Introducing: Wind Up Bird, a new café, restaurant and community hub from the owner of Yakitori Bar in Baldwin Village

Introducing: Wind Up Bird, a new café, restaurant and community hub from the owner of Yakitori Bar in Baldwin Village

Introducing: Wind Up Bird

Name: Wind Up Bird Café (the name alludes to the Murakami novel)
Neighbourhood: Harbord Village
Contact Info: 382 College St., @WindUpBirdCafe
Owners: Claudio Gaudio, Yumiko Kobayashi and Sang Kim, who also owns Yakitori Bar and Seoul Food Co., both in Baldwin Village
Chef: Yumiko Kobayashi

The Place: A café, restaurant and community hub that hosts a raft of food-related programs for kids and adults (Comfort Food for the Broken Hearted, for instance, is a singles club for chefs, writers and musicians).  The space is bright and cheery, with chartreuse booths and framed illustrations from popular kids’ books on the walls. There’s a small stage at the back for recitals, lectures and poetry readings.

The Food: Comfort dishes with some unconventional twists, like boeuf bourguignon with tongue instead of regular beef, and a sausage pot-au-feu with lotus root. During the day, Laptoppers can sip lattés and snack on house-baked muffins, pies and savoury snacks.

The Drinks: Signature cocktails include a kombucha cosmo with cointreau and lime, and the Beet It, a blend of ginger liqueur, beet juice and Johnny Walker Red.

The Numbers:
• 120-year-old joists from an Annex house used to make the bar
• 40 per cent of the patio will be converted into a children’s learning garden
• 34 framed children’s book illustrations
• 20 unique alternative programs that promote child food literacy, social environmental justice, culinary arts and literary arts
• 4 menus: breakfast, brunch, lunch and dinner
• 3 restaurants opened by owner Sang Kim in the last year
• 1 TEDx Talk given by Sang Kim this year