T.O. Food Porn…
As I had time in between semesters, over the weekend, I made my way to Toronto. As opposed to many people I know, I find T.O. to be quite an enjoyable city. Its a nice change from the routine that is MTL. There are some good eats to be had in T.O., especially Chinese food. Here is my Toronto culinary journey…
Mushroom frittata with goat cheese with a side of rye bread, pancakes and hash brown ordered at Eggstacy on Bay street.
I am a big fan of street food. Unfortunately, the city of MTL has pretty much banned this practice. But not Toronto! It’s a must for me everytime that I’m in T.O., I gotta have one of their hot dogs. This food shack was stationed in of city hall.
Wannabe Hong Kong street food at Pacific Mall. What we have here are fish balls, cuttlefish and at the bottom, duck gizzards. And all on a stick!
Had some great Shanghai food made by these Chinese migrants trapped in a fish bowl. Among the things ordered were beef tendons, crab dumplings, miscellaneous soup, chive cakes, onion cakes and white carrot stuffed cakes.
Day 1 ended with a Watermelon milkshake and a fruit salad with a secret sauce that looked like thousand island dressing.
Day 2 started off with all you can eat Korean BBQ with some real thick mango milkshake.
For dessert, I doubled-up on ice cream!
Before I left, I had some perfectly acceptable spicy pork ramen noodle with a side of mini-baby octopus at Ajisen Ramen. I think this is a Japanese chain of ramen restaurants… maybe jyankee can shed some light on this one…lol
With this, my Toronto trip ended. Maybe one day, my career willing, all this food will be available to me within a short drive…
You are VERY lucky I just came back from a delicious dinner…with all those food pics! Looks delish! Hmmm.. Ajisen? I dont know if there are any in my city.. I’ll look it up and get back to you! But the ramen looked JUST like it does here! LOL..
As I’ve stated many times here, I LOVE ramen noodle soup. Its just too bad that there aren’t any decent ones in Montreal. Ajisen Ramen sure did filled my craving…lol
god damn TO… i hate it out of loyalty to montreal. anyway, while TO is boring, it does have good food. i will readily agree to that.
furthermore, while i’ve not had any of their korean bbq, maybe, just maybe, it’s just as good as here. just not as cheap. i believe that the culinary arts can be transported from one place to another. the only thing that you can’t really transport are the ingredients and their specific flavor at a whim. for example, i could make poutine here, but it wouldn’t taste the same without curd cheese from quebec.
I like the big city feel of T.O. and like that its multi-cultural. I find its even more multi-cultural than MTL. I’ve heard the boring comments before. Maybe the people are boring but I wouldn’t know.
the next thing I wanna try the next time is a Jerk Chicken place. There are a ton of mom & pop Jamaican eateries (especially on Younge street), it reminded me a bit of all the fake chinese places we have on Ste-Catherine street near ConU…lol
i find that the multiculturalness doesn’t feel on par with montreal because of the distinct absence of french in TO. i know with census data and anthropological/sociological observations that both cities are pretty even, but still. it doesn’t feel multicultural when all you have is one language everywhere.
anyway, i had some hella good food there, even during the short times i spent there. i’d go there again to eat in recommended places (mostly ’cause i don’t wanna ‘adventure’ in boring TO lol)
I dont find that there is one language everywhere in T.O. A stroll through downtown will yield languages from around the world from T.O. residents.
i heard more french than i expected in my travels to T.O. My ex-BMO boss (who is moving there) says there is a significant number of MTL “expats” in T.O. There for a chance to further their careers.
i never said there weren’t any other languages. i meant that the signs and shit are mostly all in english and that makes a big difference. BIG difference.
A stroll through downtown and its many neighborhoods and you will notice that lots of signs are not in english. Several merchants have signs that is only in the language that they “cater” to.
Thats one thing that surprised me about T.O. Never would that fly in MTL…
i did stroll through it… it’s boring as hell lol.
even the ‘large underground network’ isn’t that large, it’s just… spacious. it LOOKS big, and it covers a large span, but it doesn’t have that much stuff.
it’s ok, i’m biased. i hate TO just ’cause i’m loyal to mtl. i will give credit where it’s due, but for everything else, i’ll diss like no tomorrow, haha.
Man, your blog looks like my first blog or Facebook albums… all food pics! It must be an Asian thing.