Oliver & Bonacini Café Grill

I have always loved O&B's pastas and will always recommend them. But I recently tried the Ricotta & Parmigiano ravioli and it might be my top favourite mushroom pastas in the GTA. It was absolutely the perfect comfort pasta dish with beautiful garlic crumbs, truffle oil, and decadent cream sauce to make every bite of ravioli the perfect bite! The Shrimp Gnocchi is also amazing, definitely try it for a special occasion. The staff here are also very accommodating and attentive.

We went to O&B Bayview restaurant. It is the 1st restaurant in the O&B chain and it closing this year. I am a big fan of Michael Bonacini as he sounds very knowledgeable on MasterChef Canada.

The restaurant was nicely decorated and spacious and the service was nice.

We ordered the fried brie and the 10 oz strip loin steak. The food was okay. We ordered our steaks as medium rare and they came well done.

Cheddar burger - One of my favourite burgers in town. Thick juicy meat, with a nice sauce, lettuce, pickle. Fries are good too.
* review for takeout burger only*

I crave the mac and cheese here!! Deliciously crispy coating on the top and wonderfully light mac and cheese with sprinkles of sweet peas.

Other than this dish, everything else always seems just okay.

I'm not a fan of their grilled calamari.
It was cooked beautifully and I love the tomatoes and capers, but it was doused... And I mean drowning.. In melted butter. I couldn't taste anything but the heavy melted butter. It was delicious at first but then it got very heavy after a few bites. I feel it was a disservice to the ingredients in the dish. Nevermind the oozing, oily salad leaves in there.

I might come just for the mains here which isn't quite what I usually say.

After an intense shopping trip to Ikea, I thought a great way to reward myself and the friend I conned into helping me, was a trip to the O&B at Bayview Village. It was later on a Sunday near Bayview Village closing time so if you're driving here, there are some entrances that are blocked off like the parking garage. Your best bet is to go in the entrance nearest to Parcheggio from Sheppard.

They have takeout options and highlight the offerings from Pizzeria Libretto which is their separately pizza offerings. It's not technically a separate restaurant. We entered from the mall. There's a lot of seating including patio indoors (the mall), dining room, patio outdoors facing the parking lot, and there are semi-private rooms as well that would do well for parties.

We were able to walk in without a res but you can make one in advance on OpenTable. Throughout the night we were served by several different staff. Everyone was very pleasant and pretty well informed about the menu. They offered suggestions when we seemed unsure and gave us lots of time to make our choices.

We started off with the Proper Mozzarella Sticks and the Parker House Rolls. The mozzarella sticks comes with 3 sticks on top of a tomato based sauce. The sticks were really crispy and the batter was the perfect thickness. I thought the sauce was a little sweet but it was nice with the salty mozzarella and parmesan. My date commented that the house rolls used to be free but they were on the menu for $5. They came to the table still warm which melted the whipped butter beautifully. Definitely a bread that was worth the stomach space!

I had the intention of going to town on a pasta or a pizza but the Lamb T-Bone Chops caught my eye. This comes with 3 chops and your choice of side. I went with a Caesar salad. Strangely the salad didn't really have any sauce on it. I'm not sure if they forgot it for me. There was a lot of parm and croutons on it though. There was also a bit of broccolini on the plate which was seasoned very well and charred to perfection. The lamb chops were also great. I found them extremely flavourful and the medium rare doneness was accurate.

Since we were going big, we had to do dessert as well. I was deciding between Oliver's Famous Carrot Cake and the Sticky Toffee Pudding. One of the waitresses pointed out that the carrot cake is by far the most popular dessert order so we ordered that with tea and coffee. They have a lot of tea choices and it's kind of hard to tell what they will taste like just from the description of the menu. I had the Celebration Tea which was very Christmas tasting.

The Carrot Cake was very good on its own. It's served with sour cream on the side which I wasn't the biggest fan of.

It was a really great meal in a great ambience. Perfect for dates or other special events.

We reserved a 3 person table for a Winterlicious dinner! The server was very friendly and attentive of our table, and has a good knowledge of their food, was able to answer my question and give us recommendations from the Winterlicious menu.

