Dundas West brewery won’t steal any hearts
BANDIT BREWERY
(out of 4) FAIR Address: 2125 Dundas St. W. (south of Bloor St. W.), 647-348-1002, banditbrewery.ca/ Chef: Faye Sengsavang Hours: Monday to Thursday, 5 p.m. to midnight; Friday, 5 p.m. to 1 a.m.; Saturday, noon to 1 a.m.; Sunday, noon to midnight Reservations: No Wheelchair access: Yes Price: Dinner for two with beer, tax and tip: $50 Does your idea of good eating include chicken butts? Then have I got a place for you. Bandit Brewery is a new brew pub in the not-so-trendy stretch of Dundas St. W. between Roncesvalles Ave. and the railroad tracks.
From a short menu heavily dependent on the deep fryer, Bandit offers $8 “chicken tails,” the fatty terminus of poultry spine properly called a pygostyle. My British grandmother called it “the pope’s nose.”
Call it what you will, I’m here to report that globs of fried chicken fat shot through with brittle vertebrae are not the worst thing I’ve eaten.
(That would be natto, fermented Japanese soybeans that should contain “a written apology,” according to a memorable but gross blog post by one Western taster.)
Bandit opened in April, after owners Stephane Dubois and Shehzad Hamza took over an old auto body shop. It draws a crowd for boardgame date nights and drinkers who recognize your beautifully nerdy 99% Invisible podcast T-shirt.
It’s all very chill, from the flimsy wooden furniture to the paper-towel napkins handed out some nights. Staff mill about somewhat effectively as classic rock blasts and tea lights flicker on the tables.
For now, the draw is the gravelled beer garden with twinkling patio lights and pet dogs tethered to the trees.
“It’s really supposed to be a beer place. We didn’t want to get too complicated with the food,” says communications manager Juan Manuel Gonzalez-Calcaneo.
But beer drinkers get hungry and crisp chicken tails are on par with the middling dining experience at Bandit.
Faye Sengsavang runs the kitchen, with a menu designed by Harrison Hennick (ex-Furlough). It sits several steps down from the beer-friendly food at Bar Hop Brewco on Peter St., but beer is an ingredient in three of the eight made-from-scratch dishes.
Gravlax ($13) is nice, the buttery cured salmon tasting of fresh dill. The salad on top would be anathema to Swedes, but jalapeno gives the julienned vegetables a pleasant bite.
Pretzels ($5) are shaped into spheres and partnered with a warm honey mustard dip. They are nothing special, a category into which I’d also put the house salad ($9), a benign mix of kale and feta dressed in part with the brewery’s Cone Ranger IPA.
The one main course, hanger steak ($19) with smashed potatoes, is a lot of money for a little meat. It’s not the only dish I recommend approaching with caution. Beer-battered cheese curds ($9) are strictly hit-or-miss. The first time I had them, they came off as hot rubber. They turned out better the next time, like mozzarella sticks but raunchier.
Sticky toffee pudding ($8) is the one dessert, steamed in small Mason jars and chockablock with dried figs. The dark toffee bubbling away on top is also chancy, made with Bandit’s porter but sometimes overcooked to the point of resembling molasses.
Mediocre food. Inoffensive beer. Bandit has much room for improvement.
The raccoon mascot, though, is indubitably excellent. apataki@thestar.ca, Twitter @amypataki