I haven't been here in ages; if I want Indian food, I go to Kismet (though, after my visit there, I might instead go to Aunty's Cafe). (Yes, I do realize that Kismet is Bengali food, and of course, it's really UK-ish Indian food. Meh.)
In retrospect, I may have been too quick to write off Curry in a Hurry. It got bad, um, 8 or 10 years ago? But today's lunch, with D., was tasty.
Their menu allows the addition of flavourful items to your curry (it kind of feels a little too much like pizza toppings: spinach, onions, tomatoes, potatoes, etc.), which I think helps a lot, and specifically avoids the thing that I most dislike about Kismet: that my curry is a few hunks of meat in a sea of sauce. Instead, I got butter chicken with spinach and onion in it, and it turned out to be a good mix. They will spice to your preference, though this largely seems to consist of throwing hot sauce at the finished dish. (I don't think it's rooster sauce.) That seemed to be the primary difference between my dish and D.'s.
Today it was very windy outside, so we both wanted to warm up, so I had chai and D. had tea, as part of the lunch special. Two cups of tea later, and a nice spicy meal in my belly, I was much more comfortable facing the wind. Then the weather worsened, but this is conveniently not a weather blog.
I had: The lunch special: butter chicken with tomatoes and spinach, rice, a samosa, and a cup of chai
I paid: $11.50 + tax + tip, or around $14.50.
Verdict:
Speed: It was genuinely hurried. We got our drink order out before we'd gotten our coats off (I guess we looked cold!), and our food arrived soon thereafter.
Quality: I enjoyed it. The rice, in particular, I liked, but the overall dish was good. The spinach helped a lot. The samosa was more meh: in particular, I didn't like how grey the potato filling was!
Value: It seems a bit pricey, honestly. D. took home leftovers; I didn't. I thought the calzone last week was better value.
Would go back: Yeah, probably. I think Kismet is likely my least favourite of the three Indian options in the plaza, now.
Thursday 20 December 2012
McGinnis Front Row
This is basically a sports bar, but it's migrated over time to being more of a general-purpose restaurant, too. I've never been a fan, and a year ago, we had a co-op going away lunch there, where I had bad food and our receptionist, whose family owns the best fishmonger in town, had terrible fish.
This time, I went with three staff members, largely to acknowledge all of the great work they've done this year. I probably should've paid more attention to the food than I did, maybe eating off their plates (er, maybe not; that'd be rude!), but I will say that it was a better meal than the last time I'd been there.
Service seemed super-slow: why does it take 15 minutes between sitting us down and getting our orders? By that point, the TV at our table (yay sports bar!) was covered up with my menu to remove distractions. And I wish that there were, um, something appealing on their beer list. But once they'd gotten their groove going, they were actually pretty fast, replacing empty drinks quickly, for example.
In the end, I had chicken fingers with seafood chowder. I appreciated that there was the possibility of having something other than french fries with the chicken fingers, and the soup was pretty good. The chicken fingers themselves were tasty, but the breading was kind of boring: I'm used to it being spiced up (and salty), and instead it was more meh.
But overall, this wasn't a bad meal, and the company was great.
I had: chicken fingers with a side of seafood chowder, with iced tea to drink
I paid: lunch for the 4 of us was around $80; the other three people had sandwiches or salads
Verdict:
Speed: Pretty slow, particularly to take our orders
Quality: Fine? It looked like the chips and "avocado salsa" (you used to call it guacamole?) that D. had was good. H. got a burger that came with both onion rings and fries; the onion rings were pretty squishy with grease. She didn't eat them.
Value: This didn't feel appropriately priced. I kind of wish we'd been able to go to the (substantially more expensive) Xmas buffet at the University Club, though; really, the goal was to share some holiday fun with some hard-working colleagues. So that's okay.
Would go back: I can't see why. I'll probably go there because I have to, not because I want to.
This time, I went with three staff members, largely to acknowledge all of the great work they've done this year. I probably should've paid more attention to the food than I did, maybe eating off their plates (er, maybe not; that'd be rude!), but I will say that it was a better meal than the last time I'd been there.
Service seemed super-slow: why does it take 15 minutes between sitting us down and getting our orders? By that point, the TV at our table (yay sports bar!) was covered up with my menu to remove distractions. And I wish that there were, um, something appealing on their beer list. But once they'd gotten their groove going, they were actually pretty fast, replacing empty drinks quickly, for example.
In the end, I had chicken fingers with seafood chowder. I appreciated that there was the possibility of having something other than french fries with the chicken fingers, and the soup was pretty good. The chicken fingers themselves were tasty, but the breading was kind of boring: I'm used to it being spiced up (and salty), and instead it was more meh.
But overall, this wasn't a bad meal, and the company was great.
I had: chicken fingers with a side of seafood chowder, with iced tea to drink
I paid: lunch for the 4 of us was around $80; the other three people had sandwiches or salads
Verdict:
Speed: Pretty slow, particularly to take our orders
Quality: Fine? It looked like the chips and "avocado salsa" (you used to call it guacamole?) that D. had was good. H. got a burger that came with both onion rings and fries; the onion rings were pretty squishy with grease. She didn't eat them.
