L’Avenue Bistro

We visited L’avenue Bistro on a weekday with a groupon which comes with a bottle of wine and a 3 course meal each for me and my fiancé. The interior of the restaurant was full of personality and we loved the decors. Service was not too bad and the restaurant filled up quickly for dinner service. On the other hand, food was a hit or miss. Complimentary baguette slices also came out cold so the bread was a bit tough to chew on. We ordered the salad and the escargot for appies from the groupon menu which we enjoyed eating. The downfall was us ordering the moules et frites in addition to the groupon dinner and the mussels were awful! The mussels tasted incredibly fishy as they were not very fresh. We couldn’t even finish the mussels as it give off a slight ammonia scent. The entrees were Beef bourguignon and steak, both were very good. Dessert was pistachio crème brulee which we thought was subpar as there were pistachio chunks that have softened throughout our crème brulee. Shiraz wine was great, no issues with that. Wished we never ordered the mussels and chose another dessert!

This was a hard call between 3 and 4 stars!
3 for food, but 4 for service. Overall experience, 3.5 stars.
My fam and I went for Sunday brunch. The restaurant was very quaint. The waitress was super friendly and very knowledgeable about the food. She knew the different types of radish in my salad, which is pretty impressive. Service was good. I did have to ask for refills, but I want to acknowledge that there was only 1 – 2 people serving and the place was full.
Food wasn’t bad, but nothing truly stood out. I ordered the French onion soup and eggs Benny. I didn’t like the French onion soup. I found it too salty and it wasn’t cheesy enough. They added bread in the soup, which became pretty soggy after a while.
The salad was pretty good. The brioche was homemade and was very moist. Bacon was a bit hard. Eggs and sauce was good.
The food was plated nicely.
My partner had the fried chicken. It was moist and filling, but he wouldn’t put this on his top 3 of amazing fried chicken he had.
Portions are fair. We had left overs, which I ate the next day and it was still good. I would come back for dinner.

Amazing food! Ordered the escargot, crab cakes and mussels. The crab cakes were ok but the escargot was so delish! And the mussels were so good we ordered more! Was my first visit. Can’t wait to go back! The wait staff was very nice and friendly. Will be checking out the tapas place across the street next as its run by the same people and has the same staff :)

A good place for Sunday brunch. Food is good, place is clean n decent, background music is light thus all guests keep their voice down.
Ordered special of the day Egg Benedict with double smoked bacon, it’s good and is on brioche. Caramelized onion is good too. Salad is so so so fresh with gold and pink root beet, just the vinaigrette too strong for me.
By the way, their mimosa is not bad. Good to go.

Such a cute French bistro! Lovely little patio. Great service too. Nice date place with ability to carry on a conversation and also not being made to feel rushed by the servers. Beef bourguignon with frites was excellent. Will definitely return!

We do a regular Saturday lunch here and it’s always vy good. Quick service, good soups and salads, fine omelettes and quiches, good coffee. This is a well run bistro, and there’s a people-​watching patio that can be vy pleasant.

While the décor, atmosphere and service here are great I was very disappointed with the food. Overall the dishes were largely Bland and overpriced. Mussels were solid as were fries. Seafood stew with two tiny scallops very little sauce, 5 mussels and some tilapia (floating poubelle) at $ 28 is akin to highway robbery. If the food were more reasonably priced then the lack of quality and quantity of the dishes would be more digestible, but I would not return nor suggest this restaurant. I would have rather gone to scaramouche and paid 25% more for a fantastic meal.

We had the soup of the day with a salad and also ordered the fish sandwich special. Food was very good but not necessarily special. Atmosphere is nice and the service excellent

Excellent meal, beautifully executed, pleasantly served in a place of good ambience. This is a little gem of a place, with the owner mostly on the premises. Classic French dishes at reasonable prices, with an acceptable wine list, recommended. The bone marrow starter was unusual and a delight. The boeuf bourgignon a little bit salty but otherwise firm meat and tasty. The French onion soup a classic.

Food was very good. I ordered the lobster humidor and oysters. This was a couple years ago, but I still remember what I ordered because I spent the rest of the night throwing it up.
Had to go to the hospital with severe food poisoning due to loss of fluids. I was okay, but I will never eat here again.
Note: no one else at my table was ill after eating here. Others had the same menu items as myself. It must have been one bad oyster.

This is a wonderful restaurant. Really small and quaint so I would reccomend making reservations. There was only about 14 tables.
For an appitizer we got the bacon and scallops. Nothing like I had ever seen before. It was a huge scallop and a super thick cut piece of bacon which was nice and salty the way bacon should be. This was easily one of the best things EVER.
For the main course I had the duck. Super moist and perfectly seasoned. It had this sauce over it that I was very tempted to lick of the plate. For dessert I had the freshly made beignets. Nice and light. My husband ordered the steak which I tried a bite of and it was like butter. Just melted in my mouth.
Highly reccomend going here. Great food and atmosphere.

