Is Cinq 01 the new Amber?

After finding success among the socialites with Yorkville’s Amber, nightclub king Toufik Sarwa opened Cinq 01 to create a more grown-up venture—a place where the emphasis is on the food rather than the guest list. But no such luck. Since the spot opened last fall, it has been increasingly packed with the well heeled, making this the first time since the ’90s that the glitterati are partying on College Street (and this time, they’re not slumming it).

Adding to the westward shift was Sarwa’s decision to move his famous white parties from Amber to Cinq 01. Last week, Shinan Govani wrote about Daniel Craig being a no-show and socialite Stacey Kimel having mile-high hair. The week before that, a fundraiser at Cinq 01 brought the fashion types (dressed head-to-toe in white, natch) out of their Bay-Bloor haunts to Little Italy. Jeanne Beker also tweeted back in October that “the fashion crowd is really adopting it as the place to be,” with fashion writer Bernadette Morra and Holts’ Barbara Atkin among her sightings.

The dream of food over fashion, however, has yet to be achieved. Joanne Kates’s Globe review notes that the place has a “Yorkvillian” vibe, and the food is “very of the moment,” citing chef Jo Castrinos’s foie gras hot dog. She concludes that Cinq 01 may be a great date restaurant, but that the food takes a back seat to the company. That said, we heard that Beker did enjoy her hot dog.

• Guest Missed: The Wear White fundraiser could only have been improved with some 007 attendance [National Post]
• Cinq 01 is a great date spot [Globe and Mail]
• Wearing White After Labour Day For Windfal [BlogTO]