Mount Everest

Another Ritual week $1 deal in Leaside

Butter Chicken

A really small portion for $1 - I think there were like 4 pieces of tiny chicken in the whole dish. However, there was a lot of butter chicken sauce and it was sweet rather than savoury. 

Website: http://www.mteverestrestaurant.ca/

Pizzaville

Ritual deal $1 pizza at Pizzaville

Ground Beef Medium pizza

This was a really good pizza (despite only having one topping because of the promotion). The crust was good and there was enough cheese and sauce. I like their pizza more than Pizza Pizza.

Website: https://www.pizzaville.ca/

Mercatto

Jan 29, 2019

$5 small insalata

Pasta with pulled pork, kale, rotini and vegetables. It was pretty good and a decent portion size, but there wasn't a lot of meat. 

Dec 28, 2018

The plates are really pretty here

Funghi pizza with cremini mushrooms and mozzarella and linguine di mare with shrimp, calamari, scallops and mussels

The pizza and linguine were good. I think it was a rather pricey lunch though. The take-out counter looks really good (and it seems more reasonably priced). 

Website: http://college.mercatto.ca/

Perfect Chinese Restaurant

Chicken and soup

Peking Duck

Lobster and duck

Steamed fish

The food was okay, but I think there are better Chinese places in Scarborough like Maple Yip and Dong Kee. However, the fact that this restaurant is open 24/7 is pretty crazy. 

Website: https://perfectchineserestaurant.com/

Feta and Olives Grill

I got a promotional email from my Feedback App, so I decided to try out Feta and Olives Grill at Atrium on Bay.

 

Souvlaki Dinner and Souvlaki pita wrap and Tzatziki pita wrap

They're definitely a healthier option since the food they had were all lower in carb and calorie options. However, I didn't think my chicken souvlaki would be chicken strips instead of chunks of chicken. The potatoes were pretty bland and the tzatziki was watery. The strangest part was the random inclusion of black beans in my wrap. I don't even know if it's Greek anymore.

Website: https://www.fetaolivesgrill.com/menu

Uncle Tetsu Cheesecake

Jan 15, 2019

 

Original cheese tart

I liked the cookie crust and the cheese tart better than the Uncle Tetsu cheesecake, but it still had that weird cheese-eggy taste.

The matcha cheese tart

This was way better than the original cheese tart - I think the matcha helps mask some of the original taste. 

May 15, 2015

My friends and I had tickets to the Opera starting around 7 giving us some time to kill after work.

We weren’t particularly hungry, so we thought we could check out the Japanese Cheesecake place that everyone's been raving about (and it's known for having an hour line up).

We lined up for an hour and a half on the wet dreary day. When we got to the front, we found out that it wasn’t actually the cheesecakes people were waiting for - it was the madeleines which were the hold-up/bottleneck. The staff were baking their miniature sponge cakes out of one tiny oven.

Since I was here, I figured I'd get the maximum amount of madeleines and cheesecakes (i.e. 6 madeleines and 1 cheesecake). 

It's reasonably priced at $10. 

The cheesecake was soft and fluffy - almost sponge-like but more moist. 

And I really didn't like it.

I found the texture and taste strange and foreign. It didn't have the typical cheesecake characteristics in that it wasn't creamy, decadent or particularly tasty in any way shape or form.

I like cheesecakes with strong flavours (caramel, nuts, chocolate, strawberry, etc.) or a good fruit sauce or chocolate on top - so to go from that to a blandish cake was a pretty drastic change.

I love the richness of cheesecake and the versatility of flavours you can make it with → like the Cheesecake Factory cakes. I couldn't even finish this one cheesecake after I took it home - it was just too weird for me.

The Madeleines 

These little cakes were very dry and also rather bland tasting. I would definitely not recommend the madeleines either.

Overall: I think Toronto is a little divided by the Cheesecakes (some people love it and others don't), but I know I won't be lining up for it for myself.

Website: http://uncletetsu-ca.com/