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Toronto restaurant recommendation

denning

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I'm in town for 5 days and am looking for recommendations for a good cocktail place or two to go to. Don't need atmosphere or to be seen, just looking for really good cocktails by bartenders who know what they are doing.

Any suggestions?
 

akoustas

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Cocktail Bar on Dundas is excellent.

Toronto Temperance Society is pretty good as well "It's membership only" but if you go to the restaurant attached "Sidecar" and state you're visiting or considering a membership they'll let you in. Bit too much of a hassle for my taste though!
 

7_rocket

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What are people's thoughts on Hye's steak house? I'm not steak expert but damn it's so good!

Do you guys have other recommendations for steak?
 

bings

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forget Hy's.. go to Jacob & Co at King and Brant for steak in toronto...
 

fwiffo

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Cocktail Bar on Dundas is excellent.

Toronto Temperance Society is pretty good as well "It's membership only" but if you go to the restaurant attached "Sidecar" and state you're visiting or considering a membership they'll let you in. Bit too much of a hassle for my taste though!


Or come find me and I'll boost you in.

Lo Pan - I stumbled into Lo Pan - the bar for Dailo down the street from Sidecar. I had the big mac bao, the spring roll with the smoked meat and mate of mine had another big mac bao and the beef short rib. He loved the beef ribs. Spring rolls were okay - not too impressed. Big mac bao - it does not looking anything like McDonald's but if you remember the taste and the texture of the shredded lettuce, somehow it's able to evoke the Big Mac taste when you put it all together in your mouth. Quite interesting. As we showed up close to 11pm, there wasn't much else in food. Lot of eccentric characters there on a Friday night and we stayed past 2am. To be honest I lost track of how much I spent there. Bartender's a good chap whom I met first at Spirit House (another "bar" for the person above).

Colette - I spent $300+ on a lunch at Colette during early autumn. We both had the vichyssoise lobster soup. Everyone keeps talking about how big the lobster is but I thought it was a fair size. Reviewer in the Globe said it was the best soup you'll have. It's interesting but I'm more into hearty stews than cold soups. I then had the duck confit salad which was medium rare. My lunch mate had a pickerel which I got to try. She loved it. She thought my salad was a bit salty. And then we ordered the chocolate soufflé. There was a mistake in the order in that it takes about a half hour for the soufflé to come out and we waited an extra thirty minutes because the waitress said the order was lost. No compensation or anything. Otherwise, service was quite nice. Very eccentric Yorkville type crowd for a lazy Friday afternoon lunch. Some women in there were wearing hats. We stumbled out of there close to 4pm after a bottle of wine, cocktails and digestif. That's not before buying a dozen macaroons from the bakery.

Patois - Came here with a good mate of mine. We split the fried chicken and the jerk chicken platters. Jerk is a little spicy, wouldn't say it's very spicy. Portions are Toronto city size - I can't imagine bringing a southerner here as he'd probably have to order three entrees to fill up. There's an option called whole shebang where you can get everything on the menu. We had the dirty fried rice - don't know what they put in it but it's a good side to all the chicken. Disappointed the steak wasn't on the specials that day. Instead of dessert we decided to have something savoury - Jamaican patties. It's not anything like the ones you get from a street vendor. They don't have much in the choice of hard liquor and I think my mate gave up on the cocktail list after one cocktail. I was going to try the jerk chicken chow mein but from the looks of what I saw on another table, there wasn't a lot of gravy, we already had jerk chicken separately and it was a bed of fried noodles - looked like it needed to be more wet. It was dead around 5pm but gets loud closer to 8pm.

Luckee - For once I came mid week and not on a Friday. I was able to get a seat at the bar and order some dim sum. I never order brunch food for dinner but since I never make it here on weekends I just had to try it. We had the siu mai, the har gow, shrimp rice noodle. Siu mai was okay - not too special. Dinner mate liked her har gow, which to me was nothing special. Shrimp rice noodle is not plain and had bits of fried dough with it but she really didn't like the smell so I ended up eating the whole thing. The bar attracts an eclectic crowd of hotel guests from the soho and some locals who look like they got lost trying to find the club district. Very dark even during the daytime.

Calvin Bar - I didn't go to America after the O&B revamp of the Trump restaurants but I did have a nibble at the Calvin Bar - some frites or poutine of some sort. Can't say it was the best judgment of the food there. They also had a "bucket of fried chicken". I really don't know why you'd pay $15-$20 for a cocktail and get a bucket of fried chicken. Anyway, the bartenders are quite interested in entertaining women than entertaining guests. Refills were slow and I can see why on a Thursday night at 6pm, the place was less than 1/5 full. Shame really considering the location of the bar.

Takhe-e Tavoos - I came here for lunch one day. We had the Dizi Sangi. It's a meat stew with beans in a stone container. The stone is hot (think dol sot bim bim bap for Koreans). You take a mortar and grind the bean and meat to a paste. Then you take the Persian bread and dip it in the broth. There is yogurt and some sour veggies as accompaniments. I started off with the Naz Khatoon, which was a mashed up eggplant and garlic mix. Again went nice with the bread. I had a bit of a taste from her Guisavah - interesting that a fried egg could go with dates and figs. I don't usually eat digs nor figs. And then Persian tea to finish. Crowd was a cross from artistic types and Persians. Wait staff were definitely not Persian but the décor is unmistakably from there. I was stuffed by the time I left and I think I paid $58 including tip there.

Been to a lot of usual haunts. Only thing to note is on a whim I went to Michael's on Simcoe on a Sunday night around 9pm after working late. Split the chateaubriand for $112 or something plus a pasta and some side entrees. It was quite nice and I noticed the wine list is a bit more reasonable now from when I last went there. (There are bottles less than $60!)

Also went to the Pizzeria Libretto outlet on University on the second day it was opened. Use OpenTable. Tables of 3 were turned down at 12pm (literally) and the bar was completely full. Prices, surprisingly, are the same as the Ossington outlet. Order quickly when you get in as the lunch rush completely slams the kitchen. Due to the newness of the place I kept getting doubles of all my starters and desserts - beet salads, biscottis. Lots of Financial District folks willing to put down money but they make the queue for ordering even worst because they have no idea about the Libretto menu (how big is the pizza? etc.)
 

akoustas

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Dai Lo is meehhhh....

I get that it's a twist on Chinese but the pricing is pretty egregious when you consider Chinatown is two blocks away. Did like Lo Pan upstairs though!
 
Last edited:

bings

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hey gents, my bro just opened up this hot spot in the Queen West area (Dundas / Dovercourt).

It's the jam right now and i encourage you all to check it out. They put a ton of work and money into this and it shows in the details.

It is a "mis-leading storefront" concept with a quaint bodega in the front and no signage. You have to go through the ugly curtains to get to the room. The 36' mural is hand painted and the esthetic is based on my grandfather's chinese restaurant that is now nearly 60 years old.

http://www.blogto.com/bars/mahjong-bar-toronto/

also featured in one of the top 10 joints in Toronto right now:

http://www.blogto.com/eat_drink/2017/10/hottest-restaurants-toronto-october-2017/

another feature:

https://nowtoronto.com/food-and-drink/mahjong-bar-toronto/
 

thefringthing

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Anyone who goes to Toronto and fails to eat momos at Loga's Corner in Parkdale has failed utterly.
 

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