Restaurants
Ortolan
Ortolan is a newly opened restaurant at Bloor West and Margueretta, in Bloordale. Tucked away in the shadow of the House of Lancaster, it takes over the spot occupied by a string of ill-fated eateries including Kathy's Kitchen and ShawarMama.
Their approach is to use locally-sourced fare to create a small but interesting menu. Though the warm, woodsy decor is inviting, the service and ambiance are disappointing.
The dining area is small, with a handful of tables and window and bar seating. Reservations are not an option at Ortolan, so I show up early to grab a spot for six people. As our table fills up, we get the impression that a group our size is not welcome.
Numerous questions about the wine list prompt our server to give an impatient gesture toward the wall behind her, where the menu is written on a blackboard. No recommendations are made - she is snappy and rushes our decision.
We sail through the menu with enthusiasm, excited about the appetizers. The sardines "two ways" ($8) are a wonderful first taste. One side of the plate offers morsels of salt-cured fish with spicy green pepper relish on a crostini, the other features sardines bathed in Riesling vinegar, served with pulpy pieces of blood orange and slivers of fresh fennel.
The house salad ($8) is less exciting. A mix of fennel, radicchio and escarole with a Cab Franc vinaigrette, it is light and refreshing but dull in both taste and presentation.
The gnocchi ($12) is overcooked, but creamy gorgonzola sauce and crunchy radicchio add tang and texture to somewhat redeem the starchy dish.
Still nibbling away as we wait for the main dishes, the server comes to clear our table. A wine glass is actually pried from the fingers of one diner, while the unfinished appetizers we are still eating are whisked away. We tell the server we are not finished and she rolls her eyes, reluctantly putting down our plate.
At this point, it's about 7 p.m. and there are still free seats in the restaurant - her apparent eagerness for us to leave is difficult to explain.
Next up are the entrées, a flatiron steak with ramps ($17) and a roasted chicken "à l'estragon" with pommery sauce ($16). Since these don't come with sides, we order them separately, going for the beet soubise ($7) and the dandelion and white bean salad ($7).
The steak is rare and juicy, accompanied by a tiny portion of locally-foraged ramps. The chicken (top photo) and its bed of braised celery get rave reviews. The skin is light and delicately crispy, the meat tender and moist.
The sides are enjoyable. The beet purée is lovely, velvety and sweet.
The dandelion greens are chewy with a bitter zest, a delicious match for the white beans' garlicky taste and creamy quality.
Sadly, our unease overshadows what could have been a great experience. Our food throughout is served with curt explanations and frosty demeanour. We start to feel increasingly uncomfortable with the treatment we are getting from our server.
A quick note on blogTO restaurant reviews - our policy is not to tell the staff we are writing about our meal and try to stay as discreet as possible. Until all dishes are served, we are merely patrons enjoying dinner. When all our food has reached the table, we only then might reveal our intentions to inquire about the restaurant and its menu.
In this case, our questions are not answered. We are asked not to write a review, as Ortolan is "simply a neighbourhood spot" and its staff do not wish to be "on the internet." Our server then loudly maligns our purpose to the tables sitting next to us, creating an unpleasant buzz in the dining room.
I admit there is a charm in remaining a hidden gem, and positive reviews can sometimes overwhelm small restaurants. Our server had honourable intentions, but these were delivered poorly. However, this is not one of those glowing accounts: the prices were high, the portions small. And although some of Ortolan's dishes were delicious, a side of attitude can give a bad aftertaste to even the best of meals.
Treating your clientele with respect is paramount - we left Ortolan feeling like we had been bullied. As a Bloordale resident, I can say this is one neighbourhood spot I will most certainly be skipping.
Daniel Boulud, in Letters to a Young Chef: "A great front of the house with so-so food is liable to be more successful than a restaurant with mind-blowing food and surly waiters and maître d's."
Ortolan is open from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. Tuesday and Wednesday, and from 5 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. Thursday to Saturday.
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and as a ps. - bit of a foot shot making local food so inaccessible (i.e. price, portion and attitude).
I was curious about the same thing!
