Toronto East Asian Dessert Restaurant Expands to Montreal — And Other Summer Openings

Labour Day has passed, so summer is pretty much over. Here’s a bonus round-up of a range of summer openers you may have missed. For other opening coverage, check Eater’s regularly-updated opening stream, over here.

DOWNTOWN — Ontario-based dessert restaurant Sugar Marmalade has expanded to Montreal, with the first location on Bishop Street. The restaurant’s mostly-sweet offerings include soya bean and sago puddings, Taiwanese-style shaved ice treats, and sweet dumplings — it ostensibly leans towards Chinese sweets, but the quite lengthy menu reads as more pan-East Asian. There are also a few outside offerings, like Polynesian black pearl desserts, crepes, and panna cotta — although with flavours like durian, matcha, and red bean, which help them fit under the Sugar Marmalade umbrella. There’s also a small selection of savoury food, like teriyaki and some deep-fried bites. The chain has been on a slight expansion binge of late, also branching out to Ottawa this year, where local critic Peter Hum found the offerings to be a mixed bag.

PLATEAU — Filipino food is a rarity in Montreal (Junior in Griffintown is the main representative), but the scene just got bigger. Café Vivi is open on Mont-Royal, billed as a Filipino café. It’s a lighter, lunchy kind of spot with sweets like a Filipino mango float, sandwiches, and a few plates like grilled pork and rice, and “Pinoy-style spaghetti”, a decidedly fusiony dish.

VILLAGE — An exciting new lunch counter is open on de Maisonneuve from former 400 Coups and Dominion Square Tavern chef Dave Plant (he’s also known for supplying pastries to cafés including Dispatch, Pista, Crew Collective & Café, and Darling). Fittingly named Dave Plant Food (Bouffe Dave Plant in French). Using mostly organic and local produce, Plant does plenty of pastries, as well as savoury fare — salads, foccacias, and more. His baking is also very photogenic: check out those cinnamon buns and that blueberry tart.

Dave Plant Food

Dave Plant Food

VILLAGE — A sort-of mixed bag mostly-curry restaurant has arrived on Ontario near Papineau. Bighi Curry is pretty darn pan-Asian — doing (at turns) Indian, Thai, Korean, and Japanese dishes (they haven’t stretched to the Middle East or Central Asia yet), from red curry to donkatsu and bibimbap. That’s a worryingly large number of culinary traditions to try to get right, but initial reports suggest they’re doing a good job of it.

PETITE-PATRIE — Bar-bistro-mixed events space Coton landed on the St-Hubert Plaza earlier this summer. It’s not super-formal, with food sticking to options like charcuterie and cheese plates, oysters, some salads and snacky fare, along with natural wines. Elise Tastet has many of the details (in French).

OUTREMONT — A new kosher restaurant by the name Bagetinos is open on Lajoie, with pizza, paninis, poutine, and breakfasts.

DOWNTOWN — Miscellaneous lunch spot Nala Gourmet is new downtown as of August, with a part lunch-counter, part-bakehouse style range of crepes, sandwiches, pastries, and breads.

POINTE-CLAIRE — Poke bowls have made it to the West Island as Côte-des-Neiges restaurant Moushi has expanded to 3593 St-Jean Boulevard. Moushi opened a little under a year ago on Decarie, doing poke, the trendy Hawaiian raw fish-rice bowls, as well as sushi burritos (akin to very large, sandwich-sized sushi rolls). The new location runs along similar lines.

GRIFFINTOWN — Pizzeria No 900 only started expanding a little over a year ago, after the success of the initial location on Bernard, in Outremont. Now Dominic Bujold’s wood-fired Neapolitan pizza restaurant counts 13 locations (eight of which are on the island). The latest addition opened at the end of August in Griffintown, at 1378 Notre-Dame West.

MILE END — The neighbourhood has had a bumper summer for new Japanese restaurants and here’s one more: Joah Joah C.K. opened earlier this summer on Parc, doing mostly sushi, along with a few snacks like fried chicken and seafood yakitori-style skewers.

• Sugar Marmalade's Asian snacks and desserts were hit and miss [Ottawa Citizen]
• Three Food Trends Rolled into One at New CDN Spot [EMTL]
• Mile End Gets Two New Japanese Restaurants in One Week [EMTL]
• Pizzeria No 900 to Open New Restaurants in Ahuntsic, Westmount, and Downtown [EMTL]
• Le Nouveau Resto Evénémentiel de la Plaza Saint-Hubert [Tastet.ca]