Martine's Wine Bar populates its menu with nature’s bounty, its wine list with approachable pours and delivers every delight in an unpretentious room that oozes cozy country charm.

"The initial vision for this space was a wine bar with snacks," explains general manager and wine director Hannah Holmes.

"Then, Grant [Van Gameren], the owner, has a farm. He was selling to a lot of other restaurants, all this produce and veggies, and he kind of thought, 'why would I not just use them for my own restaurant?'"

With that, the identity of Martine's Wine Bar as a farm-to-table restaurant was cemented.

"It was a wine bar that turned into a restaurant that focuses on wine," explains Holmes. "There's no specific style of cuisine, a lot of French, Italian. It's got vaguely Euro-bistro vibes," she adds.

"We use almost entirely local veg from Grant’s farm, lots of rotating stuff. We make really fantastic pastas in-house, and we have a wood-burning oven. We do our chicken there, our veg there," continues Holmes.

Located steps from Bar Raval, one of Van Gameren's perennially-popular spots, Martine's, which opened in May, isn't just a place to flaunt its owner's green thumb. It's also an über-appealing overflow room for its sister space.

"It was just the next logical step in what was going on," offers Holmes. "Raval is a lot of small plates, a lot of jamming people in like sardines. Everyone is standing. Not everyone wants to do that. And it gets pretty full, and we're sending people away who want a full dinner. Like, why are we not keeping this in the family?"

Inside Martine's Wine Bar's two-level space, mahogany touches hearken back to Bar Raval, with reclaimed pine and plenty of vintage pieces — from artwork and fixtures to furniture pinched from Van Gameren's own home — lending the restaurant a well-loved look.

Led by head chef Luke Haines, the team at Martine's plays expert improv with weekly deliveries from Van Stone farms, a prolific patch of land in Prince Edward County. The team supplements the heaps of produce with proteins from Woodward Meats, Daily Seafood and other local purveyors.

Menus comprise cold and warm snacks, along with larger plates, with ingredients offering an exclusive tasting tour of Ontario's harvest.

The influx of fruit and vegetables "is inspiring, for sure," admits Haines, though, he explains, "it's not always ingredients that I've worked with a lot." Happily, the challenges seem to enhance the team's creativity.

Chubby with a hint of char, tender Van Stone Carrots ($18) arrive on a bed of tahini crème fraiche and perky mojo rojo sauce. Snappy pops of sweetness from sherry-soaked raisins keep diners at attention.

Served warm, under a cool cloak of savoury, rich gribiche and drizzle of chili oil, Tempura Van Stone Beans ($14) are as fun as fries and infinitely more satisfying.

Fazzoletti ($26) is a hearty vegetarian main that's fresh and rich, comforting and all the good things.

To make it, the team replaces traditional pesto with roasted zucchini sauce punched up with herbs. Verdant and bright, the sauce is then layered onto broad al dente noodles which are topped with parm and butter, marinated zucchini, smoked burrata and lemon balm.

In all, it's a dish that catapults zucchini to crave-worthy status (no mean feat) and is the very essence of sublime seasonal eating.

Even if you generally take an anti-organ-meat stance, you should try the team's Smoked Veal Sweetbreads ($34).

Sous-vide brined, then pressed, smoked, and fried to order, each morsel is soft, light and crisp. With sweet peas balancing sharp horseradish vin, the dish could easily turn the wary into thymus gland enthusiasts.

True to its name, Martine's Wine Bar is also home to a wealth of interesting bottles. "I try and keep the list fairly approachable," explains Holmes. "Everything is listed lightest to fullest. Everything is dry unless stated otherwise. If you have questions, just ask."

In addition to classics, the list includes "a lot of off-the-beaten path bottles," says Holmes. "Everything is pretty simple. I want to have things at every price point."

Still, she admits, she likes to "reward the more adventurous people. If it's a weird region or grape that people aren't as comfortable with, I won't usually mark it up as high to convince people to be more explorative."

She also includes "fun things," like by-the-glass Champagne for the bargain-basement price of $30. "When I was young, I wanted to drink Champagne but I couldn’t really afford it. I’ve seen it on lists for $50 a glass, or $40. I don't really want to do that."

Prefer cocktails? The restaurant offers a core group of stirred, not shaken, classics, like a Dirty Martini ($18) properly sullied with fermented olive brine, along with charming features, like a clarified appletini.

Martine's Wine Bar is located at 293 Palmerston Avenue.