Bubble Republic

Apparently this is the bubble tea place to be in Mississauga. 

Right to left: Kiwi Green Tea (no ice), Passionfruit tea and Mango Slushie
The Saturday daily special was the large kiwi green tea for $3.29. Pretty reasonable and it was in a gigantic pint glass. The tea was really sweet - probably not something I'd order again. 

Then I tried the passionfruit tea and found it really sweet as well. I wonder if that's a trend here...

Caramel Pudding Milk Tea and spicy Taiwanese popcorn chicken

Despite being advertised as spicy, the popcorn chicken were not spicy...they were spiced. 

A nice tidbit size made it easier to munch on them slowly while playing card games...

Green apple soda

One word: fizzy.

Overall: The bubble teas were too sweet in my opinion (and this coming from the girl who has a huge dessert sweet tooth). It's nice that they let you play card games here at least...

Website: http://bubblerepublic.ca/

Keriwa Cafe

In the west end of Parkdale, on Queen West near Roncesvalles is Keriwa Cafe.
The restaurant has gotten rave reviews in the last two years. They went through a stint opening their restaurant only one night a week for a 14 course tasting menu to the tune of $300. Ouch...but then they went back to their normal a la carte menu (thank goodness) and things became affordable again!

Menu

Confit Pork Belly with Honey + Wild Leek + Garlic Scape
The pork belly was amazing! It was so tender and succulent that it melted in your mouth and it was flavoured with a fantastic honey and garlic glaze. We cleaned the entire plate...mmmm

Bison flank steak with red pepper + eggplant + rye berry

They didn't have the short rib that day and instead substituted the bison shortrib with a flank steak.
It was honestly the best bison I've ever had - tender and delicious seasoned with a tasty mix of spices and cooked to medium rare perfection. And the sauces were the perfect complement: red pepper and sriracha hot sauce to add a little heat and a nice cool white sauce to clean the palate. The grilled eggplant was a great vegetable side. Yum!

Smoked Hen with Arugula + Elderberry + Fiddleheads

The smoked hen was this gorgeous lean white meat with a fully rich smoke flavour. You could taste the smoke in the meat - that's how absorbed the flavour was into the meat. The chicken was paired with a Crème fraîche and asparagus purée. It was pretty and delectable.

Apple Crumble with Elderberry semi-fredo
The apple crumble was mixed with brown sugar and right on top of the whole mix was a roasted marshmallow that had the sweet half-frozen elderberry semi-fredo in the middle. I liked the play on textures with the gooey marshmallow, chilly frozen semi-fredo, crumbly apple crisps and grainy brown sugar.Very fun!

Panna cotta with crispy wild rice and pear gelee

Amazing dessert! Jelly but firm panna cotta with crisp and crunchy wild rice and a good creme anglais sauce with pear wine gelee. Despite not being very sweet, it fully satisfied my dessert craving.

Overall: For a relatively small restaurant, the food preparation took really long (like 3 hours long). However, the food was perfect - a variety of flavours and textures and so delicious!

Website: http://www.keriwacafe.ca/http://www.keriwacafe.ca/

Caplansky's Delicatessen

Caplansky's Delicatessen was another place featured on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives. 

Chicken Parmigiana on a bun
The foccacia bun was really good: soft and olive flavoured. The chicken parm was okay, it wasn't really their specialty, but it was the Wednesday special.

Knish with a separate basket of fries

The knish is a Jewish puff pastry stuffed with smoked meat, potato and spices, served with smoked meat gravy. The knish was interesting, but a tad salty for my liking. The waiter recommended ordering a basket of fries to dip with the gravy. Unfortunately, the smoked meat gravy was so thick that it was like a layer of ground smoked meat, making it undippable with the flimsy fries. On top of that, the gravy and fries were quite salty individually - so you can imagine the saturation of salt together.

Up close view of the Knish

Carrot Cake

Mmmm carrot cake with cream cheese icing...I could definitely taste the cream cheese. The icing wasn't as sweet as I would have liked it to balance out the flavour of the carrot cake.

