*Photos of the rest of the meal can be found on the 'Food I Find' page.
Hey Scarberians, if you haven't been to Aioli yet you should go. Fresh and delicious french food and a different aioli daily to accompany a freshly baked baguette. My family and I split the Chèvre house salad* and I had the Magret de Canard which can be seen above. Everything was delicious. The owner is very friendly and likes to engage with his customers. Aioli is yet another hidden gem of kingston road and a great place to go on a date. Especially on the 'Dinner and a Song' nights that they hold every so often. If you get the chance, check out Aioli and I promise you will not leave hungry or disappointed.
*Photos of the rest of the meal can be found on the 'Food I Find' page.
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Yup. That's right. They even beat out Glory Hole on Queen West for me. Von Donuts on Danforth and Pape takes the cake. Or the donut. These are the best donuts in Toronto and the best I have had. They are fluffy, not greasy, and delicious. Some of the donuts on their weekly menu include spiked donuts which have infusions of various liquors. The jelly filled donuts are HEAVY. That's how you know you got a good one. I can't express how good these are by writing about them. Go to Von Donuts and experience it for yourself. You could always pick one up for me while you're at it! ;D Take a look at the daily menu here: http://vondoughnuts.com/doughnuts/ For those of us who are lucky enough to have our mothers in our lives we should be respecting, and thanking them every day for all that they do for us. Unfortunately, many of us forget to do that and some of us don't get a second chance to love and respect them as much as we should have. Moms are great because they are the ones that truly only want what is best for us, even if it annoys the crap out of us. And let's be honest, most of us are little shit heads, and probably should be put in our places more than we actually are, but moms will always forgive us. They will love us even after bringing home rabbits that you were told not too, dying the family cat blue, stealing subway maps and generally getting into trouble. They'll try to tell you when you should go to sleep, (probably up until you have kids of your own to tell to go to sleep) and you wake up in the morning realizing that they were probably right. They will tell you that you should have more than cereal for dinner, and you'll snap back, realize she was right, and eat more cereal anyway. You'll go off to university and she'll cry every time, and make sure that you have enough cereal and almond milk to get you through the month. Other moms will let us raid the fridge, and spend their lives driving us around, bringing our keys back to work for us, and making us cute candy packages for every holiday. They bake us treats and bring the dog for visits when we're sad even if we don't deserve it. Maums you annoy all hell outta me sometimes, but you drive me across the city for donuts, and I love you. Sorry I can't be there to make you a special meal, but happy mothers day! <3
"It's kind of true that all you eat is salad and donuts..." Quote my best friend Renee.... to which I reply "And Cereal!" Yes it is true I do love salad, donuts and cereal, I wish they were my staple foods! But I do balance my meals, making sure my lunch and dinners consist of right amounts of macros. Breakfast is mostly reserved for cereal ;) Although I am pretty strict, keeping a healthy diet consisting of the right amount of calories and macros, I do make room for treats...pretty often.. haha! But only for special occasions!!!! (Like finding out about a new specialty donut shop) My point is, whatever your fitness goals, make sure you find a balance. Don't only eat donuts and cereal and don't only eat salads and chicken breast. TREAT YOSELF GIRL!
Hoppy Easter! Or as I am saying - Eat-Ster! This Easter weekend, Matt and I accompanied my dad to visit an old friend in Hamilton who makes his own maple syrup!! WHAAA?! Too awesome! And we got to take some home! I also made Nutella Stuffed Jack Cookies and Paleo Carrot Cake! YUM! Pictured in this post are the paleo chocolate chip cookies I made last week but i substituted almond flour for tiger nut flour. Tiger nut is lower in calories while being higher overall in fiber and nutrients! Plus they are naturally sweet so I used less maple syrup than the recipe called for. I call them Tiger Butt Cookies because when I went to type "TIgernut" into my phone to log the recipe, autocorrect worked its magic and changed it to "Tiger Butt". I thought it was cute so I kept it. I also made ratatouille because who doesn't love a good ratatouille?? Also featured in this post is brunch at Via CIBO, an Italian street food inspired take out place that also has seating. I saw tiramisu french toast on the menu earlier that week and just knew i had to get me some of that! (Tiramisu is my all time favourite dessert!) So I got tiramisu and Matt got Nutella and Banana. I will definitely be trying out my own version soon. A weekend FULL of delicious and nutritious foods! Happy Eat-Ster Everyone! :)
On March 15th in Toronto, you can go to select bakerys, and receive a free macaroon, as well as help donate to charities by purchasing macaroons, in which half the profits are donated. I stopped in to Bobette & Belle in Leslieville on my way home and grabbed a couple! I may have crushed one a bit... but they were delicious nonetheless!
