“That’s just great,” says chef David Lee of Yorkville’s Planta as he spots a teachable moment unfolding at a farmers’ market stall. A tot, barely tall enough to see over the table’s edge, is on tiptoe while her dad shows her how to choose the perfect tomato at Evergreen Brick Works.
“Teaching your kids about food is so important,” says chef Lee, whose six-year-old daughter, Indya, has spent her whole life learning to share her dad’s reverence for food. But only in the past year has chef Lee truly trained his culinary spotlight onto plant-based food.
“I’ve been plant-based for the past seven months,” says Lee. Basically the nouveau term for vegan, “plant-based” means using zero animal products. Lee was introduced to the lifestyle by gourmand-about-town Josh Josephson (CEO by day, restaurant savant by night).
Lee’s wife, Jennifer O’Brien, also played a pivotal role in Lee’s new diet direction. In 2015, O’Brien skipped off to a ranch retreat in California where, for two weeks, she ate an entirely plant-based diet. Upon her return, she assembled what she’d learned and started cooking plant-based meals at home.
“Her meals were outstanding,” Lee notes.
With this combined influence, Lee’s next step was an entirely natural progression.
Stepping into the former Pangaea location on Bay Street, Planta opened in late September to much fanfare. Planta — the first collaboration between Lee and the Chase Hospitality Group — offers an entirely plant-based menu in a stylish space designed by Steven Salm and EastStudio. A neutral colour palette sees pops of green thanks to palm print wallpaper.
Not a single dish served in the handsome 165-seat room features an ounce of dairy, meat or fish. And yet, the menu is chock full of dishes — like the Frenchie pizza with mushrooms, squash, eggplant and olives — that are familiar to omnivores. Small tweaks make these veg-friendly. The ’za, for example, isn’t topped with cheese, but a cheese-like topping made from cashews.
“The menu is extremely accessible. It has something for everyone,” says Lee, who’s been testing items on daughter Indya. She’s particularly keen about the faux hot dog, which swaps out a frankfurter for a slow-roasted Cookstown carrot.
Lee’s path to Planta was a circuitous one. Before coming over to Canada at the age of 24 to helm the kitchen at Centro (T.O.’s flagship fine dining establishment at the time), the England-born chef apprenticed under some of Europe’s most acclaimed chefs: Anton Mosimann, Eric Allouche and Peter Kromberg.
Now 46 years old, Lee has in turn acted as a mentor to a number of local chefs. Victor Barry (Piano Piano) and Anthony Rose (Rose and Sons) are two standouts from the long list of chefs that have learned from him.
Since his Centro days, Lee has come and gone as one of the owners of Splendido. He also briefly co-owned the upscale barbecue joint Carbon Bar, which he left in 2014 to redouble his focus on Nota Bene, his Queen West eatery that appeals to power lunchers and arts patrons alike.
Last winter, Lee made over Nota Bene, which, until then, had focused on 60-day aged steaks and foie gras dishes that helped push it up critics’ best-of lists when it opened back in 2008. Nota Bene 2.0 is more well-rounded, featuring an omnivorous menu with plenty of plant-forward options designed to appeal to vegheads and their meat-loving pals alike.
If Nota Bene 2.0 represented a middle way between the old guard of restaurant (protein-driven, pricey cuts) and the new guard of vegetable-lauding, sustainability-focused eateries, then chef Lee’s newest venture, Planta, is firmly in the new guard restaurant camp.
Although Indya couldn’t join Lee at a recent farmers’ market, she and her dad try to make a habit of hitting up the produce stalls most Saturday mornings.
“I’ve always taught Indya to have respect for food,” says Lee, before reflecting fondly on the day when — at three years old — she refused to eat from the kids’ menu at a restaurant.
“To her, that food tasted too processed,” he says with a face-splitting smile.
“The next generation has a different relationship to food than we did,” he says, running his hand over some marble-sized new potatoes at the Vicki’s Veggies stall. “These are just amazing,” he says, digressing before circling back to the discussion at hand.
“My oldest daughter, Devon, is very concerned about where food comes from and if it’s sustainable. She asks questions about how what she eats impacts the world,” he says before picking up a basket of garlic and inhaling a deep whiff.
“This new generation of eaters, they’re just more conscientious about what they consume,” he says before popping a peach sample in his mouth. “These are great for peach preserves,” he says before lamenting that “August has the most amazing produce, but ironically, it’s the slowest time for restaurants. It’s such as shame.”
Although Lee still eats the occasional animal product, “it’s mostly just when tasting the menu at Nota Bene,” he says. “I don’t miss meat at all. In fact, I have more energy than ever,” he exclaims.
And considering Lee’s this chipper, despite being in the midst of a huge restaurant launch, there might just be something to his new diet.
