| rev:text
| - Have been meaning to check it out for some time now and they posted on facebook about a cheese they brought in from France, so we just had to go.
We arrived a bit early and this was not a problem. It's a very intimate venue with lovely music playing not too loud in the background and a full view of the kitchen brigade.
We decided that since it was Thursday and we came for the cheese, that was a special enough occassion to spoil ourselves and do the suggested wine pairing with each course (I cannot remember all the wines so forgive me)
Our Amuse was a lovely quennelle fritter of cod and sweet potato served with a spicy aoli served with a sweet sparkling wine from the south of France. Nice start, and it just kept getting better.
We decided to share the steak tartare, there are 3 choices but we went with traditional. It was beautifully seasoned, an excellent sized portion with fluffy little potato pillows with a lovely flute of rose champagne.
What I love about the place is you have about 10 items on the menu, each comes in either an appetizer size or a larger dinner portion. This just screams to me, hey we can eat even more of the menu than we thought.
To start I had a foie gras torchon sandwiched between little teeny beet pankcakes, presented as foie gras oreos mmmmm foie gras anything for me please. It came with a sliced apple and beet salad that included soaked prunes wrapped in duck proscuitto. Now I don't believe in god but I do believe in food heaven and I knew biting into this that we might just be there.
Dining mate had the delicate Gaspe shrimp ceviche with a little buffala mozzarella and tomato salad. Well of course we were tasting each others food. This was amazing, with hints of ginger and the presentation was beautiful.
Okay time for some hot sticky meats in bordelaise, I opted for the braised beef served with the creamiest smoothest mash ever, mushrooms artichokes served with an artichoke cream and crispy marrow balls.
My friend opted for the lamb trio, there was loin, chop and braised shoulder that was served as a stuffed cannelloni in an upright position to look like a bone marrow. The table was pretty silent at this point with the exception of mmmmmmmmmmm and maybe more mmmmmmmmmmmm, at the end he said there was just the perfect amount of jus on my plate for everything. Meats were perfection, falling apart, seasoned and sauced in every way perfect.
I do believe we consumed some stratus, fielding, hidden bench and malivoire wines during these courses, I do recall a fume blanc and pinot noir a gamay and a gewurtztraminer.
Dessert we chose the cherry chocolate souffle and the lemon tart with goat cheese lemon cheese cake with strawberry sorbet. The souffle was presented with a serving bowl of warm rich chocolate sauce which was poured into a cavity poked in the middle and a warm cherry surprise in the base. Best lemon tart on the planet and I know lemon tart. What I loved was the goat cheese explosion that happened in my mouth when I had taken a bite of the cheesecake and then a sip of the paired wine.
Ah now it's time for the reason we came, the cheese, which was served with fortified wines from France, Rhone if memory serves correctly. We had a couple of Quebec cheeses, a lovely truffle infused cheese from Italy, Manchego from Spain a soft stinky one from Rhone and the cheese of the moment Le Geant du Rhone. Both of us love our cheese and this was the only way to end the meal and our first and not last experience at ICI.
My compliments to the wonderful staff in the kitchen and dining room, they even matched our cutlery to our outfits, which was just too funny. Your table is completely cleared and reset for each course, which is a wonderful touch. The breads are all made in house and available at the chef's bakery, Le Matin in Leslieville, and it was nice to get butter at room temperature that spread instead of a lump of cold butter you can't get your knife into.
Our experience was superb we will be back
|
![[RDF Data]](/fct/images/sw-rdf-blue.png)
![[cxml]](/fct/images/cxml_doc.png)
![[csv]](/fct/images/csv_doc.png)
![[text]](/fct/images/ntriples_doc.png)
![[turtle]](/fct/images/n3turtle_doc.png)
![[ld+json]](/fct/images/jsonld_doc.png)
![[rdf+json]](/fct/images/json_doc.png)
![[rdf+xml]](/fct/images/xml_doc.png)
![[atom+xml]](/fct/images/atom_doc.png)
![[html]](/fct/images/html_doc.png)