Thursday, July 31, 2014

Paese Ristorante: Inspired in Italy, Made in Canada

Inspired in Italy, Made in Canada

That’s the motto of Paese Ristorante, which in my books is definitely better than Americanized(Canadian)-Italian cuisine because a lot of restaurants claims to be Italian when they don’t know how to classify their food. Furthermore, I can understand that certain ingredients for cuisines such as Chinese, French or Italian are not locally available, but it is not an excuse to produce food of sub-par quality. Especially, as we live in a world of globalization.

An effort should be made ensuring dishes originating from certain regions of world be made as close as possible to the real thing; if you classify and proclaim your restaurant as belonging to the style of a specific region.

So, whenever I am in the mood for Italian food and don’t want to head downtown I head over to Paese on Bathurst St. 
(Other location: King St. W.) Because they follow the farm to table philosophy, where the ingredients they use in most of their dishes are locally sourced from Canada. Most importantly, they understand fancy does not mean perfect.

Paese always starts you off with their house-made focaccia bread accompanied by their tapenade. 
The tapenade depends on what it’s in season and I guess what the Chef felt like making that day.
The appetizer that I always suggest people that they must order at Paese is the Octopus, yes it’s true you can make octopus at home, but something about it you can’t replicate at home. I don’t know if it’s the char on the octopus itself, fried capers with escarole or the aioli, despite being a simple dish if you know what you are doing then it’s perfect.