Nodo

My go to spot for italian food. Best beef carpaccio and cannolis I’ve ever had! New school gnocchi is another favourite. Yum!

Appetizers were delicious! Mussels, squid, and fish were all great. Don’t recommend the pasta as it is too salty. Dessert was awesome, get the chocolate torte with vanilla gelato :)

We went here for lunch with 4 people and ordered a bunch of different items on the menu, the rice balls, pasta, pizza & the charcuterie board. The rice balls were amazing along with the pasta! When I go there again I will most certainly be ordering those items again.
The pizza was good but nothing out of this world and the charcuterie board was tasty but pretty bare.
Cute décor and friendly/​knowledgeable staff.

Great food. Excellent atmosphere and wait staff. Some of the best and most authentic Italian food I’ve ever had.

Nodo SAVED me!
Drama aside, Nodo was a breath of fresh air in the Toronto food scene. I was planning a surprise party for my friend’s 30^th birthday and it felt like every restaurant I called just wanted to be difficult. I was only asking for a 10 person reservation and this was either meant with restaurants i) not wanting to accommodate us at all with attitude; ii) mandating a fixed price menu that often meant each person spending $ 50 or more; iii) ridiculous caking fees (e.g., we’ll charge you 5 $/​pp to let you guys eat the cake you bought yourself). While I understand restaurants can do all of this, the call to Nodo after all these issues/​rules from other restaurants went like this:
Me: «hi, can I have a reservation for 10 people at your restaurant? Can you let me know what rules you have for accommodating us?»
Nodo: «rules, what rules? Don’t be rowdy?»
Nodo: «sure! We can accommodate you! We have a special room downstairs that can all be yours for no extra fee or fixed price menu! It’ll be perfect for a surprise party. You’re going to bring cake, sure! We’ll cut it and put it on plates and charge you nothing extra because this is how awesome we are! Oh, and we’ll also play onto your lie to guide the birthday girl in and surprise the crap out of her»
Okay, the second Nodo quotation was paraphrased because they were this cool and this awesome (the first one is true)!
The food was great, the prices were reasonable, the staff were INCREDIBLE. The birthday girl had a great time and I have been meaning to give this restaurant a stellar review for months because of how accommodating they were (over literally every other ‘decent’ restaurant in this city). Love them!

I checked this place out after I was recommended it by a friend. Being Italian, I’m usually very critical of Italian restaurants, but I was extremely impressed by NODO. Not only was the food top tier, but the service was impeccable.
I will definitely be back here again!

This place is to die for delicious. I’ve been three times and never did it once disappoint. Usually we get a glass of wine, an appetizer or cheese board, our entrée followed by a digestif. We’ve had a variety of their pasta dishes and they are all beyond amazing.
I tend to be picky in terms of quality of food and know what to expect since I have culinary training. This place definitely assures quality in every dish. The pasta is always fresh. It seems that their menu compromises of pastas that are easier to make fresh. It is always cooked al-​dente. The sauces are made from scratch and perfectly seasoned.
The staff is also very kind and knowledgeable.
We love coming here and feel that it is very reasonably priced for the quality of the food and the whole experience. I would highly recommend NODO.

Great food and ambience. Accommodated our kid with a good choice of «kid-​friendly» menu items. Food was well executed and service was efficient. Would definitely go back there for dinner if in the area.

The place is very busy and doesn’t take reservations, and parking is very difficult in the area, so plan accordingly.
The noise level was medium — normal for a place like this. Service was excellent, but the menu required a magnifying glass.
My partner’s food was a bit salty, but that’s a pretty common problem, and it was otherwise very good. Her flourless chocolate cake was excellent but the texture verged on chocolate soufflé (which is fine — just sayin’).
My short-​ribs were excellent and so were the accompanying vegtables.

Been to Nodo twice now. I have enjoyed both visits immensely but be prepared to wait a bit, it fills up fast after 6pm. I went on a wednesday night and we chose to eat at the bar; which is super comfortable for a casual meal with a friend. The bartender was friendly and helpful, yet respectful of privacy. The service is always friendly, the atmosphere warm and the food is very flavourful.
Today I had the risotto of the day which included boneless short ribs and cherry tomatoes. It was perfectly cooked and so delicious! My friend started with the butternut squash soup, it was perfection!

