Winterlicious 2012 at Luma

This weekend we went to our first Winterlicious meal at Luma inside the TIFF Bell Lightbox.  This was my first time having dinner at one of Oliver & Bonacini's newest creations.  I've just realized that they've opened up another restaurant called Bannock at Queen & Bay.  That'll probably be the next place I try.
Luma's Winterlicious dinner menu provides pretty good choices from soup, salad and foie gras pate as appetizers, to steak, chicken and seared tuna as mains, as well as choices between satisfying to light desserts.  Since there were three of us, we got to try most of the menu items.
For appetizers we had the beetroot soup, the winter salad and the pate.

 

2hung thought that the beet soup tasted a bit bitter, but I thought it tasted nice and sweet.  The pate was very rich, so we couldn't finish the whole thing.  I tried a piece of the duck heart.  The texture was a bit slimy and a little chewy.  I think I prefer seared foie gras much more than duck heart.

For mains, we tried the flatiron steak and roasted chicken breast.  This time 2hung thought his steak was a little over seared, and again tasted a little bit bitter, but my steak was fine.  I like how they paired the steak with lots of oyster mushrooms.

 

 Finally for dessert, we ordered the bread pudding and panna cotta.  Both of these tasted great.

 

For the price of $35, I thought this meal was well worth it.  They probably could've pushed it and charged $45 for this meal like what Bymark is doing, but they didn't, so if you're looking for a new place to try for Winterlicious.  This would definitely be a good choice!