Toroli

Two of us tried this place for my birthday. I had 6 tasting course and my friend had 5 tasting course. The food was flavourful and tasty (especially the black cod, I could eat 10 more of them!!) The wait person and the chef were very friendly. I definitely recommend to try this place out to experience great Japanese /​French food!

Possibly the best meal we have ever had!
The food was amazing and the staff were friendly and attentive. We found the saké selection to be the best we’ve had to pair with such a unique and thoughtful food combinations. Everything was carefully timed to be delivered when we were ready and presented lovely.
The flavors were unique and not like anything we’ve ever had before. To quote other reviewers, the tastes were so pleasurable we were literally speechless!

We totally enjoyed the meal. All of the dishes are very tasty. We particularly liked the Black cod and the foie gras. Not to mention the prices are so reasonable compared to similar quality restaurants in the SF/​Bay Area.

Merveilleuse petite place: environ 20 couverts. Un service personnalisé hors pair. Une attention dans les détails toute japonaise. Des plats avec des ingrédients simples, d excellente qualité, avec un mariage d’ arômes et d’épices hors du commun. Sûrement un des meilleurs restaurants de Montréal. Courrez lessayer et n’oubliez pas de réserver!

This place is truly a hidden gem with only 12 seats tucked away in Montréal’s plateau. After careful research we decided to go with Toroli over Au Pied du Cochon where the waits seemed horrendous.
The food and atmosphere here are both incredible. The place is run only by a Japanese couple. The husband cooks, the wife serves. This makes for a very home-​style feeling which we greatly appreciated. We went with the tasting menu which included a salad, two sake courses, black cod, and foie gras atop duck.
This meal was incredible. The black cod tasted like butter. The foie was the most challenging meal I’ve ever eaten. The flavor of the essentially raw foie gras, served with black truffle oil atop roast duck was a powerful, one might say, life-​changing experience. The raw-​livery texture was difficult to handle for a foie noob and the amount of truffle oil on the dish was almost nauseating. Yet, somehow, it was a dish I needed to have. From the presentation, to the service, to the atmosphere, this place was darn near perfect. What an excellent meal! My friend, who had never experience truffles before, literally could not talk when the server asked how his meal was. He simply groaned in pleasure. A testament to the power of flavor this chef employs. Go and try Toroli for yourself.

The restaurant was very nice. Small and cozy and the chef was cooking all by him self. The food is very original and creative making our experience a amazing and memorable one.
Thanks guys for this night!

Toroli is a very small (12 people will fill up the restaurant) fine dining experience on Marie-​Anne, just East of St-​Denis in Montréal. When you eat there, it’s like having your own Japanese-​born, French-​trained chef cooking small miracles for you.
For the past 4 – 5 years, Toroli has been serving Japanese subtlely with French sauces and presentation. Fresh ingredients, vegetables cooked to perfection, mixed rices with a hint of truffle oil and microgreens for color and texture.
Reservations are important on weekends, but during the cold months of winter, you’ll often get a table without during week nights. I recommend the black cod or the filet mignon with the five service course.

I’ve been to Toroli twice and each time they’ve impressed!!! One of the best restaurants that I’ve ever been to, let alone in Montréal!

Unagi is a must try! We add $ 5 to change our appetizer to this and my fiancé and me both LOVE it!

Nice service. Stuffy room. Food … drenched in sauce.
The salad was meh and over-​dressed. Miso soup was the highlight. Yum! Beef carpaccio and sushi appetizers were soaking in similar salty teriyaki sauces. What a way to treat delicate foods? Filet was bland and served on top of, yep, the sauce, maybe thicker. Grilled toro tasted tinny and also over-​sauced.
We skipped dessert (yes, that disappointing of a meal) and hit Rue St. Denis for ice cream, a breeze, and people watching.
We were really looking forward to this meal.

I can’t tell what’s happening with the ratings here — I cannot believe a place like this gets this high of a rating. Seems fishy.
After my gf and I did some Tripadvisor + Unilocal cross-​referencing, we decided to visit Toroli, excited about trying some Japanese/​French fusion. The dishes sounded inventive and exciting.
Upon arrival, we were told that we were lucky to get a table because they were fully booked. I eyed the suspicious «Reserved» signs placed on each of the handful of tables in the tiny restaurant. This was a flag to me — who needs to show off they’re reserved?
Flag two came when I noticed the two other parties dining at 7pm on a Friday night were tourist as well.
This is some of the worst food I’ve ever eaten. There was a thick /​sticky sweet soy something sauce that drenched 3 out of the 4 courses in our tasting menu that was so graciously suggested by our waitress. Our salad was swimming in the dressing
The main course, my seafood rolls, were definitely cooked from frozen — my eating partner’s duck was the same way too.
We didn’t even finish our meals, i’d say 95% of the food was left on the plate as I got up in a huff because I felt so ripped off.
Be aware, Tripadviaor and Unilocal are very misleading here. I feel there’s something fishy happening — save your money and go elsewhere.

Visiting from the U.S. my wife and I just happened to walk by two nights before we at at Toroli and stopped in our tracks as we glimpsed the entrees on on the table by the window. Beautifully presented, when we stopped to look the lady at the table smiled at us and rubbed her tummy. We stopped in a reserved a table.
The five course tasting menu offers several choices for each course and everything my wife and I had was delicious and visually stimulating as well. Our server was friendly, very informative and her charm added to our experience greatly, which I have to say is rare for me to say.
The intimacy of only having six tables and one chef/​owner means that only 2 – 3 tables are active at a time. That said, our food all came a great pace and we simply loved Toroli.