Came here on Friday night at 6:30 for dinner with 4 other people. They don’t take reservations, so depending on what day and time you come you may have to wait. We got lucky and were seated very quickly. There are several places to park on nearby streets.
This is right beside Playa Cabana Cantina, and is one of the newer restaurants in the Junction’s food scene. They’ve done a great job with the décor and the ambiance inside, it’s slightly rustic chic and not pretentious. The service was excellent the whole time, very friendly and great at recommending wines.
To start we had the spiducci, a charcuterie board, buffalo mozzarella with heirloom tomatoes and a margherita pizza to share. Now when it comes to spiducci/​lamb in general, I can be iffy on it because I find unless it’s a good lamb, and cooked properly, you get that unmistakable muttony flavour. This spiducci was cooked perfectly and flavourful, came right off the stick. The charcuterie board had a couple different types of cheeses (one of which had truffle in it), prosciutto, and a few types of salami, an amazing truffle honey and a couple things on it I can’t remember which was amazing. The buffalo mozzarella was large, soft and fresh and the multi-​coloured heirloom tomatoes were a nice touch. The pizza was excellent, tasted fresh, and had a nice thin crust. I was just in Italy for a month this summer and this pizza definitely compared.
For my main I had one of the specials of the night which was a risotto with scallops and a peice of salmon on top. The risotto was comparable to a traditional northern italian risotto which is hearty with small pieces of vegetables added in like diced carrots, peas, and beans. The small scallops were a nice touch and did not overpower the nicely cooked salmon filet on top.
For dessert, I had the flourless chocolate torte with vanilla gelato. OMG is all I can say. The chocolate torte was rich, moist, soft and warm, and combined with the ice cream was amazing.
After our meal, one of the owners of the restaurant came by to talk to us, he was a very nice person and you can tell he’s passionate about his business.
Overall, was very impressed with our experience and can’t wait to come back (probably very soon).

Excellent as far as Italian (fusion) is concerned! Worth the trip over from midtown! Gnocchi and appetizers we’re delicious! Will certainly be back!

I made a reservation for the downstairs dining room and Nodo did not disappoint. Our party of 12 + baby sat comfortably in the private area. The waitress and staff were very helpful and nice. Great explanation of the menu and suggestion in pairings. The rice ball appetizer was amazing, crunchy outside, and soft and rich inside (comes in 2 almost pear shape balls). Pizza and pasta were solid. Great selection of home made desserts too. One of the best places I’ve been with a big group. Fantastic service!

We had a dinner here per Unilocal recommendation. We ordered a spring salad, an octopus appetizer and a pasta (I forget the exact names). The salad was fresh but the dressing was too sour to my liking. My BF thought the salad dressing was alright. We both loved the octopus appetizer. The dish was created with fitness. The octopus was meaty yet sufficiently tender. The pasta was cooked al dente. Unfortunately, the pasta sauce was very salty. I could take salty alright, but the saltiness overwhelmed my BF. Maybe if we had ordered a pasta with Alfredo sauce, our experience would have been better.
Services was great. The décor was European urban classy. The lighting was too dim. The value of main entrée was outstanding. The appetizer was pricey due to overly small portion.

Went here for my mother’s birthday, they do not take reservations, I hate when places are «above» taking reservations but anyway, we still went.
Had the arancini which was really delicious, has a ragu sauce with some peas in it as well, never seen it done that way before. Also had the warm olives and bread knots, the olives were great, the bread was dry.
Wine list is decent, I like how they group by price because come on, we don’t all work on Bay Street. Selected a nice Barbaresco from 2010 but they brought out the 2011, no biggie.
We enjoyed three pasta dishes as entres:
Pappardelle Ragu D’ Anatra it was insanely rich and tasty, the duck is excellent. A couple pieces of the pappardelle was stuck together and raw but the majority of pieces were cooked as pasta should be, slightly a la dente.
Tagliatelle Straccetti di Manzo e Funghi, quite delicious my mom polished off the whole bowl.
Spaghetti Aglio Olio Adriatico, again an excellent dish with perfectly cooked pasta, what they don’t tell you is they use sea asparagus which is quite rare and delicious if you like them, the seafood was also very fresh and cooked as you would want it (i.e. not mush!)
They also have cacio pepe which is a Rome specialty (even though this place is apparently Sicilian?) and as simple as it sounds it’s very tough to get right, we didn’t have it but I want to try it at some point.
The most disappointing aspect of the night was when I told the manager that it was my mother’s birthday and if he could bring over a tiramisu with a candle. He said of course no problem. I waited about 15 minutes and no Tiramisu and no candle, I wish I was able to tell the server but as you’re trying to «sneakily» tell someone without my mother noticing it’s kind of tough. The manager guy basically spent the entire night talking to a table of gentlemen who were speaking Italian. I guess I know where I fell in the pecking order of importance. I ended up leaving without being able to sing happy birthday to my mom, a little disappointing. Our server was great and no fault of hers.
Would I go back… probably, would I ever go for a special night again? Nope.

