Warm weather is in the air and before you know it, you’ll be back enjoying meals on the patios at your favourite Toronto restaurants.
This week’s roundup of openings includes a new ice cream shop near Queens Quay, a St Catharines import for mouth-watering BBQ and the return of a crowd favourite – all the makings for the perfect summer.
But don’t wait until the seasons official change to try these new spots. Read on to discover the exciting new restaurants, bakeries, cafes and ice cream shops that opened between March 2-9.
New Toronto restaurants
Bicyclette Food and Wine
Chef Jean-Pierre Centeno launched Bicyclette this week as a concept blending the grab-and-go and prepared takeout with “the conviviality of a tapas and pinchos.” The menu is easy French fare like tartines, niçoise salads, French onion soup and quiche. The restaurant is located on Harbord, right near the University of Toronto campus.
Halcyon
Halcyon is a new cafe in Bloor West Village that serves coffee, wine and pizza. They serve Hot Black Coffee and have a wine list curated by Living Vine. The pizzas are made by Bello Pizza, another new upstart to watch.
Ice Creamonology
Hand-crafted ice cream always hits the spot and this new shop makes decadent flavours like white chocolate blueberry cheesecake and Turkish coffee. You can buy pints or order cones at the Queens Quay location Tuesday through Sunday. The owner, Onur Yilmaz, is a professional chef who has been working on the concept for Ice Creamonology for three years.
La Boulangerie
Trinity Bellwoods has a new bakery serving up brioches, croissants, beignets, danishes, cinnamon rolls – really anything you can dream of, it might be on the menu. Swing by for a fresh loaf of sourdough and pick up a blueberry lemon tart for dessert.
Leo & Co Bakery
We missed this in last week’s round up but popular sugar, dairy and gluten-free bakery Leo & Co. reopened after closing down temporarily following a fire on Valentine’s Day. The North York bakery is back to selling their cakes, donuts, cupcakes and giant cookies.
The Ace
The Ace is back! In December we covered the stepping down of previous owner Greg Boggs and this week Maggie Stackpole and her husband Rafael took over operations of the family-style restaurant. In an Instagram post introducing themselves to the community, Stackpole wrote: “Having a restaurant has always been my husband Rafael’s (chef) dream, and what a gift to be able to make his dream come true in such a place, with this incredible history behind and an incredibly supportive customers and neighbours. We can only hope to make you come back to The Ace and feel that we have made it worth it!”
The Bull BBQ Pit
St Clair West has a new spot for saucy and savoury BBQ. The restaurant is well known in the Niagara region for their burgers, pulled pork, smoked brisket, wings and more. The owner, Omar Fawzy, and his family moved to Toronto a couple years ago and wanted to bring the restaurant with them.