Value: This didn't feel appropriately priced. I kind of wish we'd been able to go to the (substantially more expensive) Xmas buffet at the University Club, though; really, the goal was to share some holiday fun with some hard-working colleagues. So that's okay.
Would go back: I can't see why. I'll probably go there because I have to, not because I want to.
Wednesday 12 December 2012
Campus Pizza
I believe there are only two pizza places in the plaza: this one, and Pizza Nova. (Though what I got at Meet Point was kind of pizza-like as well. And you can get pizza at East Side Mario's.) In some ways, that surprises me: we have a huge number of Chinese places, for example.
But I can't help but blame the Canadian Dairy Board. (Gentle Reader, you knew it was eventually going to be a rant about the Dairy Board, didn't you?)
(Actually, you probably didn't.)
The Canadian Dairy Board is part of the amazingly complicated and byzantine system by which the supply and cost of dairy products are set here in Canada. Basically, it's extremely difficult to sell imported dairy products here (tarriffs, quotas, etc.), and dairy prices inside the country are kept high by forbidding people to sell dairy products unless they have the "right" to sell it, and that right is itself a commodity that can be bought and sold.
The effect of this is that cheese here is incredibly expensive.
The real reason this most galls me is that the US (which is my native land) also offers high subsidies to dairy farmers, but in the form of payments to farmers, not high prices on dairy. So in the US, cheese is half as expensive.
(So is cream, but that's a rant for another day; I vaguely started that rant when I visited Marble Slab Creamery a couple months ago.)
One consequence of this, I think, is that we eat less pizza in Canada than we otherwise might. The pizza recipe that I make includes 140 grams of cheese (er, 5 ounces) for a pie that serves 2-3 people. That much cheap, boring, bulk mozzarella would cost roughly $2-$3: it's by far the most expensive ingredient in the pizza unless I top it with duck confit. (I, um, don't.)
Restaurants typically have 20%-25% food costs: that is, what you pay is roughly 4-5 times what the cost of the food was. You can't do that affordably when pizza cheese costs that much!
So pizza in Canada has the property of being either cheap and truly lousy, or expensive, and still not necessarily very good. (Ice cream, same story. Don't get me started on "double-churned" ice cream; I didn't realize I needed twice as much air whipped into my dessert!)
This panzerotti was surprisingly good, but also expensive. Though, truly, that's because of the toppings: I had them put onions, anchovies and broccoli in it. I still don't see how that turned into 5 toppings (the broccoli ostensibly was supposed to count for two), but I paid the price of a panzerotti with five toppings. Still, I did enjoy the pie. It was huge: D. had the leftovers for dinner tonight. It came along with a tomato dipping sauce that was "zesty", but also too sweet and blah. But the pie itself was tasty, surprisingly cheesy (given the rant I just gave), and had a generous amount of broccoli. The one meh-ness was that it had a lot of crust, which ultimately tasted like generic toasted white bread. But still, it was good.
I eat their pizza pretty often, as it's one of our common sources for pizza to have when we mark exams, say. This was fresher, and tastier.
I had: A panzerotti with broccoli, anchovies and onions.
I paid: $11.23. I think I was supposed to pay something more like $10, as the plain pie was $5, and each topping another $1 (broccoli counting twice), so this should've been more like $9 + tax = around $10, not $10 + tax = around $11. Ah, well.
Verdict:
Speed: OK, but not great. Still, if I'd been in a hurry, I wouldn't have ordered something that needed to be custom made. I think I waited 10-15 minutes.
Quality: As I said, it had surprising numbers of good things about it. I've never gone to Campus Pizza for lunch directly (just gotten it at university events), and it really was better fresh. I didn't like the tomato sauce, and yet still kept dipping my food in it. This is mildly embarrassing to admit.
Value: I paid too much, but even still, it was a ton of panzerotti, and turned into a lunch for me and a dinner for D. This was certainly fine. Toppings do seem strikingly expensive in general.
Would go back: You know, I rarely feel like pizza for lunch. But I may toss this into the rotation.
But I can't help but blame the Canadian Dairy Board. (Gentle Reader, you knew it was eventually going to be a rant about the Dairy Board, didn't you?)
(Actually, you probably didn't.)
The Canadian Dairy Board is part of the amazingly complicated and byzantine system by which the supply and cost of dairy products are set here in Canada. Basically, it's extremely difficult to sell imported dairy products here (tarriffs, quotas, etc.), and dairy prices inside the country are kept high by forbidding people to sell dairy products unless they have the "right" to sell it, and that right is itself a commodity that can be bought and sold.
The effect of this is that cheese here is incredibly expensive.
The real reason this most galls me is that the US (which is my native land) also offers high subsidies to dairy farmers, but in the form of payments to farmers, not high prices on dairy. So in the US, cheese is half as expensive.