@ michelle - you are spot on! I thought they mixed up interior shots with Gilead for this review!
You know the game...you sit down at your table, drop a stack of Toonies in the middle and every time the service is poor, you simply knock away a toonie and put it back in your pocket.
Gives the waitress some incentive to work a little bit harder if shes cognizant of why the toonie stack is diminishing.
As for service, it's the factor that can make or break an experience - it's not the be all, end all but bad service can ruin the best meal while great service can redeem an average meal.
Great review - the food looks amazing, but I will pass until the owner takes steps to improve the quality of service. I'm not going to spend my money on a rushed, impersonal service.
why not simply check it out, and - gasp - make a judgement for yourself. Heaven forbid invididual thought.
one review does not a restaurant make.
The review, from what I can see, appears to be honest. The reviewer could have put out an entirely negative piece, based up on their treatment of customers, but she chose not to. They got full marks for the great food,
Just curious though: did she ever think to speak with the manager? I certainly would have. Yes, the server may have lost her job out of the deal - but maybe she deserved to. Certainly that seems a reasonable consequence for sabotaging one's place of business.
You must go to lots of crappy movies,restaurants and hotels.
You simply don't ever take a wineglass out of a person's hand...I don't need to waste an evening finding out for myself that this place isn't worth it...don't have the time or money to waste confirming they suck.
The fact is that the server seemed aware they were not providing stellar service when they asked not to be reviewed and yet didn't seem to take efforts to change course.
Looks like one to avoid to me.
There's no excuse for bad service. It's unfortunate that a dinner out with friends and good food has to be overshadowed by one person's negative attitude. Truly a shame, since most restaurants in our neighbourhood are so warm and welcoming.
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Uhh, no. A pro most certainly would have returned.
But moreover, a pro would not review a new restaurant until it was at least a month or two old.
BlogTo has a nasty habit of f*cking new places by reviewing them too early.
I'm going to go BECAUSE this review is so unfair just to balance out you clowns who hate the place based on an amateur review that's weeks too early.
Anyway, that kind of behavior is never acceptable and it's perfectly reasonable to point it out in this review.
The resto scene is rough in this city, gotta be on your game.
In fact, it's been years since I've experienced bad service, most servers know how high the stakes are. I guess this one doesn't.
it is quite possible that the server's cat died, or her boyfriend dumped her, or she lost an audition, or her father was a dickhead, or her mother was emotionally withholding or whatever.
when i encounter someone like that, i try to disarm them by being especially nice to them. that almost always works. if not, tell them that it's too bad they are having a bad day, but they have a job to do and it is not fair of them to dump their baggage on others, thank you very much.
Fool.
In the future BlogTO, please ensure that when you send a reviewer out, that they are prepared to enjoy the experience rather than do it on the cheap. I'll wait for the glowing reviews from other more reputable food reviewers. I counted eight whole reviews on BlogTO as this food critic's resume.
3 appetizers
2 entrees
2 sides
who's the jerk here
Maybe you only eat at McDonald's or something.
Someone took a blog review personal.
Relax little guy, deep breathes.
I live in the area and probably won't try this place now. In my opinion, there is nothing worse than a server with a shitty attitude.
No one will go there regardless of some psuedo review.
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No, that's where a party of 6 had 3 apps, 2 mains and 2 side dishes.
How much did the party drink?
How much was the final bill for 6?
It's too bad BlogTO can't get its restaurant review act together.
If that is the case, then its good to know that so many restaurants are doing so well that they can afford to only offer good service to people who order the most food. Whew! What a relief. Here I thought that the restaurant business was a tough one with a high failure rate. I'm happy to know that I was wrong.
Thanks guys, for clearing that up :)
I wonder whether the part about being asked to not write a review was just a personal feeling from the server or if the management / owners had instructed staff to say this? (I know that sounds ridiculous... but who knows?)
If he or she doesn't rise above these situations, it is bad service. Bad service gets bad reviews, and that's why eateries in this town last or don't last.
It you have phenomenal service leave the server 20%. Most jerk customers still leave 10-12% when you have gone out of your way during the whole service to make their experience top notch.
