Winnipeg’s Enoteca named one of Canada’s best new restaurants

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This article was published 22/10/2015 (3662 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Winnipeg restaurant has landed a spot on arguably the most prestigious list of Canadian eateries and is even being hailed as a key ingredient in the city’s tourism efforts.

Enoteca, a 14-month-old French-American small-plates spot in a nondescript River Heights strip mall, landed the No. 9 spot on EnRoute magazine’s annual compilation of the 10 best new eateries across the country.

The news Enoteca — and by association, owner/chef Scott Bagshaw — was being honoured came as no surprise to Mike Green, digital marketing and communications co-ordinator with Tourism Winnipeg.

“I take a lot of travel and food writers there and everybody has been wowed by it,” he said. “The flavours are always bold and the sauces are so good you want to lick the plate.”

EnRoute was similarly impressed. It described Bagshaw as having developed a reputation as the “enfant terrible” of the Winnipeg food scene five years ago but now Enoteca, “aims to bring a little more refinement to that brashness.”

“The almost-French, almost-Spanish cuisine here plays on unexpected notes that resonate: A puck of sweet raw scallop, diced and sandwiched between slices of lomo and pickled kohlrabi, gains sharpness from black garlic and dehydrated ginger. A bowl of dense salt-roasted beets and hickory-laced yogurt, about as Manitoba as Enoteca gets, picks up a crunchy balance from thin-sliced apple and toasted black quinoa,” EnRoute gushed.

Bagshaw, who also runs Deseo on Osborne Street, was humbled by the honour.

“There are a lot of lists, especially in this day and age with people blogging and social media. There used to be one or two but now there’s like a 1,000 of them. (EnRoute) is the one, as far as Canadian recognition goes. To make this list is pretty massive,” he said.

No Winnipeg restaurant has ever cracked the EnRoute list, with the exception of the former Oui Bistro — now the Peasant Cookery — which received an honourable mention eight years ago.

Nobody is going to get on a plane just to visit a single restaurant no matter how scrumptious its food, but Green said such high-profile recognition for Enoteca represents an important piece of Winnipeg’s tourism puzzle. Enoteca, by the way, means “wine repository.”

“Winnipeg is becoming a food-destination city,” he said, noting RAW: almond, the now-annual three-week winter event held on a metre of frozen river at The Forks, attracts some of the best chefs from across Canada.

“(Enoteca) is an added element to complete the whole package (in Winnipeg) with the brilliant new attractions, such as the Canadian Museum for Human Rights and the Journey to Churchill exhibit at the zoo.”

Last spring, Free Press restaurant reviewer Marion Warhaft gave Enoteca 41/2 stars, describing the food as “contemporary, imaginative and unique.”

“Creativity isn’t automatically a compliment in my lexicon, but this is creative cooking prepared with skill, care and precision. Nothing seems contrived, not even dishes I might have had doubts about,” she wrote.

Bagshaw knows that recognition by the likes of EnRoute will result in a spike in business, but that won’t be anything new. You already need to book a week in advance to get a weekend reservation. But he won’t be looking to knock out a wall or two to expand its 32-seat capacity.

“ ‘Keep it small’ is my motto,” he said. “Most restaurants make the mistake when they achieve a certain amount of success based on their original business profile (of expanding) thinking they’ll be more successful. Most people fail or don’t execute it properly. They have higher staff turnover and a million other problems. The small details that we focus on as a small restaurant are pivotal to our success. When you get bigger, you get focused on pumping out mass (sales).”

But that isn’t to say Bagshaw’s restaurant empire is maxed out. A new Asian concept, to be called Maque, is in the works on Stafford Street. He had hoped to open the doors in August but was slowed down by some bureaucratic red tape.

“This restaurant will open when it opens. I don’t want to rush it,” he said, noting it will have the same seating capacity as Enoteca.

Green said it’s also important to note that Enoteca is off the beaten path for restaurants, which typically cluster downtown, in Little Italy or in St. Boniface. Its Corydon Avenue location used to be a Quizno’s sub shop.

“It’s nice to have neighbourhood representation as well,” he said.

Green — who also writes Peg City Grub, Tourism Winnipeg’s culinary website, and has been a food columnist for CBC and a finalist on CTV’s MasterChef Canada, described the plating of Enoteca’s dishes as “immaculate” and suggested checking out the restaurant’s Instagram account.

“They look like miniature paintings,” he said.

 

geoff.kirbyson@freepress.mb.ca