A Funkaoshi Production

Barberian's

   18 May 2007, early morning

Yesterday night a bunch of us surprised Patrick for his birthday at Barberian’s, a steak restaurant in Toronto. Jaclyn did a great job of rounding a lot of us up for the night. I met all the other people Patrick hangs out with — his Bizarro friends if you will — who I sort of remember from my days at Waterloo. We had a table for 15 or so people in the back room of Barberian’s, and I’d have to say they did a great job of accommodating us throughout the night.

The place is on Elm, just north of the Eaton’s Centre, in a fairly nondescript building/house. The place doesn’t look like your typical haute Steakhouse; one half of the place looks like an old pub, the other half is ever so slightly more fancy. I think the place has a nice feel to it. The room we were in was large enough to seat a fairly big party. There is also seating down in the restaurant’s wine cellar, which is supposed to be quite nice.

Barberian’s serves steaks — and a few other things. I don’t think there is much point going there if you aren’t going to buy a steak. The steak I had was amazing, and I am pretty sure everyone else enjoyed theirs. (Patrick has been described to me as both a “Steak Snob” and a “Steak Princess”, so maybe he can chime in with how the place stacks up in the grand scheme of steak restaurants.) The price of a meal ranged from about $30 – $50 dollars, depending on the entré you got. As Steak places go, I don’t think it’s particularly expensive, and I thought what I had was well worth the money. The wine list at the place is something to behold. The wine my friends and I split was quite tasty.

I think Barberian’s caters to a very diverse group of people. It didn’t have the sort of old banker feel other steak places sometimes have. I could certainly see it appealing to that crowd as well, but at the same time they had no issue with a group like ours. There were all sorts of people eating when we arrived. The staff were very helpful throughout the evening. The owner popped by briefly to wish Patrick a happy birthday. I found it to be a very friendly place. On the whole I think Barberian’s is well worth checking out.

Restaurants and Bars | Life