AZURE RESTAURANT AND BAR

With fall quickly approaching, I’m reminiscing about the great meals I’ve had the pleasure of enjoying this summer, which included dinner at Azure, the restaurant of the Intercontinental Toronto hotel on Front street. Azure kindly invited me to visit for dinner and to try out their special summer drink, a boozy Watermelon Margarita. One thing I always miss about the warm weather is sipping drinks out on the patio, the fruitier, the better.

Disclaimer: All food and drinks reviewed below were provided complimentary. All opinions expressed below are wholly mine.

Atmosphere: Being a hotel restaurant, Azure was elegant with a large bar and many of the diners were guests from out of town. With a slanted glass ceiling, dark wood tables and chocolate leather seats, the dining space was elegant and airy. A long bar stretched across one wall with bar stools and the area also housed sets of armchairs with round cocktail tables. That day, the Olympics were being shown on a screen behind the bar, and the spot would be great for watching any sporting event.

Service: Walking into the hotel lobby, Azure was located just to the right. A hostess greeted us and showed us to our table (one with plenty of natural light as requested). Both drinks and food arrived quickly and our server checked on us frequently. He was the kind of friendly, talkative server who liked to make jokes and chat.

Food: Dinner began with a Watermelon Margarita (or two), which was made with tequila, lime juice and fresh watermelon juice, topped with a piece of compressed, candied watermelon in a salt rimmed glass. The cocktail was refreshing, sweet, sour and very satisfying on a hot day. I really liked the compressed watermelon, that was still juicy and had a concentrated flavour.

For appetizers, my friend and I split the Hummus plate and Tuna Tostadas with a pistachio crust and peach salsa. The tuna was lightly seared, topped with the salsa and served on a crunchy corn chip. I had to take two bites for each tostada, as the medallion of tuna was such a large portion. The hummus was served with two types of olives and grilled flatbread triangles. With the amount of hummus on the plate, we needed several more helpings of pita to get through the creamy goodness, but that meant filling up before our entrees even arrived.

I ordered the Pan Seared Pickerel for my main, served with potato darphin (almost like a hash brown), ratatouille and a white sauce. Perched on the other components of the dish, the pickerel had a beautiful charred skin and flaked nicely with a fork. I enjoyed the flavour of the fish, which was lightly seasoned and cooked to just firm. Compared to the fish, the rest of the plate was a little lackluster. My friend ordered the Smoked Gouda CheeseBurger with a side of spiced fries. Even though I was full from my meal, I couldn’t help but sneak some of her few fries. We were both quite well-fed and happy with no room left for dessert. The table next to us had ordered several sweet items and the Chocolate S’mores Parfait was very tempting.