If the server has a 6 person table ordering $150 or less that might only amount to a $15 tip. After a tip-out the server only gets $10. That table has been occupied for 3 hours, meanwhile you could have flipped that table three times with larger bills and made $100 in tips. This is a job and a career for a lot of people, customers need to understand that. Tip shitty service with a shitty tip, that will teach the server a lesson. Reward good service with a good tip, because it takes talent to put up with dumb ass customers for 8 hours a day 5 days a week, believe me 60% of guests are childish and brutally annoying but we put on that fake ass smile for your shitty tip.
And stop arriving late for your reservations, "camping" at tables when you are finished your meals drinking water while there is a line up at the door and stop asking for Tea, you tea drinkers are so bloody annoying, go home and drink tea. : P
Smarten up!
And by the way, I can tell when you're fake smiling. Don't be a shit and you'll get decent tips. It's funny that my mom waited tables for almost 40 years, used the money to start several businesses and bought a home, and not once complained about a tip. Typical entitled Toronto attitude, James. Tell me where you work so I can avoid it (or go when you're working so I can tip your co-workers more).
PS. You're wrong, just to let you know.
I'm not saying this server wasn't out of line, maybe she was. I wasn't there. I do know that hauling a group of six into a tiny restaurant when not everyone is even ordering and then writing a review of it is bad form though, through and through.
These weird unspoken, unlisted etiquettes that we're somehow supposed to understand. We're supposed to take out a calculator and figure out how much we're costing the restaurant because we split an appetizer or stayed an extra fifteen minutes after dessert. They treat us like we are inconveniencing them by spending money there! Oh, and don't even bother reviewing something fewer than two times, within the first six months. Don't you know that new establishments have carte blanche? Hilarious.
It's just funny how defensive people who work in the restaurant industry get.
I used to manage a location of a certain, large bookstore chain. We had regular customers who would come in and loiter all day, causing wear to store product, taking seating away from actual paying customers, leaving their litter for the staff to clean up, and hardly ever purchasing anything. But guess what? We trained our staff to treat them just as well as anyone else. Because it's a BUSINESS, and that's how you treat your customers. We didn't roll our eyes when they asked for help finding something we knew they'd never buy. We didn't take magazines out of their hands because they had no intention of spending money. There is no excuse for that level of poor service.
Somehow, people in the restaurant industry come second to only TTC workers in feeling entitled to be selectively rude to their customers.
If someone has a negative customer experience somewhere, it's valid to write about it. ESPECIALLY if it's a restaurant reviewer. I love the people who are claiming "two sides to every story". If you weren't there, then you have NO side to the story, so why are you blindly defending a shitty waitress that you don't know? What reason could the reviewer have to lie or exaggerate in this review, where the food was glowingly written-up? Clearly she wanted to like the restaurant!
So to Steve, James and all of the Ortolan staff that are anonymously posting fake comments, stop bitching about the people who pay your salaries. There are far too many restaurants in this city that are on the verge of bankruptcy for you to be taking your customers so much for granted.
I think the food looks amazing and applaud the sourcing of local ingredients. I will definitely give it a try!
Maybe the waitress was having a bad day or maybe the group of 6 did something to piss her off!
Her job is to serve people with a smile. Not act like a cunny.
Shes in the service industry.
If you cant handle working while having a bad day, time to go back to school and get an education.
Otherwise she shuts her mouth and serves the guests properly if she wants to make any sort of money.
KL I like my job and I only bitch like you do at your job, no job is Disneyland. And you are kidding yourself when you say you can tell that a server was faking you a smile, because every single one is!!!
If you did have an objection you should have acted in an honourable manner. Spoken with management and understood their side of the story. In fact you choose the cowardly, and destructive route, of writing a negative review and hiding behind the computer.
Really surprised at this and at BlogTo.
Full disclosure I have not been to Ortolan.
And it doesn't matter if you had a bad day or if your dog just died.. you take all of that baggage and all of that attitude and put it on hold the moment you start your shift. You do your job. I hate that excuse the most. Not once did I ever let my personal life or negative thoughts affect the way I treated customers.
