blogTO | Posts by Catherine

The Best Florists in Toronto

Catherine — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 09:40:44 PDT

Flowers weren't always the mild-mannered simile for beauty they are today. Take dahlias: harmless filler flower now, formerly the Aztec flower of war, the bloom of choice to accompany human sacrifices to the Serpent Woman.

(I feel like I just broke some unspoken rule about keeping the phrase "human sacrifices" out of feel-good flower posts. Oh well.)

Then there's tulips. Today they crowd the entrance to every convenience store, yet during Holland's Tulpenwoede ("tulip fury") a single bulb was once sold in exchange for several loads of wheat, oxen, a mess of pigs, a dozen sheep, booze, butter, 1000 lbs of cheese, a bed, a suit of clothes and a silver beaker (see Torontonian Andrew Smith's excellent "Strangers in the Garden".)

Proust said he only had to think of lilacs to smell their scent. For those of us with less vivid sense memory, here is a short list of some of Toronto's best florists (which almost never trade in oxen).

More...

The Best Vintage Furniture Stores in Toronto

Catherine — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 09:40:28 PDT

You can't swing a Danish teak side table without hitting a great vintage furniture store in Toronto. Vintage furniture can be bought as-is, refurbished, or you can get vintage essence by picking up a reproduction of a classic.

Most of the stores listed here offer a little of all of the above. But they're all good options, and they all get us out of the stores where one beige starts to look very much like another, and back into the scary and exciting world of personal style.

More...

The Best Tea in Toronto

Catherine — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 10:40:08 PDT

Tea people are just nice people. They're as knowledgeable and passionate about their product as coffee people, only slightly less keyed up and twitchy.

And, let's just get it out of the way, when we're talking about tea, we're talking places that specialize in looseleaf tea (one exception to be spotted below). Most prepacked bagged tea is made with the bits and pieces left over after sorting out the tea leaves. They take the sweepings, the tea "dust", the remnants of real tea, then they bag them, and we drink it. You deserve better than bagged floor scrapings.

More...

The Best Cupcakes in Toronto

Catherine — Fri, 23 May 2008 09:37:33 PDT

As Mugatu famously said "Cupcakes are so hot right now." Apparently Toronto doesn't just have Fashion, Theatre and Financial districts, we also have a Cupcake district. Queen Street East is dominating the cupcake industry. Of the 10 cupcake destinations below, 4 of them, count'em, four, are located along Queen Street East. (5 if you count Dufflet's Beach location). Eastenders are a bit cupcake crazy. And that's a crazy I can get behind.

Most of these shmancy cupcakes don't come cheap. It's around a $3 minimum per indulgence. Which, big picture, isn't actually that much. If money were experiences, the cost of a cupcake would be about equivalent to a ride on the TTC. Public transit is a lot like a cupcake actually. They're both colourful, and satisfying, and, um, they smell good and. No wait. Analogy.. falling.. apart.

For full disclosure, here's my bias in judging cupcakes: I like cupcakes that taste fresh, and are soft and moist. Substance over style. Not that I don't enjoy haute couture confectionery, I do. There's an urban hipster in me trying to get out. But when we get down to it, yummy treats go in the belly, not in the eyes. (Unless someone's really mad at you and expresses it by chucking a cupcake in your face. But I digress.)

More...

The Best Sandwiches in Toronto

Catherine — Fri, 16 May 2008 09:30:00 PDT

The only criteria that unites the category of "sandwich" is the presence of some sort of bread. So long as there's bread wrapped around or on either side of something edible, you can call it a sandwich. It's a blank canvas, open to anyone with some filler and an idea.

This list captures just some of what Toronto has to offer. Vegetarians won't love California Sandwiches' veal meatball option, but they'll be well-served by Urban Herbivore. If you're more in the mood for slow roasted meat, look to Black Camel. Because when you think of a spitting dromedary, you think good meat sandwich. Or at least you might after trying their brisket.

More...

The Best Bread in Toronto

Catherine — Fri, 09 May 2008 10:12:32 PDT

Bread is one of the most concise and versatile film props. It was bread that finally drove Sam and Frodo apart. Yet when a film needs to look idyllic, the art director can still just pop a baguette in the scene (preferrably sticking jauntily out of a bike basket) and take the rest of the day off.

Toronto's taste in bread is growing up. We're getting away from the "how many grains can you fit in a loaf" game, which, while fun, isn't all that bread has to offer. These days we're favouring artisanal loaves, and we won't settle for any bread without a crust sturdy enough knock a man out at a thousand paces.

