hum: brassica's small plates are wonderful in westboro
on wednesday nights, ottawa chef arup jana extends his winning ways with tapas.
5 minute read
arup jana, owner and chef at brassica, has been shaping ottawa's dining scene for over 20 years.
tony caldwell
/
postmedia
brassica
309 richmond rd., 613-680-7575, brassicaottawa.com
brassica has been shaping ottawa’s dining scene for over 20 years.
tony caldwell
/
postmedia
open: tuesday to thursday 5 to 9:30 p.m., friday and saturday 5 to 10:30 p.m., closed sunday, monday
prices: appetizers $18 to $22, mains $32 to $38, tuesday three-course menu $50, wednesday tapas $9 to $24
access: steps to the front door, the washroom is downstairs.
my first visit to brassica last month gave me a welcome case of the involuntary “mmm’s.”
in quick succession, the westboro restaurant’s appetizers — a pretty plate of seared tuna ($22) and then seared scallops paired with chunks of pork belly ($23) — triggered an appreciative grunt. i could get into specific virtues such as on-point textures and garnishes that sang in harmony with the stars of their plates. but the highest praise, i think, is that these dishes elicited immediate, gut-level kudos before my critic’s analytical brain could even think of kicking in. for me, such primal responses are as significant as they are uncommon.
brassica has been shaping ottawa’s dining scene for over 20 years.
tony caldwell
/
postmedia
granted, i had high hopes for dinners at brassica, because arup jana, its chef-owner, has been cooking noteworthy and often exceptional food in ottawa since the early 2000s.
in 2003, jana impressed my predecessor anne desbrisay when he was a 24-year-old chef running the kitchen at a new edinburgh eatery called geraldo’s. “sure-handed and appealing,” was my predecessor’s description of jana’s cooking. a year later, jana opened allium on holland avenue, which earned appreciative write-ups from desbrisay and me over that restaurant’s 14-plus years. sadly, allium was destroyed by a march 2019 fire.
brassica has been shaping ottawa’s dining scene for over 20 years.
tony caldwell
/
postmedia
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brassica, on richmond road, was jana’s big comeback, except that covid-19’s arrival caused delays and complications. when i reviewed brassica in august 2020, i never set foot inside it. instead, i ate outdoors during ottawa’s first pandemic patio season.
arup jana, owner and chef at brassica, has been shaping ottawa’s dining scene for over 20 years.
tony caldwell
/
postmedia
only now do i see that when i visited brassica more than four years ago, two highlights were a plate of tuna crudo and a dish of seared scallops paired with pork belly. and when i look over my 2016 review of allium, i see that i praised “slabs of ruby-red seared tuna” and “expertly made… seared scallops.”
these echoes from the past make me realize that jana long ago figured out what he loves to cook. in many cases, he’s pretty much perfected how to serve these popular proteins in a direct and approachable manner, making slight variations to keep his regulars engaged.
a tried-and-true combo: pork belly and scallops at brassica on richmond road.
peter hum
/
postmedia
our other visit to brassica last month was on a wednesday, which is the restaurant’s consistently busy tapas night. if you’re blasé, you might say that the heyday of small plates was a while ago. indeed, allium was an early advocate for small plates in ottawa, which it served on monday nights as early as 2006 or 2007, jana told me this week.
but even if the concept is dated, the well-executed small plates at brassica were thoroughly enjoyable. four of us split nine small plates and two desserts. when we finished, it seemed like a very satisfactory and affordable dinner, especially given the savings from the tax holiday, which remains in effect until feb. 15.
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that night, brassica’s kitchen was working wonders with its deep fryer. succulent-crispy honey-glazed pork ribs (three for $18) that had been braised and then fried was our favourite item that night, although impeccable shrimp tempura lollipops with hot honey butter and ginger aioli (three for $16), beer-battered walleye with dill pickle aioli, sweet pea and horseradish purée and crinkle chips ($20) and fried cauliflower with chili and lemon hummus ($18) weren’t far behind.
salmon tartare tacos at brassica come in a crisp shell with the right amount of bite.
peter hum
/
postmedia
two salmon tartare tacos with a bright pickled corn salsa ($16) made cubes of raw fish exciting again. a chunk of beef short rib ($22) with a fine red wine jus put to shame a short rib dish that i recently ate elsewhere in ottawa, which also cost nearly three times the price. while local mushrooms on toast ($12) looked a little disheveled, they and their parmesan cream amounted to a savoury treat.
the only dishes that struck us as closer to ordinary were lamb sliders ($16) which were a bit under-flavoured and bacon and cheese gnocchi ($22) which were a touch heavy.
for dessert, we had jana’s rightly famous banoffee pie ($12), a holdover from allium’s earliest days. it’s a magic dessert that practically transports a diner back to childhood wonder with its sweet, creamy, chocolatey goodness. a massive chocolate parfait ($14) hit similar nostalgic notes.
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brassica’s tapas night also serves as an introduction to its other dinner menus.
brassica’s surf and turf: softshell crab with short-rib ravioli.
peter hum
/
postmedia
on tuesdays, jana offers a three-course, prix-fixe menu for $50, which is a great deal given how easy it is to spend $100 per person at ottawa’s upscale restaurants. this week’s edition included mushrooms on toast or tuna crudo, as well as steak frites or pan-seared salmon.
on other nights, the dinner menu includes tweaked selections from the tapas menu as appetizers and mains, such as a $38 beef short rib dish. jana is quite wily in how he shuffles featured ingredients and proteins between menus.
at that first dinner, i had a surf-and-turf special ($40) that combined a perfectly fried softshell crab with a plump raviolo filled with luscious short rib. my companion had the duck confit main ($38), which boasted one of the best-cooked and most crisp-skinned duck legs i’ve seen in recent memory. the accompaniments on that plate, however, seemed a little muddled that night.
mushrooms on toast at brassica look a little chaotic but hit the right notes.
peter hum
/
postmedia
service at brassica varied. during our first visit, our server was quite clipped and perfunctory. that, plus the kitchen’s speedy efficiency, robbed our night of the relaxed, special feeling we would have preferred. fortunately, when we returned to brassica, another server was much more warm and engaging, and the dinner’s slower pace allowed us to enjoy our outing and each other’s company.
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previously vittoria in the village, brassica has a simple but attractive neighbourhood-restaurant ambience. it seats about 50 people in a space that feels a touch more casual than the elevated food on jana’s plates.
here, cocktails are $16 each, and several mocktails, non-alcoholic beers and non-alcoholic wines are available. most wine bottles here go for between $50 and $90, while five-ounce pours range from $12 to $15 and nine-ounce pours range from $21 to $26.
brassica’s banoffee pie has history — and a lot of whipped cream.
peter hum
/
postmedia
after my recent list of 10 romantic ottawa restaurants was published, a reader chided me: “restaurant reviewers in ottawa keep overlooking brassica. it’s my favourite over all the ones you’ve listed, and i’ve been to them all.”
i’m still not sure that brassica belongs on that list, especially given that one instance of clipped, impersonal service. but i have no qualms about lauding jana’s consistently delicious dishes. let me say too of brassica: don’t overlook it.
arup jana, owner and chef at brassica, has been shaping ottawa’s dining scene for over 20 years.
tony caldwell
/
postmedia
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