Food & Drink

Introducing: La Société, Bloor Street’s massive new bistro and people-watching hub

Introducing: La Société, Bloor Street’s massive new bistro and people-watching hub

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The bar at La Société (Image: Gizelle Lau)

La Société, Charles Khabouth and Danny Soberano’s new upscale bistro, opened last week to just the chic red-carpet reception one would expect, with guests like “jersey boys” Kirk Pickersgill and Stephen Wong of Greta Constantine, media mogul Moses Znaimer, Canadian musician music manager and producer Jake Gold and Food Network Canada host Kevin Brauch (no RPattz sighting, though). We first scoped out the dining room’s impressive stained-glass ceiling shortly after it was installed, and returned last week to see how everything turned out.

The overarching theme of the Munge Leung–designed restaurant is resoundingly 1920s Parisian bistro, inspired by the likes of La Fontaine de Mars in Paris and New York City’s Balthazar (a resemblance that has not gone unnoticed on Twitter). The dining room’s main feature is, of course, the 20-by-30-foot, handcrafted stained-glass ceiling by Solarium Design Group. Located as it is on the second floor of the Colonnade (right above Sephora), La Société has large windows offering plenty of natural light, with traditional hand-painted bistro signage to alert shoppers below that there’s a new joint upstairs.

To the left side, La Société’s bar area has ample stool seating, as well as intimate alcoves with rich red banquettes. Here, the dark walls have been finished with a specially curated collection of bistro-appropriate prints, photographs and vintage frames by Hamid Samad at Commute Home (Briscola, Nyood, Colborne Lane). The antique bronze candelabra statuettes, meanwhile, were inspired by one Khabouth found in Paris.

In time for high patio season, La Société has two outdoor spaces: one at street level, with its own bar and optimal sightlines for people-watching on the newly renovated Mink Mile; and another on the second-floor terrace overlooking the street, sporting simple checkered bistro-style rattan chairs and small black café tables.

All told, the restaurant contains more than 300 seats for those looking to stop over for a schmooze, quick drink or sit-down meal. The bistro menu is chock-full of bistro classics, like French onion soup with gruyère and emmenthal ($10), steak tartare ($16), duck confit ($28) and macarons and profiteroles for dessert ($8). Despite its many meat offerings, the focus, says executive chef James Olberg, is on the seafood. The menu highlights items like its oysters platter ($19 for a half-dozen), its small ($65) and large ($145) mixed platters served on tiers, and Dover sole ($44), all sourced from Allseas Fisheries, Soberano’s fish-supply company.

Less than a week after its opening, the restaurant had already seen visits from the likes of Ben Mulroney (who raved about it on Twitter) and Deepak Chopra (he ordered the frisée salad and a lemonade). We figure they’re off to a pretty good start.

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La Société, 131 Bloor St. W., 416-551-9929, lasociete.ca.

Topics: Ben Mulroney Bistro Charles Khabouth Commute Home Food Network Canada French greta constantine James Olberg Kevin Brauch Kirk Pickersgill la societe Moses Znaimer Munge Leung New Restaurants Openings seafood Stephen Wong Toronto

17 thoughts on “Introducing: La Société, Bloor Street’s massive new bistro and people-watching hub”

  1. Nice restaurant…

    If it follows Khabouth’s history, it’ll look good, be low on substance and the food will be absolute rubbish (food pics already look unappetizing). On another note, the name sounds obnoxious, so at least it’s starting on a consistent foot. But at least the beautiful people will enjoy it for a couple of weeks until he opens up another farce… Oh well, I’m heading to Balthazar NY in a couple of weeks to enjoy what he’s clearly trying to copy. Check out balthazarny.com — look familiar? When local, check out Le Select Bistro…. for the real deal in french bistro fare.

    Good luck with “La Société”… I’ll wait to hear the reviews.