(So is cream, but that's a rant for another day; I vaguely started that rant when I visited Marble Slab Creamery a couple months ago.)
One consequence of this, I think, is that we eat less pizza in Canada than we otherwise might. The pizza recipe that I make includes 140 grams of cheese (er, 5 ounces) for a pie that serves 2-3 people. That much cheap, boring, bulk mozzarella would cost roughly $2-$3: it's by far the most expensive ingredient in the pizza unless I top it with duck confit. (I, um, don't.)
Restaurants typically have 20%-25% food costs: that is, what you pay is roughly 4-5 times what the cost of the food was. You can't do that affordably when pizza cheese costs that much!
So pizza in Canada has the property of being either cheap and truly lousy, or expensive, and still not necessarily very good. (Ice cream, same story. Don't get me started on "double-churned" ice cream; I didn't realize I needed twice as much air whipped into my dessert!)
This panzerotti was surprisingly good, but also expensive. Though, truly, that's because of the toppings: I had them put onions, anchovies and broccoli in it. I still don't see how that turned into 5 toppings (the broccoli ostensibly was supposed to count for two), but I paid the price of a panzerotti with five toppings. Still, I did enjoy the pie. It was huge: D. had the leftovers for dinner tonight. It came along with a tomato dipping sauce that was "zesty", but also too sweet and blah. But the pie itself was tasty, surprisingly cheesy (given the rant I just gave), and had a generous amount of broccoli. The one meh-ness was that it had a lot of crust, which ultimately tasted like generic toasted white bread. But still, it was good.
I eat their pizza pretty often, as it's one of our common sources for pizza to have when we mark exams, say. This was fresher, and tastier.
I had: A panzerotti with broccoli, anchovies and onions.
I paid: $11.23. I think I was supposed to pay something more like $10, as the plain pie was $5, and each topping another $1 (broccoli counting twice), so this should've been more like $9 + tax = around $10, not $10 + tax = around $11. Ah, well.
Verdict:
Speed: OK, but not great. Still, if I'd been in a hurry, I wouldn't have ordered something that needed to be custom made. I think I waited 10-15 minutes.
Quality: As I said, it had surprising numbers of good things about it. I've never gone to Campus Pizza for lunch directly (just gotten it at university events), and it really was better fresh. I didn't like the tomato sauce, and yet still kept dipping my food in it. This is mildly embarrassing to admit.
Value: I paid too much, but even still, it was a ton of panzerotti, and turned into a lunch for me and a dinner for D. This was certainly fine. Toppings do seem strikingly expensive in general.
Would go back: You know, I rarely feel like pizza for lunch. But I may toss this into the rotation.
Friday 7 December 2012
Pita Factory
This is yet another in the enormous list of pita places in the plaza. I believe the total is 5, and Pita Factory, like Pita Pit (which I haven't yet reached on this tour), is a franchise.
Today's chicken souvlaki was more expensive than at other places in the plaza. But I guess I'd admit that parts of it were better: it's December, and yet the tomatoes in my sandwich were pretty good. I fear for my breath, as the onions were fierce. And the pita didn't fall apart.
Workflow was not bad; I did notice that all of the people behind the counter were hunched over their table, and it isn't as fast as Grab-A-Greek, which has a smaller menu. But this was nothing like Just-N-Pita, which makes me nervous every time I go.
I had: a chicken souvlaki pita
I paid: $8.30 or so. (I can't remember, and I then got a coffee, so I can't tell from just counting my change.
Verdict:
Speed: okay. I kind of felt like I waited a couple minutes more than I'd have liked
Quality: better than I expected. The chicken tasted of chicken, and there were tomatoes and onions with the right flavours.
Value: I'm unconvinced that it's a $8+ sandwich. The ones at Just-N-Pita have more toppings, while at Grab-A-Greek they're cheaper. They're much cheaper at Phat Hat (name recently changed), but not tasty there.
Would go back: rarely. The physical experience is much more "deliberately uncomfortable" than at most of the other plaza restaurants: the chairs are hard, there are too many of them, etc. There are better choices.
Today's chicken souvlaki was more expensive than at other places in the plaza. But I guess I'd admit that parts of it were better: it's December, and yet the tomatoes in my sandwich were pretty good. I fear for my breath, as the onions were fierce. And the pita didn't fall apart.
Workflow was not bad; I did notice that all of the people behind the counter were hunched over their table, and it isn't as fast as Grab-A-Greek, which has a smaller menu. But this was nothing like Just-N-Pita, which makes me nervous every time I go.
I had: a chicken souvlaki pita
I paid: $8.30 or so. (I can't remember, and I then got a coffee, so I can't tell from just counting my change.
Verdict:
Speed: okay. I kind of felt like I waited a couple minutes more than I'd have liked
Quality: better than I expected. The chicken tasted of chicken, and there were tomatoes and onions with the right flavours.
Value: I'm unconvinced that it's a $8+ sandwich. The ones at Just-N-Pita have more toppings, while at Grab-A-Greek they're cheaper. They're much cheaper at Phat Hat (name recently changed), but not tasty there.
