Woodlot Bakery & Restaurant

I don’t usually give negative reviews, but here it is…
I had high expectations of this place, which was perhaps dangerous. It was rated as a top vegetarian restaurant on BlogTO, and also highly rated here. Unilocal has never let me down before, until now.
First the positive: Ambience is nice, rustic, and cozy, and the food was decent.
Now the venting begins:
I took my vegetarian mom here for her birthday. The restaurant was a little too dark for my taste. The server was very cold and unfriendly, made no eye contact, and essentially seemed like he didn’t want to be there. She ordered the French onion soup, and the Roast Glazed King Oyster Mushrooms. I had the Mozzarella Empanadas and duck confit. Like I said, the food was decent. However, the prices of this place are on the high side, and the portion sizes are on the small size. For a French onion soup to cost $ 9, I expected it to be AMAZING. It was not. (I tasted it). As for empanadas ($ 15), there were essentially 2 of them, at $ 7.5 a bite essentially. If my eyes rolled back as if I were eating oysters or sea urchins, I wouldn’t complain. However, they were nothing spectacular.
The duck confit was so-​so. As for the Roast King Oyster Mushrooms for $ 27, it was also so-​so (I also had a taste). I’m sorry, but no mushrooms should cost $ 27, unless I’m eating truffles.
I should also mention I ordered a beer, and it was $ 14.
With the high prices, mediocre food, and the cold and grumpy server, I’d warn everyone to stay away, and want to complain to BlogTO.

I celebrated a special occasion here and we both really enjoyed the food. Everything is clearly high quality and the chef had paid a lot of attention to detail when preparing the dishes. The menu is small so that fresh ingredients and attention can be paid to the dishes which is something I love.
Our waitress was really pleasant, and the service overall was great
The bread is amazing :)
Very intimate environment because it is a very small space. The only thing that bummed us out is that since it’s a small place, sound travels from table to table very easily. We had a quiet meal for a bit but by the time we finished our appetizer, a very noisy person was seated at the table next to us. It was only a group of 4 people, but they had one guy who spoke SO loudly, and seemed to always be yelling. It was so annoying to us that we decided not to get dessert and to leave and get something sweet somewhere else.
I would love to come back here and hope that no annoying people get seated near us because the food was VERY good :)

Not only is woodlot overpriced but the portions were small, the service was incredibly slow, and even with a reservation we had to wait 10 minutes to be seated. The food was good, but not infrediblyn exciting.

Décor & ambience: Industrial Chic, cozy, buzzing.
Service: Friendly staff, very enthusiastic water-​girl.
Food & beverage: They have interesting «Game of Throne» cocktails. I had ‘You know nothing Jon Snow’ with gin as the main ingredient & loved it.
The vegetarian French onion soup was very good. It is rare to find vegetarian French onion soup. The russet potato gnocchi & celery agnolotti were superb!
They also had poached duck eggs as part of the vegetarian menu? Strange. Though it comes up in search for vegetarian restaurants, they are not. They only have a few vegetarian items on their menu.
The portion sizes are very small. The soup was $ 9 dollars for an inch below the rim & $ 15 filled to the brim! Same with entrees — very small portion sizes for $ 17, a few spoonfuls more for $ 26. Good food though we are fighting the urge to stop at a Taco Bell for a fill up!

Delicious! Took my boyfriend here for his birthday. Food was ambrosia and so was the wine. Highly recommend the entire dessert menu. Service was amazing.

Overall, Woodlot serves… good food but I left feeling that the damage on my wallet was unworthy. Prolly would defer to any of the tapas places nearby than go back to Woodlot.
AMBIANCE/​SERVICE
Too dimly lit but decent level of ambient buzz
Amazing service, not pushy, very knowledgeable
FOOD ($ 68 incl tax and tip pp)
For reference, here is what we ordered. Nothing was really outstanding.
Ember Grilled Hen-o’-the-Woods Mushrooms w/​wild rice, black walnut, beet root and dill ($ 15)
Russet Potato Gnocchi w/​porcini mushroom ragu, smoked onion, balsam fir and parmesan ($ 17)
Roast Chop of Whey Fed Pork w/​charred pineapple, jerk sauce, lime and mint ($ 29)
1lb of Wood Fired Ribs w/​memphis dry rub, fermented buttermilk dressed celery root and apple slaw ($ 27)

