Mimi Chinese : One of Our Favourite Chinese Restaurants in Toronto

Mimi Chinese on Davenport has been around since the early pandemic years, but the restaurant that reopened this winter is not quite the same one. The dining room is brighter and the menu has gained a grill section. David Schwartz, the co-owner behind Big Hug Hospitality with Brandon Marek, calls it the year Mimi became what it always wanted to be.

The story of Mimi is, in part, the story of how it almost did not open on schedule. The original plan had Mimi launching in spring 2020. The pandemic forced everything to the back of the building. David and his executive chef Braden Chong started running a pop-up out of the back kitchen, gave it a separate name to protect the brand they had spent years preparing, and accidentally created a second restaurant: Sunny’s, which still anchors Kensington Market today. Without that release valve, David admits, Mimi would have tried to be everything at once. With Sunny’s absorbing the louder, more energetic ideas, Mimi could settle into a clearer brief: regional Chinese cooking with a serious Cantonese spine.

A Cantonese Spine, an Honest One

The kitchen runs on two backgrounds that line up by design. Braden Chong, third-generation Canadian Cantonese, oversees both Mimi and Sunny’s as executive chef. Yi Yang, the head chef at Mimi, grew up in Guangdong. There is no mimicry in this kitchen; the food on the table is the continuation of a tradition the people cooking it actually lived. That clarity shows up everywhere: in the staples that never leave the menu (the smacked cucumber, the shrimp toast, the stir-fried rice rolls), and in the dishes the team makes from scratch and is visibly proud of, like the tatsu.

The Refresh That Brightened Everything

Earlier in 2026, the team made a deliberate change. The space got brighter, the mood softened, and a new charcoal grill program slid into the menu. The grill is the most visible addition: Canadian beef cooked over fire, served with Chinese sauces and salts. It is not a fusion gimmick. It is a steakhouse instinct, run through a Cantonese kitchen, plated with the same restraint as the rest of the menu. The interior was reimagined by Jack Lipson of Ipso Studio (the same designer behind Linny’s), who helped move the room out of its evening mood into something that works on a Tuesday at six as well as a Saturday at nine.

The Chef’s Choice That Earns Its Place

For first-time guests, the easiest decision is the Chef’s Choice. At $99 per person, it is not a tasting menu but a curated walk through the regular carte. You eat what is best on the day, in the order the kitchen thinks you should eat it, and you leave with a real sense of why it’s one of the best restaurants of Toronto.

Wine With Chinese Food, Done Right

Geoffrey Fleming, the wine director for the group, builds the list at Mimi. He also handles Sunny’s and Linny’s. Mimi is one of the Chinese restaurants in Toronto that takes wine seriously, and the pairings reward the effort. The cocktail program shifts continuously in step with the kitchen, so there is almost always something on the bar list that was not there a month ago.

Service at Mimi is led by Anthony Young, the group’s director of operations. The thread that runs through every Big Hug address is most visible here: warm, attentive, precise, and never tipping into upselling or theatre. The team is hired for personality first, and the room benefits.

The 2026 version of Mimi Chinese is the most coherent it has ever been. If you went in 2022 and left impressed, go back. If you have never been, the Chef’s Choice is the answer.

Written by Fabie Lubin
Photography by Daniel Neuhaus / Lauren Wesanko

Updated on May 13, 2026

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