Would go back: rarely. The physical experience is much more "deliberately uncomfortable" than at most of the other plaza restaurants: the chairs are hard, there are too many of them, etc. There are better choices.
Wednesday 5 December 2012
Kick Off
This is really a bar, not a restaurant; M., with whom we went, is a regular and claimed that the owners hate it when people order food, and that they only have food because they legally must.
But it's still a restaurant, so D. and I went with M. after work yesterday.
And the beer was excellent, and the conversation very good (I really don't know why we don't spend more time with M.; possibly the right answer is to go there for beerz more often). And I was amused that, instead of being grumpy about feeding us, the owner we were talking with was happy to serve me pierogies, and to serve D. fries, and agreed with me that they were tasty.
Which they were, if fried-from-frozen.
I had: two half-litre pints of a Weißbier, and an order of pierogies
I paid: $52, but that was for a five pints, plus the pierogies and fries. I think it was $6.95 a pint?
Verdict:
Speed: The beer was fast; the food wasn't, but we'd been there over an hour when we ordered it, and by that point I really didn't care, as I was enjoying myself.
Quality: Beer was great, pierogies were fine.
Value: I think $6.95 a pint is a little high? But I guess it's fine. I don't drink in bars all that often.
Would go back: Yeah. There was video on the screen of a soccer game with massive amounts of snow, which was even fun in a Schadenfreude-kind of way. I'd go back.
But it's still a restaurant, so D. and I went with M. after work yesterday.
And the beer was excellent, and the conversation very good (I really don't know why we don't spend more time with M.; possibly the right answer is to go there for beerz more often). And I was amused that, instead of being grumpy about feeding us, the owner we were talking with was happy to serve me pierogies, and to serve D. fries, and agreed with me that they were tasty.
Which they were, if fried-from-frozen.
I had: two half-litre pints of a Weißbier, and an order of pierogies
I paid: $52, but that was for a five pints, plus the pierogies and fries. I think it was $6.95 a pint?
Verdict:
Speed: The beer was fast; the food wasn't, but we'd been there over an hour when we ordered it, and by that point I really didn't care, as I was enjoying myself.
Quality: Beer was great, pierogies were fine.
Value: I think $6.95 a pint is a little high? But I guess it's fine. I don't drink in bars all that often.
Would go back: Yeah. There was video on the screen of a soccer game with massive amounts of snow, which was even fun in a Schadenfreude-kind of way. I'd go back.
Friday 30 November 2012
Williams Fresh Café
This was tasty!!
Really, it actually was. Lunch today was an entrée salad that had chicken breast, goat cheese, beets, and candied nuts on greens, with a raspberry vinaigrette.
It was very good. The goat cheese was yummy, the beets were tasty, the chicken was not overcooked, and was juicy while still tasting of the grill, the candied nuts gave good texture, and the 2 pieces of garlic bread were appealing. The only downside to the food was that the greens for the salad included way too much useless iceberg lettuce. But some of the greens were even pretty peppery.
This was a great salad. It's the best one I've ever had in the plaza.
Ironically, since the meal was tasty, I don't even have that much to say. D. had mac and cheese (and said it was very good and tasted of real cheese), alongside a side-sized version of the same salad as mine (which differed in having no iceberg lettuce, and no chicken).
Even the coffee was good.
A downside to Williams is that it's too loud (tin ceiling) and is pretty crowded at lunch. But otherwise, it was very tasty, and I will return.
I had: Entrée salad with beets, goat cheese and grilled chicken breast, and a medium coffee.
I paid: $14.32 with tax.
Verdict:
Speed: Okay. They have a bunch of newspapers, so I spent a while reading about Rob Ford's woes in the Toronto Star while D. read the comics. The line was a little slow to get through, but we did get there right at noon.
Quality: Very good. This was a great salad. Coffee was good. I wish there had been no iceberg lettuce.
Value: Well, not brilliant; I suppose you get what you pay for. Still, this meal was around the same price as the East Side Mario's meal I had at the beginning of this whole tour, and way, way better.
Would go back: Yes, and I'm a little surprised. In the dozen years I've been here, I've only ever had a very small number of meals at Williams, and the last one was much less good. (Then again, it was also the meal I ate in the middle of an 8-hour meeting on a Friday afternoon. Yeah.)
Really, it actually was. Lunch today was an entrée salad that had chicken breast, goat cheese, beets, and candied nuts on greens, with a raspberry vinaigrette.
It was very good. The goat cheese was yummy, the beets were tasty, the chicken was not overcooked, and was juicy while still tasting of the grill, the candied nuts gave good texture, and the 2 pieces of garlic bread were appealing. The only downside to the food was that the greens for the salad included way too much useless iceberg lettuce. But some of the greens were even pretty peppery.
This was a great salad. It's the best one I've ever had in the plaza.
Ironically, since the meal was tasty, I don't even have that much to say. D. had mac and cheese (and said it was very good and tasted of real cheese), alongside a side-sized version of the same salad as mine (which differed in having no iceberg lettuce, and no chicken).
