How one Toronto bar pivoted to become a fake Italian restaurant with really good spaghetti How one Toronto bar pivoted to become a fake Italian restaurant with really good spaghetti By Courtney Shea | Photography By Daniel Neuhaus | December 16, 2020 12/16/2020 Emily and Josh LeBlanc are the husband and wife team behind Bar Mordecai, a Budapest Hotel-inspired speakeasy on Dundas West that opened a month before Covid hit. Since then they have done a whole lot of regrouping and rethinking, including their latest innovation. West Side Maria’s is an old-school (but also new school because it’s virtual) Italian eatery that may be Toronto’s first ever fictional restaurant. How does that work exactly? We found out.