Restaurant Update: New Dirty Bird, Toronto gets poke and Emma’s moving east

It is officially summer today, but there doesn't seem to be any sign that restaurant openings are slowing — especially along St. Clair West.

Just Opened

Branching out from their Kensington base, Dirty Bird Fried Chicken and Waffles now has an Annex location.
Big Tuna Poke on Bloor West is Toronto’s first restaurant devoted entirely to the trendy Hawaiian raw fish salad.
The Wine Academy, at 67 Richmond St. W., combines the place-to-store-your-wine and place-to-drink-your-wine business models with a serious food programme led by Aaron Joseph Bear Robe (formerly Keriwa Cafe).
The Cara-owned Landing restaurant group that has Williams Landing (Liberty Village), Hunters Landing (CityPlace) and Harpers Landing (Oakville) has set up camp at the Shops at Don Mills with Taylors Landing. Expect the same smart-casual atmosphere and menu of burgers, pastas and salads.

Hyper popular brunch spot Emma’s Country Kitchen is moving east. They’ll be taking over La Creole’s space at St. Clair and Atlas later this summer.
Lbs. is opening at a 100 Yonge St. with a menu of lobster, burgers and salads (hence the name.)
Hillcrest Village on St. Clair is also getting another casual Italian option as Nodo is nearly set to open their second location (the first is on Dundas West in the Junction) in the former home of The Crest at St. Clair and Arlington.

The summer season is crowded with food festivals, but Taste of Toronto seems to be carving out a space at the top-end. The participating chefs at this weekend’s event will have a special deluxe item (limited quantity, price from $16 to $150) on their menus.
Summer weather means parks are pleasant in Toronto so we took Food Crawl to Christie Pits and environs this month.
Our Spotted column finds that this whole food-as-cone thing is everywhere right now.
Karolyne Ellacott heads to Schmaltz Appetizing for this week’s bagel-and-a-schmear of a lunch pick.
Ontario raspberries are making an early appearance at local farmer’s markets and on restaurant menus.
We had a First Look at Pi Co., Yorkville’s new design-your-own-pie pizzeria.

The owners of The Bottom Line on Front have launched the Hidden Burger app. Downtowners can use it to order a burger-and-fries combo for $10.
Rudy Guo and his partners at Pearl Diver have launched the Spirit of Hospitality scholarship and a series of special dinners, the Cooper Dinners, to support it. Brian Cooper, former Dean of Hospitality and Tourism at George Brown, and his wife Midge are the inspiration for the new initiatives and the backroom at Pearl Diver has also been renamed in their honour. The dinners with see an up-and-coming young chef paired with a veteran, experienced chef (Ottawa’s Michael Blackie help kickoff the series) and the proceeds will go to support the scholarship fund.