Essential restaurants in Toronto

To dine in Toronto is to experience cuisine from every corner of the world.

Over half of Torontonians are born outside of Canada, making it one of the most culturally diverse cities on the planet. That diversity influences a devoted food scene, packed with flavour.

Locals line up for the latest guest chef or slice of pizza, and are loyal to their favourite mom-and-pop place. On a single street you might find a French bistro, a Korean snack bar, a Thai barbecue joint, and a buzzy Michelin star spot all within steps of each other. It’s a city built on its many neighbourhoods and a deep love for food. There is simply no better place to eat.

From bold flavour on hip Ossington Avenue to a Kensington Market hideaway, follow our list of recommendations and you won’t go wrong.

Restaurants in Toronto’s West End

Prime Seafood Palace

Best for: A steakhouse in a seriously slick setting
Location: 944 Queen St W, Toronto, ON M6J 1G8
Price: $$$$

Prime Seafood Palace is the crown jewel in celeb chef Matty Matheson’s restaurant empire. It immediately impresses with an interior as light and airy as a Scandinavian cathedral, with a barrel vaulted ceiling made from 12,000 pounds of Canadian maple wood. Brass window slats filter natural light while separating the dining room from the bustle of Queen West outside.

It’s not all about looks, though. A steakhouse at its core, prime rib, bone-in-strip and cote du boeuf are sourced from Ontario farms and expertly cooked over coals on the in-house hearth. The decadent menu also includes crackly, golden potato pavés, sliced so thinly you fear for the chef’s fingers – until you learn they’re made with about 26 layers of duck fat, at which point you fear for yourself (worth it). Caviar can be added to just about anything and yes, there’s seafood, served chilled or warm.

Union

Best for: Neighbourhood hero with French inflection
Location: 72 Ossington Avenue, Toronto, ON M6J 2Y7
Price: $$

When Union opened its doors on the now-trendy Ossington, the street was still emerging. Seventeen years later, locals still can’t shake this French-ish bistro. It’s hard to resist the pull of the U-shaped bar, with its scuffed and stained marble top that’s seen more than its fair share of half-price wine Mondays. Peeling wallpaper still covers exposed red brick walls – small details that add to Union’s rustic charm.

Open daily from 11.30am to 10pm, you might drift in for a midweek wine or Sunday brunch, loading up on potato rösti and Caesars (Canada’s answer to the Bloody Mary). Longstanding dishes feel part of the city’s fabric: its steak tartare is arguably Toronto’s best, and don’t sleep on the elk sliders, glazed in Canadian maple syrup, mustard, and soy.

Taverne Bernhardt’s

Best for: Rotisserie chicken on a light-strung patio
Location: 202 Dovercourt Road, Toronto, ON M6J 3C8
Price: $$

Bernhardt’s may appear unassuming beneath the fading Julie’s Snack Bar sign that still hangs outfront, but follow the smell of rotisserie chicken and you’ll be rewarded with one of the city’s most treasured local spots. Tucked inside a converted Edwardian home strung with twinkly patio lights, the vibe feels more like a dinner party than a restaurant. The chicken borders on an art form here, with top-quality birds slowly turning on a French rotisserie while potatoes catch the drippings beneath.

Served golden with all the fixings, the birds are the main event, but don’t skip the vegetables and noshes, such as Bernhardt’s Big Greenie, topped with curly shavings of smoked cheddar. Finish with the whimsical, double swirled crème glacée.

Quetzal

Best for: Michelin-starred Mexican cooked over fire
Location: 419 College Street, Toronto, ON M5T 1T1
Price: $$$$

The wood-fired grill is at the heart of Quetzal – at a staggering 28 feet, it’s hard not to be. Yet it doesn’t overpower this lively Michelin-starred Mexican restaurant in Toronto’s Little Italy. A sweeping curved ceiling is designed to evoke the white tarps of Mexico’s outdoor markets, creating a polished space that isn’t overly precious.

Don’t let the Michelin moniker fool you, this is no delicate tweezer food. Quetzal’s prowess lies in its command of open fire. Dishes are either raw, cured or cooked entirely over flame and embers. Nearly every plate carries some element of char or smoke, though never at the expense of balance. Instead, the smoke deepens the flavours: kanpachi kissed by the grill, freshly pressed tortillas arriving hot off the clay comal, roasted bone marrow glistening. Even the cocktails carry subtle hints of smokiness with many built around mezcal. Park yourself at the mighty 40 seat bar and watch the magic happen.

