Monkey Bar and Grill

Date: July 10, 2013

Location: 3353 Yonge St (north of Lawrence), midtown Toronto
Website: http://www.themonkeybar.ca/

Cuisine: Canadian, Italian, French and Asian fusion

Meal: dinner

My thoughts:

I came here for their Summerlicious event with some former co-workers (AE, AB and MM). Seeing how busy the restaurant was, we realized how lucky we were to have nabbed a reservation the day of. 

Now, let me first say that you shouldn't let "bar" fool you - this is an upscale restaurant with the prices to match. But you get what you pay for. This is precisely why I love Summerlicious (and Winterlicious). You get 3- or 4-course meals, sometimes featuring items off of their regular menu, at a discounted price. We paid $25 for a 3-course meal, which is very fair.

Anyway, this is what I had:

Panko-Crusted Brie with Blueberry Balsamic Sauce - I'd never had crusted brie of any sort before so seeing it on the menu piqued my interest. Unfortunately, I wasn't that impressed by it. I felt it needed some chicken in it, which may have then clashed with the blueberry compote. Just saying. Also, I took a close-up shot of this, so the picture doesn't give you much perspective as to how big the dish was, especially in comparison to the uberly-tiny the chunk of cheese was. This turned out to be a good thing, since I didn't care too much for this anyway!

Pecan-Crusted Chicken Breast with Pommery Cream Sauce, Vegetables and Sweet Potato Mash - This was the only entree option that is from their regular menu. We were told that this is their most popular entree, and as much as we all wanted to get a taste of everything, we just really wanted to order this. We were all glad that we did. This was divine. The chicken paired perfectly with the sauce, and there was a perfect yet subtle blend of spice in the sweet potato mash.

House-Made Sorbet and Cookie - The cookie was rather hard, so I didn't care much for it, which was okay, because the strawberry-lemon sorbet completely stole the show. It was amazing! Too bad it isn't on their regular menu.

All in all, I was impressed. The quality was there and it was apparent that there was a lot of attention to detail put into preparing the food. I'd love to try their regular menu. Reservations are highly recommended!