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| - Perfect. Totally perfect.
I took my boyfriend here for his birthday, and it's my new favourite restaurant in Toronto. Sorry, Rushton! I had made reservations at Mark McEwan's new restaurant, Fabbrica, but on the morning of the birthday became troubled by the deeply mixed reviews. I switched to Nota Bene at the last minute, and am so glad I did. They have everything all figured out.
I had made a reservation, which we were late for. I called to put it back and the hostesses were lovely about it and would accept no apologies when we arrived. The space is stunning. And huge. I was shocked at how much clean, contemporary, perfectly lit space was hiding behind that tiny little Queen and John facade. It's a beautiful place to have a long, quiet meal.
They have free corkage after 9, which we took advantage of. They took the bottle away from us while we had our cocktails, and brought it back at just the right moment. It had been decanted and allowed to air out just the right amount. I was nervous to bring it in and expected, perhaps, a bit of attitude about it or an up-sell on other things to make up for it - it didn't happen.
We were initially seated beside a group of four, with two drunk women that were simply screaming laughter. It was absolutely impossible to have any sort of conversation. We asked our server to re-seat us, stressing he had already begun to provide us with lovely service and did not want him to lose the table. He wasn't willing to be worried about that, but did remain our server in the end. The staff seemed to sense we were trying to have a quiet, intimate meal and ended up seating us in a completely empty area of the restaurant which we both recognized as a closed section. This was incredibly kind.
We saw lots of large groups having long, enjoyable, boozy meals. Everyone looked happy.
Salted cod appetizer was stunning to my palette. I could have eaten 3 servings. Just stunning. I had the Cavatelli with truffle oil and mushrooms, my boyfriend had the hangar steak - not one of the "expensive ones." Both were amazing - if this is the "cheap steak," well... I don't know what to say. We had some sticky-toffee pudding for dessert, which was to die for, and they brought our a large piece of dark chocolate with "Happy Birthday" piped in white. Nice touch.
We were the very last people in the restaurant but were admonished not to rush even a tiny bit.
Worth every penny and perfect end-to-end. GO!!
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