The croquettes, although has small portion, were great tasting. I didn't try my friends' shrimp ceviche so I can't comment on that.

My main course (that I forgot to take a picture of...) was the salmon fillet, a little average for what I was expecting after the entree, similar to the quality that I can make at home.

All three of us ordered different deserts to taste test: definitely go with the server's recommended banana split; my friend who got it was already planning for a second visit just for that.

The price was reasonable for the three-course meal, but probably not a place I would go very often unless it's a special occasion.

Oliver and Bonnacini now serve pizza by Libretto. They are known for their very thin style crusted pizzas.

We ordered the classic Margherita Doppio.... a pizza with double creamy fior di latte and San Marzano tomatoes with fresh basil. The crust is nice and thin with a beautifully blistered. Be sure to ask for their Chili Oil.... an oil that's fragrant but not spicy hot at all. I do wished it was more spicy tho. I really enjoyed the pizza... THE BEST!!

Ended the evening with their Sticky Toffee Pudding. The cake ... nice and moist topped with a thick luxurious cream and served with a very sweet caramel sauce.

Everyone wore face masks. Each table sanitized and spaced far apart. We appreciate the attention and spaciousness from other customers. A very comfortable environment.

Our server was lovely and attentive. We had a very enjoyable evening. Look forward to going back again ... next time for my favourite Liver and Onions ( we didn't order it this time ... a light appetite tonight).

For more food adventures follow me on @hungry.jo. on Instagram.

Located in bayview village, this restaurant serves high quality food at high prices.

Service: All the servers were top notch. They refilled water on their own, checked in at appropriate times.

Food: Tuna tartare - the fish is fresh, the spicy Mayo has a nice kick. Avocado mash on the bottom is nice. The fried cassava strips/chips add a nice textural change although it was overly salty, I wish there was more tuna! 4/5

Beef skewer - the beef is perfectly grilled. Beautiful char and crust on the outside, nice pink on the inside. The mashed potatoes were smooth and creamy with the right amount of salt and butter. The broccoli was grilled to perfection with good salt/pepper seasoning. Only 1 skewer of beef though. The soy sauce has a nice sweetness to it. 5/5

Carrot cake - decently moist, some spice to it. Sour cream adds some nice moisture and mild sweetness. Walnuts are the best part of this, crunchy and not bitter at all. 3/5.

Price: Expensive and the amount of food is not that much. Quality is pretty good though.

Went there for lunch yesterday. Service was great!

I haven't been here in years and the menu has changed since. We had the salmon and ended with coffee. I get it, it's still post-pandemic. The meal was underwhelming. The potatoes were so bland. The sautéed zucchini were fine. The salmon was fine at first but when it got cold (we talked a lot over lunch) the fishy smell started to seep through that the piece of fish was turning bad before it was cooked.

Let me see. We decided to meet up with friends for brunch. And the prerequisite was uptown north, we decided to come to O&B. We came during the Winterlicious time. We made a reservation for 11 am on the Saturday. It was still relatively quiet. But glad we made the reservation cause it was jammed pack by 11:30.

We were greeted by our server who was full of energy and enthusiasm. He definitely made our stay very enjoyable.

Onto the food. We were browsing the menu and noticed the normal brunch menu is gone and it's filled by the Winterlicious brunch/lunch menu. I was hoping to get some French toast and fried chicken. Haha! But we ended up getting a turkey burger and mixed green salad, eggs benedict with mixed green salad and a Caesar salad. (Yes, lots of green here). Food came out after 15 minutes? Food looked great. Turkey burger was juicy and salad had good crisp to it. However I find the dressing to be a bit oily. Eggs Benedict: hollandaise sauce was a bit oily and the salad had a heavy hand on the oil in the dressing. Caesar salad was alright. We then decided to grab dessert. Coconut panna cotta and a banana bread pudding. This took sometime to come out from kitchen. My assumption is it gotten busy since 11. The dessert tasted just okay? Not wowed by it.

Overall experience was just okay. Food was just okay. Our service was excellent though.