My Redfish adventure began on February 6th when I spoke with Jamie, the nice manager who works there after seeing someone tweet about their sustainable fish menu. I asked my usual questions, and was very pleased with the answers. Jamie even told me that there was a vegan dish – housemade miso noodles topped with miso sauce and wild mushrooms, which sounded incredible, and it sure was, just ask my mom!
Redfish is a beautiful corner space on College Street with a metal fish hanging outside their door and the wall above painted with their logo and the inscription “Redfish”. You won’t miss it! When I walked in the front door, a woman filming something asked my dad if I was Ryan Storm. It turns out that that person was from View The Vibe and had just posted an interview between us that same day! What a small world!
The art inside the restaurant was all sea themed, with everything from art featuring life jackets to fishermen and fish light fixtures. We got seated right away at a comfortable family size table near the back of the restaurant, close to the semi-open kitchen.
For appetizers, we ordered a selection of wild foraged mushrooms, maple syrup glazed brussel sprouts, and french fries with nori salt and miso aioli. My sister LOVED the brussel sprouts, and so did I, but she must’ve eaten about half of the plate, and she was still talking about them at the end of our entire meal! They were flavoured so nicely, so that when you bit into each one, you got just the right burst of maple syrup, along with just enough brussel sprout. The fries were amazing, and my brother probably liked them most. They were ok, but with the addition of nori salt and miso aioli, they were upgraded in my books to the status of “awesmazing”. Also, I tried my first oyster! The oysters usually come in platters of six or twelve, but since they were really nice, and my mother wasn’t into ordering these at all, they gave me one oyster on a bed of ice. It was very good, and had a better flavour and texture than I expected, I’m glad I tried it.
The main courses arrived beautifully plated, with lots of different colours. My mom ordered the vegan dish, which had the most enormous slab of tofu on top of the noodles, sauce, bok choy, and mushrooms. She was very happy, and that counts for a lot! My sister ordered the rainbow trout, which came served with dahl, curried onion purée and cauliflower. And although she liked the fish, I’m sure she’d come back just for the dahl she raved about the lentils so much! My dad ordered the Moules Frites, which came in a garlic scape pesto, which I ate with a spoon out of his bowl! Not the best table manners, I know, but I blame the pesto for being so good! 🙂 I ordered the Arctic Char served with apple and horseradish gnocchi and bacon. I didn’t think that I would like the horseradish, but our server assured me that it wasn’t too strong and I’m glad I trusted him. The whole dish was delicious together, and each ingredient tasted great on their own too.
The best dish in my opinion was the small roasting pan filled with a variety of wild foraged mushrooms we had as an appetizer, you cannot imagine how flavourful they were. Oh wow, it’s all coming back to me as I think about them.
We didn’t even look at the dessert menu, and not to be offensive, it seems that in almost every restaurant we go to, the desserts are all dairy, gluten, sugar, and nuts, so we opt out and have something at home or stop at a store to pick up a treat.
If you eat fish, make sure you know where it comes from and is sustainable and seasonal. Redfish proudly makes the claim that they take care of all of that and more.
P.S. sorry for the lack of pictures of the food, I took almost 40, but they are all very dark!