Even the coffee was good.
A downside to Williams is that it's too loud (tin ceiling) and is pretty crowded at lunch. But otherwise, it was very tasty, and I will return.
I had: Entrée salad with beets, goat cheese and grilled chicken breast, and a medium coffee.
I paid: $14.32 with tax.
Verdict:
Speed: Okay. They have a bunch of newspapers, so I spent a while reading about Rob Ford's woes in the Toronto Star while D. read the comics. The line was a little slow to get through, but we did get there right at noon.
Quality: Very good. This was a great salad. Coffee was good. I wish there had been no iceberg lettuce.
Value: Well, not brilliant; I suppose you get what you pay for. Still, this meal was around the same price as the East Side Mario's meal I had at the beginning of this whole tour, and way, way better.
Would go back: Yes, and I'm a little surprised. In the dozen years I've been here, I've only ever had a very small number of meals at Williams, and the last one was much less good. (Then again, it was also the meal I ate in the middle of an 8-hour meeting on a Friday afternoon. Yeah.)
Thursday 29 November 2012
Burger King
So, I don't go to "fast food restaurants".
Of course, that's clearly an elitist conceit: there's a funny sensibility that places like Subway, and Starbucks (where the food is premade!), and even Tim Horton's, fall into a category of "acceptability" where, say, Burger King does not fall.
So, perhaps, I should say: I don't go to fast food hamburger places. Well, except I do go to The Grill Burger Kitchen a few times a year, and my sandwich there would have been faster than today's lunch.
And tastier.
And essentially the same price: that lunch was $9.20, and this one was $8.35.
I do realize that going to Burger King as a guy who doesn't eat beef is possibly silly, but again: my favourite new restaurant near campus in the last couple of years is Fratburger, and they make me quite happy with veggie burgers and turkey burgers. So this shouldn't be a total failure.
Unfortunately, it was. The wait in line and then for my food was long, partly because of bad workflow and partly because (I expect) I hadn't ordered a Whopper, and hence my sandwich had to be made specifically.
The fries were meh. Not really potato-y, with boring ketchup, and not salty enough.
The "tendergrill" sandwich was dry, not tender, and largely flavourless. There was a Mark Bittman article back in March where he talked about how for a lot of sandwiches, decent fake meat would be indistinguishable from boring chicken breasts. This sandwich was a good example of a sandwich that would have been just fine with fake meat.
The toppings were boring too: salty mayo, iceberg lettuce, and flavourless tomatoes. That's it.
Really, the best part of the meal was the "medium" (actually, I think, quite big!) Barq's Root Beer. Barq's got bite.
Yeah.
I had: Combo #7: Tendergrill chicken sandwich, medium fries, medium Barq's
I paid: $8.35
Verdict:
Speed: Not good. I honestly am surprised by how much time this took; I partly went to Burger King because I wanted a quick lunch. I think it was a good 8 or 10 minutes for my sandwich to happen.
Quality: Not good. Really, I just wanted something to be interesting about this meal, and nothing at all was. I can't imagine there's a single person out there who is excited about his or her next Tendergrill sandwich. If there is, I'd like it if we could meet. Actually, I take that back: I expect I'd find such a person disturbing.
Value: Not good. A lot of the Chinese places in the plaza have much cheaper, and larger, lunch specials. If I were trying to just fill up for cheap, this isn't the way to do it. Then again, I think there were other people getting a daily special that might have been much cheaper than what I paid.
Would go back: No, once in 20 years is enough.
Of course, that's clearly an elitist conceit: there's a funny sensibility that places like Subway, and Starbucks (where the food is premade!), and even Tim Horton's, fall into a category of "acceptability" where, say, Burger King does not fall.
So, perhaps, I should say: I don't go to fast food hamburger places. Well, except I do go to The Grill Burger Kitchen a few times a year, and my sandwich there would have been faster than today's lunch.
And tastier.
And essentially the same price: that lunch was $9.20, and this one was $8.35.
I do realize that going to Burger King as a guy who doesn't eat beef is possibly silly, but again: my favourite new restaurant near campus in the last couple of years is Fratburger, and they make me quite happy with veggie burgers and turkey burgers. So this shouldn't be a total failure.
Unfortunately, it was. The wait in line and then for my food was long, partly because of bad workflow and partly because (I expect) I hadn't ordered a Whopper, and hence my sandwich had to be made specifically.
The fries were meh. Not really potato-y, with boring ketchup, and not salty enough.
The "tendergrill" sandwich was dry, not tender, and largely flavourless. There was a Mark Bittman article back in March where he talked about how for a lot of sandwiches, decent fake meat would be indistinguishable from boring chicken breasts. This sandwich was a good example of a sandwich that would have been just fine with fake meat.
The toppings were boring too: salty mayo, iceberg lettuce, and flavourless tomatoes. That's it.
Really, the best part of the meal was the "medium" (actually, I think, quite big!) Barq's Root Beer. Barq's got bite.