There’s a lot to like Woodlot. For starters, the place is warm and inviting. It’s rustic, cozy, romantic, and as you walk in you get hit with great aromas from the stone oven. The food is very nice. It’s the kind of place I would like to give 5 stars to. However, there were a few miss steps.
House Baked Bread
Score: ⁵⁄₅
WOW! Amazing bread indeed. There were two types of bread, each one super tasty. I will come back just for bakery alone! One minor complaint is that the butter was not very good. What can I say? — I’m a butter snob.
Warm Spiced Fall Harvest Salad
Price: $ 15
Score: ⁵⁄₅
This is a winning dish. Cauliflower is a modest ingredient, but in this dish it is elevated with a beautiful yogurt-​curry dressing.
Ember Grilled Hen-o’-the-Woods Mushrooms
Price: $ 15
Score: ¹⁄₅
This dish was a total flop. There was a very small portion of mushroom sitting on a salad that was very confused in flavour. There was something as crunchy as nut shells in the salad.
Wood Fired Spiced Aubergine and Mozzarella Empanadas
Price: $ 15
Score: ²⁄₅
The two empanadas were very small (two bits each.) They were very bland. You could barely taste the aubergine, and there was absolutely no wood fire flavour.
Crisp Seared Rainbow Trout
Price: $ 28
Score: ⁴⁄₅
Very tasty fish beautifully charred on the outside, albeit somewhat overcooked. It was served with some barley balls wrapped in kale that were good, but not very flavourful.
Dry aged Chuck Rib steak
Price: $ 33
Score: ⁴⁄₅
Very flavourful steak with nice charring on the inside. It wasn’t the best cut of meat, but it was nicely prepared.
Warm Kale Salad (side)
Price: 7
Score: ²⁄₅
This salad was way too sweet.
The wine offering was limited, with emphasis on expensive bottles. We opted for the half bottle of a «house» red that was pretty nice.
The service wasn’t good. The server seemed unfriendly and plain disinterested in being there.

We came here on Thursday night and ordered two things from their vegetarian menu – the stuffed anglonotti and the gnocchi. Both were really good! The gnocchi was dressed with a mushroom ragu. I love mushrooms, so naturally, I loved this plate. There was a smokiness to the dish that was good as well. The anglonotti was excellent as well. It was stuffed with marscarpone… anything stuff with marscarpone is good, isn’t it?!
I outsmarted myself though. We were a little concerned that there would be too much food, so we got half portions of each. I didn’t realize that probably the full portions were modest sized ones that we could have finished… ah well, that’s good to know for next time!
We had the treat board for dessert. It was the perfect size for sharing. There were about 6 or 7 treats for each of us. Probably, I would say only one was super sweet, while everything else was just right (at least for me). To my surprise, the macaron was awesome. I’m not saying I thought they would have made a bad macaron; rather I’m saying that because it’s so eventhough macarons are so commonplace now, the ones here were kinda awesome.
I really liked the restaurant. There was a relaxed feel to it. The menu did not seem pretentious to me, and the food spoke for itself. The service was good and friendly too. People came by to check up on us several times though the meal.
I’d come here again for sure. It’d be great if there were more places like Woodlot around as well though!

Food: 6.5÷10
Atmosphere: ⁸⁄₁₀
Service: ⁷⁄₁₀
Overall experience: ⁷⁄₁₀
Why I pretend my star rating relates to my food/​atmosphere/​service/​overall breakdown I don’t know… since the math clearly doesn’t add up let me explain myself:
The food here is fine. Some items are really good — I particularly enjoyed the potato gratin and the harvest salad. Others are forgettable.
The service is fine as well — our waiter, an older gentleman, seemed a bit off in a way (quiet, and almost uninterested) but they did do little things like bring some items on two dishes because they knew we were sharing.
The interior is very autumn — cozy and with the smell of the fireplace, it’s definitely a spot for September — November.
The reason it gets 2 stars is really because what you get is not worth what you pay. There are so many choices in Toronto that offer this intimate, «whole food» experience, and in all honesty, the bar has been raised. Woodlot falls a bit short.
THE BOTTOM LINE: everything is fine, but it’s not worth your time to go out of your way.

