The Best French Restaurants in Toronto, Ontario

The fancy French restaurant is almost a cliché at this point, but not without good reason! French cuisine has a strong reputation for rich sauces and flavours with subtle nuances that cater to the more refined pallet. As a result, French cuisine has become synonymous with "haute cuisine" - food for those of sophisticated taste. Heavily influenced by Italian cuisine in its early development, French cuisine adapted further as Wine and Cheese became national staples. French restaurants focus on providing a unique culinary experience with intense flavours, elite level service and meticulous presentation to their frequently high-brow patrons. French Gastronomy has been categorized by UNESCO as a part of the world's "intangible cultural heritage".
French cuisine is comprised of regional traditions from various parts of France along with national culinary traditions that tie together the common threads of regional fare into one cuisine. The foundations of French cuisine are cooking from the garden and cooking from the daily market. These traditions emphasize not only the usage of fresh ingredients, but also a willingness and even and eagerness to make the best of what was readily available. Variation in climate and growing conditions throughout France resulted in the variation in regional culinary traditions throughout France. The French have traditionally eaten seasonally available and locally grown products like fresh dairy cream and butter, local cheeses and wine, garden vegetables and bread from the local granary.
Today, many French restaurants employ the techniques of "Nouvelle cuisine" as opposed to the more classical French cooking traditions of "cuisine classique". Nouvelle cuisine is characterized by short cooking times and lighter dishes with smaller portions and an emphasis on presentation. This stands in stark contrast with something like an American-style buffet where food is valued in terms of quantity rather than presentation. Nouvelle cuisine adopted a number of new characteristics, including the shortening of cooking times for meals in order to preserve natural flavours, the use of shorter menus which allow restaurants to focus on a handful of specialties, the use of the freshest ingredients available and the use of high quality butter, fresh herbs and lemon juice in seasoning as opposed to the heavy espagnole and béchamel flavours of the "cuisine classique". Many French restaurants today cook in the style of the Nouvelle cuisine, although some have persisted in the classical traditions or found ways of combining the two.
Traditional French Onion Soup is a popular appetizer both in French restaurants and American steakhouses that have adapted this dish from its French origins. Made with onions and beef stock, this soup is made unique by the addition of sliced Emmenthal or Gruyere cheese which is placed on the surface of the soup before baking it in a hot oven. French onion soup is baked and served in the same heat-proof bowl. Foiegras is another traditional French appetizer and well-known delicacy. It consists of the liver of a duck, either served whole or prepared into a mousse. The duck is deliberately fattened to give the Foiegras a rich, buttery flavour.
Traditional French entrees are not totally unfamiliar to the North American palette. Steak frites is a popular dish, simply a steak and a plate of French fries. Pot-au-feu, a traditional French beef stew is another simple and distinctly French dish. This dish exemplifies the tradition of eating from the garden. Pot-au-feu typically contains low-cost cuts of beef that are cooked for long periods and at low temperatures for maximum flavour and root vegetables like potatoes, turnips, carrots, and leeks. This stew is simply flavoured with salt, pepper and a little clove for an authentic and distinctly French result.
France consumes wine and cheese per person than any other country in the world. In French restaurants, cheese platters are frequently served after the main course but before dessert and usually paired with French wine. French cheeses are diverse in their colour, flavour and texture, and a knowledgeable server will be able to recommend a suitable wine to accompany your selection of soft, pressed and blue cheeses.
Classical French desserts are unrivalled for their decadence and the French pastry chef must be a master of these. A great French restaurant must have a formidable dessert selection consisting of Mousse au chocolat, a rich a flavourful Creme Brulee and perhaps a Mille-feuille - the thousand-layer iced pastry that some have nicknamed after Napoleon.
French restaurants are typically trendy and upscale. Chefs must observe French culinary traditions of either the classical or Nouvelle cuisine, or some combination, while making their own innovations and incorporating regional cuisine where possible. It's no wonder that French restaurants attract the top culinary talent that Toronto has to offer. Menu Palace has listings of the top French restaurants in the city of Toronto and the GTA.