The Feasting Room

The Feasting Room

580a College Street

Toronto, ON M6G 1B1

(647) 785-3557

Since this is a pop-up restaurant, I was hesitant to include the address above. But then thought, this is where our dinner was held, so I'm going to provide you with all the information!

The Feasting Room has a temporary home at the Orbit Room, but is ending their run this week. We jumped to it when we heard that they were closing shop since we very much like their philosophy - serve dishes using a whole animal so that there is less waste. Each week, they create a tasting menu focusing on one animal (for instance: cow, rabbit, duck, lamb). You can check on their website or if you're in the area, the silhouette of the animal is hung under their sign (see the little pig in the photo above). We went for the last Pig tasting menu:

Loved the attention to detail. The menus are wrapped up like a pork tenderloin!

There is a drink menu and a "map" for the night. The numbers correspond to the order of dishes and they let you know which part of the animal the food is made from.

Small and intimate tables for two. There are more tables in the back if you have a larger group.

Immediately after being seated, we were presented with our first amuse-bouche. Mmm pork cracklings. Nice and crispy, but the best surprise was the pear purée dip. I think the dip could seriously be used as cake frosting.

Foreground: The Sarah - Collingwood Craft Rye with Kensington Market ginger beer and orange zest.
Background: The Nigel - Maker's Mark Bourbon Whisky with Crème de Menthe, house lemonade, and lemon wheel.

At first taste, Howard and I both enjoyed the Sarah, nice and zingy with quite a kick to it. Definitely one to sip. But after awhile, we rather enjoyed the Nigel more. But by that time, we had told our server that we preferred the Sarah. It turned out that Sarah and Nigel were our servers and Nigel had heard what we told Sarah about her drink. Oops!

Another nice treat was that a couple of times during the meal, Chef Noah Goldberg and GM Mathieu Dutan served our dishes. It's always nice to see the people behind the project.

Our second amuse-bouche were the Devils on Horseback. Howard ate them both and preferred them to the ones we had at The Spotted Pig.

First up, the soup! Delicious and hearty. I wanted more of this. The crispy pig ears are so good when they have soaked up a little bit of the soup.

Frisee salad with fried onion rings, pork terrines, and capers.

Shoot, we can't remember which part of the pig this came from! According to the map, the third dish is from the snout, chin, and foreleg. It was served with a carrot purée and shallot. Busted. We were paying attention, but I guess our hunger overrode everything. We politely nodded and dug in. There were a couple of times during the dinner when I asked Howard if we were eating too fast. But the food was so good! And it's meant to be enjoyed, right?

Blood sausage on peppers and topped with a quail egg.

Am I a fan of blood sausage? No. But was this a well composed dish? Yes, the flavours worked well together and I hate the whole thing.

The main part, which is also the best part of the animal - the cheek! The pig cheek and bread were served on top of kale and accompanied with two slices of apple that were amazingly delicious.

The crust of the bread soaked up so much of the fat and flavour. Yummy!

For dessert, something quite different! Powdered pig fat and diced quince.

They could be used to garnish the chocolate pudding. The bottom layer was milk chocolate and the top was white chocolate. Candied bacon in between. Can we say divine? I want the recipe for this so badly!

Thank you to the team at The Feasting Room for the fantastic dinner. We wish you the best of luck and hope that there is a permanent location in the future!