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Your Perfect Toronto Food Day

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OK here is a challenge to all: My wife's birthday is coming up, and I need fresh ideas. I went a little crazy last year, and I have been informed that the bar has been raised.

We will be spending the whole day out (Saturday), so I need tips on breakfast, lunch, and dinner (feels like our favourites are getting stale - plus we have young kids, so we are no longer current).

Instead of asking for some great places and suggestions, let's take a new approach: What would be your perfect food day?

If you could eat anywhere in town for each meal (and toss in an evening drink), where would you go (excluding your kitchen)?

Can be on the cheap, or spare no expense. Doesn't need to be romantic. Only criteria is that it needs to be food that you love. ; )

I'll take your feedback and cobble a plan together.

Thanks in advance!!

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  1. Well first of all, my perfect food day would include my kitchen. Or back yard at the very least.

    I'd start at the St. Lawrence Market. Grab peameals from Carousellek and then look for some fish/seafood and steak for dinner. (Bring a cooler). Then from there, I'd head to Kensington, walk around and eventually grab lunch or just nibble, nibble, nibble.

    Probably head home after than and get crackin' on dinner.

    Then do a movie after.


    1 Reply
    1. re: Davwud

      Cant hold back anymore...

      What's with the back bacon at Carousel??? Often dry and RARELY spectacular, this is not a special sandwich. I get sucked in every couple months wanting it to be really really good and it just isnt most of the time. Good kaiser, but the bacon is over cooked 90% of the time. The saving grace is that their bacon is never overly salty as other purveyors can sometimes serve.

      Buy a raw slab of peameal at the market, slice it thick, brush it lightly with some oil and throw it on your BBQ for a quick flash. Too much work, throw it in a very hot pan. Dont overfill the pan as it will get too wet with extracted liquids. I like to throw pepper on it while cooking, or sometimes even montreal steak spice.

      Anyway, I am not suggesting that you do this at home everytime you want back bacon sandwiches. But just do it once so you can see why Carousel is really not that good.

      You can find GREAT bb at Shanghai Cowgirl, Taro Grill, Insomnia and for a hammier, less bacon/carmalized flavour, the Gladstone is always juicy and excellent. Even Georges, up from the market, is a better sandwich.

      There. I said it...

    2. Your request is very similar to this...


      ...which has tons of interesting responses.

      1 Reply
      1. re: Gary

        It was a very FUN day too! Even though the restaurant planned that day weren't ALL perfect, it was the experience that made it all so much fun! You will have a great time. (We filmed a lot of it, but lately, work had been taking up most of my time, so i haven't had a chance to edit the day together, which I will do during my Christmas holiday!)

      2. what a fun question. I would definitely start off with a big walk down to queen and over to Bar One for breakfast. Lunch, well I don't know if I could fit in three big meals a day- right now, dinner would be at Cava..i'm awfully interested in Claudio Aprile's (sp) new place, when does that open?

        1. We're doing exactly this on Saturday for my husband's birthday!

          We're hitting Summerhill LCBO first, to get what we need for dinner. The lobsters will have already arrived at my Mom's house so dinner is more or less covered.

          We're then going to the St. Lawrence Market to sniff out some side dish options for the lobsters!

          Then we're off to JK Wine Bar for a lunchtime snack... nothing too heavy.

          We're picking our way across to have a drink ...somewhere... this is as yet undecided but there has to be some shoe shopping on the way (my husband is the imelda marcos of this area!)

          Then we're going to afternoon tea at the royal york... (honeymooned here, so it's a bit of reminiscing!)

          Then we're going home to cook lobsters... then eat lobsters...

          Then we're going to have dessert. I've ordered one from somewhere special and Mom is picking it up... I can't say where here b/c hubby checks the board sometimes and this is the only part he doesn't know anything about...

          This is what we are doing. What would we do if we could afford anything we wanted?:

          Same start to the day but lunch at the Studio Cafe (Four Seasons); Tea at the Windsor Arms; Dinner at Scaramouche; Dessert at North 44...

          That would be if we could........ And we had a limo cuz I don't know how we would drive around after all that!


          1. Hmm, this is a tough one. So many ways I could go on this but I'd be pretty happy with the following itinerary...take a long walk to Sugar for brunch - have a bowl of latte with my ramekin of chocolate accompanied by the eggs benny or maybe the french toast or maybe just the granola. We'd stroll along Queen West and meander up through Chinatown to Kensington. We'd then have a couple of snacks - papusas among them - in Kensington and maybe head over to Baldwin for some Chinese buns and a couple of dim sum snacks. I'd have to rest my weary feet by sitting at Louie's for an afternoon coffee and watching the world go by. Later that evening, I'd probably just head over to Terroni for a salad and pizza. Yup, that would be a good chow day.