Food: ⁷⁄₁₀ —- Value: ⁴⁄₁₀ —- Service: ⁷⁄₁₀ —- Ambiance/​Décor: ⁹⁄₁₀
I have no problem paying for great food, but I didn’t leave Woodlot thinking I’d eaten great food. It was good food, but I don’t know what exactly the wood-​fired oven or «handmade» aspects of their food added to the taste.
Our waiter, an older gentleman, was really quiet and almost too unexcited. A lot of the time, we couldn’t hear him and just guessed what he was saying and I felt like my soul quieted a little every he spoke. Service was economical, but our glasses of water were always full. The person at the door was much friendlier.
The restaurant is dimly lit and most of the seating is upstairs. It was a pretty cool space.
APPETIZER: Fall Harvest Salad ($ 15)
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This was literally like a few thin slices of carrots, few thin slices of turnip/​cabbage, some «crisp bread» (aka sesame covered crackers), chickpeas, cauliflower, and some yogurt sauce. It was modern pretty, I’ll give it that. But when you start moving the food around, it was just so bare, I was like… where is the rest of the salad? Admittedly, the yogurt sauce was quite good, but I feel like the value of the dish was maybe $ 3.
PASTA: Russet Potato Gnocchi ($ 17)
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
We got the small appetizer size of the gnocchi and they were kind enough to bring it to us on two plates because we were going to share anyway. It was maybe less than a shallow handful on each plate and definitely overcooked. It was mushy baby food and I can’t say the taste made up for anything.
MAIN: Roast Chop of Whey Fed Pork ($ 29)
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
The portion is small. There were five slices, one of them bone-​in. Each piece had one edge of fat, which made it taste quite good, but the pork in general was on the drier side. For me, this was the standout dish of the night; quite yummy.
SIDE: Smoked Scamorza and Potato Gratin ($ 7)
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
As a side, the portion size was understandable. The price point was not. It was a small rectangle of potatoes. Not a very memorable flavour.
SIDE: Seared Rapini ($ 7)
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
For the same price, you could get a full-​sized dish elsewhere. But this was a more reasonable portion for a western restaurant. Taste was average in that it tasted as it should have. The details of this dish — garlic, aleppo chili, lemon, and parmesan — don’t really come through. The cheese is on the top, so that’s hard to miss, but it’s only on the top and added sparingly, so it doesn’t transform the entire side.
I left the restaurant thinking that everything just should’ve been better. I don’t feel like there’s much use touting a wood-​fueled oven or «the finest raw, local ingredients» when you don’t make use of these things to make outstanding dishes. I wouldn’t come back. It’s just not worth it.

If someone can give me the recipe for Woodlot’s rib rub, I would be eternally grateful! Damn is all I can say. Damn! :fist up:

Woodlot has an outstanding wood fired oven. It has a great aroma and adds a delicious flavor to everything which is baked in there. I know pizza isn’t quite in line with the other menu items, but I would have loved to try a pie made here from scratch like all of the other dishes are.
For starters, we split the empanadas and the lobster, ham hook, & potato salad. I really liked the empanadas which came with a hot sauce and a Vietnamese salad. I liked the fusion on Latin American and Vietnamese cuisines in the dish.
I had the Sourdough Red Fife Chitarrini for dinner. The pasta was cooked perfectly, and the sauce was the perfect level of creaminess.
My girlfriend had the smoked ricotta and black pepper cavatelli. Again, perfect pasta and the dish was very tasteful too. Woodlot clearly exemplifies the difference fresh made pasta makes.
Our friend ordered the ribs which turned out to be my favorite of the entrees. The ribs had a perfect char from the dry rub and the meat fell right off the menu. I highly suggest this item.
For dessert, we split the peanut butter semifreddo. I’m not usually one for desserts; however, this was outstanding. It was freshly made so it took a while to come out, but the wait was worth it. There was a great juxtaposition of textures between the soft yet brittleness of the brownie crust versus the creaminess of the peanut butter center and the chocolate fudge top. Truly delicious.
On top of it all, the waitstaff is very knowledgable and friendly. I highly recommend Woodlot!

Terrific food. Sourdough pasta, pork chops, ribs, stuffed poblano. Vegetarian menu a plus. Small streetside elevated patio.

We went to Woodlot this Friday to find a full restaurant. Thankfully, we had reservations for two and they gave us the best seats in the house, in my opinion. We had the kale salad, ravioli, and cavatelli. All were tasty and inventive… and I could taste the quality of ingredients. Our server was lovely as was the ambiance. Although I’m not hung up on any of the dishes and need to have them again… I would come back every once in a while as it was a pleasant dining experience.

