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| - Hands-down, the best Summerlicious experience I've had, in four years of Licious-ing. Really, it's 4.5 stars. (When oh when are Yelp going to allow us to give half stars?!)
Came here for a weekday lunch after being told to get lost by harried staff at Midi Bistro around the corner (more on that in my next review). Bodega's patio is simply beautiful: large, shady, looking onto the sweet Baldwin St cafe strip and all of its action on one side, and the gorgeous old vine-covered red brick Victorian on the other. Comfy banquettes with a back just high enough to drape your arm comfortably over. Honestly, patios don't come much better than this. Plus, there's proper silverware, napery and glassware.
We were seated and attended to straight away by our lovely server, a guy with a lilting West Indian accent, who was friendly but not intrusive, and totally attentive throughout, despite the busy lunch period--no waving the bill down here. Clearly, someone at Bodega knows that hiring enough staff (and good staff) is crucial to keeping customers happy, a very basic hospitality lesson that you would think more restaurateurs and pub owners would have grasped by now... amirite?
The Summerlicious lunch prix fixe is $20 and features a few tasty-looking options. I had a chilled filet of sole mousse with a red pepper sauce; confit of duck with sweet potato, bacon and rosemary hash and green beans; and orange creme brulee. My date had the soup du jour (a chilled cucumber puree); the grilled steelhead trout with israeli couscous; and warm berries with vanilla ice cream.
The food was a little inconsistent, but generally very good. The standout dishes were my duck confit and his berries and ice cream. I was worried about ordering duck confit and sweet potatoes on such a hot day (30+C), but it was a nice small portion and it was really delicious--rich, moist, crispy-skinned. The sweet potatoes were fantastic--the bacony-oniony sauce they came in made them incredibly more-ish. His trout was a little overcooked, but the couscous was studded with raisins and pine nuts for interest, and pretty yum. My chilled sole mousse was a little blah, but he wolfed down his chilled cucumber soup, which was light, minty, and very refreshing. My creme brulee was beautifully executed: it had a lovely brittle crunchy top which was super-fun to crack with my spoon, and a nice delicate orange flavour. His dessert was outstanding: I don't know what they did to those berries--or maybe they are just perfectly in season right now--but they were the berriest-tasting berries I've ever eaten! A nice mix of strawberries, blackberries, and blueberries. Yummmmm.
Again, though, the things that really made it for me were the gorgeous surroundings, and the superlative service. Last night I was at The Rhino in Parkdale, where I waited literally forty-five minutes--no exaggeration--to get a lukewarm pint of beer. Here, I had a glass of beautifully chilled, crisp prosecco in my hand within eight minutes of sitting down. LOVE. IT.
Bodega is one of the (sadly very few) restos that know how to do Summerlicious right: don't cheap out, hire enough staff to cover the busy times, and make sure the food is impressive and done with care, not prefabricated crap that you're cranking out and trying to pass off as something fancy. I would definitely say that I've had more bad experiences than good during Summerlicious and if anything it has been most useful in weeding out the places I definitely won't go again. This, however, is not one of them. Well-played, Bodega!
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