  2. Looks very nice, Food Menu oldskool tame will have to check it out. Hmmm gotta find my proper attire.

  4. I know most ppl don’t travel around the US or S.america, Europe etc…For just food. There is a select bunch who do this rather spend $200 for dinner then a brutal resort. Anthony Bourdain said it nicely I am not a Tourist I am a Traveler. But it kinda hurts when a lot of these remade Restos from our southern brothers are done in our city posing it off as something new fresh. I see why a few ppl I know would rather not open in Toronto and have success in other parts of the world.

  5. i love all the toronto pickles that say these guys are ripping off balthazar. isn’t balthazar itself just a pretty authentic rip off of pretty much any bistro in saint germain des pres?

  6. Superb profiteroles! Can’t understand why the wine list includes a lot of Italian, Australian and California wines while some regional French wines, which should be a mainstay in a French bistro, are not available.

  7. second what @mattagascar said. sounds pretentious. sounds like they invited those celebrities, which instantly makes it lose all the appealing qualities a bistro has.

  10. I live in London England and I was in Canada last week and on Sunday morning on the red carpet I saw the patio cafe – road level – and I approached the hostess to ask if it was permanent and I was very pleased that she said “yes”
    And I said to my daughter-in-law that I was pleased that finally there is something in Toronto that looks a little like Europe

    On Tuesday before we left to return to London I took my daughter-in-law for Lunch and we were very pleased. Service: Very Good. Food: we were very pleased with our order – it was delicious; Setting: very nice and tranquil; Service: good and patient

    In Conclusion I do hope the restaurant does well and on our return to Canada I did promise my daughter to go for Lunch

    Finally a boulevard in Toronto as it should be!!

  11. Sybile, toronto is not Europe, why would we want to look like it? This concept is not original, and the food is sub standard, perhaps like the tourist areas of paris.

  12. My wife and I just spent seven full days in Paris, we had our fill of fine French bistros and brassiere’s, but coming back home we just had to try La Societe just to compare, and you know what, you don’t have to go to Paris anymore, just dine here. First of all you can not find good service in Paris, here you can, someone cares a lot. For those who have not been at La Societe, don’t talk before you try. Nothing but the best quality goes into this menu, I had to try a bit of everything, and let me tell you it was amazing, try it you will see, besides dollar for euro, I’d rather pay with dollar and get my monies worth.

  13. why is toronto so afraid of anything with a bit of polish? this place has revived the colonnade and given bloor some of its old lustre back. i’ll admit the food shots are poor but I was there for the first day of public service and thought it was fine.
    gosh, give it a chance!!
    you can dress up or be casual which makes la societe perfect for the neighborhood.

  14. As soon as we heard this place was open a few girlfriends and myself made the drive from Woodbridge to check out this new spot. (desperately needing a summer alternate to ONE) I believe we have found it! Or at least somewhere to alternate between.
    The decor was absolutely fab, and decadent just like the menu! So impressed by how many items there were (3 whole pages). Made it incredibly hard to choose although can’t go wrong most things come with fries! Food was rich, and meat heavy perfect the truly carnivorous.
    Definitely over indulged, but at least we could shop it off after.
    I would recommend this to anyone and know we will be making many trips! Already have plans to book some up coming bachelorette’s!

  15. They must be joking. Don’t waste your time with the food at this place…if you want to know why: a turgid aioli, an anemic quazi Marseille Bouillabaisse and a soupy lemon tart. Not to mention a terrine described as “kind of like a spread” by the server who was more suited to work at Lone Star. With passable oysters at $20 for a half dozen the servers encouragement to “go big” was a cloying and embarrassing money grab. Our meal was pleasantly followed with a bill that was shoved in our faces seconds after receiving dessert. Not worth your time or money.

  16. Ordered the onion soup and cassoulet, both of which were mediocre at best… If a French restaurant can’t nail those two staples, well, never mind the fancy.

  17. Worst dinner ever tonite…. do they think people are stupid or what… worst cassoulet ever had… waiter pouring water on me and saying its only water…
    no go back for that price….

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