rice – Page 9 – Michael Eats

Fake Butter Chicken at TVX: The Vegan Extremist

Published on October 24, 2019October 24, 2019 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 291 Augusta Avenue, Toronto
Website: https://www.facebook.com/TheVeganExtremist/

Is it still butter chicken if it doesn’t have butter or chicken? That’s the question at TVX, a vegan joint in Kensington Market that serves what it calls “plant-based South Asian cuisine.”

Mostly, they serve a variety of vegan curries that come with rice and paratha roti. One of those curries is the aforementioned butter-and-chickenless butter chicken, which subs in fried cauliflower for chicken.

So is it still butter chicken? Not really. But is it tasty? Definitely.

It doesn’t taste quite like any butter chicken I’ve had before — the sauce is tangier and less creamy — but for what it is, it’s quite good. It’s garlicky, very spicy (you can choose your heat level — I went with the spiciest, and it wasn’t kidding around) and surprisingly satisfying.

The fried cauliflower works really well — it’s battered and fried, with a nice crunchy exterior and a meaty interior. It doesn’t even vaguely resemble the chicken in a traditional butter chicken, but the hearty crunch stands up nicely to the sauce, and it’s delicious regardless.

The paratha roti was also untraditional but tasty. It’s thicker and more substantial than any paratha roti I’ve had before, but it still had that satisfying combo of crispy, greasy exterior and chewy interior that you’re looking for.

Passable Taiwanese Food at Chi Chop!!

Published on September 2, 2019 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 2352 Yonge Street, Toronto
Website: http://chichop.ca/

You wouldn’t particularly know it from what they’re serving at Chi Chop (sorry — Chi Chop!!), but Taiwanese food is pretty great. It has a lot in common with Chinese cuisine, but it’s also got its own thing going on in some very delightful ways.

Chi Chop (!!) serves Taiwanese-style fried chicken, and it’s fine. I got the Ninja crispy chicken bento box, which comes with a generous piece of boneless fried chicken, rice, a salad, three small spring rolls, and miso soup.

Nothing particularly stands out. The fried chicken isn’t bad, but it’s made from white meat, and it’s predictably dry. It’s also a bit too aggressively battered, with an overly thick exterior.

Still, I didn’t dislike eating it. It’s nicely seasoned, and there’s nothing blatantly wrong with it. It’s missing the sauce from the photo on their menu (which would have been nice), but… I don’t know. It didn’t offend me. It’s a shrug. An edible shrug.

It probably doesn’t help that the set is a bit muddled; the chicken is Taiwanese, the soup is Japanese, and the spring rolls taste Filipino (they have a separate section of the menu dedicated to Filipino cuisine). It definitely feels like a “Jack of all trades, master of none” situation.

Horcha-ta-ta at Bang Bang

Published on July 11, 2019 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 93a Ossington Avenue, Toronto
Website: http://bangbangicecream.com/

Oh hey, another super delicious scoop of ice cream from Bang Bang. Are you surprised? Because I’m definitely not. They’ve been around for five years now, and they’re still serving up what is hands-down the best ice cream in the city. It’s not even close.

This particular flavour was called Horcha-ta-ta and is inspired by horchata, a sweet, creamy drink made from rice.

The ice cream itself has a really rich flavour, and is imbued with cinnamon and other spices (nutmeg I think? Some other stuff, probably?). It’s topped with sweet sticky rice, condensed milk, and a generous sprinkling of cinnamon.

It’s delicious. It actually reminds me quite a bit of rice pudding, but with the cinnamon and other spices giving it a really interesting flavour. And of course, the quality of the ice cream is just as great as ever. It’s so good.

Tasty Peanut Sauce at Nimman Thai

Published on December 18, 2018 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 1060 Eglinton Avenue West, Toronto
Website: https://nimman.ca/

I think a really good peanut sauce is one of those things that can make pretty much anything taste delicious. It really doesn’t matter what it is; slather enough peanut sauce on it, and hey, what do you know, it’s delicious now. How about that.

Case in point: the Nimman long song at Nimman Thai, which features some kind of saucy chicken on top of rice, with a side of Chinese broccoli and, of course, the aforementioned delicious peanut sauce.

The chicken was tough and its sauce was pretty bland, but once you dip it into the intensely flavourful peanut sauce, you’re off to the races. That peanut sauce! I would have dipped anything into that.

I got the dish as part of their lunch special, which is actually a really great deal — for twelve bucks, you also get a bowl of soup, a salad, and a spring roll. The soup was pleasantly zingy, and the salad had a really interesting dressing that tasted strongly of fish sauce.

The spring roll, on the other hand, had a funky flavour and an overly thick wrapper. It wasn’t great, and since the peanut sauce wasn’t on the table yet, I couldn’t even dip it into that to save it.

Shoddy Indian Food at Amaya in Sherway Gardens

Published on December 5, 2018December 5, 2018 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 25 Sherway Gardens Road, Etobicoke
Website: https://www.amayarestaurant.com/

Amaya is a (usually) decent quality chain that (usually) serves tasty Indian fare. But the Sherway Gardens location is… odd. I tried it when it first opened, and the food was so atrociously bad that it was nearly inedible.

I figured they deserved another chance — new restaurants often need a month or two to work out all the kinks. I just tried the rogan josh, which features big chunks of lamb in a mildly spicy curry sauce on top of basmati rice.

Yeah, it was pretty bad. It’s so weird, because the other Amaya locations I’ve tried have been pretty reliable, but the Sherway Gardens location is almost like a completely different restaurant.

The flavour of the curry wasn’t bad, but the chunks of lamb were mostly tough and rubbery (with a few tender pieces interspersed throughout to mix things up), the rice was ice cold, and when I got to the bottom of the bowl, there was a big pool of greasy water that was tremendously off-putting.