Also, as for prices being high, you pay for quality, especially in restaurants. (Most fine dining restaurants use the standard 40% food cost to determine prices, so your $10 app cost $4 in materials to make, plus labour, rent, etc.) If you think that is too much, then go to a place where you get $2 worth of ingredients for $5. Our society loves to hear key words like local, organic, etc... but doesn't like paying for it.
I can find a lot of BlogTO bad reviews for places that are packed and lots of good BlogTO reviews for places that are now out of business. So people, don't put much stock in this review. Go for yourself, without the preconceived notions this review has put forth, and then decide how it is.
Finally, restauranteur and restaurateur are both acceptable terminology. Look it up.
Whatever. It the service is crap and the food is small portioned and overpriced, I won't be going. Whether that info comes from BlogTO or my buddy who ate there last night, it's the same to me.
Sounds like the statement "we should all earn the same and be equal, and no one should be hungry in the world, and there should be no war or disease and we should all live forever"
Wrong. Utopian dream.
In our real world this is not the case. You don't seem to get the notion that a restaurant needs to pay bills to get by. If everyone who came ordered an appetizer and a glass of water, and got equal service, then that type of customer would multiply until the point that the restaurant was serving just appetizers and glasses of water. Tables for people to eat meals and drink wine are full because of this and the restaurant will go out of business. It's not rocket science, it is business.
"hiding behind a computer"? Feel free to tell all of us your real name so that we can make sure you aren't the hugest hypocrite to post on here all day.
I am going to give these guys a break and check it out for myself. It's a LOT of work to open up a restaurant. To have people not even give your business a chance based on a single review- and based a single server- is unfair.
What I'm saying - because apparently you can't comprehend it - is that no matter what you order, the moment you sit down in that restaurant, you should be treated with RESPECT. And if you are in the service industry, it should be the first thing you give. Treat the customer with respect.
It's not rocket science. It is business.
If the restaurant needs to pay bills then provide that good service and the bills will for sure get paid.
Its quite simple.
Yeah, none of that has anything to do with basic principles of customer service.
A place like this isn't going to be setting up a ton of advertisement, their business will grow by word of mouth. A bad experience whether it be the food, the atmosphere, or the service is going to be remembered more than the good. The review clearly states all the points, the food was amazing but the service was awful. How many people do you think read about how amazing the food was and even cared anymore? All they cared about is that one person making the night a living hell wasn't worth the money.
The cost is high for quality, but the cost pays for the food, the establishment itself, and the employees. Shouldn't the quality of service be just as good to cover the cost too? If the establishment is clean and nice, food is incredible, and service is equally incredible than cost is no issue, I'd gladly pay 100 dollars or more per person for a meal of this quality given that everything else was of equal quality too. But sadly, it looks like at least one of those points is missing..making the cost seem irrelevantly high.
I'm not saying give the best service to everyone, or the same service to people. I'd have my establishment treat repeat customers better than first timers, I'd want to make sure the people paying more money are treated better, but I still want to see people eating for the first time at least want to come back or tell others to try it. You don't make money by alienating your customers..and if every person that comes in is only going to eat there once and never come back, you don't make money either.
Bottom line is their business is gonna be reduced HUGE by this review. I for one dine out 2-3 times a week and will definitely not give this place a second look. Their own fault for hiring a horrible server.
It's kind of sad they had to rally the troops. Even the Black Hoof is tweeting people to go to Ortolan. Do these people have no shame?
All in all, I hope people will go & make a decision based on their experience.
With the photos I am seeing above, I don't fully understand how you achieved this?
Unfortunate you had such "bad" experience, but I can't help but feel we are only getting one side of the story
We will continue to monitor this thread and will close it or remove comments if comment abuse continues.
Hey, wait staff are not the owners of the restaurant, and their opinions, likes, dislikes, shouldn't count for squat as far as the customers are concerned. Frankly I believe that employers should simply pay proper wages for professional servers and stop this nonsense of making me decide how much I should add to my bill to subsidize servers indecent hourly wages.
Also, how much money someone spends to open their restaurant is their problem, not my problem.
