Best Toronto Italian restaurants

Aria Ristorante

25 York St., 416 363 2742
The room is a showstopper, with tremendous starburst light fixtures and floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Maple Leaf Square. Translucent pink sheets of tender veal dressed with anchovy, tuna and caper sauce make for the city’s vitello tonnato that is best. Desserts are lusciously traditional (a pistachio tart with macerated strawberries) or brilliantly non-traditional (a creamy popcorn, pine nut and sweet corn ice cream bar). Closed Sundays unless there’s an event at the ACC.

La Cascina

1552 Avenue Rd., 416-590-7819
Abruzzan chef Luca Del Rosso’s menu changes daily, but his principal tools are consistently time and salt, olive oil —each dish is cooked slow, long and soft. The antipasti class brings a run of mini-masterpieces, including creamy pan fried potatoes paired with sour tomatoes and salty capers; slow-cooked lentils and carrots; and a downy scramble of eggs, eggplant and ricotta.

Bricco Kitchen and Wine Bar

3047 Dundas St. W., 647-464-9100
Using its midcentury Scandinavian furniture, intricately patterned ceramic plates and whitewashed brick, this wonderful 45- in the Junction is easily among the prettiest areas in the town. The polished-but- aesthetic that is unfussy applies to the cooking also, with nuovo rustico dishes from your Piedmont area highlighting flavours that are hearty and both trendy demo. The antipasto board departs in the normal meat-and-cheese spread to include chickpea fritters, blue cheese–stuffed dates, lonza that was superb and prosciutto-wrapped bread sticks. Lemon rind balances creamy Arctic char that is uncooked, and starchy support is lent by big, fluffy gnocchi into a rich braised rabbit. Wine rotates every two weeks, along with the trios of two-ounce pours are a great strategy to try the many all-natural, small-company alternatives on offer.

Mistura

265 Davenport Rd., 416 515 0009
The attractive, gray-on-grey room is best scanned in the comfort of a plush booth. Chef Klaus Rourich sends out refined interpretations of classic northern Italian dishes. For seasoning, a vibrant salad of orange slices, shaved fennel and celery uses ricotta and niçoise olives, and almonds for texture. Octopus, without a trace of mush, is counter by earthy puttanesca. Textbook bolognese, just bound with milk, is deep with flavour.

Amalfi coast restaurant

Toca

181 Wellington St. W., 416 572 8008
The Ritz-Carlton’s attractive eatery has finally found its footing. A pair of scampi perch that is barely cooked of burrata on soft curds held in place from the natural bowl of an artichoke heart. Bitter, mellow sautéed mushrooms in a heating fall salad tame brilliant red radicchio leaves. Arrayed and sliced throughout the bone, the sup remely tender, slightly awesome steak Fiorentina is one of the city’s great cuts of meat. Smooth and airy Roman gnocchi, made with semolina instead of potato, make a great accompaniment, as does a bowl of glistening braised escarole studded with hazelnuts and raisins.

F’Amelia

12 Amelia St., 416 323 0666
While preserving the Italian heart of simplicity, the kitchen of the Cabaggetown favourite continues to wow with its creativity. Appetizers are excellent: smoky grilled radicchio livens up an already delicious fig salad, and battered and grilled calamari comes brushed with garlicky pesto. Chef Riley Skelton provides a unique take on carbonara—possibly the most holy dish in the Italian canon— adding sautéed red onion, crisped prosciutto and spinach, and using handmade tagliatelle in place of spaghetti. Creamy eggplant is the star of a hot lamb sausage pizza. In warmer weather, the size of the eatery doubles and is the ideal area to drink a glass of wine and take in the sights that are neighbourhood.

Tutti Matti

364 Adelaide St. W., 416-597-8839
Don’t let dinner jazz playlist and the outdated decor at this Amusement District trattoria dissuade you— long as you’re hungry, there’s no better place to be. Servers are concurrently efficient and laid-back, a mix that indicates an all too-uncommon awareness of hospitality that is authentic. The menu attributes humble Tuscan staples—lots of boar and a lot — but the dishes arrive to the table expertly cooked and exquisitely conceived. A well timed glug of amber vin santo catapults chicken livers and sage butter, tossed with gold house-made tagliatelle and briny capers, into a divine plane. While the short ribs are popular, the bunny entrée is superlative, its meat gently cooked sous-vide before being dusted with flour, deep-fried and plated with lemony fingerlings and grilled greens. It’s a sly showstopper, memorable precisely for the simplicity that is brazen executed. Which, come to consider it, additionally describes Tutti Matti to a T.

Enoteca Sociale

1288 Dundas St. W., 416-534-1200
At its heart, the restaurant will not, although its chefs may change. Between the faux-wood panelling, the genuine warmth toward returning parties by professional staff as well as the bar shown ’s remarkable variety of exceptional, quaffable Italian wines, this comfy place stays Toronto’s of dining by the Tiber, most authentic replica. Chef James Santon catches the soul of a languorous puddle of smoked ricotta, a pillowy foundation for sour tomato, chilies and also the boot in his gnocchi that reads achingly simple, but is soul-food substantial. Dialogue resumes only after every last bite has been scraped in the plate and licked off the spoon, and pauses for chocolate terrine, a trinity of spritely olive oil, candied hazelnuts and compact chocolate mousse.