Bar Isabel

Best for: Longstanding Spanish tavern for energetic tapas
Location: 797 College Street, Toronto, ON M6G 1C7
Price: $$$

Before Toronto’s wave of snack bars and small-plates restaurants, there was Bar Isabel, with its pan con tomate and pintxos-bar culture that didn’t just throw the set menu out the window, but doused it with sherry and set it aflame.

Thirteen years on, it may not be a rebel anymore, but it’s stayed true to itself: good food, great service, a stalwart that’s still got it. It is easy to spot on College Street, with its Spanish tavern facade sticking out like a wooden thumb against the surrounding brick and glass. Inside, mosaic tiles and dark wood glow red like a Spanish bull.

The vibe shifts depending on where you’re seated: the front room is intimate, almost monastic beneath stained glass windows. The bar is lively and energetic with bone marrow luges and regulars sipping house vermut. The back area, always bustling with servers, many of whom have been there for years, balancing plates of gleaming conservas, slicing whole legs of Bellota jamón, or pouring sherry cream over the legendary Basque cake.

Bar Eugenie

Best for: Hyper-seasonal small plates in a cosy Harbord Village house
Location: 89 Harbord Street, Toronto, ON M5S 1G4
Price: $$$$

You could spend a whole day eating in Harbord Village, rotating between its bakeries, cafés and restaurants, but you’d be remiss not to make a stop at Bar Eugenie for dinner. Look for the pointy white house squeezed between two others, marked by a bright orange door, and you’ve found it. The wood-fire oven in the kitchen and narrow interior breed comfort, making it feel more like coolest friend’s house.

The restaurant is owned by three industry heavyweights who met while working at Alo Food Group (with a few Michelin stars under their belt). While the restaurant is named after Eugénie Brazier, the famed French chef, the menu is tied to any one cuisine. Instead, each dish on the seasonal menu is built around a standout ingredient. Perhaps its Ontario asparagus with brown butter in spring, or lamb tartare with a trio of soy-cured egg yolk, olives, and white anchovies.

Jamil’s Chaat House

Best for: Comforting Pakistani-style cooking
Address: 1086 Queen St W, Toronto, ON M6J 1H8
Price: $$

Walk through Jamil’s Chaat House’s bright yellow entrance and you’re not in Queen West anymore. Instead, you’re somewhere between Lahore and Toronto. What began as a successful pop-up has grown into permanent digs for Pakistani-inspired bold flavours. Bollywood records, personal photos and flickering candles sit beneath a soft amber glow, set against walnut millwork.

While Pakistani influences anchor the menu, the dishes aren’t bound by rules. Karahi chicken meets a sloppy joe, on a potato roll laden with tomato-rich Kashmiri chilli, topped with mayo and pickled ginger. Leave room for the date sticky toffee pudding with salty cardamom ice cream, which tastes like a masala chai-induced dream.

Pizzeria Badiali

Best for: Cult-status slices with inventive toppings
Address: 181 Dovercourt Road, Toronto, ON M6J 3C2
Price: $$

​​If you see a line at the corner of Dovercourt and Argyle Street, chances are it’s for Badiali. One thing about Torontonians: we will wait in line, especially for a pizza shop that hasn’t had a quiet moment since opening in 2021. Diners grab a slice and stick around, spilling onto the sidewalk. A second location is also available in Mirvish Village.

Toronto doesn’t have a defined pizza style like New York or Naples, but like so much of the city’s food scene, it borrows a little from everywhere to create something distinctly its own.

The industry veterans behind the venture get cheffy with toppings: classic margherita and pepperoni sit alongside more experimental cacio e pepe and vodka pie. The capicola and pineapple is their take on Hawaiian pizza (invented in Canada, no less), topped with whole milk mozzarella, red onion, capicola, pineapple, and Calabrian chili. Pro pizza tip: order online ahead of pickup.

Alma

Best for: Contemporary Chinese cooking with global influences
Location: 1194 Bloor St W, Toronto, ON M6H 1N2
Price: $$

Almost a direct contrast to the vibrant Bloordale Village it sits within, Alma’s interior is decidedly pared back: white walls, wood furnishings, and neutral tones, save for a few red Chinese lanterns dangling from the ceiling. The flavours, though, are anything but muted. Drawing on her Hakka-Chinese heritage, upbringing in India, and time cooking in French and Italian kitchens, chef-owner Anna Chen folds each strand of her collective experience into dishes like the scallion bao with stracciatella or the signature pork wonton noodles, slicked in a punchy, schmaltzy black pepper soy sauce you’d be forgiven for slurping right from the bowl.

