maple syrup – Michael Eats

Delicious Slices at Sadboy Pizza

Published on March 23, 2026 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 51 Main Street South, Georgetown
Website: https://sadboy.ca/

I can’t say I’m in Georgetown often (or ever), but I had heard nothing about good things about Sadboy Pizza and was in the general vicinity, so sure, why not?

All those good things: 100% correct. Sadboy Pizza serves some top notch slices.

They have a variety of interesting-looking pizzas, but I’m all about the plain cheese, particularly when I’m first trying a place, so I went with the mozz OG (“fresh and aged mozzarella blend”).

It’s a great slice of pizza. In particular, the crust is just where you want it to be, with a perfect amount of exterior crispiness, a tender chewiness within, and a really satisfying flavour.

The combo of fresh and aged mozzarella adds a pop of flavour that you normally don’t get in this type of pizza, and there’s a good ratio of cheese to tasty sauce.

It’s not one of the bigger slices I’ve ever had, but it was also only five bucks even. Which means that it was small enough and cheap enough that I was able to justify buying a second slice. I went with the breakfast4dinner (“garlic cream sauce, crispy diced hashbrowns, bacon, chicken breakfast sausage (halal), sesame seed crust, frank’s maple syrup drizzle”), and yeah, it was just as good.

I don’t know that I would have guessed the breakfast angle if you hadn’t told me — it tastes like a pretty standard meaty pizza, though the syrup does add a nice sweetness that helps to balance out the saltiness from the sausage and bacon. Still, whatever it is, it’s quite delicious.

My only real complaint here is that both slices could have used another minute or two in the oven (they were both a bit lukewarm around the middle), but other than that? Sadboy totally holds up to any of the top-tier pizza joints in the GTA. It’s that good.

Tasty Cake Doughnuts at Maverick’s Donut Company

Published on August 28, 2024 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 1618 Queen Street West, Toronto
Website: https://mavericksdonuts.com/

Maverick’s is an Ottawa-based doughnut chain that opened their first location in Toronto last year. You might be thinking that we have enough doughnut joints in the city, but you’re wrong and here’s why: Maverick’s specializes in cake-based doughnuts. Most doughnut places will have a cake doughnut or two on the menu, but here it’s pretty much all of them.

I tried six: cherry glazed, pecan pie, maple bacon, double chocolate, lemon ricotta, and chocolate coconut.

They were all quite delightful. The cake is dense but not too dense, they’re not overly sweet (aside from maybe the maple bacon, which I still quite enjoyed), and they have a light crispiness on their exterior. They’re top quality doughnuts.

And the flavours were all great, though if I had to pick a favourite, it might be the nutty pecan pie. Or the double chocolate, which had a really satisfying chocolate flavour. Or the cherry glazed, which tasted like a doughnut and a maraschino cherry had a baby. Or the lemon ricotta, which had a nice tartness and a satisfying creaminess. Or the maple bacon, which had satisfying pops of saltiness from the bacon to offset the sweetness of the maple. Or the chocolate coconut, which is always a tasty combo.

Oh, I just named all the doughnuts, didn’t I. Well you know what? I liked all of them. They’re all my favourite. Deal with it.

Maple & Cheddar Chicken at McDonald’s

Published on January 13, 2020 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 796 Burnhamthorpe Road West, Mississauga
Website: https://www.mcdonalds.com/ca/en-ca.html

The Maple & Cheddar Chicken was a pleasant surprise. “Maple” being so prominent in the name of the sandwich, I sort of figured it would be way too sweet. And yeah, it was sweet. But the sweetness feels relatively well tuned.

The Maple & Cheddar Chicken comes topped with maple mustard sauce, “mayo-style sauce,” cheddar cheese, crispy onions, tomato, and lettuce.

It pretty tasty, though the maple mustard sauce is basically all maple with a tiny bit of mustard. It’s a glaze. It’s incredibly mapley, and hardly mustardy at all.

But the salty chicken, cheddar, and crispy onions all do a pretty decent job of balancing out the sweetness. It works.

Also: put crispy onions on everything, please. They’re delicious and enhance basically everything they’re on. Well, maybe not on dessert, but hey –who knows? Crispy onions on a sundae? Might work. I can’t rule it out.

Bacon Maple Chicken Sandwich at Wendy’s

Published on November 22, 2018 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 1569 The Queensway, Etobicoke
Website: https://www.wendys.com/en-ca/home

I actually quite like Wendy’s. I mean, it’s still a fast food chain, so it’s not great — but it’s one of the better ones.

Well, usually, at least.

The Bacon Maple Chicken Sandwich definitely isn’t their finest hour. It’s a fried chicken sandwich served on a croissant bun and topped with Swiss cheese, maple glaze, and bacon.

It’s super sweet and super dry, and I just did not enjoy eating it at all.

The “maple glaze” is basically just thick, sludgy maple syrup. It’s intensely sweet and far too overwhelming for a sandwich like this. The mildly spicy chicken patty (you can get spicy or original) helps to balance out the sweetness a little bit, but it’s not nearly enough to overcome the sugar overload.

Everything else is dry. The fried chicken patty is dry, the “croissant” bun is dry (and aside from the cosmetic, it has zero croissant-like properties), the completely unmelted cheese is dry — even the bacon is dry. I like crispy bacon as much as the next guy, but the glass-like strips in this sandwich were taking it a bit too far.

It really needed additional sauce to give it moisture, but adding more of the maple glaze would pretty much be instant diabetes. The whole thing is head-scratchingly misguided.

Exceptional Pancakes at Mildred’s Temple Kitchen

Published on July 5, 2018 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 85 Hanna Avenue, Toronto
Website: http://www.templekitchen.com/

I don’t want to get too hyperbolic here, but I’m fairly certain that I’ve seen the pancakes from Mildred’s Temple Kitchen about four billion times on Instagram. They pop up on my feed at least once a week. It’s hard to get a big group of people to agree on anything, but everyone is quite unanimous regarding the greatness of the pancakes here.

They’re not wrong.

The pancakes (dubbed Mrs. Biederhof’s Blueberry Buttermilk Pancakes) have a really appealing balance of fluffiness and substance, with a lightly crispy exterior that’s unlike any pancake I’ve had before. The texture is almost like an incredibly light and fluffy biscuit.

It’s possible that something had gone a bit wrong, because I suspect they’re not supposed to be this crispy on their exterior (the bottom pancake in the pile was downright crunchy). And yet somehow it totally works.

The flavour is great, too — the pancakes are slightly tart from the buttermilk, with the perfect amount of sweetness from the blueberries and the maple syrup. The whipped cream adds a nice little punch of additional richness, and helps to bring all of the flavours together.

My only complaint? It’s an excessive amount of food. I wish there were a one or two pancake option, because these things are substantial, and they sit in your stomach like a ton of bricks. It’s great while you’re eating them, and unpleasant for the rest of the day.