroom

It never fails. From behind the divider that separates the kitchen from the cash at Guru’s Inspired Food Bar, I hear a succession of slapping sounds, and all I can think of is the piping hot, impeccably made naan that’s to touch down soon at my table. If I were a dog, I’d be wagging my tail.

Garlic Naan at Guru’s Inspired Food Bar

During four recent visits, not everything has been as worthy of anticipation at this tiny, no-frills, Indian eatery and take-out counter, which opened last fall in Hintonburg. But along with that fantastic, garlicky flatbread, I’ve sampled enough punchily flavoured and even intriguing fare that I’ll continue popping by for quick, casual meals, despite a few duds and minimal ambience.

Located where the Wellington Sandwich Shop — a Hintonburg fixture for almost three decades — had been, Guru’s seats less than 20 at spartan wooden tables amid green and yellow walls, and doles out food in takeout containers, on disposable plates, or wrapped in tin foil.

The menu, which is more geared to giving each customer a plate of food rather than encouraging family-style sharing, is surprisingly large and interesting. While there are practical limitations — proteins here are limited to chicken, shrimp, fish, eggs, tofu and paneer (Indian cheese) — the menu includes not just familiar favourites such as butter chicken and tandoori shrimp, but also wraps and pastas drawing on Indian flavours, plus a few Indo-Chinese Hakka dishes.

While Ottawa doesn’t yet have a restaurant that serves a wide range of that interesting hybrid fare — Toronto, I observe with frustration, does — Guru’s is one of a handful of Indian eateries in town that offers a few Hakka dishes. At Guru’s, I’ve had the best Hakka noodles that I’ve tasted in Ottawa. They were properly textured, captivatingly flavoured with a hot-and-sour-and salty mix of soy, ginger and Indian spices, and dotted with tender shrimp or chunks of chicken. 

Chicken Hakka Noodles at Guru’s Inspired Food Bar

Spicing here can be brusque and significant, as it was with a serving of tandoori shrimp that set my mouth jangling, but in a good way. Less potently flavoured, but very enjoyable, was a kebab of haryali chicken, still moist thanks to its yogurt marinade. The kitchen here also treats paneer with the same green, savoury sauce.  

Tandoori shrimp platter at Guru’s Inspired Food Bar

Haryali Chicken at Guru’s Inspired Food Bar

Haryali Paneer at Guru’s Inspired Food Bar

In India, a “Frankie” is a flatbread-based street food that wraps, meat, egg, vegetables and chutney in bread for a easy grab-and-go meal. Guru’s serves two Frankies, one with chicken tikka and the other with paneer, assertively grilled to bring panini to mind. The bites that I tried of my fellow diner’s “Poulet Frankie” left me wanting more. Wraps and Frankies here have come with crisp fries with a bit of spicy seasoning, but nothing as fiery as I’d expected given the menu’s mention of peri-peri.

Poulet Frankie at Guru’s Inspired Food Bar

Chicken tikka pasta was dauntingly portioned, with a tray filled to the brim with large tubes of pasta and chicken that bobbed in a thick, heavy sauce. If any dish cried out to be shared, it was this one. 

Chicken Tikka pasta at Guru’s Inspired Food Bar

Other dishes were not nearly as impressive, including two more Hakka items. The bright orange shrimp fried rice was less complex in flavour and could have used more vegetables. Chili shrimp was mostly sauce, and very much short on shrimp and vegetables. A vegetarian curry platter was a pretty pedestrian dish that relied on frozen veg.

Shrimp Fried Rice at Guru’s Inspired Food Bar

Chilli Chicken at Guru’s Inspired Food Bar

Vegetarian curry platter at Guru’s Inspired Food Bar

With the platter dishes that came with basmati rice and salad, the salad seemed pretty perfunctory. Given that, a better way to go might be to order some items from the “extra dish” category, bring them home, and share them.

Three inexpensive desserts are available, of which I’ve tried some gulab jamun, kindly offered on the house. The syrup-soaked milk and dough balls hit the spot.

The restaurant is not licensed, but sweet, salty and mango lassi drinks are offered, as are turmeric lattes. 

