Mary T.
Yelp
A friend of mine came here several months ago. What caught my attention was her raving about getting an ounce of wine for $1 during happy hour.
Wow! That's crazy. I flagged it.
I meet up with a couple of friends every couple of months or so. We like to eat and socially drink. I showed them this wine happy hour special and they said yes without any hesitation.
We are a bunch of winos... haha!
We met up on the first Saturday of October for brunch. I made reservations in advance. It's habit. It's a reflex reaction.
I got there early. It's in Corktown.
I parked on King Street East, steps away from the Sackville Playground, which is roughly across the street from Gusto 501. I paid for three hours of Green P parking through the app, which did the trick.
There are a set of lights by the playground. I crossed the street with two 501 King streetcars on either side of me. My friend spotted me on the other side. We both walked over to the eatery.
It was a nice day. The entire restaurant was open. We walked in without opening a thing.
I said hi to the greeter and indicated that I had a reservation. He found me and took us to a table steps away from the bar. Moments later, our third friend joined us.
We always have a good time catching up over good eats and drinks. Doing it as this eatery was no exception.
We got the following items to start:
- Gusto rosso (Argentina - Chile)
- Brasato di manzo
- Ricotta pancakes
- Funghi pizza
We all started with five ounces of wine. We got a refill later on. We chose gusto rosso from Argentina - Chile. It was a cabernet sauvignon and malbec mix. We loved it. It was perfect with a nice finish. $10 for two glasses of wine each seemed so absurd, but was a great deal.
We all got individual mains, but ended up taking bites of our dishes because we like to sample. It's fun!
I got the brasato di manzo. It consisted of tomato-braised short ribs, bomba, ricotta, and poached eggs. It was fantastic. The short ribs fell off the bone. They were so tender and flavourful. The poached eggs were runny and so yummy with the bomba (spicy pepper paste in the sauce) and ricotta.
One of my friends got the ricotta pancakes. They had blueberry compote on top. I was fortunate to get a bite of this delightful stack of pancakes. So fluffy and dreamy! If you love light, fluffy pancakes with the best blueberry flavour in a compote, you must order this dish.
If I aren't into brunchy items, go with the funghi pizza. My other friend had it. If you are a huge mushroom fan, this pizza was delicious. It had a generous assortment of sliced mushrooms that were flavourful and so good with the best pizza crust. We sat close to the pizza oven. It was delightful to see our pizza come out of the oven, and get sliced, plated, and served hot out of the oven.
The food was exceptional. We were stuffed.
We then saw the dessert menu. We ordered everything and split it all because that's how we roll.
We got these desserts:
- Tiramisu
- Pizzelle
- Torte di mandorle
The tiramisu was probably our favourite out of the bunch. It had a delightful custard-mousse texture. It was exquisite and one of the best tiramisu desserts that I have ever had, probably because it had kahlua and marsala.
The torte di mandorle was special. Our server poured vanilla mascapone cream sauce over the torte that had peach compote and pistachios. It was delicious and the presentation made us happy.
The pizzelle was simple. Think of it as two pinwheel waffles with a generous layer of Nutella buttercream between them, sprinkled with icing sugar. Simple is good. This dessert paired well with the others almost like a mini dessert.
We all used the washroom before we left. It's at the back on the first floor. It was clean.
There's a second floor. I don't think there's an elevator. I didn't see anyone dine up there. I'd imagine that it gets used for dinner or when this eatery gets extremely busy.
There was a patio. It was a gorgeous warm day that we could have dined outside if we wanted to.
This restaurant was awesome. We had a great time having bunch and chatting for nearly three hours. I highly recommend coming here, especially to take advantage of the wine deal if you like good wine at a loonie an ounce.
(418)