Restaurateur Teo Paul’s Debut Cookbook Is Packed With His Greatest Hits
After almost two decades spent building acclaimed restaurants, chef Teo Paul has somehow managed to keep a low profile.
Now, with the release of Done Right, he’s finally stepping into the spotlight.
Done Right by Teo Paul. Appetite by Random House, 2026, $45.
In the cookbook, Teo shares more than 70 soul-satisfying recipes from Union and Côte de Boeuf, his French restaurants in Toronto, Le Tambour Tavern, his Parisian steak house in Hamilton, and Heart’s Tavern and Bar, his laid-back spot in Kimberley, Ont. To try the more upscale dishes at Brasserie Côte, Teo’s newest restaurant in Toronto’s Annex neighbourhood, you’ll want to visit and pore over the menu.
Teo’s favourite brasserie in the Marais inspired several recipes for the cookbook.
Teo got his start as a chef in Paris during his early 20s, where he worked lunches at a bistro serving up brasserie dishes such as poulet rôti and steak frites. “I was cooking every day for 140 guests in a hot basement,” says Teo. “I never saw the people who came to eat; I kept my head down and put food in the dumbwaiter.” Looking back, Teo considers this challenging experience to have shaped him as a chef. “I didn’t have time to overcomplicate anything. I realized I didn’t need microgreens or another garnish — all I needed was good food, done right.” It was Eamon O’Dea who gave Teo that job in Paris and, now, years later, they’ve opened Brasserie Côte in Toronto together.
Done Right took Teo five years to bring to life. It’s part culinary memoir: the book moves chronologically from Teo’s childhood in Toronto to Paris in the early aughts to Piedmont, Italy, where Teo cooked at a hotel, then back to Toronto, where he opened Union in 2009 with the help of his late father. Teo is brutally honest about the struggles of restaurant life, namely the loneliness and impostor syndrome that come with devoting one’s life to their business. “I wanted to write a cooking story,” says Teo. “When I started, it kind of poured out of me; it was healing.”
In an industry where extravagance is celebrated, Teo proves that it’s often the simplest things that taste best — and that people crave the most. At Union, the burger with pickles and spicy mayo doesn’t sound like anything out of the ordinary, but it’s the fresh, fatty ground beef cooked in duck fat and topped with double-smoked bacon that really takes it to the next level. At Le Tambour Tavern, which draws crowds for its brunch, the French omelette requires little more than pantry staples to make, but the addition of grated Comté cheese makes the dish sing with flavour.
Both of these recipes can be found in the book, along with other comforting dishes we’re featuring here, including Tomato Soup with Honey and Butter and Bavette Frites with Hotel Butter and Aioli — both popular menu items at Union. The Warm Spinach Salad with Bacon and Chèvre Chaud is the ultimate savoury salad dressed in a punchy balsamic vinaigrette, and Teo’s Apple Berry Crumble is warming and delicious, great for autumn dinner parties. It bodes well for home cooks that, when developing recipes, Teo has always tried to use as few ingredients as possible, making them uncomplicated to cook. “It’s about quality over quantity,” he says.
After years of success at his restaurants, Teo is still very much a nonchalant guy who prefers to fly under the radar. But underneath that quiet confidence is incredible talent, dedication and a love of cooking that has served him well. “Ossington Ave. — where Union and Côte de Boeuf are — doesn’t guarantee success,” he says. “But running some of the most consistent, steady places here has kept a high bar for other restaurants who join.”
You’ll find the same consistency in Done Right. Teo says all that’s required for the recipes — apart from the ingredients on the page — is to be fully present, and to cook with both hands. “That’s what makes great food come alive.”