Citizen
207 Gilmour St., 613-422-6505, facebook.com/citizenoftown, instagram.com/towncitizen
Open: Thursday to Monday, 6 p.m. to late
Prices: small plates $9 to $16
Access: no steps to front door, washrooms
First off: With a name like Citizen, how could a restaurant be anything but a winner?
But seriously: the downtown eatery that could just as aptly been called Marc Doiron’s Follow-Up, Vegetable-Forward, Small Plates Club served some of the best and most interesting dishes that I’ve had so far this year at a just-opened place.
My expectations were high, given chef-owner Doiron’s acclaimed food at his first restaurant, Town, on Elgin Street, around the corner from Citizen, which is on Gilmour Street. The two restaurants share a single kitchen and also a few dishes.
But Citizen, which opened in early January where a hair salon had been, is its own place. It’s more casual in look — not that Town is at all stuffy — and a little lighter and more cosmopolitan in menu. At Citizen, which is open just four nights a week, well-crafted, distinctive and even visually intriguing small plates appeal to a contemporary palate with finely calibrated combinations of flavours and textures.
At my two visits during the last week, those plates even ate frequently like big plates. Doiron had packed so much complexity, taste and richness into some of them that we were surprisingly sated.
One small piece of advice: choose carefully from Citizen’s menu to maximize contrasts. It’s not that we’ve had any duds. But I can say that on our first visit, we overdid it on the menu’s meatier, umami-rich and cheese-bolstered dishes. Better would have been a more diverse dinner, with the contrasts afforded by some of the varied and no-less interesting vegetable dishes that we tried on our second visit.
Citizen’s most recent menu lists 16 items, of which I’ve sampled 12. (Apologies to the stuffed dates, pecorino potatoes, olives and lavender almonds.)
Of that dozen, what am I craving? For one thing, the exemplary beef tartare ($14), well-seasoned, brightened by salsa verde and topped with a parmesan wafer, and then served sumptuously with toast rather than the usual, frequently too-dry and crumbly crostini or crackers. The tartare is a carry-over from Town’s menu, and understandably so.
Beef tartare at Citizen
Just as good was Citizen’s potato salad with smoked brisket ($15), which was a well-rounded dish that sang with acidic and herbal notes along with the humble, but elevated spuds, and meat that was notably smoked but not overly so.
Smoked brisket and potatoes at Citizen
I’m very keen on the Moroccan-inspired complexities of Doiron’s grilled eggplant dish ($16), joined by morsels of braised lamb and couscous salad, perked by a preserved lemon and almond gremolata but also cooled and rounded out by coconut yogurt.
Eggplant and lamb at Citizen
Roasted squash and charred radicchio salad ($9) was a deceptively potent treat, with miso-tinted brown butter amping up its savouriness and a lime crema adding a citrus-y pop.
Squash and radicchio at Citizen
Falafel ($9) were impeccable, and seemed like a deluxe version of the ubiquitous Middle Eastern deep-fried chickpea street food, given the lavish beet hummus and miniature but impressive salad of sprouted lentils, chickpea and pickled beets on the side.
Falafel and beet hummus at Citizen
Harder to split, but worth that effort, was Town’s fried chicken sandwich ($16), which was hefty, moist and taken in Korean direction with a lightly spicy gochujang mayo, even as coleslaw, pickles and prosciutto cotto broadened its appeal.
Spicy fried chicken sandwich at Citizen
Five leaves salad ($12) thrummed with umami thanks to its buttermilk anchovy dressing and heavy scattering of parmesan and sieved egg yolk.
Five leaves salad at Citizen
Charred broccoli ($10) interestingly nodded to Spain, with its thick, filling sauce based on ajo blanco (a garlic and almond soup), manchego cheese, pickled grapes and toasted almonds. I did wonder, though, if the broccoli could have supported more roast-y goodness.
Charred broccoli at Citizen
Yams and chorizo ($12) borrowed smartly from Mexican cuisine, supporting its stars with crisp strips of tortillas, a tomatillo salsa, a black pepper crema and pickled onions. The dish was a bit of a flavour muddle when fork met mouth, but it was still good.
Yams and chorizo at Citizen
Roasted carrots maintained some crunch, and shared their pretty plate an odd but effective combination — an appealing sesame brittle, a slurry of pesto, tobiko and candied mandarin.
Roasted carrots with goat cheese sauce at Citizen
I mention the scallop crudo ($16) — another dish available at Town — last because the sweet skew of its brown butter, hazelnuts and fruit made me think of dessert. While I was a little unsure about it, my friend thought it was the best dish of the seven at our dinner.
Scallops with brown butter and hazelnuts at Citizen
Speaking of dessert, there was just one on Citizen’s menu, and after the globe-trotting of other dishes, it was as Canadian as could be. Doiron’s pouding chômeur ($9) was an indulgent, traditional meal-ender of white cake in maple sauce, fancied up with a bit of apple compote.
Pouding chômeur at Citizen
Like Town, Citizen is a long, narrow, cosy space with a bar opposite tables. Stocked at that bar are some well-chosen bottled beers and interesting, mostly Old-World wines, some of which are available by the glass. Citizen does not take reservations, but was full or about to be full, predominantly with a hip, youthful clientele, when I visited.
Currently chef Michael Frank, formerly of the late, lamented Mellos in the ByWard Market and the consultant behind the food at Bar Robo in Chinatown, has a Monday night cooking residency at Citizen. Frank’s mini-menus to date, on display at Citizen’s Instagram page, have toured different cuisines, from Filipino to the Caribbean to Bavaria.
I haven’t tried any of Frank’s Monday night specials, but it’s a safe bet that they’re good. If they can match Doiron’s best efforts, they would be stunning.
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Peter Hum’s restaurant reviews
