Three Winnipeg restaurants make Canada’s 100 Best Restaurants 2025

The annual Canada’s 100 Best Restaurants (opens in new window) guide has been revealed for 2025 and three Winnipeg restaurants have made the list.

Tasting menu restaurant deer + almond (opens in new window) has continued to climb up the list to #34, improving on its placement at #39 last year, which at the time was the city’s highest ever standing in the prestigious guide. Yujiro (opens in new window) made a big jump from #92 in 2024 to #65, while entering the list for the first time this year is Nola (opens in new window), which comes in at #86.

Chef Mandel Hitzer’s Exchange District restaurant, deer + almond (85 Princess St.), is no stranger to the list, having made it numerous times since the inception of Canada’s 100 Best in 2015. Hitzer is also the recipient of the publication’s Community Leadership Award (opens in new window) for his work in Winnipeg that includes co-founding and running RAW:almond (opens in new window) with architect Joe Kalturnyk, a winter pop-up restaurant that is often staged on the frozen Assiniboine River that brings some of North America’s best chefs (including many on the 100 list) to the city.

Yujiro Japanese Restaurant (1822 Grant Ave.) is by award-winning chef Ed Lam and co-owner Esther Lo, who also have Saburo Kitchen (opens in new window) in Hargrave Street Market. River Height’s Yujiro is equally known for its excellent ramen (opens in new window) service at lunch, along with its selection of sushi and izakaya dishes at dinner. Chef Lam is also a past Winnipeg-leg champion (2022) (opens in new window) at the Canadian Culinary Championships.

Nola’s (300 Tache Ave.) placement on the list was long overdue, having grabbed many accolades since opening in Saint-Boniface in 2021 (opens in new window). This includes being named by The Globe and Mail as the #1 new culinary concept on the Prairies in 2022 (this, after garnering a rave-review from the paper in May that same year), and making the Air Canada enRoute best new restaurants long list. Owned by Mike Del Buono’s Burnley Place Hospitality (opens in new window), Nola’s dishes come courtesy of celebrated chef Emily Butcher, who is a partner in the business and its sister restaurant Bar Accanto (opens in new window) (which also previously made the enRoute best new restaurant long list). Butcher’s cooking CV includes winning bronze at the Canadian Culinary Championships in 2020 (opens in new window) and making an impressive run on television’s Top Chef Canada the following year when she was the chef de cuisine at deer + almond.

The 100 Best Restaurants list also features plenty of former Winnipeg talent, particularly in the top 10 where spots #7-9 all have a connection to the city.

Montreal’s Beba (#7) is owned by chefs Ari and Pablo Schor, two former Winnipeggers; the chef de partie of the famed massive wood-fired grill at Toronto’s Quetzal (#8) is chef Kris Kurus (opens in new window), who represented Winnipeg and deer + almond at the Canadian Culinary Championship in 2024; while Vancouver’s Published on Main (#9) is by born and raised Winnipeg chef Gus Stieffenhofer-Brandson (opens in new window), who has previously topped the Canada’s 100 Best list. Kurus was sous chef at Published on Main when it topped the list, along with when it was awarded its first Michelin star, which the restaurant has retained since.

Voting for this year’s Canada’s 100 Best Restaurants was conducted by 160 food writers, chefs, restaurateurs and industry veterans from across the country.

The number one spot went to Restaurant Pearl Morissette, which is located in Jordon Station in the Niagara Region of Ontario.

Canada’s 100 Best also releases a Canada’s 50 Best Bars (opens in new window) list, which will be unveiled on May 12. The Roost (opens in new window) (651 Corydon Ave.) made last year’s 50 Best Bars list at #39, and has placed as high as #29 in 2019.