I used to live by this place. I’d walk by almost every day and wonder what the deal with the cow print décor on the outside was without ever stopping to take a look at the menu in the window. Only after reading some Unilocal reviews I decided to check it out with a friend who loves both Japanese and French food.
Japanese-​French fuzion WOWZA. Seriously. This is one of the best meals I have had in my life. Honestly I can be a bit squeemish about seafood at times but no bother here — too good. We ordered two of the five course tasting menu and shared the results.
To start was a really well put togther and tasty salad, then a lovely miso soup.
Then we were given an appetizer that I will never stop talking about. This dish was essentially a sushi roll, cut into four pieces. But it was fried, so the rice was crunchy, and it was topped with a mélange of seafood, I think it was scallops. And topped with a miso sauce. I hesitated to eat my last piece because this dish was so magical. I am drooling just thinking about it.
My friend ordered the lamb and I had a dish called Paradis de la mer. We shared. It was epic. I can’t say which I liked better because I can’t decide.
Service was fantastic, really personalized. My friend was leaving for Japan in a week and the owner came and gave some suggestions for places to go — he also sent my friend an email days later with even more information. What a hero.
The only small complaint that I could possibly have is that some of the flavours in the dishes were a bit too similar. But it’s a damn good flavour — sticky misom soy lovely-​ness. But just’ sayin’
I loved this place and would reccommend it to anyone looking for something a bit different than the regular. Also people looking for something awesome.

You must come on time… this is the warning we get when we rsvp.
At first I thought, the gull this one has to dictate rules and such for a small resto.
Then I thought, well this one has to be so good he can permit himself to be capricious, you know, what with prep time for good cuisine and stuff.
Turns out, it’s all crap. All this posturing about a japanese chef, hell bent on quality control and making good food, is just fantasy.
Things tend to be too salty, too sweet and tangy or all three at the same time. I’m confused as to what happened in the kitchen when we went because it is not at all what others said about this place.
The only thing good was the plating, everything looked so pretty, but the food is just lacking… too much soy sauce.
Disapointing.

Visiting from America and we have dined at many a fine restaurant all over the U.S.
This place hangs with the best of our dining experiences.
Small, intimate restaurant. A very approachable but also romantic setting. Unbelievably, they run as a 2 person team on a Friday night. One person as the front house/​server, and one as the chef. No sous chef, just one man preparing each dish individually with TLC (tender loving care).
We had a 6 course tasting menu ($ 65) and the 5 course prix fixe ($ 46). We came 20 minutes ahead of our reservation so the chef graciously offered us a yellowtail/​pesto skewer appetizer that was delicious.
Salad, soup was not just thrown together as I have experienced at many restaurants,
Black cod appetizer was outstanding, one of the best bites of fish we have ever had.
The foie gras/​lamb dish was superb. The portions for the tasting menus were very generous.
One reviewer commented on how slow the service was. It’s literally one man doing everything so you should be prepared to wait for your dishes that are so carefully and thoughtfully put together. Our meal lasted approximately 1 hour/​45 minutes. We’ve had tasting menus that have gone over three hours, so all in all, it wasn’t that long and frankly, we enjoyed every minute of it.
You should definitely call ahead for reservations as this place seats less than 20 people.

The 5 of us had a wonderful meal here! This tiny, intimate restaurant has truly made our night special. The food was amazing, a perfect combination of Japanese and French cuisines, rich flavors and beautiful presentation! The portion size was much bigger than other fancy restaurants we’ve been to; two people from our party couldn’t finish the food and brought it home. Like I told my friends after the meal, coming from Chicago, I could easily find a very nice Japanese restaurant, or a very nice French restaurant, but this was the first time I experienced this unique rendition of both cuisines in such a beautiful harmony, that’s something I couldn’t find in Chicago. I will have to go back to Montréal to experience this again soon!

Excellent restaurant, though the ambiance could be a bit better. This would hit 5* if the prices were a bit more reasonable. But excellent food and nice to go to a Japanese restaurant that doesn’t serve sushi. Innovative food and some nice choices. The lamb was tender. The miso soup was good. The salad was extremely flavourful.

Love it and loved the Sayuri Saki

My husband and I had a wonderful dinner here while visiting Montréal. It is hidden away on a side street; an escape from the hubbub of St Denis. The food was gorgeous — delicious, beautiful, innovative and very inexpensive for what it is. The space is cozy and pretty with just a few tables. The chef is a true artist and the waiter struck the ideal balance between being unobtrusive and attentive. It’s a real gem. My favorite meal in Montréal.

The soup was very tasty. The best Miso I ever tasted. The eel crêpe that followed was surprising and very good. The desert was a crisp tasting yuzu and cream tea ice cream. Only the truffled duck magret did not wow us.

Three of us just had a wonderful dinner here. Two of us had the base menu, one with the appetizer of the day (a roll with unagi, flying fish roe, and other delights) and miso duck, the other with the miso black cod appetizer (as the other review says, this is absolutely incredible, the flesh is buttery-​silky and the flavor so rich) and the sake-​steamed yellowtail with mussels (very good), the third of us had the sesame salmon. The tasting menu of sakes is great, as is the shochu (fun aftertaste). This restaurant is worth a visit from anywhere.

Minuscule petit restaurant de 20 places mais de la grande cuisine et superbe exécution. L’ambiance y est sobre et sans flafla et la musique un tout petit peu trop forte sans être dérangeante. L’entrée de sashimi de boeuf au ponzu est brillante et la morue au miso absolument exquise. J’ai hâte d’y retourner pour essayer les plats principaux et les différentes formules en tables d’hôtes.