Hum: Buvette Daphnée is capable of hitting exalted heights of food and service. Don't accept less.

Share this Story : Hum: Buvette Daphnée is capable of hitting exalted heights of food and service. Don't accept less. Copy Link Email X Reddit Pinterest LinkedIn Tumblr Breadcrumb Trail Links Travel Ottawa Life Local Food Reviews Hum: Buvette Daphnée is capable of hitting exalted heights of food and service.

Don't accept less. The ByWard Market restaurant has the wine list and the Canada’s 100 Best clout, but after two wildly different visits, it can take more than a reservation to have a great night. Get the latest from Peter Hum straight to your inbox Sign Up Author of the article: Peter Hum Published Mar 27, 2025 • 7 minute read Join the conversation You can save this article by registering for free here .



Or sign-in if you have an account. Sean Karwowski, left, is the chef de cuisine of Buvette Daphnée. Nicholas Leduc, right, is the wine director.

Photo by Jean Levac / Postmedia Reviews and recommendations are unbiased and products are independently selected. Postmedia may earn an affiliate commission from purchases made through links on this page. Article content Buvette Daphnée 11 William St.

, 613-680-0380, buvettedaphnee.ca Grilled celeriac salad, crispy carrots, sprouts, garlic yogurt dish of Buvette Daphnée. Photo by Jean Levac / Postmedia Open: Tuesday to Saturday 5 to 11 p.

m., closed Sunday, Monday Prices: Dishes from $5 to $36, multi-course menu $75 Access: no steps to front door, washroom Ask for Nicholas. If you want the optimal experience at the William Street restaurant and wine bar Buvette Daphnée, remember those three words when booking a table.

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Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience. Access articles from across Canada with one account Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments Enjoy additional articles per month Get email updates from your favourite authors Sign In or Create an Account Email Address Continue or View more offers If you are a Home delivery print subscriber, online access is included in your subscription. Activate your Online Access Now Article content You could not have a better server than Nicholas Leduc, Daphnée’s wine director.

Not only does he share his expertise about food and wine with the kind of genuine, infectious enthusiasm that makes a restaurant memorable. The former Montrealer, who moved to Ottawa to work at Daphnée when it opened in the summer of 2023, personifies the bonhomie that typifies eateries and bars in his hometown, at places where restaurant-goers feel like valued guests rather than just customers. Given that Daphnée self-identifies as a “buvette Montrealaise” — a convivial wine bar in the rightfully trendy Montreal style — you might ask, how could Leduc not be its premier ambassador? Nicholas Leduc, wine director at Buvette Daphnée.

Photo by Jean Levac / Postmedia Leduc recently served me, along with my companion, a Daphnée regular who had specifically asked for Leduc’s attention when he reserved. We had an exceptional time. We enjoyed food and service at levels that vault a restaurant into consideration for the prestigious annual Canada’s 100 Best Restaurants list.

That’s not simply speculation. Full disclosure: I’m on that list’s panel of judges. Advertisement 3 Story continues below This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below.

Article content But at another dinner, weeks before, my table of four had, at best, an OK time at Daphnée. The food ranged from pretty good to a pricey flop. A $55 smoked beef short rib with grilled cabbage and braised beets let us down with tough, chewy meat.

Service was all right that night in January, but it was still perfunctory rather than hospitable. We certainly didn’t feel like we were in good, caring hands. Will the real Buvette Daphnée please stand up? Buvette Daphnee restaurant at 11 William Street in the ByWard Market.

Photo by Jean Levac / Postmedia But first, some explaining is in order regarding my interest in Daphnée since I’d reviewed it — glowingly, in fact — in November 2023, after enjoying two great dinners served, notably, by Leduc. In 2024, a lot happened at Daphnée. It was a roller-coaster ride, in short.

In mid-May, the restaurant was No. 97 on the Canada’s 100 Best Restaurants list , less than a year after it opened. Daphnée also cracked the prestigious list’s supplementary short list of Canada’s best new restaurants, ranking eighth of 10.

Advertisement 4 Story continues below This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Article content (Let me say, in passing, that the Ottawa-area, Quebec-style wine bar that people, including myself, tend to overlook is Soif Bar à Vin in Gatineau , owned and operated by the world-class sommelier Véronique Rivest. Soif has also appeared on the Canada’s 100 Best Restaurants list.

) But then, about two weeks after Daphnée received its national kudos, it mysteriously closed. I had to ask a lot of questions, but I learned that almost all of its staff had walked out, mutinying against chef Dominique Dufour following months of tension. Dufour took responsibility for the crisis and told the Citizen she was “stepping back.

” Only two months later, in late July, did Daphnée reopen, with largely new teams in its open kitchen and on its floor. Naturally, I was curious what a night out at Daphnée, post-Dufour and post-crisis, would be like. Duck confit with jus, sunchoke and parsnip at Buvette Daphnee in the ByWard Market.

Photo by Peter Hum / Postmedia My first visit in late January featured a few nice dishes, including slices of luscious honey-glazed ham with brown butter and compressed celery ($16) and delectable duck tartare with black garlic and hazelnuts worked into it ($22). But that smoked short rib was a dud that four hungry people chose not to finish. And the service did not make us feel special or impress upon us that Buvette Daphnée and its wines were special.