Delicious food and beautiful ambience, Woodlot never fails to impress. We were recently back with friends and everyone had an excellent time.
Meals start with fresh sourdough bread and butter. Right after, we had delicious oysters with slices of lime instead of lemon — a first for me that worked very well.
I had the special, a very tender 40-​day aged steak that was simply outstanding. My fiancé went with the vegetarian menu and the equally great halloumi, lentils and sunchokes. All the dishes were beautifully plated, and the drink list was refreshingly different. There’s a careful but «unfussy» quality to the menu and plating.
Our server was excellent and always answered questions with detailed descriptions of the food and drink. I especially appreciated his handling of my allergies: he explained to me what the kitchen had used to replace ingredients I couldn’t have.

This is one of those noteworthy places on all of the best-​of lists which draws yokel tourists like me. There must have been a lot of us in town that week, because the place was packed, and we had to sit at the bar downstairs.
The meal starts with excellent, fresh sourdough bread.
As an appetizer, the pea empanadas, which come with a side of pickled veggies, were tasty enough, but not very memorable. I don’t think I’d order that again.
The sunchoke veggie entrée is the definition of «hearty.» And, actually, so is the mushroom tart entrée. Both plates were tasty and filling. But it is rather expensive for this kind of food. Probably you are paying for the experience?
The bottled beer list was pretty respectable, though I wish there were more top end Canadian beers (e.g. Unibroue), instead of selections from places like Anderson Valley.

They really kept the menu simple here. One for meat eaters and another for vegetarians. Urban rustic ambiance. I ordered the trout and thoroughly enjoyed it. Judging from photos from others of the trout, this dish may not always be dressed the same but the taste stays unequivocally good. Homemade sodas also found here. Had the white pulp based ginger-​ale soda. Not bad. On the way out, each guest is encouraged to take home a loaf of their homemade bread… almost makes you feel like you just had dinner at a friend’s place.

Woodlot is always in my top 3 in Toronto. I would recommend it to my friends, parents, colleagues, and a perfect stranger. I love everything about it. Being seated in either the chefs table, which is literally in kitchen surrounded by pots pans and baking trays, or upstairs in the intimate and cozy dining room, you feel at home. The food is always a 10 out of 10. My go to is the flat iron steak and the pork chop but I like to dabble in the separate vegetarian menu and pretend I’m Italian by ordering a second course of mouth watering pasta. Their wine list is often an interest read, I like the tenacity of the sommelier to pick wines that are out there, interesting and from regions you didn’t even knew had great wine. Service again is always fantastic, consistent.
If you haven’t been, you must, you won’t be disappointed! Thanks for some of the best meals of my life Woodlot :)

Now a days most pouplar restaurants seem to look always the same. classic wood and old Edison light bulbs .
An example of this…
Woodlot
I have to admit they Had a Good ambience it is a typical rustic Canadian style no different from any others very ordinary.
However, everybody said «u must try these sodas“but it was Ok!!!
Pork could have been more tender soo chewy and onion soup was over powered by these aged STINKY cheeses.

Very, very cozy atmosphere, especially with the large open stone oven and warm lighting. Nice place for the winter days. The place was a bit hard to find in my opinion and parking was extremely limited; you’ll have to make do with street parking. If you don’t like communal tables, book in advance. Otherwise risk the chance of either waiting for a table for quite some time, or sharing with others.
Came here for dinner: their breads were fresh and warm, very welcoming start to this place. The woods mushrooms starter was a nice little warm dish and quite fragrant (good vegetarian option). Their flat iron steak, however, was actually a bit dry… quite disappointing, especially considering what they are charging for it. Their gnocchi was okay but not something I would go back for; kind of bland. The seared sea bass was fresh and tender, yet the wow factor was lacking. The reviews raved about their French Onion Soup, which unfortunately when I went they said it wasn’t available…
Their dessert menu was pretty good actually. We might have enjoyed this more than the mains. Not sure if their dessert menu changes, but the parfait was plenty on fresh ingredients, enough for 2 – 3 people. Their pot de crème was very rich and tasty. Definitely a sugar overload there. We also had a macchiato to go with the desserts, which I thought was too strong, considering the other ones I’ve had elsewhere.
A little pricey for what I would think it’s worth but it’s a cozy visit once in a long while.