Risotto was amazing.
Great service and fantastic food.
Menu was a little longer than I like to see — but that’s ok. It was a solid offering that covered something for everyone.
A little louder than what I was looking for — but a couple glasses of wine solved that problem.
Well done — worth a second and third visit!

So delicious! Without a doubt, this little Italian gem of a restaurant does not disappoint! Dishes are sophisticated, creative, and flavorful and they are not overpriced.
Despite how ‘common’ it might be to order pizza and pasta, the combinations here are unique and awesome! I think you can’t go wrong with whichever pizza or pasta you decide to go with, they all sound so good!
If you like a strong, creamy, mushroomy pizza, I highly suggest Ca’Domini. Our favorite dish of the night was the Rigatoni (vegetable version) though be aware this is REALLY salty and the pasta is very al dente but flavor is bang on. The papardelle with duck is interesting, still very good on its own but the other dishes we ordered impressed us more. If you order this, despite the size it is very heavy and you’ll be drinking lots of water to compensate for the salt.
We also ordered grilled octopus and lamb skewers as appetizers. They were good but less value for it since for the price you don’t get much. Complimentary bread with olive oil is served at every table.
Service is friendly but veryyy slow. We were ignored/​forgotten a few times. Lots of families come here and there is a beautiful room downstairs if you need to book a room for a special event.
Highly recommend and would come back!

I love this place.
The food is delicious, ambiance is fantastic, and service has always been great. I live very close by and have dined here for lunch and dinner a few times and it’s consistent. The entries have all been very good, I normally order a pasta, fresh and delicious, flavourful and a good portion size, and my hubby will order a pizza. He’s like them all so far. No complaints! This is probably my favourite resto in the junction– the food is awesome and decently priced (more than I can say for some other restos in the area…)
A special touch: They gave all the female patrons flowers on International Woman’s Day! Awhh shucks, flowers for me? Supporting women’s rights too? I’m smitten.

The gals and I had much to celebrate this past week and we met up at Nodo, a new Italian hotspot in Toronto’s Juntion neighbourhood. I liked the French country décor…but wasn’t this an Italian restaurant? Whatever. It was a warm and welcoming atmosphere right upon entry.
I joined my girlfriends, who were already mid-​update and snacking on what I think were pickled or soured navy beans (Is it a French thing? I’ll have to check), and sliced baguettes with olive oil. I loved how the table was casually dressed in a simple and elegant way.
Three out of the four of us ordered that night’s special, which was a veal chop with potato «cubes» resting on a bed of rapini and asparagus. Tan ordered the braised beef with vegetables. All plates were a very good size, very well presented and paired well with our wine. (And Barb’s preferred mixed drinks :-)
Nodo’s chop was a chop all right. And a good-​looking one, too. I cut myself a piece from the generous portion and thought about the bite as I chewed. (What I call the «Ratatouille Moment.») Not as crispy as my university-friend’s version, but tasty. Truthfully, I found it a little on the salty side and it was an active explosion of flavours when paired with the bitterness of rapini and strong taste of asparagus, but when I asked my two friends (who also ordered the chop) one said: «A teensy bit salty, but very good,» and the other replied «I’d like to marry the chef.»
It’s funny how we all taste our food differently.
In my opinion, the birthday dessert of handmade cannoli were the star of show (Happy Birthday, Tan!), and after one bite, I don’t recall EVER eating one that good. The outside was fried and crispy, and the cheese on the inside was rich, creamy, a little tangy (yum) and I probably could have had more than just one.
Ambience? Great. It was a cold and Thursday night and the place was full, warm and buzzing. Folks were still walking in when we were leaving. It wasn’t too loud, it wasn’t too dark and the place had great energy. Our handsome European server was attentive and the host (Giancarlo?) was happy give our favourite Event Planner a small tour of the private dining room that, although is in the restaurant’s basement, was bright, warm and perfect for large dinners and small parties. By the way, the restaurant seemsnon-​descript from the outside… but it’s surprisingly big on the inside.
While my dinner of choice may have been salty to me this first time around, I plan to go back and try another.
What an awesome addition to Dundas West in the Junction. I’ll see you all there again soon.

So excited for another great restaurant in my ‘hood.
We checked out Nodo for dinner on a rainy Wednesday night. We were seated right away at a cute table for two near the window.
Great menu, lots of pizza and pasta options. We ordered 2 different pizzas and swapped slices to try each. Really good pizza, nice crust and a generous size for the $ 13-​$ 15 price range (better than Queen Margherita West IMO).
We stayed away from the tempting wine list as I’m still on detox from my vacation and we skipped dessert as well.
Service was extremely good, our server checked in on us quite often.
We’ll be back for more!