Tag: cheese

Tasty Slices at Gram’s Pizza

Published on by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Gram's Pizza
Location: 1640 Dupont Street, Toronto
Website: https://www.instagram.com/grams.pizza/

Pizza!  It’s good!

(Why yes, writing the opening paragraph of these blog posts is always the hardest part, why do you ask?)

Gram's Pizza

Gram’s Pizza is a new pizza joint near the Junction that serves a variety of slices, along with whole pies.  I went with the cheese (“tomato sauce + mozz + grana padano”), because a plain cheese pizza is the best way to suss out the quality of a pizza joint (also cheese pizza is delicious).

Gram's Pizza

It’s a solid slice of pizza.  The crust has a nice crispy exterior and is slightly thicker than the norm for this style of pizza, but it works.  And they’re clearly not shy with the grana padano, with its nice salty sharpness really shining through.

Gram's Pizza

It didn’t exactly rock my world, but it’s a very good slice of pizza.  I’d come back.

Cheesy Noodles at Garden Hong Kong Cafe

Published on by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Garden Hong Kong Cafe
Location: 28 South Unionville Avenue, Markham
Website: None

I’ve mentioned before that I make it a general policy on this blog to not compare dishes to the real deal in whatever country they’re from.  I just don’t think it’s particularly useful or fair, for a number of reasons.

But sometimes I’ve gotta do it.  In this case, I pretty much fell in love with the cheese noodles I had in Hong Kong, and was very excited when I saw that they had them on the menu at Garden Hong Kong Cafe in Markham.

Garden Hong Kong Cafe

It’s a really simple dish; it’s basically just instant noodles with cheese sauce.  In Hong Kong, it was served with braised pork cheek on the side; here, it was chicken wings.

I will say that the version at Garden Hong Kong Cafe was tasty enough, especially when you top it with a generous spoonful (or two, or three) of the garlicky, sweet chili oil they have on the table.  That chili oil is doing about 95 percent of the heavy lifting in making this as good as it is, but hey — tasty is tasty.  I’m not complaining.

Garden Hong Kong Cafe

Sadly, the cheese sauce here is pretty bland, and is applied very sparingly to the noodles (as opposed to Hong Kong, where the sauce completely smothered the dish and had a delightfully sharp cheesy flavour).

Still, that aforementioned chili oil is delicious enough to smooth over any of the dish’s faults, and at $8.50 (!) — which includes a mug of delicious milk tea — it’s hard to deny that it’s an absolute steal.

I should note that this place is very small and very busy (it was already packed and had a waiting list when I showed up a few minutes after they opened on a recent Saturday), so keep that in mind.

Tasty Wraps at I Am Doner

Published on by Michael NusairLeave a comment

I Am Doner
Location: 433 Queen Street West, Toronto
Website: https://www.iamdoner.ca/

I Am Doner is an oddly-named doner chain from the UK that serves beef doner and chicken shawarma (along with various vegetarian options like falafel and halloumi) that you can either get as a wrap or a bowl.

I Am Doner

I ordered the house special, which comes crammed with chicken shawarma, beef doner, falafel, and halloumi.  Because why get one thing when you can get everything??  That’s just science.  I ordered it as a wrap, which, by default, comes with chili sauce, mayo, and a whole bunch of veggies.

I Am Doner

Between the meat, the cheese, the falafel, the various veggies, and the generous amount of sauce, it’s a bit of a mess.  It’s ridiculously crammed with stuff.  They’re not kidding around, that’s for sure.

It’s very tasty, but there’s so much going on here that it’s hard to even gauge the quality of the individual components.  It’s just one meaty, saucy mass of food.  I liked it a lot, but I’d probably just pick one of the meats next time so I can have a better idea of what I’m eating.

I Am Doner

The bread they wrap it in definitely has a big job to do, because this thing is so overstuffed that it really needs something with heft to hold up to it all.  And yeah, it does its job.  It’s nice and chewy, and holds together nicely.  It’s a very good wrap.

Garlic Mushroom Bacon Cheeseburger at Wendy’s

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Garlic Mushroom Bacon Cheeseburger at Wendy's
Location: 5250 Dundas Street West, Toronto
Website: https://www.wendys.com/en-ca

Wendy’s is on a roll — the last burger I tried here, the French Onion Cheeseburger, was easily a top-tier fast food hamburger.  This one?  Not on that level, but still quite tasty!

The Garlic Mushroom Bacon Cheeseburger, as per their website: “A quarter pound of fresh, never-frozen Canadian beef, roasted mushrooms, 3 strips of Applewood smoked bacon, muenster cheese, and Renée’s Gourmet Creamy Garlic Spread. Literally oozing with umami.”

Muenster cheese!  On a fast food cheeseburger!  Ooh la la.

Garlic Mushroom Bacon Cheeseburger at Wendy's

Also, normally I’d mock the line “literally oozing with umami,” but you know what?  It kinda is.  It’s savoury AF, and is definitely more umami-packed than your typical fast food fare.

Maybe too umami-packed?  On top of being incredibly savoury, it’s a bit of a salt bomb.  Something with a little sweetness and/or acidity to cut through the salty richness would be nice.

Garlic Mushroom Bacon Cheeseburger at Wendy's

Still, I can’t deny that it’s tasty.  The very rich, garlicky sauce pairs nicely with the mushrooms and the bacon, and the slice of muenster cheese definitely sets it apart from its American-cheese-topped fast food brethren.

Seriously though, throw some pickles on there or something?  It’s a lot.

Raptor Chicken Nacho Poutine at McDonald’s

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Raptor Chicken Nacho Poutine at McDonald's
Location: 1001 Islington Avenue, Etobicoke 
Website: https://www.mcdonalds.com/ca/en-ca.html

I’ll admit that the Raptor Chicken Nacho Poutine kind of sent me into an existential panic.  Like, where did I go wrong in my life that I’m sitting alone in a McDonald’s on a Friday evening, scarfing down an ill-advised novelty poutine so I can review it for my food blog?  What wrong turn did I make to get here?

The Raptor Chicken Nacho Poutine is not good.  But hey, I ate it.  It caused me to look deep down inside myself and not like what I see, but I did eat it and finish it, so of course I’m going to blog about it.  Otherwise what was it all for??

Raptor Chicken Nacho Poutine at McDonald's

Here’s how McDonald’s describes this thing: “this new offering is made with 100% Canadian-raised seasoned chicken, our World Famous Fries™ layered with stringy cheese curds and savoury gravy, topped with tortilla strips and drizzled with nacho cheese sauce.”

Maybe I’m exaggerating a bit about how bad this is.  It’s not gross, I guess, but I didn’t find anything about eating it to be particularly pleasant.  It’s mostly just an odd hodgepodge of flavours and textures that don’t particularly belong together.

Raptor Chicken Nacho Poutine at McDonald's

I think the nacho cheese sauce is the worst offender.  I actually like nacho cheese sauce, but combined with the gravy and curds it had an odd sourness that I found off-putting.  The tortilla strips were fine, but again, they just seemed odd in the context of a poutine.

As for the big chunks of chicken that they had plopped on top — like everything else, they’re just kinda there, doing their own thing.  They don’t really add anything to the dish.

Then there’s the poutine base, which is fine, but I don’t think McDonald’s has a great poutine in the best of times, and this was certainly not the best of times (the fact that the fries were paler and soggier than usual didn’t help).