Overall: The food was okay, a tad salty for my taste. The service was quick and they tried to be helpful in making recommendations, but it didn't really work for me.

Website: http://caplanskys.com/

Prairie Girl Bakery

June 13, 2013

I love pistachios in desserts (try searching my blog for "pistachio", there's a ton of results). 

So I couldn't wait for Prairie Girl Bakery's featured flavour to be pistachio. Yay!

Black Forest and Pistachio Mini cupcakes

The pistachio was really good! Vanilla cupcake base with pistachio buttercream and topped with two small pistachio nuts. It had the rich nutty flavour in sugar form - delicious! 

The black forest was a chocolate based cake with cherry and vanilla icing topped with chocolate sprinkles. It was okay overall.

August 20, 2012

Another cupcake run

From the top left: Hazelnut, Root beer float, Chocolate Strawberry, Vanilla Lemon, Red Velvet Cream Cheese, Chocolate Peanut Butter. 

My favourite cupcake was the Root Beer float cupcake because it was so different, interesting and delicious! It was exactly how root beer and vanilla ice cream would taste like and in cupcake form - it really doesn't get any better than that. 

I also enjoyed the real strawberry icing on the chocolate strawberry cupcake and the Vanilla lemon was a delicious blend of tangy sweetness (not sour at all). 

I wasn't as big a fan of the Red Velvet Cream Cheese, Chocolate Peanut Butter or Hazelnut. The cream cheese icing on the red velvet was nice, but not particularly outstanding; the chocolate peanut butter icing was smooth and creamy like peanut butter (but I wasn't a fan of that combination - except maybe for Reeses Peanut Butter cups) and the Hazelnut was relatively plain and simple compared to the other flavours. 

August 2, 2012

Prairie Girl Bakery is a quick 5 minute walk away from the heart of the Financial District in Downtown Toronto. (a.k.a, a perfect snack break)

The menu is relatively simple; they stick to the core classic flavours and add a new spin on other flavours like Peanut Butter and Jam and Salted Caramel (this week). 

Package of 6 minis goes for $9.95

Salted Caramel

The cupcake was moist, but a little bit sticky to eat. The ideal bite size snack.

The icing was sweet and decadent and stayed true to the salted caramel flavour. Proportion wise, the buttercream icing was heavier than the cupcake. But that's great news for icing fans! 

Joe Prairie's Red Velvet Cupcake with Chocolate Cream Cheese icing and a swirl of Vanilla icing. 

I didn't really taste the cream cheese icing in the chocolate, rather I thought it was chocolate buttercream icing with a swirl of cream cheese icing on top. It was a really sweet combination.

Overall: Prairie Girl Cupcakes are perfect sized morsels of sweetness. Their menu has simple classic cupcake flavours and they're done well. 

Website: http://prairiegirlbakery.com/
 

Golden Horse Restaurant

For a rather hidden away location on Highway 7, Golden Horse Restaurant is a pretty popular restaurant. 

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The restaurant is actually bigger inside than it appears outside and weekend lunches are busy. 

 

The Afternoon Tea menu

Fried spaghetti with garlic and bacon
It tasted like Chinese chow mein with spaghetti instead of egg noodles or noodles. The portion size was a little small but it was tasty. I think they added a bit of msg because my mouth felt really dry after eating it.

Crispy Pork Cutlet on bun

There's a reason why a lot of people ordered this pork cutlet bun.
The pork cutlet had a nice crispy crust and it was topped with mayo, relish, cheese, tomato and lettuce. Similar to a Big Mac burger at McDonalds, but a healthier and fresher version.

Deep Fried Chicken Leg with Fries

Hefty portion: the chicken leg was gigantic (definitely way bigger than you could get at a KFC or Popeye's chicken). There was a lot of white meat, which is nice and the skin was super crispy. The fries were okay.