Everyone has a different definition of what a good restaurant is. Is it one with nothing but flawless dishes? Is it one that consistently serves a few fine items worth returning for? If the latter definition is meaningful for you, you might find Guru’s,  thanks to its naan, noodles and Frankies, to be a good option in Hintonburg. 

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Café My House
1015 Wellington St W., 613-733-0707, cafemyhouse.com
Open: Tuesday to Friday 5:30 to 9:30 p.m., Saturday and Sunday 10:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. and 5:30 to 9:30 p.m., closed Monday
Prices: sharing boards around $40, five-course tasting menu $85, 10-course tasting menu $135
Access: no steps to front door or washrooms

When chef Briana Kim competed last fall at Ottawa’s Gold Medal Plates event, a somewhat clued-out journalist wrote of her business, Café My House: “the vegan restaurant in Hintonburg isn’t known as a fine-dining eatery.” 

That not-in-the-know writer was yours truly, and this review of Café My House is my attempt to set the record straight.

Granted, vegan fine-dining is rare. Kim in an interview this week told me that she thinks she’s the only vegan fine-dining restaurant in Canada.

Related

• Chef Briana Kim wins Ottawa's 2017 Gold Medal Plates competition
• Peter Hum plays armchair judge at Ottawa's 2017 Gold Medal Plates competition

More importantly, Kim, who won at Gold Medals Plates in November ahead of nine other chefs and represented Ottawa at last month’s Canadian Culinary Championships in Kelowna, does her singular thing very well. If vegan fine-dining does indeed exist, that’s due to the self-taught Kim’s pioneering and labour-intensive efforts.

For me, the bottom line is that my two recent meals at Café My House — a gorgeous, artful, five-course blind-tasting menu at dinner and a more relaxed but still highly crafted brunch — were delicious and even striking revelations to open one’s eyes and palate. (Let me add here that I’m basically as carnivorous as they come.)

Kim, 34, opened the first Café My House in 2009 on Bank Street near Walkley Road, but about five years ago she relocated to the hipper environs of Wellington Street West and the larger space of what had been the more casual AlphaSoul Cafe. Today, Café My House is a narrow, predominantly green-walled and dimly lit space that seats about 40 at its tables and bar, plus 16 more at its cosy back patio.

Over the years, Kim’s cooking has evolved, she says. The Bank Street My House initially served more conventional food, sometimes drew on Kim’s Korean roots, and even occasionally allowed for ham, eggs, smoked salmon and cheese on its plates. However, after two years at that location, Kim began to offer tasting menus once a month. Since the move to Hintonburg, Kim has dialled up the refinement, complexity and creativity of her now solely plant-based food, and at dinner, tasting menus are the specialty.

My recent dinner began with a sunchoke and watercress soup, poured table-side into a blocky bowl of crunchy sunchoke and salsify chips, pea shoots, sea asparagus and pine nuts, topped with an onion tuile. With its great, clear flavours and aromas and panoply of textures, the dish made a sparkling first impression.  

At Café My House on Wellington St. West sunchoke watercress soup, right, is poured into a container containing pea shoots, sunchoke chips and more.

Then came an elaborate, edible composition, tucked under a transparent dome that held in its smoke and arranged various items, crispy noodles and crumbles around a mushroom “panna cotta.” Of course, unlike panna cotta, Kim’s creation is creamless, not to mention savoury. But she has a fondness for playfully referring to treats of non-vegan dining with her ingredients, which can include “steak,” “pepperoni,” and “chorizo.”

Mushroom panna cotta at Café My House.

For a Café My House first-timer, such allusions and the sheer novelty of Kim’s cooking might prompt a slew of questions to a server about the wizardry required for each dish. I’ve found that staff, in addition to being friendly and attentive, were also well-informed about the details of Kim’s dishes.

More generally, Kim this week told me that modernist cooking techniques, ingredients and even powders figure into her work. Interested in the intersection of food, art and even science, Kim experiments with dehydration, rehydration, preservation, carbonation and fermentation. It makes sense when she says that she looks up to the chefs at two wildly innovative, world-class, tasting-menu-based restaurants, Noma in Copenhagen and Alinea in Chicago. Indeed, she says she hopes to arrange an internship for herself at either Noma or Alinea. 

