smash juice bar toronto
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Smash Juice Bar

Smash Juice Bar is the all-raw, all-vegan, all-organic offshoot of Rose City Kitchen. Open since spring 2015, the juice-focused takeaway spot is shares a space with the lunch counter and Clockwock Coffee's first location in a cafeteria-like space in the Financial District .

Though they don't have the space to themselves, they've managed to carve out a room of their own: Head past the coffee counter down a hallway into the back, and you'll find yourself in an intimate, boutiquey space, wrapped with refrigerator cases and fronted with a table of juice samples and menus.

smash juice bar toronto

You'll also find chief nutritionist Aly Shoom, who doles out nutritional advice and helps newcomers find their way around the shelves, which feature a dozen or so juice blends, in addition to raw entrees and snacks, sparkling fermented drinks, and even skincare (body butter and coffee scrub, to be precise).

smash juice bar toronto

"Juicing is a part of a healthy lifestyle, so we really try to bring that '360 wellness', which is why we do the skincare, the juice, the food. I also do nutrition consultations. It's a healthy lifestyle one-stop shop."

smash juice bar toronto

Their juice lineup ($7 and up) features six blends, all organic and cold-pressed. I try the Reboot, with kale, lemon, ginger, and a little pineapple for sweetness (Shoom says it's one of their most popular juices). Other shops might branch into nut milks or smoothies, but Smash veers into unusual territory with cold-pressed coffee, and aloe water.

The less-adventurous can give the lime and turmeric kefir water ($5) a spin. Made with water fermented with kefir grains, the citrusy, soda-like drink is not too sweet, but wholly addictive. Same goes for the mango-orange sparkling kombucha, which mostly omits the drink's usual vinegary tang for a fruity flavour.

smash juice bar toronto

A selection of raw meals ($8-$13) are available, including Thai-flavoured kelp noodles and zucchini linguini topped with hemp hearts and lemon, but the real hit from the food aisle is the pumpkin pie ($7). Made from walnut, coconut oil, maple syrup, carrots and nutmeg, it's a remarkable facsimile of the real thing (especially when you consider that it's entirely raw).

smash juice bar toronto

Their flagship creation is the executive cleanse, a one-day, 9-to-5 regimen geared toward busy professionals. Nipun Sharma, the CEO of Rose City Kitchen, explains that the program was inspired by an investor, a busy lawyer, who said they weren't able to spend a week running off juices alone, but would love the chance to do a half-day cleanse.

"We did this for people who are not really knowledgeable about cleanses, and find it too much to commit to a week. They can commit to a workday, a morning to late afternoon," Sharma says. In addition to featuring one juice, one smoothie and a sparkling drink, the executive cleanse ($35) also includes a lunch-hour container of zucchini linguini and a mid-afternoon raw snack.

smash juice bar toronto

"Not everyone's so hardcore, they can take a day to drink juice," Shoom says. "I know it doesn't even fit into my lifestyle, and I'm a nutritionist. I can't concentrate at work. I love to work out and be active, and I can't sustain myself on juice. I think other people are also like that. We want to make healthy accessible to everybody."

smash juice bar toronto

Photos by Jesse Milns.


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