Restaurants in Toronto’s East End

Maha’s

Best for: Family-run Egyptian daytime dishes with cardamom lattés
Location: 226 Greenwood Ave, Toronto, ON M4L 2R5
Price: $

Torontonians queue year-round for Maha’s heaping plates of Egyptian brunch, regardless of the weather. Open from 8am to 4:30pm every day except Wednesday, this charming spot in Leslieville feels like stepping into a family home. And in a way, you have. Chef Maha Barsoon and her children, chef Monica and drinks director Mark, are behind every dish, pour, and thoughtful detail, from the signature honey cardamom latté to the trinkets and keepsakes from trips back home to Egypt.

The food is as comforting as the surroundings: the Egyptian street-corner staple of foole (slow-cooked fava beans) is served with falafel and house-made tomato feta, while the shakshuka swaps poached for scrambled eggs with a side of traditional balady bread, perfect for scooping. End with a Turkish coffee and perhaps even a fortune reading from the leftover grounds.

Wynona

Best for: Handmade pasta in a romantic neighbourhood spot
Location: 819 Gerrard Street. E., Toronto, ON M4M 1Y8
Price: $$

In this pasta-obsessed city, Eastenders stay true to Wynona: a romantic, Italian-ish spot with whitewashed brick, light wood, and big bundles of dried flowers. It has the easy comfort and confidence of a restaurant fully settled into itself, that’s spent years handrolling and shaping pasta to perfection.

The menu changes with the seasons: cappelletti – the hat-shaped pasta – with ramps in the spring, or ziti with miso squash in the fall. Good wine and good food are always on the table, especially with their “Trust Us” menu with five courses for $75 per person.

Restaurants in central Toronto

20 Victoria

Best for: Michelin-level finesse in an unpretentious downtown oasis
Address: 20 Victoria St, Toronto, ON M5C 2A1
Price: $$$

Contrary to being in the middle of downtown, 20 Victoria feels surprisingly secluded. As the surrounding office towers empty out, the block turns almost eerily quiet. This is when 20 Vic really comes alive.

A new team took over the restaurant in 2026 and has maintained its refreshingly down to earth approach to fine dining, despite the white-tablecloth interior. The intimate restaurant holds 22 seats across two spaces: a bar for à la carte, and the dining room where a seven-course tasting menu delivers bold flavour (think kanpachi with sea-buckthorn leche de tigre) is served. Dishes stay rooted in Ontario ingredients and Canada’s coastal regions, while reflecting the team’s diverse heritage. Do get the signature Muscovy duck.

Sunnys Chinese

Best for: Regional Chinese cooking hidden in Kensington Market
Location: 60 Kensington Avenue Toronto, ON M5T 2K1 (inside Kensington Mall)
Price: $$

The fluorescent-lit hallway of Kensington Mall (inside Kensington Market) leads to one of the city’s most delicious surprises: Sunny’s Chinese. Hidden at the end of a narrow passageway, the buzzing restaurant feels worlds away from the cracked floors and harsh lighting outside. The dim, windowless space glows with seafoam-green booths and pink-tiled walls, while heat pours from the open kitchen, where sizzling woks and pungent chillies bring regional Chinese dishes to life. In the summer, cool down on the epic back patio with baijiu slushies.

The menu leans heavily into the flavours of Sichuan, Shaanxi, and Guangdong, with the comforting ‘silver needle noodles’ and saucy ‘mapo tofu’ earning cult-like status among locals. Start with the gunpowder slap: a mini cocktail, a shot of baijiu (“fire water”), and a crisp beer (sip, shoot, sip) from Toronto’s Burdock Brewery, and who knows where the night will take you. But do not let it end without Sunny’s Hong Kong French toast for dessert.

Richmond Station

Best for: Farm-to-table Canadian dining with a neighbourhood feel
Location: 1 Richmond St W, Toronto, ON M5H 3W4
Price: $$

Running for more than 13 years, Richmond Station has managed to defy many odds: it’s smack in the downtown core, an area that often sees high turnover. And while it’s not in a particularly neighbourhood-like location, it has a steady stream of welcoming regulars. The service (included in the menu prices, so no tipping) is warm and unpretentious; very Canadian, if you will.

Light pours through a large circular front window and travels through the space, which stretches back to a second level. An early adopter of the farm-to-table movement, the owners even operate their own regenerative farm outside the city. The tightly edited lunch and dinner menus shift with the seasons, focusing on local suppliers and provenance. The legendary Station Burger is a constant, with pasture-raised beef and crisp rosemary fries.