Dinner continued with a harmonious, wow-worthy collection of circles. On a platform of lightly pickled melon were wheatberry “meatballs,” discs of “chorizo,” onion jam and toasted coconut. This dish made me turn conventional thinking on its head — I began to muse about carnivores depriving themselves of vegan delights.

Pickled melon with wheatberry “meatballs” and “chorizo sausage.” at Café My House

Those who think that vegan food lacks flavour would be forced to re-think after trying the mouth-filling punchiness of Kim’s lime-basil granita palate cleanser.

Lime-basil granita at Café My House.

The dinner’s last savoury course was a re-plated version of Kim’s Gold Medal Plates-winning dish, which arranged a mushroom “steak,” charred cabbage, pickled pear and fennel-and-rice crackers in a bowl with kombu broth and mushroom mousse. Again, Kim transformed humble ingredients into a feat of finely calibrated flavours and textures. 

Mushroom steak in kombu broth at Cafe My House

Dessert, our server said, was a play on “PB and J,” in which splashes of jam and nut butter, cacao nibs, parsnip chips and more covered a plate. It was enjoyable, although not my favourite dessert that I’ve had at Café My House. I thought more highly of the chocolate-based items I’d had at brunch there. One was a chocolate caramelized onion cake, which Kim told me is sometimes paired with smoked onion coconut ice cream. “I always add savoury components to our desserts to highlight the vegetables we use,” she added. “We’ve had tomato cheesecake paired with pea sponge cake and dehydrated tomato raspberry fruit roll-ups.” 

PB & J dessert at Café My House

Somehow, despite the intensity of its preparations, the kitchen makes accommodations for people with celiac disease or allergies, as I discovered from the alternate plates that landed at a neighbouring table. 

At brunch, we’ve shared Kim’s tasting board ($38), which was full of winners. There were superior and imaginative examples of avocado toast and kale Caesar salad, two mini veggie burgers, “apple sage sausage,” “pepperoni” and “deviled egg” that were slyly reminiscent of their namesakes and tasty in their own right, and precisely pickled veg. A hearty dish of mushrooms and tomatoes on toast was like manna for an umami-lover.

Tasting board at Café My House.

Mushrooms and Tomatoes on toast at Café My House

While brunch at Café My House seems to me like a great introduction to Kim’s cuisine, the five-course blind tasting menu is worth the splurge and the best expression of what this special chef is about. (Note: The dinner that I enjoyed last month is to be entirely replaced a week from now with a new tasting menu.)

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews

Sula Wok
184 Main St., 613-890-7852, sulawok.com
Open: Monday to Saturday 11 a.m. to 9 p.m., Sunday 11:30 a.m. 8 p.m.
Prices: All items between $7.50 and $12.95
Access: front door is wheelchair-accessible

Almost a decade ago, the husband-and-wife team of Andrew Lay and Xin-Hui Su were running the Yak Café, a two-storey Tibetan-themed restaurant and handicrafts store in the southern Chinese town of Yangshuo, about 600 km northwest of Hong Kong.

These days, the couple still sells freshly cooked Tibetan momo dumplings and other Asian dishes, as well as Su’s jewelry on the side. But now, their business is Sula Wok, which opened in late January on Main Street.

The couple’s brand, spun from Su’s nickname, Sula, should be familiar to many Ottawa foodies, thanks to the Sula Wok food carts that have been stationed in recent years at various locations and festivals in the city, selling Asian tacos, dumplings and more.

The couple’s Main Street location is the latest example of an Ottawa-area Asian food-cart business branching out to open a bricks-and-mortar location. (Raon Kitchen, the tiny Korean eatery on Laurier Avenue, was spun from a food cart, while the Taiwanese bun food cart Gongfu Bao can’t open its shop in Centretown soon enough.) 

Andrew Lay and his wife Sula own Sula Wok on Main Street in Ottawa. They live above their restaurant.

However, in true mom-and-pop style, Lay, Su and their three sons live in the floors above their business. After the couple bought the previous property at the Main Street address, they demolished it and built the custom-designed building where they work and live.

