It’s that time of year again. Summerlicious (July 3rd – 19th); when diners flock to Toronto’s restaurants in search of a cheap meal, and restaurant staff groan and complain at the long hours and stiffed tips. Summer (and Winter) Licious are self-perpetuating catch-22s. Diners expect poor service and so tip poorly regardless, while servers expect poor tips and so give bad service. It’s enough to make some of us avoid the whole thing completely. But it doesn’t have to be that way. With just a few basic rules in place for both customers and restaurants, Summerlicious could be a lovely, enjoyable, even civilized event. Here’s how…
Category: restaurants
Sunday Brunch – Sage West
Sage West – Closed
924 College Street
647-346-6183
Brunch for two with all taxes, tip and coffee: $30
Most people are probably more familiar with Sage Café on McCaul Street than they are with her sister restaurant Sage West. It’s one of those places you really want to like; it’s a pretty space that doubles as a lounge with live salsa bands and dancing in the evening; the staff is friendly and accommodating. The food… well the food is just mediocre.
We arrive to discover only one other table occupied, yet the extensive menu has many things crossed off. The chicken pot pie and the potato latkes are no longer on offer, and the chicken burrito handwritten onto the printed menu is also not available. Our server tells us the restaurant is in the process of changing the menu to reflect a move to more Latin-American fare (thus the salsa dancing), but the scratched out menu sheets are still kind of sloppy.
There’s Nothing to be Nervous About
Trattoria Nervosa
75 Yorkville Avenue
416-961-4642
When we last talked to Chef Andrea Nicholson back in late November, she was at the helm of a sinking ship. Despite her best efforts at creating an accessible, locally-sourced menu of classic Canadiana with a fine dining twist, 35 Elm Street, the restaurant where she worked as the executive chef, was failing. In fact, only days after we ran a profile on Nicholson and her work at 35 Elm, the place was abruptly shuttered.
“We were told while we were prepping for dinner service,” the chef remembers. “It was such a slap in the face. It breaks my heart.”
Toronto Taste 2009 – Good Eats in Pictures
Sunday Brunch – Bonjour Brioche
Bonjour Brioche
812 Queen Street East
416-406-1250
Brunch for two with all taxes, tip and coffee: $25 (cash only)
People seem to either love or hate Bonjour Brioche. I regularly come across raves about their exquisite pastries and breads, but the service, and the line-up on weekends, can be a sticking point. In fact, in order to ensure we’d get a table to do this review, we actually visited on a Friday. Even then, by noon the place, including the patio, had filled up.
I suspect that a big part of Bonjour Brioche’s charm is that it’s so charming. Mixed furniture, pretty blue cotton tablecloths and tchotchkes mix well with display cases of tarts and cakes and baskets of bread, brioche and flaky croissants.
The Many Flavours of Riverside
Greg tells many great stories of the time he lived at Queen and Broadview in the late 80s, upstairs from one of the guys from Skinny Puppy. Those stories almost always come back to the fact that there was a dearth of restaurants in the area back then, and save for but a few greasy spoons, you pretty much had to leave the neighbourhood to find a decent place to eat.
What a difference a couple of decades makes, with the recently-named Riverside District having become a magnet for young families, boutiques and galleries as well as hip restaurants, cafes and food shops. A stroll along Queen Street East from the Don River over to Carlaw offers up any number of great places to eat and shop for food. And let’s not forget the coffee.
Sunday Brunch – La Tortilleria
La Tortilleria
1040 St. Clair Avenue West
647-344-2429
Brunch for two with all taxes, tip and hot chocolate: $30
Rubbernecking as the St. Clair West bus rumbled eastward on a Saturday morning, the hungry husband and I both see the sign at the same time “Now serving weekend breakfast”. So we pass up the roti at the Green Barns Farmers Market and walk back to Dufferin to La Tortilleria. Because we loves us some Mexican food.
However, when we arrive we realize that our knowledge of Mexican food really only involved the more typical dinner entrees – what the heck do they eat for breakfast in Mexico anyway?
Elegant Whimsy – Food and Fun at Trevor Kitchen bar
Trevor Kitchen and Bar
38 Wellington Street East
416-941-9410
The entrance way to Trevor Kitchen and Bar reminds me of a Goth club. There’s a shiny red motorcycle situated just inside the door and dark stairs lead down into a candlelit room. Seriously, I’m expecting to hear some Bauhaus as I descend into what food critics referred to as a “subterranean grotto” when the space first opened in late 2006.
Despite the white walls, both the long bar area and the adjacent dining room are dim, with candles and ceiling pot lights creating ambient shadows across the 150-year-old stone walls. It’s a potentially intimidating space, but prospective diners shouldn’t be scared of the dark, because the team in the kitchen have prepared a seasonal bistro menu that is akin to your Mom wrapping you in a big hug and then serving you Sunday dinner. If your Mom was fancy and cooked foie gras.
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Two Meals
Most of us, if we’re lucky, eat three times a day – or more. We can look at this activity as either a chore, or a joy. We can take pleasure in every flavour, every spice, every texture and smell, or we can look at eating as something we have to do to stay alive, but man, doesn’t it get tedious after a while?
Recently, I had the opportunity to experience both ends of the spectrum.
April marked the 20th anniversary of the last time I had eaten at McDonald’s. I wanted to mark the occasion in some way but none of the options were appealing – especially the ones that might get me arrested. Instead I chose to do the most radical thing I could think of, which was to go and eat a meal at McDonald’s. Heck, I’ve eaten bull’s testicles, it couldn’t be that bad, could it? And to counter the McDonald’s meal, a few days later I would be attending the Slow Food Banchetto feast, a five-course meal created by 25 of Toronto’s top chefs.
The McDonald’s meal, as expected, was disgusting. The burgers were greyish brown and had the spongy texture of crepe soles on a pair of shoes. The McChicken sandwich was bland and beige and resembled a flat disc of breaded particleboard (which would have been more palatable, knowing how mechanically-deboned chicken is actually made). The fries smelled and tasted of rancid grease. The fruit pies were spit out and thrown away, they were so soggy and bland. The first few bites of the meal took me hurtling back to 1989, when this was something I would have described as delicious, but my grown-up self could not stomach that food or the hard seats, bright lights, chaotic service area or the aura of sadness and defeat that permeated the restaurant.
Around the World and Back in Time at Butler’s Pantry
Butler’s Pantry
371 Roncesvalles Avenue
416-537-7750
Brunch/lunch for two with all taxes, tip and soda: $30
This is supposed to be a brunch review. You’d know that because it’s Sunday. Except it’s not a brunch review because we didn’t actually eat brunch. Upon arriving at the Roncesvalles location of Butler’s Pantry we decided we weren’t really in the mood for typical brunch fare. Instead we decided to revisit some old favourites for a trip down memory lane.
That’s not to say that Butler’s Pantry doesn’t offer a decent brunch card. Although it’s been probably 7 or 8 years since I’ve had the dish, their French toast ($7.25) is still renowned, and I’m momentarily chagrined at my decision to have an entrée when a plate of the massive fluffy fried bread goes past. The rest of the brunch offerings (offered until 2pm on weekdays and 4pm on weekends) include a variety of omlettes ($6.25 – $8.25), eggs Benedict ($7.25, $8.75 with smoked salmon), and scrambled eggs ($8.95).
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