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Café Renée
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Café Renée is an Italian-French brasserie where joie de vivre and fine food are served up in equal measure. A King West spot that aims to transport diners elsewhere, this spot is for anyone craving the type of escapism best provided by a parade of plush dishes and deluge of classic drinks.
If there’s a theme to Café Renée — beyond the France-meets-Italy yarn the team tells — it’s butter. Skim the menu and you’ll spy it, browned, perked up with lemon and anchovy, cozying up to escargots in the team’s pasta-ified version of the classic. In a silken, dashi-spiked carbonara hollandaise it cloaks a toothsome tangle of bucatini. Even frites, which chef de cuisine Joshua Ling says the team “played around with for a long time,” jump from the fryer into a bath of brown butter before being hit with house-made herb salt. “The butter,” raves Ling, “just gives another level.”
From the prim uniforms to the intentionally worn tiles and mirrors, the sophisticated food, boisterous room and, yes, the devotion to beurre, Café Renée is a faithful replica of Paris’ liveliest, most sought-after eateries. What it brings to the table (quite literally), is a pile of pastas.
“We describe Café Renée as an Italian brasserie,” says Ling. “We take a lot of Italian dishes, a lot of pastas, but we infuse a lot of French flavours into those dishes. It’s very Italian-themed but all those seasonings and flavourings are of the French background.”
Fresh from a stint at Hong Kong’s Michelin-starred Vea, chef Ling brings an appreciation for fine dining to his role at Café Renée, where the goal is to serve excellent food sans the stuffiness. “It’s nice to find what worked there and bring it to a more approachable atmosphere. … It’s nice to make things more fun for people.”
Together with executive chef Nick Liu, Ling devised a menu that flaunts the duo’s combined know-how with French, Italian and Asian techniques and ingredients. “There’s a lot of subtle Asian seasonings that we use,” explains Ling. “Chef Nick and I have a lot of Asian background, so those ingredients sneak their way in as very undertone flavours.”
For his part, beverage director Angus Edmundson has crafted a cocktail list sprinkled with sips that feel as light, lively and welcoming as the restaurant itself. It’s a list inspired by the “simplicity of old-school European cocktails,” he explains. “We’re doing lots of riffs on classics, not overcomplicating it, four or five ingredients.” Still, stirred with house-made tinctures and bitters, traditional ingredients upgraded with modern substitutes, each feels reborn.
Longing for more complexity? An alum of the BarChef school of mixology, Edmundson really lets his creativity loose upstairs, where guests will find the moody, intimate Charlemagne Cocktail Bar. Yes, it’s housed in the same building and run by the same team — just don’t call it the restaurant’s speakeasy.
Early on or late, Edmundson’s Café Renée cocktail menu has something for every taste. Au courant diners will thrill at three takes on the eternally trendy espresso martini, including the maple-laced Crème Brûlée rendition.
Traditionalists, meanwhile, will hearten at the sight of classics, from an Old Fashioned to a raspberry-infused French Martini.
Stone Garden, a clarified goat milk punch, rallies the bold with its notable combo of white rum, Amaro Nonino, black tea, peach, lemon and lavender bitters.
A low-ABV aperitivo with sweet and dry vermouths, orange blossom honey and orange bitters, the Evening at the Duomo is for diners looking to soften up slowly.
Prefer drinks with a sassy lick of sweetness? Then you’ll want to make the strawberry-hued Binotto’s acquaintance. Just don’t order this expecting a sugary punch. With rye and Fernet Branca, it’s as fruity and soft as it is bracing.
From a list of crowd-pleasing starters, Gruyère Cheese Sticks and Parisian Poutine might beckon, but Steak Tartare is the wise choice considering what’s to follow. Embracing a sunny pool of egg yolk truffle mayo, traditionally-seasoned meat makes a zingy topper for house-made gaufrettes.
Move onto some wine from the chummy, charming list, and a bowl of the kitchen’s people-pleasing pasta. There’s Rigatoni Alla Vodka and Crab Spaghetti, both made with hand-made noodles from Woodbridge’s Grano Duro Pasta. Dashi gives the vodka sauce added depth with uni cream bolstering the briny, buttery flavour of every long, slippery spaghetti strand.
Cheese-filled pillows hailing from the southeast of France, Ravioles Du Dauphiné have found their way to Portland via New York City’s Chelsea Café, which catapulted them to social-media superstardom after opening in 2023. Here, they’re plumped with a blend of mascarpone, Comté and Gruyère, left uncut (natch), then drowned in beurre monté seasoned with garlic, shallots and caramelized soy emulsion. With 15 pieces per sheet, there’s enough to share with every seatmate hungry to understand the buzz.
Carnivores will appreciate chef’s 12-ounce Steak Au Poivre, which is dry-aged for 30 days before making its grand entrance. Served with sautéed spinach, brown-butter frites and house peppercorn sauce fortified with Madeira, brandy and red wine it’s deeply savoury and rich yet easily one of the menu’s lighter options.
Lively and loud, crowded and unquestionably cool, Café Renée is small enough to feel intimate and chic enough to feel fresh, with a menu that skews trendy but doesn’t ignore flavour. Spend a night here, and lips slick, eyes and spirit mollified by rounds of cocktails and a table crowded with temptations, you’ll appreciate why King West’s most Parisian corner is suddenly the hottest place to be.
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