However, everyone has a mind of their own - try the restaurant, don't try the restaurant - this one review is not going to make this restaurant fail. Over time it'll succeed or fail on its own merits.
The food was fantastic and inventive. Very happy to have this in my neighbourhood and if this negative review means I will actually be able to get in to the restaurant...thank you:-)
Sorry, but this review sounds suspicious to me. Maybe they didn't want to be reviewed and the amateur reviewer took it personally? Hard to say since I wasn't there, but I'll be back for sure regardless. The care and craftsmanship put into the food was fantastic. These guys are artists, and if that's not your thing, so be it but I'm looking forward to my next visit.
To all of you who said that she should be fired, I hope you never mess up at work yourselves. You must all be perfect all the time. No excuses. I said no excuses.
I for one have to give them credit for trying to raise the bar in a rough neighbourhood. Running a buisness in this hood is hard. There are bigger things to worry about than the rants of some self proclaimed foodies. Try drug dealers, prostitues, pimps, and crack heads on for size.
Overall the blog TO review wasn't bad. It's definatly not fair to review so soon after opening. They weren't given enough time to work out the kinks and stretch thier new legs.
I've already been back, and will go again and again.
Likewise Rose went on Saturday and has already "been back and will go again and again"? Really two visits in 7 days?
I would suspect "Kurt Krumme" "Loved It" and "Rose" are all staff, if not the same person (if not steve/thedigital)
I share house with 5 people. We all have the same IP address, we all go out to restaurants and we all have differing opinions.
Should we all get a group consensus before posting?
As the monitor and someone with some sort of IT background I think you should be able to realise this.
As for the review. Well this is BlogTO - take it with a grain of salt - but don't be fooled into not trying things for yourself. Nothing worse than second hand information.
I get it if the food is questionable on the first visit in a recently open restaurant and there should be another visit. But this was a case of the waitress overall attitude during service. Being nice is a common sense trait in the customer service world.
I'm a web designer. There's the new thing called Google, yer gonna love it. Seriously though, I'd prefer it if you nurtured your paranoia and never set foot in there again. There are precious few d-bag free spots left in the downtown. I said I'll be going back and I will. You can spend your time polishing your tin-foil hat.
I ate at Ortolan last week, upon a high recommendation from a friend who had also eaten there. The food was amazing, the wine list was inspired, and the server was attentive and knowledgable. This establishment has a lot of soul and a lot of promise. And, wait for it, I'm recommending it to all of my friends!
This restaurant is a great addition to the neighbourhood. And if you can distinguish the beat of your own drum, you might get a chance to experience it.
Please don't let one bad experience from a "reviewer" prevent you from checking out Ortolan for yourself. I'm proud to have this new addition to the neighbourhood.
Recently written is Brigitte's side of this story, which you can find here...
http://brigittelynne.blogspot.com/2011/04/food-fights.html
This review has great photos, but is otherwise really problematic. Going to a small restaurant with a group of six, and then only ordering two meals is pretty poor form -- especially if you're also taking a bunch of pictures -- which I would find obnoxious if I was at a neighboring table. Just because it's a local restaurant doesn't mean you can behave like you're at Kelsey's.
I find that a lot of blogTO reviews of 'nicer' restaurants have this weird anxiety about service... like the reviewers feel uncomfortable in upscale places and become hyper-conscious of perceived slights as a result.
I will be going back to Ortolan... they are a great addition to the neighborhood.
And in case you haven't noticed, photos are pretty common with restaurant reviews.
why dont you read this : http://brigittelynne.blogspot.com/2011/04/food-fights.html
Ortolan, get over yourself. Reviews good and bad are part of the business. You just need to transcend them either way.
Also, about this comment: "The prices were high, the portions small."
Really? Your photos of the food and descriptions of the prices suggest otherwise. The mains here are clearly a la carte, with sides chosen separately. So the fair thing to do when judging value-for-price is to take this into account. The $17 flatiron steak main pictured, for instance, looks like a reasonably decent portion of meat. Pair that with a $7 side (which are also fairly portioned, judging by these photos) and you have a complete dish for $24. That's certainly comparable to what you'd pay for a main in any other top resto in Toronto.
i have sworn this site off forever.
shitty people
shitty knowledge
shitty experience
restaurant is good to me, i plan to go often as i am just a block away!