I used to work in the yonge-​eglinton area and just minutes away I found L’avenue. The owner is very friendly and doesn’t seem to forget a face because every time I’ve visited I receive a warm welcome. Although what I favoured is no longer on the menu, the Chicken «a la basque» is a great contender. A generous serving of fried chicken with espelette pepper and tomato sauce and summer slaw, this dish leaves you feeling satisfied but not overly stuffed and ready for bed.
A nice spot for an intimate and quiet dinner however make sure to make reservations as they are a smaller restaurant and busy in the summer.

Magnifique!
I’d planned my order based on the online menu, which turned out to be outdated. Luckily I tapped into my high school improv training and all was well. We started with L’Avenue’s delicious French onion soup ($ 12) which is rich and hearty enough to share with someone you really, really, really like. Like, like enough to share it with. So… nobody.
For my main, I had a special of Arctic Char on a bed of ratatouille and some other stuff délicieux. I also tried the Catalan Seafood Stew (with scallop, tiger shrimp, mussels, fish, and saffron tomato broth, $ 25) which was, well, fishy and fresh. Very good. Both paired perfectly with white wine, of which they offer many varieties — we picked a local.
My dining companions were fans of the burger, beef bourguignon, crispy frites, and a salad that had big tasty slices of beet and radish, which I know because I stole a bite of that too.
Service is lovely and so lax and accommodating with dietary restrictions, breezily making dishes edible for my lactose-​intolerant pals. I went with some regulars and I can see why they always return.

Came here early on a busy friday night with my 2 young kids and my elderly parents. Greeted by the very friendly staff, and the fantastic serviced continued right thru the night. Love the open kitchen concept, they have great staff flow despite the limited work space. Kids got crayons and were doodling away on their brown paper table top covers.
We love french food and have been to France numerous times, so always looking to relive those food moments. Standout dishes for me were the escargots (despite the snails being a bit on the smaller size, not those giant ping pong ball sizes ones that I love), my duck leg confit was perfect along with the string beans and rich sauce. My mom’s seafood soup was nicely done as well. They also do seared scallops beautifully, and love the side order of skinny frites. Great bread as well, nice and crispy on top.
The french onion soup was a bit too salty and didn’t quite have enough cheese in it, bone marrow was ok but didn’t have quite enough marrow compared to other bistros we’ve had (and was topped off with a lot of breading), the «bacon» portion of the scallops and bacon app was too dry, as well as the meat in my dad’s beef bourguignon and sauce was not complex enough for my tastes. Wife’s duck breast was just ok, cooked about right but a bit tough. Kids shared a chicken deep fried in batter, they seemed to like it and the chicken was juicy (same with string bed of veggies).
For dessert we shared the beignets, which wasn’t like the triangles shaped ones but just little squared and was a bit boring.
Extensive wine list, our single glasses of the Provence Rose and my French Pinot Noir went well with our dishes.
The place did get quite busy by 7:30pm and the kitchen with only 2 chefs was struggling a bit to get dishes out. Our waitress was great as she would heckle the chefs when our desserts were ready (after about a 10 min wait) and when she saw that the tart didn’t look good enough to serve, she told us outright about it rather than just serving it anyways to us (which we appreciated).
Overall a decent meals, some missed but mostly hits, will definitely go back to try their other dishes.

Found L’Avenue on Blog T. O and decided to give it a shot. It’s an unassuming, relatively small restaurant that appeals to those who enjoy a quaint and intimate dining experience.
We sat on the patio and they were nice enough to let four of us sit at a two person table (it’s not a huge patio) so we could be outside.
I’m no wine expert but they have a pretty extensive list and the bottle we got was pretty good.
My five star rating totally comes from the food. I had the duck breast and it was amazing. While duck is always a solid choice theirs was cooked perfectly and the dish was a fantastic medley of flavors. The combination of flavors were unassuming and meshed instead of clashing.
On top of everything the service was great. Highly recommend L’Avenue!

Four of us went to this restaurant for mother’s day. We had a reservation and were seated immediately. The service was quick at the beginning but slowed down considerably by the time we ordered coffee and dessert, maybe because the place had filled up. We had to ask for pepper, they also forgot to bring spoons with the coffees. One of the servers was happy to take a group photo for us and all of the people who came to wait on our table were very friendly.
The ricotta gnocchi was pretty good. The bone marrow appetizer was good, the Seafood Stew «Zarzuela» was good, as was the Beef Bourguignon. I felt that the quality was good for the price. The place is small and a little bit tight, but nicely decorated and inviting. They have a small patio, too. My main complaint was that my table had one round centre leg and it was very uncomfortable; I am not a large person and I had nowhere to put my feet, so I would recomment asking for a table that has 4 legs.

Excellent service, intimate setting, fabulous food and refreshing wine are the things that are top of mind when I think of L’Avenue Bistro. We went here for a work gathering and it could not have been more perfect. They took reservations and had a table ready for us to go. The waiter was exceptionally friendly, courteous and professional. He even remembered the name of the individual on the team who made the reservations.
I had the simple salad and duck confit with fries and it was tasty and not too large a portion. All of the other entrees that my coworkers ordered looked equally delicious too.
I would recommend this restaurant for an intimate gathering as the ambience was quiet and allowed for good conversations.

