Italian – Page 2 – Michael Eats

Tasty Sandwiches at Tutto Panino

Published on July 5, 2025 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 100 Sorauren Avenue, Toronto
Website: https://www.tuttopanino.com/

In case you haven’t noticed, Toronto is in the grips of an Italian sandwich obsession. It seems like every other new restaurant these days is serving up a variety of Italian cold cut sandwiches.

Enter: Tutto Panino. They’ve got the usual assortment of cold salami and mortadella sandwiches, though their specialty — the Bolito (“beef brisket, salsa verde, chili oil”) — is a hot one.

It’s a solid sandwich. It comes crammed with a healthy amount of ultra-tender braised beef brisket, and is topped with a zippy salsa verde. You can get it mild or hot — I went with hot, and yeah, it’s got a decent kick. It’s nothing too aggressive, but it’ll give you a bit of a tingle.

The lightly crispy bun does a good job of holding up to the meaty sandwich, though I wish it were either a bit crustier, or lightly toasted. Everything here is quite soft, so some extra texture would be nice.

Similarly, the salsa verde is tasty, but I really think the sandwich needs some pickles or something a bit more acidic to cut through the richness of the beef.

Still, I didn’t love it, but am I mad that I ate this sandwich? Absolutely not. Would I eat it again? I absolutely would.

Stellar Pizza at Cowabunga+ in Hamilton

Published on January 30, 2025 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 30 Vine Street, Hamilton
Website: https://www.cowabungapizzeria.ca/

Apparently, Cowabunga+ serves the best slice of cheese pizza in the world. Well, okay, I’m listening.

When I found myself in Hamilton recently, a stop was a must.

They have a few different pizzas available by the slice, but obviously, I had to go with the award winning, best-in-the-world cheese.

The cheese pizza, per their menu: “marinara, mozzarella blend, fior di latte, oregano.”

It’s a very tasty slice of pizza. Is it the best in the world? No, but I’d be shocked if it weren’t the best in Hamilton, and it’s up there with the better slices in the GTA.

The crust has a bit more heft than the norm, with a good level of exterior crispiness, a satisfying dense chewiness, and a very pronounced sourdough flavour that’s actually quite delightful.

It’s very, very cheesy, but that substantial crust mostly holds up to it (though it was buckling and tearing a bit under the weight of the deluge of cheese). It might have been too much cheese on a different slice of pizza, but here, there was a good balance between the crust and cheese.

Unique Pizza at Venga Cucina

Published on December 27, 2024 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 3076 Dundas Street West, Toronto
Website: https://www.vengacucina.ca/

Venga Cucina is a really unique pizza place in the Junction that serves a style of pizza called pinsa, which their menu describes as a cross between focaccia and pizza.

The menu also features a variety of antipasti and pasta, but clearly the pinsa is where it’s at. I tried a couple: the margherita (“pomodoro, mozzarella, basil”) and the gino picante (“calabrian nduja, cured hot sausage, pepperonata, fior di latte, sundried tomatoes”).

Apparently the crust here is made with a combination of rice and soya flour along with regular flour, and is fermented for 96 hours. This gives it a texture that’s actually quite different from any pizza I’ve had before, with a very crispy exterior and a super light and fluffy interior.

I wouldn’t want this to replace normal pizza (I did miss the chewiness you get from a more traditional dough), but as something that’s almost in a category of its own, it’s quite tasty.

Both pinsas were very good, though as usual, the tasty simplicity of the margherita won out. Still, both featured a really satisfying contrast between the good quality toppings and the crispy/airy crust, and both were kicked up a notch by the tasty chili oil they had on the table.

Tasty Slices at Gram’s Pizza

Published on December 21, 2024 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

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 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).

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.

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

A Great Veal Sandwich at Palma’s Kitchen

Published on November 24, 2024 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 3485 Semenyk Court, Mississauga
Website: https://palmapasta.com/

I found this place after typing “veal sandwich” into Google Maps while shopping (hey, sometimes you’ve gotta have a veal sandwich), but Palma’s Kitchen has quite a bit more going on than that. There’s the typical Italian hot table, along with a small but fairly extensive supermarket selection.

They have a handful of sandwiches on the menu; I went for the veal, and had it topped simply, with just hot peppers — I don’t think a good sandwich like this needs anything else, and this is definitely a good one.

It’s that sauce. It has such a delightfully rich, savoury flavour; I could eat it out of a bowl like soup.

The veal is served from a hot table, so its crispiness is long gone, but when the sauce is this tasty and it’s really soaked into the veal (which is melt-in-your-mouth tender), you don’t miss it.

The bread — clearly very fresh — suits the sandwich perfectly, with a very light exterior crispiness, and enough heft within to hold up to the saucy veal (but not so much that it feels overly dense). It’s great quality bread.

I wish the hot peppers were a bit hotter (okay, a lot hotter — they’re only mildly spicy), but this was otherwise a seriously great sandwich.