Re-made restaurant has downtown look

TORONTO—Eleven-year-old Wildfire Steakhouse and Winebar has a new look that, in the words of chef and owner Jody Ness, is “downtown brought uptown.”

Earlier this year, artist and design consultant Cristina Tofan re-did the interior of the 185–seat restaurant on Yonge Street south of York Mills, using a lot of polished wood, slate, leather, specially designed LED lighting and touches such as a backlit glass artwork by a New York artist and a 12-seat chef’s table made of Asian hardwood.

The restaurant has collection of 7,000 bottles of wine under 700 different labels, and one eye-catching part of the restaurant is a wall of wine on wood shelves behind glass.

“While Wildfire has a great reputation and a loyal customer base, I wanted to look at some the reasons our uptown crowd goes downtown,” said Ness in a release.

Now that they can find a downtown ambiance in North Toronto, they have less reason to go out of the neighbourhood.

Ness has reworked the menu along with updating the look of the restaurant.
He has put Dungeness crab croquettes, oysters Rockefeller  and polenta fries on the lounge menu.

From his grill, he continues to serve piri piri half chicken churrasco and Sterling Silver steaks.