Dear reader,

Last night, my partner and I drove from our home in the west end to Ciao Roma in Woodbridge for some of the best al taglio pizza outside of Rome. Because nothing—not a dozen roses, a box of chocolates or a candlelit prix fixe dinner—says love like making a 40-kilometre round trip up and down the 400 in still-kind-of-rush-hour traffic together for food. 

Someone else who regularly heads north of the city in search of nostalgic Italian dishes is Cibo’s executive chef, Laura Petracca. In this week’s newsletter, she takes us for a tour of her favourite childhood and teenage haunts in Richmond Hill, getting her go-to order at each one. I can only imagine what kind of food coma she experienced afterward, and I thank her for running this gastronomic gauntlet for us.

Also, we look inside the kitchen of chef Tomer Markovitz and check out two new spots closer to the core: cozy Christie Pits restaurant the Fall Bright Tavern and a bar from a Calgary-based brand that skews way more tropical than it does country-western.

Cibo chef Laura Petracca (seen here on her own pizza pilgrimage) grew up in Vaughan and regularly makes the trek back to visit family—and to eat her favourite Italian dishes in nearby Richmond Hill, where her parents moved when she was a growing teenager with an appetite for good food. 

Lulu Bar is the Well’s new spot for tropical cocktails and Polynesian snacks (think poke, Spam skewers and DIY duck wraps). But, instead of bamboo and palm, the space—decked out in wall-to-wall and floor-to-ceiling teak—is a mid-century-modern paradise.

The Fall Bright Tavern, a new Christie Pits local, aims to rival your favourite home cook with a menu of back-to-basics dishes like chicken stew, braised beef cheeks, and freshly baked picture-perfect slices of chocolate cake or apple pie accompanied with fat slabs of cheddar cheese.

Chef Tomer Markovitz’s home kitchen is stocked with hits from the menu at Romi’s, his bakery on St. Clair West: hummus, labneh, schug and tahini, which his two-year-old daughter (and the bakery’s namesake) eats by the tub. Take a look through his fridge, freezer and cupboards for some staple inspiration.

In the latest issue: how two faux-Inuit sisters cashed in on a life of deception. Plus, the city’s best cheap eats, a suburban holy war between religion and real estate, a bittersweet memoir about ditching Toronto, and more. Still not receiving Toronto Life at home? Subscribe today.