NOTA BENE

First month in Toronto and we are celebrating at Nota Bene, one of the best new restaurant in town in the past years. You can tell when a restaurant has an Italian influence when you find oil instead of butter, that's for me it's heaven, even better if the bread has a wood oven taste. We tried the signature dish Crisp Duck Salad: Sumac-dusted Green papaya, Slaw, Cashews and I had the Octopus with Spanish Chorizo, we followed with the Jennifer Stilton's Beef Brisket Burger and the Beef Tenderloin and finished with Sticky Toffee Pudding and Apple Tarte Tatin.

 

OCTOPUS WITH SPANISH CHORIZO:
 Baby Cucumber, Sun dried Tomatoes

JENNIFER STILTON'S BRISKET BURGER:
Pommes Frittes (NB Signature Dish)



APPLE TARTE TATIN: Vanilla Ice Cream

STICKY TOFFEE PUDDING: Pecan Praline,
Spotted Dick Ice Cream



 

 

 



Experience: $157,00

• Crisp Duck Salad
• Octopus with Spanish Chorizo
• Brisket Beef Burger
• Beef Tenderloin
• Apple Tarte Tatin
• Sticky Toffee Pudding
• 1 bottle of water
• 1 glass of Verdicchio

The Duck salad was very nice, as it was the Octopus even if I just got 6 thin slices of it. The Burger was supposed to be the signature dish, it was a good burger but not a great one. The dessert was probably the best part of the meal, the Tarte Tatin super sweet but very good. On the bad note, we had a glass of Riesling that wasn't very good but our server was nice enough not to charge us for it.


SCARAMOUCHE

Scaramouche is a romantic historical novel by Rafael Sabadini published in 1921, the novel opens with the memorable line: " He was born with a gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad".
This old style restaurant with white tablecloth offers an amazing view of downtown Toronto,
we have been offered a welcome olive tapenade and home made pecan bread, just delightful.

QUEBEC DUCK: foie gras terrine,duck pastrami,
 fig confit, pickled leeks, grapes maple cider jelly,
 hazelnut, sourdough toast and vincotto

SEA BASS: artichokes, roasted fennel,
oven-dried cherry tomatoes, black olive grilled chili pepper,
shellfish tomato nage, smoked paprika aioli



VENISON: bacon wrapped loin, sour cream spaetzle,
candy cane beet, leeks forelle pear,
walnuts, watercress pesto,
red wine jus and triple crunch mustard cream

SOFT PISTACHIO MERINGUE: rhubarb ginger beer sorbet,
pistachio cream, poached Ontario rhubarb

 

Experience: $ 190.00

• Quebec Duck, appetizer
• Sea bass, entree
• Venison, entree
• Soft Pistachio Meringue, dessert
• Half bottle of Astrolabe, Sauvignon Blanc ( New Zealand)

The meal was very good, one of the best I ever had and the dessert absolutely outstanding. Scaramouche is the perfect spot for an old style celebration.