J.P. Challet is my new BFF. He doesn’t know it yet, but after dining in his new bistro, Ici, I feel like we’re … close. He gets me.
Ici has been one of the most anticipated restaurants to open this fall. This is in no small part due to serious delays after a battle with Joe Pantalone and the local neighbourhood that fought to deny Challet a liquor licence for his charming space.
But, two years after signing the lease, Ici is here. It is real and the food is spectacular.
The sign in the window, Cuisine Nouveau Classique, tells all. Ici is Challet’s whimsical interpretation of classic French food. Inside, the space is, well, “intimate” would be putting it mildly. Most seats are bar stools and face the open kitchen or the windows. The decor is sparse, mostly grey with red accents.
Challet is all about making diners feel at home in a pressure-free, fine dining kind of way, from the affordable wines by the bottle and the three- or six-ounce options by the glass to the optional two-thirds portion on menu items. And I’m enjoying the vibe.
Before starters arrive, I order dessert. Grand Marnier soufflé is made from scratch and needs to be ordered ahead of time.
The Lorette salad and goat cheese tart ($9/$15) is a simple presentation of a frisée blend with some creamy celery root matchsticks playing second fiddle to a lovely, but tiny goat cheese and caramelized onion tart with a perfectly crisp and thin pastry shell. It’s very Parisian with a Dijonforward dressing. Superb.
The lobster bisque that is served with salmon quenelles ($12/$18) is velvety with deep flavour. The salmon quenelles are lightly poached and tender.
Foie gras torchon and black trumpet croquette ($18/$28) is silky smooth with sweet marmalade.
Hot crispy croquette is great textural contrast.
Now we enter the “nouveau” zone with shrimp pomme frites and rouille ravioli ($13/$19), a deconstructed seafood soup — without the liquid.
The plump shrimp are wrapped up with crisp shoestring potatoes and bathed in a light creamy herb sauce, but rouille is not substantial enough to fill ravioli.
The veal blanquette ($17/$29) is a free- form ravioli filled with veal stew where intensely flavoured mushroom liqueur slightly overpowers veal. Morels offer a delicate earthy note, and the two-thirds portion is very satisfying.
The duck magret apicius ($17/$29) is the star of the show: perfectly cooked with a subtle harmony of anise and honey.
My Grand Marnier soufflé ($16) does not disappoint and takes me back to my first job when I made them. Nicely browned, good contrast from orange zest and still wet in the centre. The Trio of Apple ($10) is a balanced caramel tatin with wafer-thin crust and crepe filled with steamed apples.
Both desserts have lightness and simplicity that only the French can seem to master.
J.P.’s menu is classic, but his interpretation is pure joy. It’s lowkey and the food is the star — like dining at a friend’s house who just happens to be a great French chef.
Ici Bistro, 538 Manning St., 416-536-0079 $100 Dinner for two
Post City Magazines’ food critic Christine Cushing graduated from George Brown and Ecole de Cuisine La Varenne in Paris. She stars in Fearless in the Kitchen.
