Tabule
2009 Yonge St., Toronto, 416-483-3747. Dinner for two with wine, tax and tip, $60.
That Toronto is a city of neighbourhoods is a cliché. The ramifications of our identification with neighbourhoods are less obvious. If troops march on their bellies, then Torontonians equally go to work (and play) on theirs.
The neighbourhood around Yonge Street between Eglinton and Davisville has not been blessed with a surfeit of good restaurants. This past summer, we lost Quartier, the sweet French bistro that never made a buck. Grano is gorgeous and fun, but is not exactly a hotbed of fine cuisine. For a nanosecond, we had great Italiana at Vittorio's, but poor Vittorio departed this vale of tears, which put paid to that.
Slim pickings.
So when Tabule opened this summer, it was no surprise that the neighbourhood went nuts. Good luck getting a table. Still, there's no snob appeal or trendy thing going down here. Tabule is unfashionable, the decor pleasantly ordinary, the ambience unfancy. Tabule is Jerusalem Restaurant cleaned up, edited and gently gentrified.
Middle Eastern cuisine is appealing for three reasons. 1) It has big flavours -- the liberal use of garlic, lemon and olive oil, the core triumvirate of a tasty life. 2) Like other cuisines of the Mediterranean world, it relies on neither butterfat nor animal fat, which makes it ultrahealthy. 3) It's inexpensive.
A big slice of Tabule's menu is the standard lexicon of the eastern Mediterranean. Their hummus, tabbouleh, baba ghanouj and lentil soup are all impeccable. The tabbouleh is loaded with fresh veg and the requisite parsley, the baba ghanouj is wondrously smoky, and the lentil soup is rich with flavour and happily free of cream and butter. With appetizers, they bring a little plate with good olives, lightly pickled pink daikon, hot peppers and small dills.
The only Middle Eastern favourite that is less than salutary is falafel in a pita. Having dined lately at Kensington Kitchen, where they serve the gold standard of falafel, all ungreasy crunch, we're disappointed with the less than crispy offering.
The lesser known Middle Eastern standards are more fun. Vegetarians will be happy here, thanks to fried eggplant (similar to Jerusalem's, which is its best dish), a splendour of thin slices browned crisp and soaked in enough oil to achieve divine decadence. Fried tomatoes are everything they should be: garlicky, sweet and succulent. Flash-fried cauliflower with tahini sauce, another classic (although more arcane), has a strange and yet enchanting taste. Pilaf of rice with lentils, browned onions and spicy tomatoes and cucumbers is almost enough to turn a carnivore away from the dark side.
Ditto the vegetable appeal of delicate vine leaves stuffed with rice spiked with tomatoes, garlic and lemon. Dip these babies in labni (Lebanese cream cheese with garlic and spices) and what you get is creamy, rich and dangerous. Take a trip farther down the road of excess and dunk moist chunks of lamb (from the kebabs).
Other great meat moments at Tabule include kubbe, in which ground meat is rolled round a heart of onions and pine nuts, wrapped in cracked wheat and deep-fried. The only meat mistake is sautéed chicken livers that have been cooked for too long and are dried-out and dusty.
Tabule's adherents, and there are many, cherish the restaurant for its sophisticated take on Middle Eastern food, e.g. red snapper baked with olive oil, olive paste and herbs. The seasoning is deft, and the fish is perfectly cooked and accompanied by signature golden rice pilaf that has more flavour than rice normally claims.
Desserts are store-bought save for creamy rosewater-scented rice pudding. Tabule's taste is impeccable in finding tiny baklavas filled with fresh pistachios. Same with gooey sweet kunaffa, angel hair phyllo layered with light custard. Wash it down with fresh mint limeade or pink guava juice, or take a walk on the wild side with alcoholic exotica in the form of a lemon rosewater martini.