Yeah.
I had: Combo #7: Tendergrill chicken sandwich, medium fries, medium Barq's
I paid: $8.35
Verdict:
Speed: Not good. I honestly am surprised by how much time this took; I partly went to Burger King because I wanted a quick lunch. I think it was a good 8 or 10 minutes for my sandwich to happen.
Quality: Not good. Really, I just wanted something to be interesting about this meal, and nothing at all was. I can't imagine there's a single person out there who is excited about his or her next Tendergrill sandwich. If there is, I'd like it if we could meet. Actually, I take that back: I expect I'd find such a person disturbing.
Value: Not good. A lot of the Chinese places in the plaza have much cheaper, and larger, lunch specials. If I were trying to just fill up for cheap, this isn't the way to do it. Then again, I think there were other people getting a daily special that might have been much cheaper than what I paid.
Would go back: No, once in 20 years is enough.
Tuesday 20 November 2012
China Legend
As is probably clear by now, I'm not Chinese. But I do eat, just fine, with chopsticks. I learned almost 30 years ago, when I was at Edinboro Summer Academy (which seems in the intervening, um, long time to have changed into a program in science and math for young women).
So it's somewhat inconvenient that my dun dun mein comes with a plastic fork, not a pair of chopsticks.
And the food itself is a little weird: it's wheat noodles with a black-bean/garlic/Sichuan peppercorn sauce, some onion and green pepper, a few pieces of broccoli, and some pak choi. I'm used to the stuff from Mary Chung's, near MIT, which just had more depth of flavour.
This is fine, but ultimately too much boring food, rather than a smaller amount of better food.
I had: dun dun mein, which came with a little cup of hot-and-sour soup
I paid: $7.90 with tax.
Verdict:
Speed: pretty good. I wrote a Tripadvisor review (of someplace different) in the time it took me to wait for my food.
Quality: fine, but not great. I'm ultimately only eating half of it, because really, a big styrofoam container full of boring noodles just isn't cutting it.
Value: Actually not that amazing, given how cheap the ingredients were.
Would go back: No, I don't think so.
So it's somewhat inconvenient that my dun dun mein comes with a plastic fork, not a pair of chopsticks.
And the food itself is a little weird: it's wheat noodles with a black-bean/garlic/Sichuan peppercorn sauce, some onion and green pepper, a few pieces of broccoli, and some pak choi. I'm used to the stuff from Mary Chung's, near MIT, which just had more depth of flavour.
This is fine, but ultimately too much boring food, rather than a smaller amount of better food.
I had: dun dun mein, which came with a little cup of hot-and-sour soup
I paid: $7.90 with tax.
Verdict:
Speed: pretty good. I wrote a Tripadvisor review (of someplace different) in the time it took me to wait for my food.
Quality: fine, but not great. I'm ultimately only eating half of it, because really, a big styrofoam container full of boring noodles just isn't cutting it.
Value: Actually not that amazing, given how cheap the ingredients were.
Would go back: No, I don't think so.
Wednesday 14 November 2012
Sunshine Express
I actually ate there last week, but I didn't bother reviewing that one, so I went back.
I ordered S19: Chinese Kung Pao Chicken. There was also "Chicken in Kung Pao Sauce", which I didn't get; when I was asked if I realized I was getting "Chinese" food, I said I was sick of white people food. I guess "Chicken in Kung Pao Sauce" is more admittedly white people food.
I actually have no idea how far along on the authenticity meter this is (though this post does show something similar to what I got. The biggest difference between what I ordered and what I'd normally get with this name is that it had a lot of cucumber in it. Basically, it's chicken cubes, cucumber cubes, a lot of hot pepper bits, peanuts, and a salty/garlicky brown sauce on rice.
It's tasty. A little one-note, but tasty. The cucumber adds a good crunch to it. The recipe I linked to includes Sichuan peppercorns, which I think would help a lot (and, I expect, would make it closer to authentic, too.) The sauce is a little too cornstarchy, and the chicken is fine, but not brilliant.
Yeah, we're back to our old friend, meh.
[Oh, but do check out Pete Wells's choice takedown of a lousy looking restaurant in NYC. Yeah, I'm just a piker here.]
I had: Chinese Kung Pao Chicken
I paid: $8.25 including tax
Verdict:
Speed: Pretty good. I didn't finish the NYT article I was reading.
Quality: Okay. Too salty, and generically too much, "gloppy brown sauce on stuff" feel.
Value: Fine. I didn't finish it. Most of the crowd was students who were probably needing bigger lunches than I do.
Would go back: No, probably not.
I ordered S19: Chinese Kung Pao Chicken. There was also "Chicken in Kung Pao Sauce", which I didn't get; when I was asked if I realized I was getting "Chinese" food, I said I was sick of white people food. I guess "Chicken in Kung Pao Sauce" is more admittedly white people food.
