By lindsaylow
When I want to think I’m cool, and if I’m hungry (which I usually am), I go to one of the (few) trendy restaurants where they understand that their bread is buttered just as well by aging gastronomes like me as it is by skinny young hipsters in four-inch heels. It’s no accident that The … Continued
By lindsaylow
Middle Eastern food has supplanted tacos as Toronto’s flavour du jour. Ezra’s Pound morphed into a hummuseria, the Khabouth/Harji duo opened Byblos, and now we have Fat Pasha from Anthony Rose (ex-Drake Hotel exec chef, owner of Rose and Sons and Big Crow). This happened because the Indian Rice Factory closed, and Mr. Rose was … Continued
By lindsaylow
I eat around. Familiarity with other parts of the world allows me to say with certitude that in Toronto we have the most choices in Asian food of any city in the world. Okay, so the Thai food is better in Thailand and the sushi is better in Japan. But outside of an Asian cuisine’s … Continued
By lindsaylow
One hates to be so negative. And repetitive. How often do you hear me whine because a fantastic chef had a great restaurant and then he (it’s pretty much always a guy) wanted to make more money because success went to his head, so he opened a second restaurant. And maybe more. Before you know … Continued
By lindsaylow
Last year, when I went to India for the first time, I was shocked by the food. Even at the high end (which was fabulously snazzy), the food was somewhat disappointing. Not bad — never bad — but kind of blah, like what we get in a good curry house in Little India. Long-cooked stewed … Continued
By lindsaylow
I’m completely stumped. All these years of eating for a living and I cannot figure this one out. How come The Chase (both upstairs and downstairs) is so hot it’s sizzling? Just try getting a table. The service sucks and the food is ho-hum. We can’t even talk to them about our reservation without being … Continued
By lindsaylow
You have to get cold to go to the hottest new restaurant in Toronto — and that may be its undoing. The suits who work in the financial district don’t like going outside. They do like walking to drink and dine. They also like expensive booze, fancy food, a snazzy room and waitstaff eye candy. … Continued
By lindsaylow
There are people in this world who like their food with the volume turned up. Maybe their marriage sucks. Or they’re on a really boring date. Or they’re out with an old friend out of obligation and there’s nothing left to say. Diners in any of these situations might really enjoy dinner at the Drake … Continued
By lindsaylow
I am gobsmacked. Utterly confused. Freaked out even. When Bruce Woods was chef at Modus Ristorante (2011–2012), he produced some of the best traditional Italian food in Toronto. There were ethereal gnocchi, deep rich sauces, great hunks of fabulous meat and wonderful pastas. It’s not as if chef Woods arrived on the scene fresh from … Continued
By lindsaylow
The restaurant space on Winchester Street has been a killer forever. Whoever goes in there sinks like stone. There have been some dogs in that space … and some good ones that also died. What do foodies have against Cabbagetown, other than it isn’t Dundas West? As the days lengthen, a stroll around Cabbagetown’s mannered … Continued
By lindsaylow
If Grant van Gameren were a one-trick pony, you would not be reading this column. Because he would have opened son of The Black Hoof, and why bother with that? After Grant, who was its founding chef, left the Hoof in 2011, he ate his way around Europe, finding most felicity in the tapas of … Continued
By lindsaylow
Farmhouse Tavern harkens back to a time of pastoral pleasures… The farms, the fields, the sweet smell of clover… No matter that most of us never lived that life or that the restaurant’s mission, to use only that which is produced in Ontario, is cute but silly. One, because the environmental benefits of eating local … Continued
