lamb – Page 2 – Michael Eats

Tasty Soup at Tang Home Style Lamb and Beef

Published on May 12, 2025 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 3380 Midland Avenue, Scarborough
Website: None

Tang Home Style Lamb and Beef is a great under-the-radar Chinese restaurant; they’ve got a whole bunch of tasty looking noodle dishes on the menu (not to mention a lamb bun that it seemed like most of the other tables were ordering — I’ll have to come back to try that one), but their specialty is paomo, a delicious lamb soup.

They serve a regular version and a spicy version; I went with the spicy version.

The thing that makes this dish stand out are the chopped-up pieces of flatbread interspersed throughout. They’re kinda like very thick, chopped up noodles; they have a great amount of chewiness to them (they’re not soggy or mushy at all) and bring the soup a ton of personality.

The bowl is also crammed with a generous amount of sizable pieces of tender lamb. It’s a hearty soup, that’s for sure.

As for the broth, it’s mildly spicy and has a very zesty, slightly sweet flavour. I liked it on its own, but it really comes alive once you add some of the smoky chili oil that’s on the table.

Unique Chinese Food at Tangritah Kabab House

Published on December 17, 2023December 17, 2023 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 900 Rathburn Road West, Mississauga
Website: None

One of the things I like about living in Toronto is that not only is pretty much every country’s cuisine available to try (which I explore in another blog, 196 Plates — I think it might be about time to bring that one back), you can actually get so much more specific than that.

This place — which specializes in Uyghur cuisine — is a great example of this. “Chinese food” tends to be put under one enormous umbrella, but China is a huge country, and its food is wildly different from region to region.

I tried a few things here, and it was all extremely delicious. First up: a dish the menu only refers to as “fried meat.” I think it was beef, though it might have been lamb (if it was, it didn’t have much of a lamby flavour). Either way, it was super tasty, with a bunch of tender meat, nicely cooked onions, and a very cumin-tinged flavour that was extremely addictive.

Next up was the Tangritah Special Langmen, which is an Uyghur dish in which hand-pulled noodles are topped with stir-fried veggies and meat. The flavour here was a bit less distinctive than the fried meat, but the noodles had a really satisfying chewiness, and the veggies and meat were perfectly cooked (again, I’m not sure what the meat was, but I’m gonna say beef).

Finally, I tried the samsa, a bun filled with a mix of lamb and onions. This looks like it might have initially been crispy on its exterior, which would have been nice, but it was either steamed or microwaved to reheat and was soft throughout. Regardless, it was quite tasty.

A Solid Wrap at Shah’s Halal Food

Published on January 26, 2023 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 65 Duncan Street, Toronto
Website: https://www.shahshalalfood.ca/

Shah’s Halal Food has a pretty straightforward menu; it’s basically just chicken, lamb, and falafel that you can either order on rice or as a wrap. Apparently it’s a chain with a whole bunch of locations in the States and the UK, and yeah, that checks out. It tastes like chain food.

Still, it’s not bad. I went with the lamb gyros, which comes absolutely crammed with lamb, veggies, black beans, chick peas, hummus, and three different sauces: white sauce, hot sauce, and green sauce.

The lamb itself is probably the weakest part of the sandwich; it comes out of a metal warming tray looking like the saddest, grayest cubes of meat that you’ve ever seen, and it has a spongey reconstituted meat flavour. It’s not great.

But the sandwich is so crammed with stuff that this is barely even an issue — I wish it were a bit spicier (it’s basically not spicy at all), but it’s zippy, crunchy, and flavourful, and the soft but substantial pita does a good job of holding it all together.

Tasty, Meaty tacos at Gus Tacos

Published on July 24, 2022 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 1533 Queen Street West, Toronto
Website: https://tacosgus.ca/

Gus Tacos have three locations in the GTA; they’re clearly successful for a reason. My tacos were great, and my dining companion raved about his burrito. Supposedly, the tortas are quite good as well. Clearly, I need to come back.

The woman behind the counter mentioned that the barbacoa (braised lamb) taco is their most popular choice; I ordered that along with the chilorio, which turned out to be very similar to the barbacoa, but with pork. Probably not the best two choices, as they were both along the same lines — but when the tacos are this delicious, it really doesn’t matter.

The tortillas were obviously fresh, which is a must, and while both tacos were tasty, the barbacoa wasn’t kidding around. If you like the slightly gamy flavour of lamb, this is absolutely the taco for you. It’s super tender, flavourful, and thoroughly delicious. So good.

Amazing Lamb and Rice at Mandi Afandi

Published on April 23, 2020 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 5120 Dixie Road, Mississauga
Website: https://www.mandiafandi.ca/

I’ll admit that I was skeptical about Mandi Afandi. The spot they’re in formerly housed a Popeyes Chicken; since it closed down in 2013, that location has been home to a revolving door of failed restaurants. The last one — Mandilicious — also specialized in mandi. I didn’t have high hopes for what I assumed would be the latest in a string of shuttered eateries.

But then Suresh Doss highlighted the place in his column for CBC, and of course, I had to sit up and take notice. If Doss writes about a restaurant, you can be reasonably assured that the food will be tasty.

They have a handful of things on the menu, but of course, mandi — a traditional Yemini dish which features slow-cooked meat and rice — is right there in the name. They serve it with either lamb, chicken, or both.

I tried the lamb. Even with the Doss seal of approval, I was still fairly skeptical about the place, and I could not have been more wrong. It was shockingly delicious.

The lamb is delightfully tender and absolutely crammed with flavour from the spices they cook it with and the meat itself. I love lamb, and this is some of the best I’ve had in a long time.

You’d think that the rice would take a backseat to the meat, but surprisingly enough, it’s just as good. You can tell its been cooked with the meat because its infused with that flavour, and it’s fragrant with the same delightful spices that make the lamb so tasty.

The crispy fried onions only amp up the flavour, and add a nice textural counterpoint to the tender lamb and fluffy rice. You also get little containers of yogurt sauce and hot sauce on the side, and while neither are particularly necessary (it’s already so damn good on its own), they both compliment the dish quite well.