Danybear's Profile
Looking for cool kitchen stores in Toronto
There is a Nella on Bathurst and Bloor area.
Food-related volunteering [Toronto]
People with AIDS Foundation has a meal program that requires volunteers.
The Chickery - Spadina South of Richmond (David Adjey's new casual spot)
COSTCO rotisserie chicken has shot up in price to $7.95, not dry and better than Loblaws or David Adjey blessed chicken. The man is a media whore not a chef.
Good Chinese Food Delivery
Ever since I had to jettison Saigon Gourmet from my speed dialer for sending incredibly awful Chinese food, I have been on a quest to find a source for decent or dare I hope high quality Chinese food. The default seems to be all the creativity goes into writing the menu, and what comes through the door is a combination of the cheapest ingredients badly prepared. Tonite I tried SPICY and Sweet from up on St. Clair Avenue. When they first opened up there food was good quality, nice;y prepared but the portions were miniscule for the price. Now, perhaps a year later they have copied all the style of most other Chinese food delivery outfits. Masses of hacked green peppers (because I guess red peppers are more expensive) beef that features gristle instead of flavour, and paper thin chicken breast in doughy batter to make lemon chicken.
Isn't there even one decent Chinese food delivery in my neighbourhood: Bloor and Ossington??
Restaurants at Bloor/Bathurst
Country Style has gone waaaaay downhill, right on the edge of oblivion. Food couldn't get up to mediocre and the service staff had a glint in their eyes as they know that your money for the "tax included price" will never get reported to HST or the Feds!
European Meats is closing
COSTCO and NOFRILLS both carry inexpensive smoked turkey legs.
Restaurant "Har Gow" on Danforth
Being a fanatic for dim sum, I had to try this place out, and it wasn't bad, but the non dim sum menu item prices are outrageous, much higher than any restaurant that I have been to that exp[ended money on real china and cutlery. Nice people working there, but if yiu take away ambience and crockery and cutlery, shouldn't the prices be lower?
knife sharpening
I tried this "knife sharpening service" The man also fixes shoes and boots with the same equipment and doesn't know anything about knifesharpening
Rose Sellers in Restaurants, Especially at Valentines?
Whats with restaurant managers that allow rose sellers to work their tables hustling second rate flowers to couples out on a date? The seller usually looks like a street person and the flowers are crap. Why would any restaurant allow this?
Freezer Jam - Help!
The lids don't need sealing if the jam is frozen. You can have either frozen jam or jam at room temp with sealed lids, don't need both.
Timothy's Coffee issues
Why are so many posters favoring the Timothyy's operation? Wou;ld hope that CH would foster raising standards, not being satisfied with low standards. As to the attitude of the service staff, who cares if they have a crappy homelifeor day, thye are there to do a job! I don't care about their personal lives, it should not enter into the equation, even if they are paid minimum wage, especially with all the chat about escalating tip percentages lately. Jusat do th ejob, make sure date squares include dates!
Chiado question
Used the Groupon for the Tasting Menu tonight and have to say I was very disappointed with the event. To start off the host is incredibly full of himself, overly brisk, with the feeling that you should understand you are lucky to be in his restaurant. The tasting menu is definitely a tasting menu, a small taste of a few things. The rooms are lovely, the design excellent, the service staff very efficient. A very large investment has been made in far out dishware, too bad the same can't be said for the food. The serving plates were piping hot, sadly not hot enough to heat up the food. The cheese course was a joke, reminiscent of those cardboard circular cheese boxes with a dozen triangles of tasteless cheese, along with two tiny smears of soemthing that may have tasted good if there was enough to taste. The lobster bisque tasted oddly sour for some reason. The main: Tyle Fish could have come from Captain Highliner, the sauce was so incredibly spicy there was no tasting of the fish. Lukewarm mashed potatoes (they cool of quickly when there is only a teaspoon of them, could have come from a box of powder. The dessert sampler was merely amusing. The biggest item on the menu was pretension, definitely more than I needed.
To finish off the evening we were presented with a menu card that ordered us to pay a $25.00 tip! Nothing less, nothing more.
When a restaurant starts off by acknowledging that they have rough rubes as customers and need to be instructed on tipping, they lost me.
Groupons and Winterlicious should be mediums to bring in new customers to become regular customers, not to drive them away after one evening.
I am rethinking my whole interest in Groupons and such. Tell me I am getting a hundred dollar meal for a discount, and then give me a discount meal with an inflated tip and I am soooo outtta there!
Where can I buy coffee beans from Costa Rica?
Costa Rican coffee beans have become very trendy lately. I used to have a condo on the beach in Jaco in Costa Rica and love the coffee, every time I returned my suitcase was filled with about 60 pounds of beans in foil bricks. No clothes, just coffee beans. Some Canadian Customs Officers were intrigued and tried to find out what I was "really" smuggling (nada), and others didn't care. Now a days Loblaws and No Frills has packets of coffee beans from Costa Rica in several roastings.
New Cuisinart Griddler -- suggestions please?
Just bought the waffle plates to fit my Griddler, now I can throw out the old waffle iron and save some space.
Whole organic chicken?
Antibiotics are not allowed in chicken or turkey feed in Canada. I would assume free range chickens in the middle of freezing winter come from some place else (warmer) cancelling out the local feature.
