Introducing: The Dock Ellis, an unusually hip sports bar on Dundas West from the owner of The Emmet Ray

Introducing: The Dock Ellis, an unusually hip sports bar on Dundas West from the owner of The Emmet Ray

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Name: The Dock Ellis
Neighbourhood: Little Portugal
Contact Info: 1280 Dundas St. W., 416-531-2300, facebook.com
Owners: Alain Pitout, Callum Woods and Andrew Kaiser, the owner of the The Emmet Ray on College Street
Chef: Trish Gill, formerly the sous-chef at Beast on Tecumseth

The Food: Cheap, inventive bar snacks. A basket of nachos subs house-fried wontons and braised beef for typical chips and chili, and jumbo chicken wings are spiced with fruity scotch bonnets (or, for the truly intrepid, suicide-style ghost peppers). For $18 a head, Sunday’s tailgate brunch brings a Southern-style feast of hush puppies, pork ribs and blood sausage rolls.

The Drinks: Eight local beers on draught, including brews from Amsterdam, Beau’s, Stone Hammer and Wellington.

The Place: A no-nonsense sports bar for the skinny jean set. Customers can watch the game on nine flat-screen televisions, or go head-to-head at pool, shuffleboard or foosball. Like most sports bars, décor is memorability-based: pennant flags, framed gloves and news clippings about the bar’s namesake, a pitcher for the Pittsburgh Pirates who threw an epic, LSD-fuelled no-hitter in the summer of 1970.

The Numbers:
• 1600 square feet
• 28 days to renovate the space (formerly a Portuguese sports bar called Red Cherry)
• $18 a head for Sunday Football Brunch
• $10 for the priciest item on the menu
• 9 flat-screen televisions
• 8 beer taps
• 1 mural by local graffiti artist Globe