I actually have no idea how far along on the authenticity meter this is (though this post does show something similar to what I got. The biggest difference between what I ordered and what I'd normally get with this name is that it had a lot of cucumber in it. Basically, it's chicken cubes, cucumber cubes, a lot of hot pepper bits, peanuts, and a salty/garlicky brown sauce on rice.
It's tasty. A little one-note, but tasty. The cucumber adds a good crunch to it. The recipe I linked to includes Sichuan peppercorns, which I think would help a lot (and, I expect, would make it closer to authentic, too.) The sauce is a little too cornstarchy, and the chicken is fine, but not brilliant.
Yeah, we're back to our old friend, meh.
[Oh, but do check out Pete Wells's choice takedown of a lousy looking restaurant in NYC. Yeah, I'm just a piker here.]
I had: Chinese Kung Pao Chicken
I paid: $8.25 including tax
Verdict:
Speed: Pretty good. I didn't finish the NYT article I was reading.
Quality: Okay. Too salty, and generically too much, "gloppy brown sauce on stuff" feel.
Value: Fine. I didn't finish it. Most of the crowd was students who were probably needing bigger lunches than I do.
Would go back: No, probably not.
Tuesday 13 November 2012
Kabob Hut
This was tasty!
It's a Persian place in the near plaza, which has been a bunch of different things over the years, but seems pretty stable in this incarnation.
I ordered the special for the day, which was tahchine (vaguely pronounced like tagine), advertised as rice with chicken, eggs and safron. It took a while to arrive, and I do wonder, since it includes the crusty rice on the edge of the pot that is an Iranian delicacy, if it would've been tastier if I'd not gotten it to go, since then it would have been crunchier.
But it was tasty, with very good saffron flavour, a decent amount of chicken breast pieces, and an eggy crust on the rice. I enjoyed the meal. I might even make it myself, soon.
I got: today's special, tahchine
I paid: $9.99 + tax = $11.29
Verdict:
Speed: Not so great. There were a bunch of people all waiting for their food for takeout, and the tables were pretty full, and it all-told wasn't ideal.
Quality: It was good! There was apparently the possibility of having it be half salad, which I didn't take, and I don't know why (well, I think then I would've found it overpriced). As a dish, it's a little too one-note: this isn't even biryani, with a greater diversity of spices and flavours. But all that said, it was tasty.
Value: OK. I'm actually glad they didn't skimp on the saffron, so I guess I'm happy to have paid for that. And it was white meat, not dark. In many ways, though, this lunch reminded me of Aunty's, except that one was a bigger lunch and would've been better still if I'd been smart and gotten salad.
Would go back: Yeah, I think so. I was a little lost with the menu (they even have pictures, but I don't know what I'm getting even with them!). But it was good, and different.
It's a Persian place in the near plaza, which has been a bunch of different things over the years, but seems pretty stable in this incarnation.
I ordered the special for the day, which was tahchine (vaguely pronounced like tagine), advertised as rice with chicken, eggs and safron. It took a while to arrive, and I do wonder, since it includes the crusty rice on the edge of the pot that is an Iranian delicacy, if it would've been tastier if I'd not gotten it to go, since then it would have been crunchier.
But it was tasty, with very good saffron flavour, a decent amount of chicken breast pieces, and an eggy crust on the rice. I enjoyed the meal. I might even make it myself, soon.
I got: today's special, tahchine
I paid: $9.99 + tax = $11.29
Verdict:
Speed: Not so great. There were a bunch of people all waiting for their food for takeout, and the tables were pretty full, and it all-told wasn't ideal.
Quality: It was good! There was apparently the possibility of having it be half salad, which I didn't take, and I don't know why (well, I think then I would've found it overpriced). As a dish, it's a little too one-note: this isn't even biryani, with a greater diversity of spices and flavours. But all that said, it was tasty.
Value: OK. I'm actually glad they didn't skimp on the saffron, so I guess I'm happy to have paid for that. And it was white meat, not dark. In many ways, though, this lunch reminded me of Aunty's, except that one was a bigger lunch and would've been better still if I'd been smart and gotten salad.
Would go back: Yeah, I think so. I was a little lost with the menu (they even have pictures, but I don't know what I'm getting even with them!). But it was good, and different.
Friday 9 November 2012
TCBY
WHY?!?!
I mean, seriously, what is this?
So, it's not cheap. A "small" is $3.65 with tax, and is pretty big, but then again, you can pay just $1.75 more (okay, that is 45% more...) and get a small from Marble Slab, and be much, much happier.
Anyhow, it's not cheap.
It doesn't taste like anything. The cup we shared just now (D. was going to get his own cup, but I convinced him to share mine) is "blueberry cheesecake" flavour. It's an unappetizing purple-grey colour, and tastes like fake vanilla, with a funny set of other weird fruity flavours. The TCBY ingredient page doesn't include that flavour, but does include other ones that are "fruit"-flavoured with no fruit in them.
The texture is terrible. There's this chalkiness and also graininess (basically, this is the consequence of their not being enough fat in it, and the "guar gum, carrageenan, locust bean gum, xanthan gum" that are in the ingredients not being enough to make up for it.
