When Chef Grant van Gameren opened Rosetta in Prince Edward County earlier this year — and perhaps a few times before that — he told us it might be his last new project for a while.
Turns out, it’s not so easy to keep him out of the kitchen. Now, he’s teamed up with longtime partners Hailey Burke and Zach Smith to transform Martine’s Wine Bar into Casa Rubia. A Spanish restaurant highly influenced by the Basque and Galicia regions of Northern Spain, Casa Rubia introduces large plates to complement Bar Raval’s tapas-style dining.
“You can get the experience of cocktails and stand-up dining experience at Bar Raval but also our customers can come in for a more formal sit-down dinner at Casa Rubia,” says van Gameren. “It was important for us to align them a little bit more for a little bit more of a cohesive corner here.”
The transformation comes months after Smith became a partner at Bar Raval earlier this year. Before moving to Niagara, where he became chef and co-owner of the Michelin-recognized Fat Rabbit, Smith spent four years working in Bar Raval’s kitchen.
The interior of the space at 293 Palmerston Avenue was revamped by Future Studios. With a mezzanine above a downstairs bar and a 20-seat patio out front, the space has a European feel, marked by vintage artwork.
“It’s a beautiful room. It’s been a great restaurant for a couple of years since we’ve opened it,” says van Gameren, whose own resumé also includes The Black Hoof, Bar Isabel, Quetzel, and El Rey. “It’s been busy, but really what we wanted to be doing evolved and changed and we just decided to do it in this space.”
The star of the menu — and the eponym for the restaurant — is the Rubia Gallega beef imported directly from Galicia, a northernwestern region of Spain. These cattle are raised outdoors and are free to graze and feed on grass and other vegetables, a natural diet that contributes to a unique, finer marbling of the meat.
“I’ve been there, I’ve dined at some of the best restaurants that raise their own cattle,” van Gameren says. “The Galician beef is a certain breed, but they’ll raise it to over five or eight years and more — some I’ve heard up to 16 years. They’ll raise these cattle on grass and, with them being older cattle and grass fed, it tends to turn the fat a yellowish colour and it’s just a unique type of beef.”
Casa Rubia’s menu is not exclusively limited to the unique beef, however, as you’ll also find Ibérico pork products, a high-end, acorn-fed meat that also derives from Spain. Ontario beef will also find its way to the menu, as well as other unique cuts like that of the Galician cattle that was brought to Australia to be raised with the same practices.
“We’re not the first ones to serve it, but we’re excited to display it as part of our restaurant menu,” says van Gameren.
Despite the focus on steaks, he says he would not coin Casa Rubia as a steak house. The seasonal menu includes vegetable and seafood dishes like fish sourced from Spain and Portugal, as well as a tripe strew made from an old recipe of van Gameren’s and slow-cooked for six hours.
A suckling pig is also a highlight on the opening menu, made in the wood-burning oven that was used when the space was home to Italian restaurant Woodlot, before Martine took over.
Burke’s cocktail program is focused on classic martinis and negronis, alongside vermouth and traditional digestifs, while wine director Lexi Wolkowski’s list is focused on Spanish and Atlantic wines.
“It goes back to what I fell in love with as a young chef where it’s high quality. When I’ve travelled to Europe, there’s a certain feeling in the food and the presentation and the quality and the simplicity of it all, and that European restaurant vibe,” says van Gameren. “A lot of dishes aren’t super composed. It’s just ingredients that are well prepared.”