Just went to this French restaurant tonight for my parents’ 45^th anniversary. We’re not very impressed. Service and ambience was excellent, but the food is just okay, when price is taken into account.
For appetizers, I had a French onion soup. My mom had a salad while my dad had the escargot. The soup had lots of onion in it but it didn’t have a rich taste. I didn’t taste any herbs either. The salad is as expected. The escargot is not the one that I normally have at a French restaurant. Instead of the escargots submerged in olive oil with butter, it was mixed with a thick cream. Bread was served with this dish so I suppose it was more like a spread. Eating it alone would be too rich and too salty.
For the main dishes, both my mom and dad ordered the duck breast while I had the lamb shoulder. The duck breast was pretty good, although there’s not enough sauce. The lamb shoulder was too salty even though it’s pretty tasty. I like that there’re lots of vegetables on the side though.
All of us were pretty full so we skipped the desert menu altogether. At around the same price, I have had better French food at restaurants in the San Francisco Bay Area.

I have no idea how long this Bistro has been around but I am wondering why it took me so long to find out about it. This place is Fantastic, with a capital F!
The ambiance is delightful, from the wood covered deck when you enter to the gorgeous water pitchers and details on the walls. If it didn’t feel french bistro when you walked in, meeting the owner, brings it all home. Incredibly friendly, and very attentive (as were all of the staff).
We went for Sunday brunch and the menu is quite extensive. I had the poached eggs du jour (which happened to be eggs benedict served on homemade brioche instead of the traditional english muffin) served with potatoes and salad. The portions are quite large for a place like this and everything was cooked perfectly! At the table we also had the omelette du jour (comes with salad), the quiche du jour (also salad) and roast beef au jus (with frites and aioli). We couldnt resist ordering a side of lemon ricotta pancakes with fresh berries and cream (I mean really… who could resist that?) and we were not disappointed. Light fluffy, with just enough sweetness. We also ordered some sides — homemade Toulousse sausage (quick spicy so watch out) and Pork Belly (by far the most tender well smoked belly I have had in years!).
We were all completely stuffed — every plate had been cleaned down to the last crumb… and then they brought out the dessert menu. Had I known about this before hand I would have ordered something smaller… but we found a way to make it work.
All of the desserts come matched with a beverage (alcoholic) and I chose the beignets with honey mead. The pairing was excellent, unlike ice wine that is overly sweet, this was just sweet enough to compliment without overpowering the icing suger and espresso crème anglaise. Perfectly cooked to melt in your mouth, outside of New Orleans I havent had any this good! At the table we also enjoyed a hazelnut/​rhubard cake and a caramel/​strawberry/​apple pie.
Not only will I be back for brunch, I cant wait to try dinner. They also have special wine/​food pairing nights so check in with them to see whats coming up!
Bön Appetit!

4.5 Star
L’Avenue … I cannot wait to come back again… that’s how much I enjoyed my dinner!
A small and intimate setting with a French cuisine inspired daily menu that based on the local and fresh ingredients in the market for the day.
Wine list is impressive/​extensive and they really know their wine since one of the owners Otta used to work at GM and Sommelier at Nota Bene.
I was lucky to be here for an early dinner between 5:30 — 6:30 to take advantage of the Prix Menu for $ 25. Great value that alone worth an extra 0.5 star. And for this evening:
Potato & Leek Soup with Blue Cheese Crème Fraiche
— really hearty and rich… love the blue cheese crème
Beef & Dumplings (Slowly Braised Beef Stew with Spring Vegetables & Potato Dumplings)
— beef are so soft
— dumplings chewy with a great bite
— the broth is well flavoured and surprisingly light
— great choice of vegetables: baby carrots, brussel sprouts, turnips
Macerated Berries with citrus-​infused cream, garnished with white chocolate pearls
— those white chocolate pearls are the highlight of the dessert. biting into them is like an exposing of flavours in my mouth
We ordered also
PEI Mussels with Tomato Concase, White Wine ($ 13)
— fresh mussels cooked perfectly
— the broth itself is so light, complimenting the freshness, I can even drink the broth as a soup or use the baguette to soak them all up!
Rainbow Trout with Sauteed Watercress, Crisp Creamer Potato and Critus Salsa ($ 22)
— Every single element of this dish are so nicely done and compliment each other
— The skin of the fish is crispy and the fish itself is cooked so tender and moist
— The slight bittiness of the watercress
— The slight sweetness of the starchy potato itself
— The critus salsa added a little sourness to the whole dish
The service is top notch! Professional and attentive. The vibe is homey and cozy, just like dining in a friend house… of course I wish my friend can cook like that?
L’Avenue also serves brunch on weekends and lunch on weekdays.
I definitely will be back again for dinner, lunch and brunch!