Toronto can’t get enough of Italian fusion
Five new restaurants that incorporate French, Cantonese or Japanese flavours into their Italian food
Italian food is having a moment in Toronto, but not one defined by red sauce. A new crop of restaurants is rethinking what Italian cuisine means by drawing on the flavours of chefs’ histories and travels. The results feel both familiar and fresh: pomodoro finished with Japanese seaweed, ragù enriched with duck confit or cappellacci floating in dashi broth. It’s food that feels steady yet restless, balancing the comfort of tradition with the curiosity of a city that thrives on cross-cultural exchange. Call it fusion if you want, but these restaurants aren’t chasing gimmicks. They’re using Italy as a canvas and layering on French finesse, Cantonese character or Japanese soul.
Radici Project
Named after the Italian word for “roots,” Little Italy’s Radici Project reflects the respective heritages of its founders, Emiliano Del Frate and Kayo Ito’s respective heritages, and how they’ve planted their own traditions in Toronto. Their Italian Japanese blend is an interpretation of itameshi, a well-established style of fusion in Japan.
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Del Frate, who trained in Michelin-starred Italian kitchens, including Don Alfonso, filters that pedigree through thoughtful dishes that fold one culinary identity into the other. Cacio e pepe takes the form of takoyaki topped with beef tataki, while cappellacci are stuffed with Genovese ragù and set afloat in a delicate dashi broth. What arrives at the table isn’t forced fusion, but dishes where two flavour profiles meet naturally. Drinks follow the same philosophy: natural wines and sake share space on the list, while cocktails might mix Italian amaro with Japanese ume liquor, creating surprising harmonies.
“I was born in Italy, but I’ve spent years cooking in Italy, Japan, Denmark, France, and now Toronto,” says Del Frate. “When I cook, all of those places come with me. People in Toronto are open to stories told through food, especially when they can feel the truth and care behind it.”
The Playbook Commons
Part red-sauce restaurant, part steakhouse, part sports bar, the Playbook Commons is Italian fusion reimagined for game night. Located inside Hotel X, the restaurant’s menu riffs on Italian American comfort food, with prime cuts and global culinary flourishes that push the concept beyond Nonna’s kitchen.
“We felt that introducing American-Italian cuisine to traditional steakhouse offerings would bring together two classic styles of dining in a way that feels welcoming and comfortable,” says culinary director and head chef Jia Zou.
The menu lists red-sauce staples like spicy vodka rigatoni, but also genre-blurring plates like the Iberico pork chop, a variation of pork chop pepperonata that’s finished with a sauce deepened by dark chicken jus and emulsified with butter.
“I think Italian fusion is having a moment because people miss that homey and nostalgic feeling of eating comfort food,” says Zou. “In a space where everyone’s trying to be the next new thing, it can be a breath of fresh air to offer guests something familiar.”
Vinoteca Pompette
When Pompette rebranded late last year, the goal was clear: less special-occasion French fine-dining, more neighbourhood-friendly Italian hangout. Vinoteca Pompette doesn’t abandon its roots so much as remix them, blending an Italian backbone with French technique, global flavour cues and an emphasis on seasonality. “It’s a cuisine that’s easy to make your own, whether through a classic French dish given an Italian twist, or by weaving in flavours that everyone knows and loves,” says Jonathan Bauer, managing partner and co-founder.
Dishes slip easily between Italy, France and beyond. Take the pappardelle al ragù: it reads Italian, but the slow-braised duck confit that anchors the sauce borrows straight from the French playbook. Or the Ontario heirloom tomato: a Mediterranean spread of pesto and ricotta salata that gets nudged eastward by mushroom XO, the Cantonese condiment that brings a briny umami kick.
The 300-bottle-deep wine list includes both French and Italian bottles, all sourced from natural, organic and biodynamic producers. Cocktails are inventive, with updates on Italian mainstays, like a pistachio negroni and a caffè corretto spiked with parmigiano-infused vodka.
Tatsuro’s
At Tatsuro’s, Japanese and Italian flavours meet over pasta and toast. Leslieville’s all-day brunch spot from Oscar Lau and Maggie Wong serves the kind of food they like to eat, made with the ingredients they always have on hand. “Our culinary background is mostly Japanese cuisine, but we cook very Italian at home. And our pantry is full of Japanese ingredients, so it was natural to bring the two together,” says Lau. “Both cuisines have a lot in common: strong connection to traditions, respect for ingredients and a near obsession with simple things being done right.”
Related: This Japanese Italian diner is Leslieville’s latest brunch obsession
That balance shows up across the menu, which focuses on comforting pasta dishes and house-made shokupan toasts. The wafu carbonara—one of the diner’s most popular dishes—layers bacon, citrusy ponzu and an onsen egg over noodles, then finishes it with a sprinkle of parmesan. And the nori pomodoro is made like a standard Italian tomato pasta, but topped with seaweed for a hit of umami.
The vibe is as cozy as the food: white and green walls, plus cute knickknacks. The restaurant takes its name from Tatsuro Yamashita, a pioneer of Japan’s city pop movement—a ’70s-era sound that blends Western funk, jazz and disco into something distinctly Japanese. The playlist matches the menu’s character: warm, playful and unexpectedly genre-crossing.
NL Ginzburg
The latest project from Carmelina Imola and Zachary Kolomeir (the team behind Dreyfus, Vilda’s and Taverne Bernhardt’s), NL Ginzburg reinterprets the Italian trattoria through a Jewish lens. “It aims to be foundationally Italian with the influence of Jewish diasporic cookery that we’ve seen throughout our travels in Italy,” says Imola.
Related: The team behind Bernhardt’s, Dreyfus and Vilda’s just opened an Italian restaurant
It’s a fresh take on Italian fusion that swaps trendy mash-ups for something informed by history. Italy’s Jewish communities—which are distinct from the Ashkenazi, Sephardi and Mizrahi traditions—have been part of Italy’s culinary fabric for centuries, and that legacy runs through the menu at NL Ginzburg, showcased in plates like chopped chicken liver crostini served like a Florentine toast, or Pugliese lentils simmered with tomato and soffritto.
The menu is built around a charcoal grill, seasonal produce and the kind of minimalist pasta dishes normally found at countryside trattorias. And the space is understated, styled with vintage Italian movie posters, religious oil paintings and Simonetti chairs sourced from Italy’s Le Marche region. It’s an intimate setting for a concept that blurs borders while staying grounded in what came before.
Jessica Huras is a freelance writer and editor with over a decade of experience creating food, travel and lifestyle content. She’s a content editor for the LCBO’s Food & Drink magazine, and her work has appeared in the Globe and Mail, the Toronto Star, Chatelaine, Toronto Life and Elle Canada, among other publications.