Overall: A mediocre meal - at least it was cheap and fast. Certain items are good like the pork cutlet bun, but others weren't.

L'unità

L'unità is a nice intimate restaurant located a little north of Yorkville near Avenue and Davenport. 

We were seated at a gorgeous polished wood table: 

The complimentary bread and olive oil

The bread was deliciously soft and so tasty with baked in tomatoes and cheese. The olive oil was fantastic with the bread.

Don Roberto pizza: lamb sausage, potato, fior di latte & dandelion

The pizza had a nice authentic crust and the combination of the thinly sliced potato, cooked chunks of lamb sausage and dandelion made for a good combination. 

Squid ink troccoli 'al nero' with gulf prawns, calamari, capers & preserved lemon

I actually found this dish quite salty with the squid ink pasta, capers and salted seafood. I guess squid ink pasta is always salty because I found it salty in Venice too. 

Margherita D.O.P.

Interesting fact: D.O.P. stands for "denominazione di origine protetta" and it is a trademark of legal protection for the foods whose characterisitcs depend primarily or exclusively from the territory in which they were produced. (credit goes to Wikipedia). The pizza was quite cheesy with the fior di latte mozzarella cheese. It was okay, but I think I prefer Pizza Libretto's margherita pizza. 

Spring Rabbit Gnocchi with wild boar pancetta, sweet peas & creme fraiche 

The dish was so tasty - the gnocchi were soft and delectable morsels and it was paired with the most delicious and tender rabbit with lots of flavour. Yum! I totally recommend this dish.

Quattro Stagioni pizza with tomato, fior di latte, fiddleheads, green olives, wild mushrooms & house peameal bacon

I was expecting all those toppings to be evenly spread out on the pizza, instead each quarter of the pizza had a different topping. A cute presentation (quattro stagioni means four seasons). I'm not a fan of fiddleheads - they're bitter, but the rest of the pizza was okay. 

Overall: I had a good experience at L'unità: the service was great, the restaurant was lovely and intimate and the food was good. 

Website: http://www.lunita.ca/

Burger Week 2013

The second annual Grid.To Burger Week:

June 1, 2013 - Lick's

A few burger franchises such as South Street Burger and Lick's also take part in Burger Week. 

The Jerk—a jerk patty topped with a mozzarella and cheddar blend, sautéed onions, and peppers. 

At first I couldn't really taste the jerk spice blend, but as I ate my way to the center of the two patties, I got quite a blend of flavours and cheese. It was like they melted the cheese and stuffed the burger with onions and peppers in the middle. Really quite good - especially with Guk!

Website: http://www.lickshomeburgers.com/

May 31, 2013 - The Stockyards Smokehouse & Larder

I went for Round 2 the next day at The Stockyards. 

  

They were offering up a chicken fried-steak burger stuffed with smoked pimento cheese, topped with gravy mayo, sausage gravy, and pickled greens.

 

I originally thought it was a chicken burger, but then I had a bite and realized that it wasn't the right texture for a chicken burger. It was kind of interesting: the cheese, gravy and pickled greens definitely added to the fried chicken taste of it. The fries were really good, a little soggy by the time we got back to eat the burgers - but still delicious. 

Website: http://www.thestockyards.ca/

May 30, 2013 - Dave's on St. Clair

  

Dave's on St. Clair offered a ground beef patty with arugula, horseradish aioli, home-made pickles, and shaved red onion on a house-made potato bun for $5. The catch? You had to sit down and eat there. 

The $5 burger
The burger was delicious! Tons of fresh arugula, tasty aioli sauce and a thick cut beef patty on a great bun!
The downside? The service was terrible. The turnover was really slow and even when a table left, it took a while before the next table was seated - there was like one waitress (and one bus boy). Not only that, considering how slow it was moving, we tried to pre-order before we got our table so we could sit, eat and go...but the waitress refused to take it and we ended up waiting about 1.5 hours to get our burger.

Website: http://davesonstclair.com/