Advertisement 5 Story continues below This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Article content But was that the new normal at Daphnée or just an off-night? My return visit, during which pretty, delicious plates prevailed, argued for the latter. Grilled Labrador gem scallops with mojo verde ($15 for two) featured sweet, soft shellfish with a slather of herbaceous goodness.

We needed some of Daphnée’s bread, which is in fact sourdough made by the excellent Gatineau bakery Maison Oddo, to sop up the tasty remnants. A dish described as “potato, egg, smoked tomato soubise” ($16) was unapologetically breakfast for dinner, starring a quartered egg with molten yolks plus a ton of herbs on an unbeatable hash brown nestled in a rich, smoky, tomato-y sauce. Grille steelhead trout, beurre blanc and roe at Buvette Daphnée on William Street in the ByWard Market.

Photo by Jean Levac / Postmedia Two grilled vegetable dishes that I’d had in January were more impressive the second time around. Under a canopy of crispy carrots and sprouts and on top of a bed of garlicky yogurt, ribbons of grilled celeriac ($19) were delightfully charred and complex in flavour. Grilled maitake mushrooms ($24) presented themselves majestically, and they were so meaty, toothsome and tasty that the pickled chanterelles and even a fantastic Béarnaise sauce seemed quite secondary.

Advertisement 6 Story continues below This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Article content Especially compared to January’s short rib failure, the two protein-forward plates were outstanding examples of precise cooking and superb sauce work. Two pieces of grilled steelhead trout ($56) showed supreme respect for the fish, while its pool of beurre blanc made us swoon.

Duck confit ($35) was almost exaggeratedly crisp-skinned and tender-fleshed, while its rich jus brought back memories of the luxurious sauces at Daphnée that had impressed me so much in the fall of 2023 . An eclair ($15) stuffed with miso and hazelnut ice cream and topped with molten dark chocolate was a sweet, rustic, hedonistic finish to our meal. Grilled maitake mushrooms with pickled chanterelles and bearnaise sauce at Buvette Daphnee in the ByWard Market.

Photo by Peter Hum / Postmedia While I didn’t re-order the short rib during my return visit, we sat at the counter beside the kitchen and watched several short ribs leave the pass. They looked much better than what I had been served weeks before, as if they’d been softened up by more time braising after being smoked. Chef de cuisine Sean Karwowski later told me about the sub-par short rib: “That was a dish being fine-tuned and probably wasn’t ready.

.. Definitely dishes evolve on the menu.

” Advertisement 7 Story continues below This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Article content Karwowski, who was hired last July, said Daphnée’s menus are collaborations between himself and chef and partner Jordan Holley. A few nights a week, Holley, who is also the chef and co-owner of Riviera on Sparks Street, expedites food from Daphnée’s kitchen to servers, Karwowski said.

He also said that he and Holley are extending the Montreal and Quebec influence on Daphnée’s food that Dufour, its opening chef and partner, brought in 2023. Karwowski added that Dufour, “a very talented and creative individual,” is still a partner at Daphnée. While Dufour is now on maternity leave, she still contributes ideas for dishes and relationships with producers, Karwowski said.

While Karwowski wasn’t there during Daphnée’s meltdown, he says the work environment there is now much better. “When we take care of the team, we take care of the guests,” he said. Advertisement 8 Story continues below This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below.

Article content Chelcair with miso and hazelnut ice cream and warm chocolate at Buvette Daphnée. Photo by Peter Hum / Postmedia When Leduc served us, we were definitely well cared for. He was an emissary for the menu as he proactively gave us a rundown of dishes and made recommendations.

We also asked him to choose a suitable bottle of wine for us. After some discussion, he picked a winner from Quebec, drawn from his connoisseur’s stash that leans into Canadian wines. There’s no doubt that I was busted.

Of course Leduc and Karwowski knew who I was and that I would be writing about them. (Frankly, for me not to have been busted in January was already a strike against Daphnée.) The cynical take is that we received special treatment during my second visit.

For example, Karwowski chose to re-do that grilled trout for us rather than serve fish he felt would have been overcooked by a minute or so. He told us about the re-do and apologized for the slight delay. Was that decision meant to curry a critic’s favour? Would he have served us second-rate fish had we been Joe Schmoes rather than VIPs? Advertisement 9 Story continues below This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below.

Article content The more charitable take is that we received consideration to make our meal sparkle, but that similar standards and care would hold for all guests, regardless. I prefer to be charitable rather than cynical. Maybe the takeaway is that if you go to Daphnée, do everything you can to make your night exceptional.

Draw out special treatment from your server, even if Leduc has the night off. Engage, within reason, with staff, including the chef and cooks if you sit at the bar side, plus the servers who Leduc should lead by example. Given the Canada’s 100 Best Restaurants-level experience that I know Daphnée can deliver, I’d say don’t settle for less.

Do what you can to help prove my less-than-satisfying meal there was an off-night exception. [email protected] Want to stay in the know about what’s happening in Ottawa? Sign up for the Ottawa Citizen’s arts and life newsletter — Ottawa, Out of Office — our weekly guide to eating, listening, reading, watching, playing, hanging, learning and living well in the capital.

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