Restaurants
Yours Truly
Yours Truly isn't just a valediction anymore, but the latest restaurant-cum-bar on Lower Ossington. Chef Jeff Claudio has created a modern-styled daily prix fixe dinner and a small plate menu that's complimented by an inventive cocktail list.
Depending on how the evening may unfold, the bar can be a bit of a scene, so plan accordingly for dinner — i.e. the earlier the better if you're looking for a quieter meal.
With both classic and signature cocktails listed on the menu, we decided on the Vanilla Pisco Sour, a bourbon-based Rare Earth and Banana Cognac. Each drink carried a flavour profile that hit our sweet tooth. The Pisco Sour was a refreshingly tart lemon meringue in a glass. The heavy noted cognac only needed to be set a fire to perfectly match Bananas Foster. Does having a perfectly spherical piece of ice to cool my drink also make it taste better? Yes, it does. It also looked stunning on our candle lit table. Details, folks.
The plating at Yours Truly reveals some precise knife skills in the kitchen. We chose the special that evening at the suggestion of our cordial waiter: Chorizo with torn croutons over a potato puree with a duck egg. It was a spectacular dish with admittedly humble beginnings, and it perhaps not so oddly reminded us of breakfast.
Sriracha Deviled Eggs is a definite go-to. The deviled egg is a nice throwback that has been updated with the inclusion of sesames and nori, which balance the heat thrown off by the Sriracha. Old dish, new flavours.
With slight hesitation, we ordered the salt cod (I've had bad experiences in the past with this cured fish). Yet again, I was completely thrown off by the appearance of the dish. The cod was incorporated as an inari — basically an tofu pocket stuffed with rice, fish and seasoning. The rice vinegar and mirin masked the usually pungent cod and when dipped in the wasabi aioli was the perfect combination of sweet, tart and salty.
Another Asian inspired dish, the Pork Ssam is served on bib lettuce with honey or tamarind glazed pork belly and garnished with coriander. Not my favorite, I prefer more heat than sweet for this Thai dish.
Chef Claudio has designed a superb and approachable menu that reads as a pastiche of flavours native to different cuisines. Fusion wouldn't be the right word to describe the menu, but it'd be fair to say that it shows off a modern approach that highlights both the visual experience of food and the the type of unconventional flavour combinations that can be scored through innovative techniques. Claudio is someone to watch in the Toronto restaurant scene. Yours Truly may have opened last month, but it'll be on top of my list for a long time to come.
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there isn't even any brown on the stem of the baby greens so no knife there.
Otherwise good review! I look forward to trying it.
Aside from the unpleasant aftermath of eating at Yours Truly, the dining experience itself was the worst that I have had in a long time.
1. The wait time between tasting menu courses was inordinately and unjustifiably long. After finishing each course, I and the members of my party waited for at least 20 minutes before the next course came out. Considering that there were only 2 meal options on the menu, we were baffled by the long wait times. The meal took roughly 2.5 hours.
2. The cauliflower soup and salad starters were so salty that I couldn’t even get through them.
3. The aforementioned cauliflower soup reappeared later in the meal (in a poorly disguised version) as a sauce for vegetarian gnocchi. Similarly, the same seasoned rice in the inari small dish reappeared later in the bream course. Eating the same things in reshaped forms throughout a meal left us feeling cheated and dissatisfied.
I could go on, but here is the bottom line: I highly discourage anyone from eating at Yours Truly (unless you enjoy vomiting after a disappointing meal).
Course 1 - Carrot
a roasted stub of carrot served with sliced raw carrots. We all had a good chuckle and decided this place might be taking itself too seriously but we decided to reserve judgement.
2 - Egg
an undercooked poached egg on a bed of what must have been Miracle Whip. Absolutely vile and stomach churning. Served with a fork and no bread, so quite impossible to eat, assuming you were so inclined.
3 - Gnocchi
not bad, but no better than what comes out of the frozen section of my grocery store
4 - Milk and Honey
I thought it would be hard to eff-up dessert, but they managed. tasted like sweetened buttermilk
Service was dismal. Our sullen, hipster waitress couldn't be bothered to ask us if there was anything we needed or how everything was. I remember this quite clearly because I was dying to tell her.
Vile meal
Probably the worst service I've had in recent memory. Just awful. Food was fine, but when you're sitting there waiting for that long between tiny servings, it's a bad experience regardless.
You know, a little 'sorry', or 'thanks for your patience' goes a long way as well.
This is not a typical restaurant, so don't expect dishes to come out in more traditional portion sizes - or quickly for that matter. These dishes supposed to be savoured, discussed, and digested before the next one comes. The glazed duck breast that I had (with beet, currant, and cocoa) was of Michelin star calibre.
The only thing Yours Truly needs is an espresso machine. I feel like a full cup of drip coffee contains too much hot liquid to follow up an extraordinary meal.