For a fast casual/takeout restaurant, Sula Wok is more sympathetic and personalized than most. It’s decorated with drawings by the couple’s children. The reclaimed-wood tables made by Lay are also glass-topped showcases for Su’s jewelry. The eatery only seats about 15 now on metal stools, but will seat a few more people outside of its garage doors after the weather warms up.

The enterprising, likeable couple run the eatery with just a bit of part-time help. “We’re in desperate need of more employees. We’re working every night ’til 11 doing prep,” says Lay, a 47-year-old who before he met Su in Yanghsuo famously served gourmet sausages from his Sunnydays hot dog cart at Bank and Sparks streets during the 1990s. 

Su, 39, is Chinese on her father’s side and Tibetan on her mother’s side. But she serves dishes of varied backgrounds and inspirations, from Tibetan to Thai to Sichuanese to Vietnamese to Chinese-Canadian, relying of seasonings and sauces made from scratch. The eatery expands on the food cart’s menu, offering about 30 items in different categories, from dumplings to sides to salads to fried rice dishes to Asian tacos to curries to stir-fries on rice or noodles. All dishes come in takeout containers, and those who dine on site, but wish to share dishes will likely want an extra container or two to facilitate sampling. 

Carryovers from the Sula Wok cart were reliably delicious. Of Su’s dumplings ($11.95 for 12) I’ve tried her generously filled and savoury Tibetan beef or pork and chive momos. They were quickly and happily polished off, sometimes with squirts of house-made ginger or peanut sauce. Pro tip: If you visit when some dumplings have been freshly made and have not yet been frozen for later cooking, you’ve lucked out. Order a dozen, which will be extra succulent (not that the frozen specimens, at most a week old, have degraded that much).

Tibetan momo dumplings at Sula Wok

Asian tacos, made with Tibetan beef or sweet and sour pork, were a little trickier to eat, but both packed tasty meat and assertively pickled veg into their tortillas. A bao bun made with Vietnamese barbecue pork and a store-bought (but still fine) steamed bun, was at least as good, if not better. Less trendy, but just as pleasing, were crisp, old-school, open-ended and pork-stuffed egg rolls ($7.50 for four). 

Asian Taco at Sula Wok 

Vietnamese pork bao bun at Sula Wok

Egg rolls at Sula Wok

Of four salads, we tried a very punchy, crunchy Thai green papaya salad ($11.95) that left our mouths thrumming with their potent heat. A different and almost as bold flavour experience came with the Sichuanese Hui Guo Rou (twice cooked pork) on rice ($11.95). For that dish, which Su also cooked at the Yak Café, I asked Su to go heavy on the Sichuan peppercorns so that the slices of pork belly, which had been simmered and then fried, inflicted extra tingling when I ate them. More comforting, but not boring, was a chicken and cashew nut stir-fry ($11.95).

Spicy green papaya salad at Sula Wok

Sichuan Hui Guo Rou (twice cooked pork) at Sula Wok

Tibetan fried noodles ($11.95) was a full-bodied winner of diced vegetables, bits of beef and the mouth-filling flavours of a spice blend that included curry powder, turmeric, coriander, ground ginger and more, infused into the dish’s thin noodles. 

Tibetan noodles at Sula Wok

Pad Thai ($11.95) was not bad. Despite its sweet leading note, the dish impressed with freshness and lingering tangy and hot notes. The only dish that underwhelmed was a bowl of rice noodles topped with chicken-and-tofu coconut curry ($11.95), which was a little watery and bland.

Pad Thai at Sula Wok.

Thai coconut curry with rice noodles at Sula Wok

Shrimp fried rice ($10.75), studded with plump, toothsome seafood and slivers of black Chinese mushrooms, delivered more satisfaction and complexity that a lesser, soy sauce-drenched version of the same dish.  

Shrimp Fried Rice at Sula Wok

Sula Wok is not built for lingering. It serves no desserts and has no liquor licence. Still, house-made lemongrass ginger tea was a soothing and even seemingly restorative beverage choice.

Having interviewed Lay and Su in person for a 2015 story, I can say with certainty that they knew me and my mission. That said, they greeted other customers just as warmly, often by their first names, and I would see no reason, why I, they or you would receive anything less than tasty, wallet-friendly food and kind service with heart to it.  

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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews