Bight Restaurant - Thunder Bay

Bight Restaurant & Bar was recommended to us during our visit in Thunder Bay. The waterfront restaurant recently opened at the Water Garden Pavilion at Prince Arthur's Landing Marina Park and I imagine that it'll be pretty popular with the locals and tourists around summertime. 

The restaurant has a great open concept within the Water Garden Pavilion and it'll be great place for families and couples to grab a bite to eat while enjoying the Marina (not so much in the winter when Lake Superior is frozen over - but hopefully in the summer).

Fish and Chips $15

Wow! This meal was so good! The fish had a meaty, flaky and firm flesh with a nice crunchy batter. 

I also can't rave enough about the lemon caper tartar sauce - it was AMAZING (I kept ordering more of it). It had the perfect mix of zesty, tangy and sweet with the chunks of chopped pickles and little hint of lemon in the mayonnaise. The fries were perfect too: crispy and flavourful - it was even better with the tartar sauce, although their in-house made ketchup was nice (if a little too sweet). The kale and radish slaw was pretty good - an interesting take on normal coleslaw. 

Overall: Delicious! The food is fantastic and the view is really nice. Service can be a little slow, but it might just be that they're working out their kinks and it might even be better in the summer when you can actually enjoy the view of the Marina.

Website: http://www.bightrestaurant.ca/

5 Forks - Thunder Bay

Right next to the Days Inn Thunder Bay North is the 5 Forks Restaurant:

A classy nice restaurant with a well-stocked bar and some big screen TVs for customers to follow sports.

The Signature burger $16
Topped with pulled pork & smoked cheddar, smothered in forty creek bbq sauce & crispy onion strings
I probably should have paid more attention to the side of the menu...this was a 1/2 pound burger - Yikes!
Really good though! The pulled pork had this sweet bbq sauce on top and the crispy onion strings were so good! The hot cross bun was a nice change up from a normal burger bun or kaiser; the one downside was the wilty iceberg lettuce and mushy tomato (and I didn't see the baby dill pickle). I ordered a Caesar salad to balance out the burger. The cheese crisp was good and it had real bacon bits, but I found that it didn't have enough dressing. 

!
The burger was huge!So much meat...

Prosciutto & Arugula flatbread $16
brushed with a roasted garlic spread & topped with mozzarella, asiago & sliced prosciutto finished with fresh arugula tossed in house-made infused chili oil & topped with shaved parmesan cheese.
The flatbread looked almost paper thin, but apparently it was rather filling. It was really nicely presented.

Overall: The restaurant was rather pricey and service was pretty slow, but the burgers are really good.

Website: http://www.5forksrestaurant.com/

Niva's Restaurant - Thunder Bay

On my Porter flight from Toronto to Thunder Bay, I was flipping through the in-flight magazine noticed that a restaurant in Thunder Bay was profiled: Niva's Restaurant - a family run home style Finnish restaurant.

So, we decided to try it out:

The waitresses seemed liked they knew all the regulars and they had a warm greeting and welcome for everyone who came in.

Considering it felt like -45°C outside with windchill, I was immediately drawn into the hot meals section of the menu:

Hot beef sandwich with gravy on top

Mmmm gravy...everything tastes better with gravy on top! 

A very filling hot roast beef sandwich with thick and slightly sweet gravy on the top. 

Fantastic home cooked meal!

Mojakka meal

This Finnish homemade beef and potato stew had chunks of beef and a slightly starchy and grainy taste from the potatoes. It was hearty, tasty and thick - perfect for warming up in the cold weather. I also got two pieces of brown bread, a drink and a dessert which I upgraded from rice pudding to:

Coconut Cream pie for an extra $1 

Well worth it! The pie was freshly made in the morning and it was delicious. The homemade custard was a nice balance of not too heavy and not too sweet on a great pie crust. Then it was topped with real whipped cream and toasted coconut - amazing!

Overall: Good food and dessert! It's a little more upscale and cosy than the Hoito and it's constantly busy with regulars at lunch.

Terra Restaurant

 Terra in Thornhill is a nice classy restaurant just south of Highway 7 on Yonge. They regularly offer a 3 course Sundaylicious menu for $39 (excluding tax & tip). 

I asked for hot water & lemon and I got my own little pot!

We were served the complementary bread and butter and then our appetizers came:

Lobster Bisque with Brandy Chantilly
In simple layman's terms, this was a creamy Lobster soup with brandy whipped cream. The name was as sophisticated as the way they served it: (1) first, a waiter put the soup bowl with just the whipped cream on my plate (it took me a while to process that there was only the whipped cream and no, the bisque wasn't invisible); then, (2) another waiter came with a tureen and poured the soup around the chantilly and it floated to the top.
The soup was rich, thick and heavy with the lobster flavour. The spices also packed a punch near the end. It was really lovely - even if it was a super heavy way to start off my meal.


Baby Arugula Salad with balsamic dressing, candied pecans, Bosc Pear and Gorgonzola Cheese
A simple and nice salad. I love the contrast of the pear, balsamic and gorgonzola cheese: the pear was honey sweet and juicy, the balsamic was lightly tangy and the gorgonzola had a strong bite to it. It would have been better with more dressing.


Tender New Zealand "Arrow" Calamari - grilled, sautéed spinach, blistered cherry tomatoes, garlic, caramelized lemon and extra virgin olive oil (additional $6)
Wow - we weren't expecting that much more calamari for $6 more. What a delicious appetizer! The calamari was perfectly grilled and tender and the bed of spinach and cherry tomatoes added great flavour.  The $6 upgrade was worth it!

Canadian 'AAA' Beef Filet with Broccolini, Rapini, Fine French Beans, Organic Carrots, Fingerling Potatoes and Red Wine Jus (Additional $15)
Great filet mignon! Tender, juicy and a fantastic medium rare that was delicious with the red wine jus.
The broccolini, french beans, carrots and potatoes were done well.


Grilled Provimi Veal T-Bone with Wild Mushroom Risotto and Red wine jus (Additional $12)
The mushroom risotto was AMAZING! It was fragrant and complex and it was accompanied by a bed of broccolini and beans. The veal T-Bone was done nicely too.


Grilled Centre cut Atlantic Salmon with lemon, olive oil emulsion and mixed greens
The salmon was nicely seared with a super tender light pink fleshy center (a little more cooked than sashimi raw). The chefs cook here with a lot of detail and finesse. The greens and potatoes were nicely done as well - although the red wine jus was much tastier than the olive oil emulsion.

 
Pineapple upside down cake
Wow - that's a lot of cake! I was not anticipating that dessert would be...so huge!
It was so good that I couldn't help but finish it (despite being super full from my entrée). I loved the almond ice cream with the soft warm cake - it was almost like the richness and flavour of the cake was complemented perfectly by the ice cream. It was evident that a lot of thought went into making this dessert.


Chocolate Torte
Another massive dessert: warm and rich molten lava cake with banana ice cream and assorted berries on the side. Super decadent and delicious!


Crème brûlée
One of the better Crème brûlées I've had in a while! An indulgent, sweet and creamy vanilla custard with an accompaniment of berries and biscotti - delightful!

Overall: Fantastic meal at Terra Restaurant! The food was delicious every course of the meal and service was efficient! The bonus was that you can get 1000 OpenTable points for dining at Terra (meaning that you're that much closer to getting a $26 dining certificate to eat at your choice of restaurants).  

Website: http://www.terrarestaurant.ca/

Spice Route

You can identify Spice Route since it's the only large building with a distinct door (and no name plate) on King Street West.

Through the large wooden doors of Spice Route, you enter a really nice Asian themed restaurant with a huge central bar in the middle of the restaurant. 

Note: The bathrooms were really cool. They each had sliding doors with individual toilet stalls & sinks in each room. The interesting part was the one-way(?) window to a courtyard. 

The service was rather slow. 

The spice rack with wasabi mayo, soy sauce and a spicy salsa

  

Complementary buns

They were pretty interesting; a little crispy from being lightly deep-fried on the outside and doughy inside. 

Viet rack of lamb - lemongrass marinated with mint sauce $26

The lamb was flavoured really well and the meat was tender and juicy. I also really liked the slightly spicy fish   sauce that I used for dipping on the side. The chef put 4 ribs for the plate, but these were relatively small portions. Therefore, the dish wasn't very filling even with the bed of gai lan underneath the ribs. 

 Mongolian sirloin beef with dry chili, scallions, fresh ginger + crispy rice sticks $20

There was a spicy kick to the sirloin beef that wasn't evident at first, but eventually I started feeling the heat. 

I liked the sauce and the combination of the dry crispy rice sticks and moist chewy beef in sauce. 

Dessert Menu

 Lemongrass + ginger crème brûlée topped with chocolate chopsticks 

Really delightful and interesting! The candied ginger was really nice; however there was no sign of the chocolate chopsticks? 

The crème brûlée had tiny hints of lemongrass, but it wasn't very obvious.

Raspberry chocolate brownie with caramelized mandarins and tangerine cream

This dessert was nicely done: the brownie had the right texture and the cream on top was light and packed with flavour. 

Overall: It was a nice meal, but definitely a little pricey for Asian fusion. It's understandable that the costs are higher due to real estate costs in the King West area, but I wasn't wow-ed by the food either. The atmosphere in the restaurant was great, hip and intimate with a club like feel. 

Website: http://www.spiceroute.ca/ 

Sushi on 7

I had a serious craving for All You Can Eat Sushi, so we went to Sushi on 7:

The main difference between the dinner menu and the regular menu is mainly sashimi (and maybe a few more rolls)

 

Spider rolls (Soft shell crab) (8 pc.) and Spicy Salmon roll (6 pc)

The restaurant lets you order in increments of 4 and 8 for certain rolls and other rolls come in 6. 

I love soft shell crab rolls; they serve the rolls with crunchy and meaty crab, avocado, cucumbers and imitation crab. I really like the way they do the rolls here too - there's not too much rice and there's a ton of ingredients to pack the rolls. 

The spicy salmon was good too! Not super spicy but enough to add a nice kick to the sushi. 

Dinner only: Green Dragon Roll

Tempura shrimp, imitation crab, cucumber and avocado with avocado and fish roe on top. I found that I liked the Crispy Dragon roll (below) better than the Green Dragon roll only offered at dinner:

Crispy Dragon roll
They had BBQ eel and avocado on top of the roll and the same ingredients as the Green Dragon roll.
The sushi here was all tightly wrapped and perfectly bite sized (they fit nicely into your mouth Sushi Bong)

Dinner only: Rainbow Roll
Imitation crab, cucumber, avocado rolls topped with assorted ingredients (raw salmon, avocado, raw shrimp and BBQ eel)

  

Deep fried Squid Balls
Tiny, chewy and gummy balls with sauce for dipping.

 

Deep fried Salmon head and Chicken gizzard skewers

I don't think I've seen on an AYCE menu (must be Chinese style AYCE sushi)

   

Dinner only: Salmon sashimi and white tuna sashimi

Fresh buttery soft and delicious salmon. The pieces were pretty big too! We ordered more salmon cause it was so good. The white tuna was leaner and a little tougher (I love salmon sashimi more).

 

Top: BBQ eel sushi pizza and Bottom: Enoki and beef rolls

I really liked the BBQ eel sushi pizza: the pizza was made of this crispy and chewy rice patty and topped with BBQ eel and like tempura yam or something soft. I learned that sushi pizza is a popular novelty in Toronto (thanks Wikipedia), I always thought it was just part of all AYCE menus.  

 

Chicken Cutlet Udon
Cute little portion of chicken cutlet udon

 

Dinner only: Wasabi mussels
They weren't very spicy at first and then I started feeling the heat. If I liked wasabi, I probably would have enjoyed these more...but I was too busy tearing up.

Shrimp tempura
Crispy fried tempura

 

Dinner only: Crème brûlée

I love crème brûlée; it's probably one of my favourite desserts. This one by Sushi on 7 tasted like an Asian version using egg custard rather than a vanilla custard. I kept thinking that this was like a Hong Kong Egg Tart with a little caramelized brown sugar on top - I can't say I was a fan.

  

All things mango! Mango pudding and mango ice cream
The mango pudding tasted like it was out of a box and the mango ice cream was okay.
Sushi on 7 has more dessert options than a lot of AYCE places (I would have ordered the deep fried banana if I was able to keep eating).

Overall: I really liked Sushi on 7! The sashimi was good, rolls were tightly wrapped and ingredients were fresh, service was really fast and prices were reasonable.