Giulietta

Oh Toronto, my beloved home. Without fail, Italian fine dining here makes a fool out of me. I approached my Giuletta experience with tempered expectations and still, I was let down. We were a party of two and frankly, our dining experience was underwhelming and in aspects, off-putting. We ordered two glasses of orange wine, a fried artichoke appetizer, the corn agnolotti, and a cacio e pepe. The wine was fine but at $25 a glass, it was an incredibly ungenerous pour. The artichoke appetizer compromised of four tiny pieces and largely resembled paper-thin phyllo pastry. If I were made to blindly guess the main ingredient in this dish, I would have failed spectacularly. If I had to describe this, I’d say it was incredibly nothing. The server left us with the dish and returned some 10 minutes later and bizarrely commented that we had finished the appetizer shockingly fast. If that wasn’t enough, she doubled down and said “I turned around and it was gone!” With the portion size and minuscule amount of actual artichoke, a distracted toddler could have finished off this dish in a fraction of the time. This comment struck both my friend and I (two women) as strange and borderline offensive and frankly, coloured my impression of the service at this Michelin-affiliated restaurant. The corn agnolotti was good but far from exceptional. At $43 a plate, I expect to be wowed. The portion didn’t make sense at seven pieces of actual pasta and the flavours were flat. The corn, filling, and cream were heavy and the dish could have greatly benefited from some balancing herbs, acid, and nuttiness for texture. The cacio e pepe was average. I am a salt-lover and I felt it was inexplicably over-salted. Neither of these dishes impressed us. Our total bill came to $172 before tip (which of course, started at 20%). I am no stranger to small plates or fine dining but both of these executed well should not feel like a rip off, which this restaurant did. The decor was overly minimal and washed out. We sat at the bar but the tables looked like cafeteria tables (tube lighting and all) which the overcrowded environment did not help. The exposed walk-in fridge right behind bar diners was strange as we could clearly see “unglamorous” prep aspects like plastic containers, bags of ice, and caution wet signs even if some pretty chanterelles were on display. From a practical standpoint, this also meant a constant traffic of staff which hindered the ambiance. We could have ordered more but every aspect put us off and we were quite happy to leave. Would not come back and would not recommend this predictably mid experience.

Fantastic neighborhood spot, although we do not live in the neighborhood it’s worth the drive. Atmosphere and energy is fantastic. Love the service, food and wine selection. I really enjoyed the Iberian Pork.

Came here for a celebratory dinner and had a nice time. We ordered the radicchio salad, and burrata as appetizers. Both were lovely but my partner couldn’t get enough of the burrata. We shared mains: cacio e Pepe and the steak. We were extremely full by the end and probably ordered too much..the steak was so juicy and tender that we haven’t stopped thinking about it. The pasta was cooked to perfection and they made sure to tell us about coating the noodles and eating it before it cooled. To finish we had the tiramisu. Overall amazing and would love to come back sometime.

Everything was spectacular. Cannot wait to go back.