LOBLAWS Maple leaf Gardens
Banner ad at the top of this page says opening November 23. Click on Nothing for further information. If they can't get a website up, how can they stock that big hole in the ground?
Source for Used Food Grade Buckets with lids
Looking for about a half dozen plastic food grade buckets with lids, used preferably free. I want to make several vats of soup for the Occupy Toronto folks, but I don't have anything big enough or disposable to deliver the soup in. Any suggestions?
Planters has whumped up the price of their peanuts by 40 percent.
not sure why, in spite of this news, all stores are having specials on peanut butter, brand names are cheaper than No Name.
Fake Pumpkin Shortage
There has been much talk about the shortage of pumpkins, pumpkin pie filling and pumpkin pies this season (Canadian Thanksgiving). Is it just Toronto that has cornered the market on pumpkin products. Walmart had stacks of pumpkin pie filling (in 2 sizes of tines) masses of baked pumpkin pies . Sane thing in No Frills and Loblaws.
Has the pumpkin mafia been trying to squeeze the market?
Snack Bar at COSTCO
Just back from shopping at the Queensway COSTCO, had stopped for lunch and was pleasantly surprised to see they offer a chicken and apple salad for 6 bucks. Great alternative to all the carb heavy other offerings
The chicken was delicious and plentiful, but obviously made from the bbq chickens that didn't sell yesterday, suffers from too much salt. Remainder of the salad includes a variety of greens, pecans, dried cranberries and cheese. The dressing packet I believe was from Renees,a teriyaki looking like liquid. Very filling salad and worth the $.
Help me!! SOS! Hot and Sour Soup
The recipes I am currently working with add black fungus and lily roots. I have no idea of their flavour impact, but they do appear in all the recipes I have seen. For me its trial and error to get something that i like.
Source of Mustard Seeds
The seed and nut place in Kensington Market has black, yellow wand brown mustard seeds.'
Tips in Toronto restaurants: 15% before tax? 10% after tax? or, 15% after tax? (moved from Ontario)
I don't understand folks worries that they are tipping on amounts pre- or post tax: the government is NOT getting any of it! The tip is supposed to be a gratuity to the wait staff person who served you, but of course it is now so bastardized as to be unrecognizable. Servers constantly complain of how they have to tip out to the runner, bus boy, bartender and owner.
When they do their tax returns like the rest of us, all this income conveniently disappears. Actually I understand it usually disappears the night they receive it, leading to the immpression that servers are poor. Time ot remedy the situation and make the price you pay include whatever costs are necessary INCLUDING service staff.
Time Limited Offer, AYCE Sushi
Ajimi Sushi has been a reliable AYCE for a couple of months. Its not stunning quality, but its plentiful and includes all the soup, drinks and ice cream plus all the sushi things you can possibly want.
Last night they seem to have instituted a "we prefer cash " policy. Upon attempting to settle a $45.00 tab, was given the option of paying only $30.00 if payment was in CASH.
To me, this means they owe the bank money, so don't want it going to the bank via credit card receipts, better to save the cash for suppliers. This is a short term ploy, and probably they won't be around much longer. So if your looking for an ayce feed get there soon!
Green Kaiso Salad, need a source and a recipe
New Generation Sushi offers something called Green Kaiso Salad, basically a seaweed plus salad that is very yummy. I am looking for a source of the seaweed used and a recipe for the salad. I have been to a few Asian grocery stores on Spadina and some sell the complete salad, but at a price greater than New Generation. Anyone have a recipe and a source for the seaweed?
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New Generation
493 Bloor St W, Toronto, ON M5S1Y2, CA
Kashi Bars
I just got a sample in the mail of their soft fruit bar. Really nothing special, and I certainly won't be using the coupon to buy more. They taste and feel like some sort of fig newton type bar that is a lot cheaper under another brand.
Shanghai-style Hot & Sweet Soup - my new favourite
Does this place have a name? want to check it out.
OOPS, just saw it,.
New New Ho King Restaurant
For years I and many others used to depend on New Ho King for a chinoise fix, either delivered or in house. About two years ago the food quality slid drastically downhill and I stopped dealing with them.
Now they have a new location a few doors south of the old haunt. New chairs and table, new uniforms for the service staff, BUT the same old crap food from the last two years!!! The Hot and Sour soup is my test for Chinese restos. This largish bowl was NOT hot and Sour soup. It was a thin watery broth with a few red pepper flakes floating among the flotsam and jetsam that looked like table scrapings. Sure it had tofu, damn little, a few strands of egg and no flavour whatever. Lashings of soya sauce did nothing to save this bowl. I had ordered it as the seafood version, but since there were no critters whatsoever, I assume this was the default version.
I also ordered Hunan Beef, steamed rice and Deep fried Scallops with salt. The waitress suggested I have the lunch special of the Hunan beef, as it was with rice and cheaper. The green peppers and onions were great, crispy and fresh, the rest of it was a Chinese version of Chef Boyardee texture and flavor. The scallops were sliced in half and drenched in batter and deep fried, a very weird taste, with many small bits of deep fried something that wasn't scallops.
You can dress the place up but the kitchen is still sliding downhill
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New Ho King
416 Spadina Ave, Toronto, ON M5T2G7, CA
