Since Falasca opened, I’ve only heard great things about their pizza and finally made it for lunch last week. We arrived at around 12:30 and there was still a line to the door from the counter. At lunch time, Falasca offers 8 pizza choices from their extensive menu. Each slice is cut to order and priced by weight (~2.00-$2.50/100g), credit cards are accepted only for orders over $10. It was very busy that day and the counter was beginning to look sparse by the time I made it to order.

I grabbed slices of the pesto and focaccia prosciutto, and swapped for a slice of the diavolo from my friend. It was a lot of pizza for me in one sitting but I polished off every bite. The crust was thin and crispy while the ingredients were fresh and paired well together. I really liked the pine nuts on the pesto pizza.

The seating area at lunch was self-serve and the owner was friendly and efficient working behind the counter.

I’m looking forward to trying out more of the pizza flavours and pastas in the future.

Atmosphere: The interior of Quince has a very industrial look with metal tables, exposed brick and concrete and hanging pendant lights. The front of the restaurant are large glass panels looking out onto Yonge where a patio area is set up in the summer months. I love the touch of bright red metal chairs in the central dining area. There’s a more intimate dining area closer to the kitchen, near the bar.

Service: We were about 30 minutes late for our reservation, I called to let them know and they were very understanding. Our server even asked if we were in a rush and was very considerate of the time.  Our entrees arrived just as we were finishing up the bread basket.

Food: I really like the hummus that Quince serves with their bread basket in place of butter. It’s still rich and creamy but less guilt inducing. For entrees, we both had the house made pasta. I ordered the daily pappardelle special with scallops, double smoked bacon and watercress while my friend had the fettuccine with mushrooms, a soft boiled egg and freshly grated cheese. I liked the pappardelle a lot, the flavours of the scallops and bacon were really rich and savoury. The scallops were cooked well. The only off point was that the sauce was a bit oily. The fettucine looked amazing as well and the soft boiled egg was perfect.

In the past, I’ve also visited Quince during winterlicious and tried their flat iron steak grilled panini. The experience is always a nice treat during the workweek.

I’ve been to Fin countless times for lunch over the past 3 years and it’s one of my favourite restaurants in the Yonge and Eglinton area. My order is pretty standard now, the spicy tuna sashimi bowl. The lunch menu is a variety of set rice bowls with a good mix of cooked entrees and chirashi bowls but I’ve been eager to try out their a la carte dinner menu.

Atmosphere: The restaurant itself is pretty spacious, with the typical sake bottles for decor. It’s very suitable for large groups and offers private dining rooms, which our party was seated in. As customers enter and leave, the servers do yell at you in Japanese, but the general atmosphere is quieter and calmer than Guu or even Don Don.

Service: As our party trickled in one by one, tea was brought in for each new arrival. Our private room was out of the way off a corridor, so it was hard to get anyone’s attention unless a dish was being served. No one checked in on us through the meal outside of this, so we had to make sure the servers didn’t leave each time to add to our order. After all our dishes had arrived, no one came to clear the dishes or ask if we wanted to order more, which is typical for izakayas. Our experience could have been even better with more attentive service, this might have been because we weren’t in the main dining area. If Fin added some kind system to ring for service, it would help a lot.

Food: We ordered pretty much every item from the “Daily Special” menu, not everything is pictured. The “Seafood Futomaki Giant Roll” is one of their specialty items and filled with over 15 ingredients. It was really hard to eat, each piece was the size of my fist, but worth the effort. We ordered two so that each person could try a piece and the second servings disappeared quickly.

Pictured from the special menu that day are the clams and salmon belly with yuzu sauce. The salmon was my favourite dish of the night, flaky, flavourful and the sauce was amazing. The mackerel is pickled and toasted with a blowtorch at the table. Mackarel sashimi can be fishy if not fresh, but this wasn’t at all and the last pieces were fought for. Fin serves a udon carbonara similar to Guu, that is a lot creamier and has roe in the sauce. I didn’t love this dish and prefer the Guu version better.

Finishing up the meal, we had 4 servings of the beef sukiyaki hotpot (2 servings pictured). The soup was really sweet, authentic, and a good portion size.

Fin will continue to be a regular lunch spot for me, and I would happily be back for dinner. It’s a great izakaya option in midtown, and could almost satiate my Guu cravings, almost.

(Poor photo quality, I forgot my camera and had to rely on iPhone)

Lil Baci is located within a few blocks of work for me and has been picked up into my roster of lunch venues in the area. The menu is within a good price range for lunch ($15-$25), the portions aren’t oversized but filling and of course delicious.

I usually order the soup (made fresh daily)  and ½ sandwich combo and have tried the Ragu Boy (pictured below) , Italian BLT and Lil Baci Hero. A side salad is served with each plate, very lightly dressed. Some of the lettuce pieces were still full leaves, which I didn’t mind but I did have to cut it up myself a little. As for the sandwich itself, I love the fresh baked bread. It’s soft, airy and just soaks up the sauce. For the Ragu Boy, the pork was tender and fell apart easily. I would recommend any of the three sandwiches I’ve tried. The side soup of the combo is served in a small espresso sized mug, this portion could be bigger. The service is always excellent and our water jug was always full.

Next Visit: The pizzas

UPDATE 12/20/2012: Went back to Balsamico in December and it was so much better. The restaurant was full and the food was much better. This time I ordered the Linguine Fra Diavolo. The pasta was great, the sauce was a little on the oily side but the experience is bumping my rating up from a C* to B*.

Balsamico is one of the many Italian restaurants in the Yonge-Eglinton neighbourhood that’s opened up more recently. I stopped by for lunch in August with a friend. We sat down at noon and the place was empty, it pretty much stayed empty for the rest of the lunch hour.

Atmosphere: The restaurant feels very warm with dark wood tables, a bar at the back and mustard yellow walls. The old fashioned chandelier also provided intimate lighting throughout the space.

Service: We were able to sit at a table of our choosing since the restaurant wasn’t full. The service was welcoming, attentive and friendly but not intrusive. They were very patient with explaining the menu to us and answering all of the questions about the Italian names.

Food: I had been craving risotto for some time now so went with the Risotto Ai Funghi for my main while my friend ordered the Quattro Stagioni pizza (mozzarella, fresh tomatoes, grilled mushrooms, grilled zucchini and prosciutto). The way the toppings  on the pizza was separated was interesting, we ended up rebuilding each piece with a little bit of each anyways but that flexibility was nice. My risotto was fairly under cooked  It may have been because it was a quiet day and they weren’t expecting an order, but it’s really no excuse. I only got through half of it. The flavours were great and I loved all the mushrooms, it just needed more time on the stove, which for $19 at lunch I wouldn’t have minded waiting. The half I took home, after being reheated, was perfect.