More...

The Best Juice Bars in Toronto

Catherine — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 12:06:57 PDT

Little kids are juice junkies. They're on a hamster wheel of sipping a juice, spilling a juice or being offered a juice. When we're young and finicky, our list of acceptable fruits and vegetables is about five items long. Which is why our parents hit us with the juice. Juice sneaks under the radar and quietly delivers vitamins and nutrients to unsuspecting children.

Then we get older and we eat the real thing. We show off with our full fruit bowls and elaborate salads. Juice falls by the wayside. Forget about it, we can barely remember to drink enough water. And there are so many interesting fermented drinks to explore. And the coffee. Oh god the coffee.

Enter the juice bar. Juice bars make juice newfangled and interesting. You don't just drink juice, you design, compose, substitute and supplement it. Virgin orange juice no longer. Beets! Parsley! Wheatgrass! Coconuts! Take all those fruits and vegetables you have been unable to bend to your will (I'm looking at you, kale) and turn them into a refreshing beverage. Juice bars wrangle those tricky pineapples and beets, distilling them down to their tasty essence.

By the time these top juice bars are through with them, fruits and vegetables have turned from something to quench your thirst into protein power-boosting smart smoothies --getting as close as we've come so far to Willy Wonka's three-course-meal gum.

More...

The Best Health Food Stores in Toronto

Catherine — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 11:00:00 PDT

Health food stores have come a long way, baby. When I was young, and my well-intentioned hippie parents were raising us on a diet of fruit leathers and wild rice casseroles, I spent a great deal of time in health food stores. If I close my eyes, I can still see the giant unmarked tubs of natural peanut butter, and smell the slightly astringent smell of chewable vitamin C.

But right around the time Lisa Simpson admitted she was going to marry a carrot, things started getting better for healthy eaters. A lot better. Even these days, while big business is slapping 'natural' and 'organic' all over themselves, independent health food stores are increasingly mainstream, stylish, and plentiful, with fantastic options all over downtown Toronto.

More...

Tapasurbano

Catherine — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 08:31:04 PST

It's not fair: who wants to take over the space of a neighbourhood favourite like Queen West's Sugar? Wait, no. Would that be harder or easier?

Urbano is the new "Italian-inspired tapas parlour" at Queen and Shaw. Which, honestly, I got a little excited about.

(Though I couldn't go for a few months because I was still mourning the end of Sugar brunches. Too soon.)

Then I went, I saw, I ate. And I got a little less excited.

This is where you go to fill up on Calabrese bread and straightforward food (like that lemon chicken over on the right). And it'll be good. But your socks will remain on your feet (because they won't be knocked off, get it?).

Read on in the full Urbano review in our Restaurants section.

La Merceria: Eat, Drink, and Be Tempted

Catherine — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 16:08:43 PST

Only a few months old, La Merceria on Adelaide St W is a lethal combination of beautiful things, great coffee and sweets.

La Merceria is a hybrid home decor boutique and cafe. Which roughly translates to playing dirty. All the while you're sitting in comfort against an oversized pillow, sipping a perfectly prepared espresso, you're surrounded by purchasable home design goodies. And if your decision making isn't already impaired from your first (or second) cup of coffee, they sucker punch your resistance with sugar -- a little something made of dulce de leche?

Many of the people who came in while I was there were first timers, just walking by. Every one of them was instantly smitten with the place. So I don't really need to sell it, you can just go, and experience the smittening yourself.

Though you can also read the full review of La Merceria in our Cafes section.

Foam, seedlings and more at C5

Catherine — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 23:07:02 PST

It must be hard to be the restaurant inside a structure that evokes such strong feelings as the Michael Lee-Chin Crystal does. But given a chance the restaurant in the belly of the beast can win you over.

If you love the Crystal, you don't need to be talked into going. If you hate it, close your eyes and run to the elevator that'll take to you up to some very scrumptious eating on the 5th floor.

Read on for an updated Winterlicious review of Crystal Five (C5).

Le Bar a Soupe: Outsourcing homemade goodness

Catherine — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 17:58:23 PST

Sometimes you just want a simple home cooked healthy meal, but you really can't be bothered to home cook it at your house. Or you have $5 burning a hole in your pocket and you wish there was somewhere in Toronto where that still bought something the size and shape of a meal...

Through the magic of soup, both of these dilemmas can be solved in one move, if you just wander on over to Ossington's Le Bar a Soupe...