Photo: Milos Paprica @madvillan Until moving to Waterloo for school, I really took living in Toronto for granted. I didn't understand why people at school got excited about going to Toronto. Every town, city, region etc, has its own little gems, hidden away for locals to love and guests to discover. What I didn't realize is that Toronto is jammed pack with little gems. I'm mostly aware of the food ones, but things like Kensington market, the TTC, and Rob Ford are some of Toronto's most iconic entities, things that come to mind to the people not from here when they think of Toronto. Kensington market is a great place. From what I have observed, it is mostly recognized by people not from the Toronto area as a place ridden with pot heads, alcoholics, drug addicts, that old car that became a planter, weird stores, and a good time. Kensington Market is a lot of those things. What a lot of people don't know, or may not realize, is that Kensington Market is free of multinationals. That means there's no fast food chains, no stores you would find at your mall, no corporate supermarkets, and no Wal-Marts. Wal-Mart did however try and make it's way into the area but the Rio-Can developer was defeated by locals(Alamenciak, The Star). Yes, Kensington is a great place, home to a 'You gotta eat here' joint(The Grilled Cheese), and great small stores, but the rest of Toronto has so much more to offer. Our former mayor made it onto Jimmy Kimmel. I love Rob Ford, and I want people to know. Another one of Toronto's icons would be non other than the TTC. And I hate the TTC. If you're from out of town, riding the red rocket is somewhat of a novelty, but if you're a local, you know just how gross it can be, especially at peak hours. The TTC gets me going sometimes. We don't have enough subways. We just don't. We are a heavily populated city, and we should have a better transit system. I have had to wait for 4 subway trains to come through young station before getting somehow lifted in and squashed into some guys armpit. FOUR TRAINS. To be packed in like sardines? Ridiculous. And that was good fortune, a lot of the time people miss their stops due to being crammed in so tightly and not being let out. Recently, after taking the subway to the greyhound station to go to Niagara I stewed on the bus, thinking 'I hate this city. I hate living here, it's ridiculous, blah blah blah etc etc'. And then I came to my senses. This is one of the best cities in the world and I love living here. I have lived here my entire life and I'm still exploring and experiencing it. I was reminded that Toronto has people like Milos Paprica, The Cookie guy. Last year I went to Toronto graffiti artist Spud bomb's LUST show for the upcoming pride week. There was free poutine, and there were free cookies provided by a guy named Milos. I grabbed an individually wrapped cookie on my way out to have as a snack later and decided to look up the information on his label. I started following him on instagram(@Madvillan) where he gives away free cookies to strangers, and created the hashtag 'Sweetening up people's day'. How many cities have a guy who gives out free cookies he makes himself to strangers just to make people happy?! Not many. And as I sat in that greyhound bus, next to a guy that smelled like stir fry, I realized just how much I love living in a city like Toronto. It takes being a local to know about someone like Milos, or about something like Glory Hole Donuts or Hey Meatball! or the hundreds of other great little gems Toronto has to offer that I still haven't found. This city is crowded, expensive, sometimes kind of gross, but I can find any ethnicity of food in this city. I can go to graffiti artist shows, and win free cookies, and run into characters of Degrassi, and find great stores and never ever be bored in this city. Being crammed into a subway car into some guys armpit for a few stops is a minor give, for a major take. Toronto, I love you. Here's the link to watch the City News video where I finally won my cookies from Milos and was on TV!: http://www.citynews.ca/2015/01/29/toronto-man-bakes-cookies-for-complete-strangers/ You can also read about the cookie guy when he was written up in the star: http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2014/12/27/torontos_cookie_guy_delivers_sweet_treats_to_strangers.html Today I scored a job! So I celebrated with some prize winning donuts from The Rolling Pin, a bake shop in Toronto that won donut showdown. I love donuts. And specialty foods. Put em together and BAM! Holding the title of Melmarks favourite specialty donut shop was another Toronto gem that goes by the name of Glory Hole Donuts and they're the real deal. Now if you have some donut knowledge, you know that donuts are traditionally deep-fried which, if you have a not-so-great donut, you would also find out instantly as grease coats the inside of your mouth. My mom and aunts had been RAVING about this donut shop in Buffalo called Paula's Donuts, and so when my boyfriend, his brother, and his girlfriend and I took a quick trip down to Buffalo, we made a stop at Paula's. Now don't get me wrong, these donuts weren't terrible. First off, they were HUGE. Like massive. But they were way too greasy. I'm not talking leaving giant oil stains on the box greasy, I mean biting into it forced grease to be released from its floury-yeasty goodness. It was't as bad as you're imagining it, but not my game. Glory Hole is my game. Their donuts are airy and not greasy to the bite. The Rolling Pin has a similar donut, although they seem to have more elaborate flavours, and definitely more elaborate presentation with some of the donuts featuring miniature pipettes to inject a shot of flavour into the heart of your donut. I've had a PB+J donut from Glory Hole, and a Fluffer Nutter Donut from The Rolling pin, same same but different, and in that category I think Glory hole wins. But the banana cream pie donut from The Rolling Pin... just go get one. Then you'll understand. I tend to treat my body pretty well when it comes to what foods I'll put in it, but life is short. So if you find that there is a specialty donut shop near you, go. And experience how great the donut world really is outside of Tim Hortons. I never understood the whole Anti-Valentines Day movement. Sure, it's never great to be surrounded by couples in love and be reminded you're alone, but the thing is, even if you're single, you're probably not alone. Valentines Day isn't about singling out the singles(HA get it?), it's about celebrating love - letting the people in our lives know that we love them and care about them! And getting a ridiculous sugar high as you snack on all the festive treats while watching a marathon on romantic comedies. Some people have a different hate path and believe Valentines day is a stupid, made up holiday to make people either spend too much money, feel depressed and alone, or like they have met their soul mate. To those people, can I ask you something? Why you gotta hate? Everything is heart-shaped, pink and chocolate. It's basically second Christmas. If you hate Valentines day simply just to hate it, I think you should curl up with someone(your significant other, mom, dog, yourself), and grab some pink foil wrapped caramel hearts, watch some rom coms, and make some Valentines to let others know you care about em.
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AuthorHalf Asian from Toronto living in Shanghai who loves oceans, chocolate, stupid looking small dogs, cereal, donuts and experimenting in the kitchen. Archives
January 2016
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