A VIRAL VALENTINE'S
While restaurants hope to be open to diners for Valentine's Day, many, like Aperitivo chef Luca De Marinis, are making takeout contingency plans.
While Ottawa's restaurants hope to be able to reopen their dining rooms for the Valentine's Day weekend, some are prioritizing special menus as to-go choices for couples to enjoy in their homes.
“There is a good chance it (restaurants) may open, but the seating limit will make it hard to have a good, busy, dining-in crowd,” says Joe Thottungal, chef-owner of Thali in downtown Ottawa. “So we are aiming mostly for takeout and delivery. If it opens, we may do indoor dining for limited people.”
Below is a roundup of 16 options for romantic restaurant-made dinners for home dining on Feb. 14 (or thereabouts). There are likely many other options.
Thottungal's pan-Indian restaurant on O'Connor Street is offering four menus for two for Feb. 13 and 14 — a vegan menu, a vegetarian menu, a seafood menu and a meatbased menu, with optional drink pairings. The vegan and vegetarian menus will be $75 (or $100 with drinks) and the options for meat- and seafood-eaters will be $10 more. Orders can be placed at thaliottawa.ca and Thali staff will deliver.
Not only is Aperitivo in the Kanata Centrum Shopping Centre planning a special Valentine's dinner, it is also giving away three dinners for two to people who are going “out of their way to make these challenging days a little better,” the restaurant posted on Instagram. It is asking for suggestions to be sent (until Feb. 5) to info@aperitivo.ca with the subject line #aperitivoeamici. Aperitivo's dinner, which is also gluten-free, costs $79, and includes confit lamb leg, brown butter parsnips and sunchokes, shaved carrot and beet salad and mascarpone and espresso cheesecake.
Also in Kanata, the Brookstreet Hotel is offering a $180 surf-andturf dinner for two on Feb. 12 to 14, including butternut squash soup, chicken liver terrine, steak and lobster, and crème brûlée. Orders can be placed at brookstreethotel. com/valentines.
For the Valentine's Day weekend, NeXT, chef Michael Blackie's restaurant in Stittsville, is offering a seven-course dinner inspired by Thai cuisine, with a cocktail and Thai beer, for $90 a person. Orders can be placed at nextfood.ca.
From the Westboro restaurant Brassica, chef Arup Jana's $120 dinner for two consists of six courses, including tuna crudo, charred tomato and butternut squash soup, arancini, shrimp gnocchi, fried chicken and strawberry cheesecake. Details are under the Takeout Menus tab at brassicaottawa.com.
In Hintonburg, the Latin American restaurant Soca Kitchen on Holland Avenue is offering a reheatable dinner for two ($110) on Feb. 13 and 14 that includes seafood soup, a napa cabbage Caesar salad, roasted lamb and escargots in lobster butter, black garlic mashed potatoes, and chocolate cake. It can be ordered at thesocakitchen.com/ collections/delivery-menu.
At the innovative Hintonburg restaurant Carben, the Valentine's dinner ($160), available from Feb. 12 to 14, will include squash salad, duck tartare with foie mousse and orange ginger gel, cured albacore tuna with papaya salad, olive soil and a ginger-turmeric emulsion, rabbit leg and smoked pork belly with lentils, and chocolate Bundt cake with cheesecake mousse and compressed Moscato strawberries.
The dinner for two ($100) from two six {ate} on Preston Street consists of shrimp cocktail, wedge salad, striploin steak and bay scallops, fondant potatoes, roasted beets, and passion fruit chocolate truffles. It is available Feb. 12 to 14.
Ottawa's two temples of cutting-edge gastronomy in Little Italy are also offering Valentine's dinners. Alice, the vegetable-forward restaurant on Adeline Street, has a refined seven-course dinner for $100 per person (email info@ alicerestaurant.ca to reserve).
Atelier's dinner, also $100 per person, includes oysters, ahi tuna, koji-aged duck breast with foie mousse, and an elevated chocolate brownie. It can be purchased at atelier.tickit.ca.
In Old Ottawa South, Montgomery Scotch Lounge is offering a dinner for two of winter salad, roasted oysters au gratin and strawberry Jaffa cake, paired with two drams of Bowmore scotch and a bottle of sparkling Riesling, for $170.75. To order, find the listing at eventbrite. ca by searching “He likes oysters.”
In Centretown, Fauna is preparing a $160 dinner for two, available Feb. 13 and 14, that includes oysters, Caesar salad, beef Wellington and chocolate for dessert.
The posh downtown restaurant Aiana is offering Ottawa's priciest Valentine's dinner for two ($225). It includes beef Wellington with truffles, side dishes such as tomato farro, Parmesan fingerlings and black walnut salad, porto truffles, and chocolate and amaretto cheesecake. For another $125, you can have caviar and sparkling wine. The restaurant is taking bookings from Feb. 1 to 10.
The Whalesbone on Elgin Street's Valentine's Day dinner for two, available Feb. 11 to 14, is $85. It includes lobster bisque, baby kale and endive salad, king crab gnocchi and key lime pie.
In Ottawa's east end, just south of Beechwood Cemetery, the penthouse restaurant Le St. Laurent has dinner for two ($160), available for pickup Feb. 13 and 14. It includes seared yellowfin tuna, spinach cavatelli, beef Wellington, and chocolate torte.
Farther east, the kitchen at Baccanalle is offering its Caribbean starters and entrees, and an assortment of gifts for pickup and delivery on Feb. 12 and 13 at baccanalle.com/vday. Orders must be placed by Feb. 8.