TORONTO – There are plenty of hotels in Toronto with spiffy rooms. And there are lots with smiling front-desk folks. And a number with great food either at the restaurant or immediately adjacent.
I could name a half-dozen city hotels that have those qualities in spades. But there aren’t many where the mere act of walking in the door gives you a lift and makes you think, “Okay, I’ve arrived. This is something special. This is something cool.”
That’s the feeling I get when I walk into the Shangri-La Hotel Toronto, which features a large, airy lobby and a glittery but still comfortable ambience.
One of the great features is the Fazioli piano, which has some of the lyrics from Joni Mitchell’s “My Old Man” inscribed inside the lid. The hotel has live music every day after 2 p.m., often featuring five or six performers over the course of an afternoon and evening.
The “In Harmony” drink and the food and drink menus at Shangri-La Hotel Toronto. JIM BYERS PHOTO
There are comfortable seats spread around the lobby bar area, which also has flickering gas fireplaces and a series of glass booths that show off rotating fashion displays. When my wife and I visited recently they had couture on display from Alex McQueen and Thea Parker.
I’ve been in the lobby a dozen times or more over the years, and it always seems to be buzzing with activity.
I hadn’t noticed before, but the interior also has some metal birds on or around the ceiling, a continuation of the large, silver bird sculpture outside called The Rising. I also hadn’t noticed, but if you look up from University Avenue you’ll see the odd bird outside a few hotel windows.
There’s a koi pond surrounding The Rising sculpture, and the pond continues into part of the Shangri-La lobby, enclosed by glass below your feet. Also cool.
One of the cool and unusual features at the hotel, which opened in 2012, is the extensive drinks menu at the Lobby Lounge, which is served up in a series of four small books (plus one for food) placed on each table in the bar. The “In Harmony” cocktail is a keeper; served with Levenswater Gin, germaine elderflower, luxardo maraschino, hibiscus syrup, lemon juice and plum bitters. It was served in a beautiful glass with tiny flowers. Another cool offering is the “Full Monty,” with Bulleitt Rye, amaro averna, amaro nonino, maple syrup, orange bitters and bittercube cherry vanilla. A touch sweet for me, but satisfying, and deeply flavourful.
I’ve had dinner at the hotel restaurant, Bosk, on a previous occasion. This time it was for breakfast, which includes a lovely buffet with fruit, pastries, yogurt and other traditional buffet items, as well as made-to-order dishes such as healthy egg white omelettes, smoothies, turkey sausage and strong, French press coffee. The service was outrageously good and personal, which is something you don’t always find at North American hotels.
A corner room at the Shangri-La Hotel Toronto. JIM BYERS PHOTO
I also noticed that the words to Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi” were beamed onto one of the buffet tables from an overhead light, which is pretty cool and provides another Canadian touch.
Bosk has a small patio that fronts onto University Avenue, but it was a touch cool when we had breakfast so we opted for an inside table. The restaurant is an elegant affair with plenty of warm wood (hence the name bosk, which literally means a small woods or a thick stand of bushes).
The Lobby Lounge also serves dim sum and Aternoon Tea, with something like 68 varieties of tea and scrumptious-looking treats. Afternoon Tea is served every day from noon to 4:30 p.m.
The flower arrangements at the Shangri-La Hotel Toronto change on a regular basis. JIM BYERS PHOTO
We didn’t get a chance, but the hotel also has a Miraj Hammam Spa. The fitness centre has a 20-meter pool, an infra-red sauna and a Jacuzzi, as well as the latest workout equipment and an outdoor terrace.
The hotel has an outstanding location, a block from the St. Andrew subway station and in the heart of the downtown business district. It’s the shortest of walks to Roy Thomson Hall and the entertainment district, and a short walk to almost all downtown attractions.
There are 202 rooms and suites, including some insanely beautiful suites with massive marble bathrooms and standalone tubs. Our room was a corner unit with a large living space, coffee maker, a comfortable and well-equipped work desk (important given the location in the CBD) and more; with elegant accents in shades of tan and aubergine. The bathroom was quite large and bright, with a tub that’s aligned so you can sit back in a nest of bubbles and gaze out at the lights of University Avenue and downtown Toronto.
A tub with a view at the Shangri-La Hotel Toronto. JIM BYERS PHOTO
It’s quite striking.
The second-floor event space has a great patio overlooking University Ave., complete with a small Japanese-style garden a bee hive that’s home to 50,000 bees. The hive, which you can see behind glass in part, produces some 20 kilograms of honey each year, which they use in the hotel and also send to Flying Monkeys Brewery, where they use it in their B-Wall Lager.
For dinner, we headed next door to Kojin, which occupies the third floor above the highly regarded and tasty Momofuku. The restaurants aren’t technically part of the hotel, but you can enter Momofuku from the Shangri-La lobby. (See my note later in the story about the special package the hotel has, which includes dinner at Kojin).
An array of tasty dishes at Kojin, adjacent to the Shangri-La Hotel Toronto. PHOTO BY JAKE KIVANC, COURTESY OF SHANGRI-LA TORONTO.
We enjoyed a tasty, innovative and immensely satisfying meal at Kojin, which has a section that juts out towards University Avenue and has tons of great light, as well as giant Asian lanterns overhead that turn from white to yellow to deep orange as the evening goes on. It’s one of the most striking settings in the city, from what I’ve seen. And the food might be even better, thanks in large part to chef Paula Navarrete.
We started off with their signature dish of giant corn flatbreads, which are puffy like a pancake and served with giant shears you use to trim off small (or huge) chunks. They do them up in a variety of ways, including one version with beef drippings, another with Niagara ham and coppa and another will avocado and goat cheese. We had the house specialty, which is served with grass-fed butter and salted, spiced honey. It’s almost a dessert and it’s truly amazing, with a swirling mouthful of flavour in every bite.
We tried the BC shrimp crudo, which was simple but tasty, as well as the homemade sausage board. I wasn’t too crazy about the blood sausage, but it’s admittedly not everybody’s taste. I quite enjoyed the chicken sausage with a bit of kim chi and cheddar, as well as the mild Italian sausage and the beef frankfurter.
House made sausages at Kojin. PHOTO BY JAKE KIVANC, COURTESY OF SHANGRI-LA HOTEL TORONTO.
They made a fabulous salad with grilled radicchio and basil pesto. And the bone-in, 45-day minimum, dry-aged striploin is tender and sweet and smoky and perfect.
Other items we didn’t try include a whole chicken in a pot, grilled trout, popcorn shrimp with caviar and a “lacquered” pork chop with macadamia and charred onion that sounds terrific.
The highlight for me, and apparently for many visitors, was the Tita’s Mash. I was so in love that I may have had jotted the ingredients down incorrectly, but I believe the potatoes are served with eggs, Quebec cheese curds and aged gouda. They serve it up in a small skillet and cook it just right so that the top of the potatoes are crispy and ever so slightly charred. Hands down the best potato dish I’ve had in my life.
One of the dessert highlights is the chocolate souffle, which is opened up with a spoon and then filled at your table with homemade ice cream and a small pitcher of crème anglaise. Oh, my.
The Shangri-La has a Momofuku package that includes a night at the hotel, $150 towards dinner for two at Kojin, breakfast for two at Bosk and a Momofuku/David Chang/Peter Meehan cookbook. The package was recently listed for $625 Canadian.
Editor’s note: The Shangri-La Hotel paid for our hotel stay and meals at Kojin and Bosk. They did not approve or review a copy of this story prior to publication.
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