sandwich – Page 11 – Michael Eats

Great Baked Goods at Brodflour

Published on July 29, 2024 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 8 Pardee Avenue, Toronto
Website: https://brodflour.com/

Brodflour is a delightful little bakery in Liberty Village that sells sandwiches, pastries, and outstanding loaves of sourdough bread. They might actually sell my favourite loaf of bread in the city — it’s thoroughly delicious, and unlike a lot of other bakeries that sell higher-end sourdough loaves, they actually offer to slice it.

(Yes, surprisingly enough, there are an unnerving number of fancy bakeries in the city that sell $10+ loaves of bread and refuse to slice them for you.)

I tried the smoked salmon sandwich (“Jerusalem bagel, house-made labneh, capers, pickled onions, salt and pepper, tomatoes”), which is tasty. The bagel is maybe slightly too dense, but they’re clearly using good smoked salmon, and all of the ingredients work really well together (I’m normally not a fan of onion with smoked salmon, but pickling them takes away most of that raw onion harshness). It’s not a mind-blowing sandwich, but it’s quite good.

What was mind-blowing was the cardamom knot. Oh man this thing was tasty. It’s sweet but not too sweet, the pastry has a really great chewy texture that’s not too dense, and the sugar on the outside gives it a nice texture that contrasts with the chewy interior. That’s not to mention the cardamom flavour, which is delightfully intense. It’s a great, great pastry.

Firecracker McCrispy at McDonald’s

Published on July 27, 2024 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 1001 Islington Avenue, Etobicoke
Website: https://www.mcdonalds.com/ca/en-ca.html

I wasn’t a particularly big fan of the regular McCrispy, which I thought was fine, but way too plain to be particularly worth thinking about. But a spicy version? Yeah, now you’re talking.

The McDonald’s website describes this as “a crispy chicken sandwich topped with a creamy sweet and spicy sauce and crispy jalapenos. Made with tender and juicy 100% Canadian-raised seasoned chicken and served on a soft potato bun.”

You can get it with or without bacon; the signage outside of the store advertised the bacon version, so that’s what I got.

It’s pretty decent. It’s a big upgrade over the standard McCrispy, that’s for sure. The sweet and spicy sauce is, as advertised, very sweet and a little bit spicy. It’s borderline too sweet, but with all the other stuff, it works.

The crispy jalapenos add some extra crispiness and a tiny bit more heat, and the patty itself is what it is. It’s fine.

The bacon is probably unnecessary, though. Something a bit thicker likely would have enhanced things, but the bacon here was so thin that it kinda got lost among the other components of the sandwich.

Tasty Fried Chicken at Brock Sandwich

Published on July 25, 2024 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 1260 Bloor Street West, Toronto
Website: https://www.instagram.com/brocksandwich/

Note: Between the time I wrote this and posted it, Brock sandwich has, sadly, shut down (I’ve got a bit of a backlog). Whoops! Well, enjoy the review of a sandwich you cannot eat.

Brock Sandwich has a whole bunch of tasty looking sandwiches on their menu, though on this particular visit, I went with the Chicken Piri Piri: “fried chicken, charred onions, coleslaw, piri piri sauce.”

It’s a very good sandwich; the fried chicken is crispy and perfectly cooked, all of the toppings are thoroughly tasty, and the slightly crusty bun works perfectly with the other components of the sandwich.

My only real complaint is that as a fried chicken sandwich, it’s a bit busier than it needs to be. Between the charred onions (which are delicious, with a sweetness that’s cut by the mild smokiness from the charred bits), the zesty piri piri sauce, and the very zippy coleslaw, the fried chicken feels like a supporting player in its own sandwich. It’s a bit overwhelmed by other stuff.

Still, that is a very, very minor complaint; regardless of whether or not the fried chicken is the star, it’s impossible to deny that it’s a delicious sandwich.

Nashville Hot Chicken at Knockout Chicken

Published on July 23, 2024 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 207 Augusta Avenue, Toronto
Website: https://knockoutchickento.com/

Knockout Chicken has been serving up fried chicken sandwiches in Kensington Market for a few years now (they also have a location in Mississauga), and yeah, I can see why they have staying power. Their fried chicken is pretty solid.

They have a whole bunch of sandwiches on the menu, but the woman behind the counter said the Nashville Sandwich is the most popular (“Nashville-style fried chicken breast, homemade coleslaw, pickles, jalapenos, and chipotle aioli”), so that’s what I got.

It’s not the crispiest or the juiciest fried chicken I’ve ever had, but I enjoyed it. It’s got a decent kick to it, it’s nice and flavourful, and the slightly sweet bun suits it well. It’s got a bit more going on than you’d expect from Nashville hot chicken, but for the most part, it works.

My only real issue here is with the coleslaw, which tastes heavily of sour cream and is a bit one-note rich. I think the sandwich would have been improved with less (or none) of this stuff, but everything else was tasty enough that this wasn’t a huge deal.

Dave’s Genuine Deli at the Waterworks Food Hall

Published on July 14, 2024 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 50 Brandt Street, Toronto (inside the Waterworks Food Hall)
Website: https://www.davesgenuine.ca/

I’m a sucker for a good smoked meat deli sandwich, so it bums me out that there are so few great ones being served in the GTA. There’s SumiLicious and Centre Street Deli and… that’s about it?

Well, you can add one more sandwich to that list: Dave’s Genuine Deli. I actually went to the original location a year or so ago and the sandwich was just as good then, so they’re consistent, too.

They have a handful of sandwiches on the menu (including, intriguingly, a couple of southern-style BBQ sandwiches), but of course, I went with the smoked meat, which you can order as a quarter or half pound serving (I went quarter and kinda wished I went with half once I realized how good it was).

It’s so good — super tender, perfectly rendered fat, great spicing, and a very pronounced smoky flavour. That smokiness kind of reminds me of Caplansky’s in their glory days in the Monarch. Great bread, too. It’s a top-shelf smoked meat sandwich.

The only thing I’d change is that I’d order the mustard on the side next time. They were very heavy-handed with it, and on a lesser sandwich I’d be fine with that (it might even be necessary), but the quality of the meat was so good that the aggressive slathering of mustard overwhelmed its flavour and took away from it a bit. Still, that’s a very minor complaint for an otherwise phenomenal sandwich.

I also got an order of the fries, and they were great too, with a perfect crispy/creamy combo and a nice amount of salt.