Empire Restaurant and Bar
47 Clarence St., 613-241-1343, empireottawa.com
Open: Sunday to Thursday 11 a.m. to 11 p.m., Friday and Saturday 11 a.m. to midnight
Prices: mains $15 to $29, steaks $23 to $49
Access: A few steps to front door, washrooms downstairs
In the early days of the Empire Grill, which opened 17 years ago on one of the ByWard Market’s prime corners, the sleek, high-volume eatery was a bustling draw for Ottawa’s young, chic and tech-savvy.
Suits were worn, steaks were eaten and expense accounts were tapped. As I wrote in September 2000 when I covered the tech sector for the Citizen: “Empire Grill, arguably the hippest of the market’s hangouts, is doubling in size this fall and wiring its new space for Internet conferencing.”
But the days when Ottawa thought it was going to become Silicon Valley North have long passed. And since then, economic downturns and a demoralized public service have limited the income being disposed in Ottawa. Some of the city’s very good restaurants have closed in the last few years. Others, like Empire Grill, have adapted.
The restaurant at Clarence Street and Parent Avenue, which seats 360 when you include its patio, rebranded by dropping the “Grill” from its name. Earlier this year, it closed for three weeks of renovations that left its interior more relaxed, warm and contemporary. Empire’s new bar is larger and has local beers on tap, there’s more booth seating, and elsewhere, leather chairs and banquettes are gathered around hefty tables of reclaimed wood. Owners Dave Mangano and John Borsten hired chef Norm Aitken, formerly of Juniper Kitchen and Wine Bar, one of those lauded but shuttered restaurants, to rewrite Empire’s menu, making it more accessible and affordable.
Interior of Empire Restaurant
Based on two visits this month, I’d say that because of these new developments, we can talk about the rise of Empire, not its decline.
Aitken’s menu is a diverse but pragmatic one-pager that applies at lunch and dinner, with plenty of laid-back but nonetheless interesting options. While Aitken’s new fare thrills less, and costs less, than what the chef, a Chopped Canada champion and Gold Medal Plates competitor, served at Juniper, Empire’s best mainstream choices have been well executed and perked by smart, tasty accents. Meaning, if something comes with a killer condiment called black garlic aioli, you should order it.
There are bistro items, pastas, a few nods to Asian influences, dishes that the kids will want, and steaks that uphold the Empire Grill tradition. I’ve sampled fairly widely and with just a few mild disappointments.
Empire’s menu renames appetizers “rush hour,” which makes sense given how fast they hustle from kitchen to table.
Beef tartare ($15) had freshness and good seasoning going for it, while that irresistibly funky black (i.e., fermented) garlic aioli set taste buds singing. Fish tacos (two for $13) were sizable, with crisp, battered fish, but their guacamole and salsa on the side didn’t excite as much as that aioli.
Beef Tartare at Empire Restaurant
Fish tacos at Empire Restaurant
Crispy braised lamb dumplings ($12) were small, dim sum-like pouches of potent lamb flavour, wading in a pool of punchy tomato sauce. Crispy (there’s that word again) honey-glazed beef short rib nibs ($11) encased chunks of pliant meat in a sweet wrapping. These two starters brought to mind idealized Chinese-Canadian food.
Lamb dumplings at Empire Restaurant
Honey glazed short rib nibs at Empire Restaurant
The cheapest of four steaks, a flank steak with fries ($23) was well executed and beefy, if a little modestly portioned. Vegetables such as spinach with mushrooms, onion bhaji or grilled asparagus were each available for an $8 supplement, although the meat and potatoes by themselves felt fairly complete, because of a fine mushroomy reduction and excellent shoestring fries that passed the snap test.
Flank steak and fries at Empire Restaurant
It’s tempting to advise that if something comes with those thin, crisp wonders (almost like idealized MacDonald’s fries), you should order it. They certainly helped make the juicy, caramelized onion butter-enhanced Empire burger ($16) and the fried haddock ($23) more satisfying meals.
Burger and fries at Empire Restaurant
Haddock fish fry at Empire Restaurant
We tried some fancier mains, including some crisp-skinned, assertively salted trout with so-so rice ($25), a duo of sous-vide-cooked, lightly crisped duck breast and OK confit duck leg on a mound of cooled, cranberry-studded quinoa salad ($29). But the cheaper items made a bigger impression and seemed like better value.
Trout main course at Empire Restaurant
Duck duo main course at Empire Restaurant
Another fine, affordable main was a plentiful bowl of roasted mushroom pappardelle ($15), made with fresh pasta from the Empire’s nearby sister restaurant, the Grand.
Mushroom pappardelle at Empire Restaurant
I asked Citizen wine columnist Rod Phillips what he thought of Empire’s wines. “The new wine list looks like a big improvement,” he replied. “It’s compact and sensible, has a decent number of wines by the glass, and delivers a good range in terms of region, grape variety, and style.
“There are some Canadian wines from top producers, and some outliers from elsewhere that are very interesting, but it also has enough mainstream wines for the less adventurous.”
All I can add is that it would have been preferable if a half-litre of red that we’d ordered had arrived a little cooler than room temperature. Too-warm wine aside, service was friendly, confident and speedy.
Lemon pie parfait (made in house, $9) and a dense slab of chocolate cake (one of several outsourced desserts, $9) hit their sweet notes hard.
Chocolate cake at Empire Restaurant
I would have liked meal-enders with a little more sizzle and refinement. But then, that would have been more in keeping with how the old Empire Grill rolled.
Its successor strikes me as a solid crowd-pleaser, quite likely more in line with how many people want to eat when they venture to the ByWard Market.
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