ENTERTIEN - UPHOLD ME WITHIN YOUR REALM
I wouldn’t call the establishment pretentious as in other reviews since the quality is there. Portions are very small and prices quite high but definitely worth it! There is an arrogance though in such things as the chalkboard only menu, listing many dishes without descriptions that very few customers would recognize as well as the efficient but unfriendly wait staff.
Looking past that there was a comfortable atmosphere with a simple, elegant decor and Motown and Dire Straits on the stereo.
The food and wine were all that I expected and more. The Bordeaux blanc and the Rose were unusual and lovely, the gnocchi with mushrooms was delicate, the radish salad with dill and cumin was fresh and tasty, and the skirt steak was tasty with lemon and garlic although a bit stringy as it is known to be.
The dessert wine, Kracher Beerenauslese Cuvee was excellent as was the raspberry, almond Fool and the chocolate, hazelnut Torte served with whip crème and red currant puree.
I highly recommend a trip to “Bloordale” for a taste sensation!
The heavily tattooed server at Ortolan who poured me some water, claimed she was the manager of the place. I did find her to be quite cold and even received a snarky tone from her because I didn't order wine.
Overall, I found Ortolan to be extremely pretentious and disappointing - the food and the service.
I won't be going back.
Come on Ortolan, pull up your socks and get serious about things!
I think the review of the service may have been a bit harsh, I have been to Ortolan more than once and I have enjoyed both amazing food, wine and rather lovely service.. I Hope We Can Get More Information About Restaurants From Your Blog
I only wished that I could remember the wine that we had - a white from Prince Edward County, believe it or not, and it was lovely.
Our server was fantastic - he helped us by explaining all of the menu items, their ingredients and preparation - and I think he actually thrilled that we asked! Everything was so full of flavor and beautifully presented.
Aside from the food, I was very impressed with the wine selection and recommendations. I believe the both the white and the glass of port I had with dessert were made in Ontario! Who knew?!
I eat out a lot, and yeah, sometimes service can suck, and especially food can be overpriced and lacking - but please everyone, if you've got some dough to spend (because it can be pricey, especially if you like to indulge like me!) try Ortolan, and try to sample things you would never dream of (for me it was cured trout - delish!) And have some vino while you're at it! I can't wait to go back!
To our surprise, the waiter inside saw us and invited us in, understanding that we'd planned an evening at their location and they'd closed early because it had been slow. The service was careful and we did not feel rushed, the food was very, VERY good, and it was an overall pleasant experience.
Neither of us has ever been to a restaurant in Toronto where such courtesy has been extended. I highly recommend the place, the staff and the meal. We will go again.
it, Thanks a lot.
And again, when people said that the review is unfair because the restaurant just opened... they're right! A restaurant opens and the waiters come and go. That waitress might have been fired by now so the review is then irrelevant.
We are not defending the waitress by any means, use your brains and think. Are you smiling everyday? Are you ALWAYS in a good mood? You never have a bad day? Geez people, don't ask others to do what you can't! and who know, maybe the 6 of them were rude? Just asking, not stating.
Looking at their order, well, in another restaurant they might not have been accepted at all. If you bring 6 people to a restaurant, you have to order for everyone (in most good retaurants) which was not the case here. Why go to a restaurant if you don't want to eat in the first place?
I've been there twice and I love the place! The service is amazing. the 2 different waiters we had always explained the food and the wine and gave recommendations (maybe they fired the crappy waitress). They also offered a side and an appetizer because they were out of steak (which I ordered) to apologize. Yeah, what a crappy service! The food is really amazing and tasty. In other words, the restaurant might have changed since its opening and some people are just missing a great spot because of a precocious review made from people who didn't even go there to eat.
but it's always funny to see people who have never been there bashing the place... apart from a few negatives comments from people who actually ate there (eh, what do you expect? we can't all agree on food), most angry comments are from people who haven't....