[Oh, today's random aside: did you know that guar gum has gotten much more expensive because of hydraulic fracking? Yeah. Mostly, its price has become much more volatile, but is also much higher than just a couple years ago.]
Really, I shouldn't be thinking of hydraulic fracking while I'm eating "fro-yo". But I guess that's better than thinking about how I used to go to fro-yo places in the '80s when I was in high school. Yeah.
I had: a "small" blueberry cheesecake cup.
I paid: $3.65 including tax
Verdict:
Speed: Well, it was in my hands mere seconds after I ordered it, thanks to the soft-serv machine.
Quality: If this is the best fake ice cream that chemistry can produce, real ice cream has nothing to worry about.
Value: Terrible. There are two different places within 400' of this store that sell real ice cream for not too much different price, and their ingredient prices are going to be much higher since they use things like butterfat in their mix. And they're actually tasty, unlike this junk.
Would go back: Oh, definitely. I think I need to get a frequent buyer card. Um, no.
I mean, seriously, what is this?
So, it's not cheap. A "small" is $3.65 with tax, and is pretty big, but then again, you can pay just $1.75 more (okay, that is 45% more...) and get a small from Marble Slab, and be much, much happier.
Anyhow, it's not cheap.
It doesn't taste like anything. The cup we shared just now (D. was going to get his own cup, but I convinced him to share mine) is "blueberry cheesecake" flavour. It's an unappetizing purple-grey colour, and tastes like fake vanilla, with a funny set of other weird fruity flavours. The TCBY ingredient page doesn't include that flavour, but does include other ones that are "fruit"-flavoured with no fruit in them.
The texture is terrible. There's this chalkiness and also graininess (basically, this is the consequence of their not being enough fat in it, and the "guar gum, carrageenan, locust bean gum, xanthan gum" that are in the ingredients not being enough to make up for it.
[Oh, today's random aside: did you know that guar gum has gotten much more expensive because of hydraulic fracking? Yeah. Mostly, its price has become much more volatile, but is also much higher than just a couple years ago.]
Really, I shouldn't be thinking of hydraulic fracking while I'm eating "fro-yo". But I guess that's better than thinking about how I used to go to fro-yo places in the '80s when I was in high school. Yeah.
I had: a "small" blueberry cheesecake cup.
I paid: $3.65 including tax
Verdict:
Speed: Well, it was in my hands mere seconds after I ordered it, thanks to the soft-serv machine.
Quality: If this is the best fake ice cream that chemistry can produce, real ice cream has nothing to worry about.
Value: Terrible. There are two different places within 400' of this store that sell real ice cream for not too much different price, and their ingredient prices are going to be much higher since they use things like butterfat in their mix. And they're actually tasty, unlike this junk.
Would go back: Oh, definitely. I think I need to get a frequent buyer card. Um, no.
Seoul Soul
This is a Korean place close by the campus. It's been there forever, but I guess it changed hands a couple years ago and completely remodeled and re-menued. Among other things, they removed the sushi from the menu; this seems to be a common trend among Korean places here, as they cede the Japanese food domain to Chinese-run restaurants.
I'd long since removed it from my lunch rotation, and I hadn't been back since, so I guess it was high time.
I had stir-fried squid with vegetables, which came with a side of rice. The squid was good (although, huh: I think it was octopus, now that I think), and of course being Korean, the sauce was spicy. (When I was in Korea in 2005, the universal comment from Koreans to westerners about their food was, "it's so spicy!" It is, but it's much more than that.) There were a lot of onions and a few other veggies in the mix. It was a little oily, and honestly a bit one-note. Then again, it was tasty. The banchan were warm deep-fried potatoes, kimchi, and sesame-seasoned beansprouts. Yum.
I had: Lunch special #3: stirfried squid with vegetables and rice
I paid: We paid $25 for the two of us for lunch, including tax and tip.
Verdict:
Speed: Okay, but not brilliant. I guess I was mostly noticing the delay because we were parked right by the door, and it's drafty. They have an airlock-style door, but that doesn't work when you always keep the front door of the airlock open.
Quality: Good. I really would have enjoyed the meal more if the stirfry had tasted more complex. I kind of got bored.
Value: Was this really worth $12.50? I guess I don't think so, but I'm starting to wonder if I just have weird calibration. See, my brain still always thinks, "you know, if you were home, you could go to City Café, and spend $6.75 on a great lunch. I guess rents in the Plaza are too high to make that possible there.
Would go back: Yeah, I expect so.
I'd long since removed it from my lunch rotation, and I hadn't been back since, so I guess it was high time.
I had stir-fried squid with vegetables, which came with a side of rice. The squid was good (although, huh: I think it was octopus, now that I think), and of course being Korean, the sauce was spicy. (When I was in Korea in 2005, the universal comment from Koreans to westerners about their food was, "it's so spicy!" It is, but it's much more than that.) There were a lot of onions and a few other veggies in the mix. It was a little oily, and honestly a bit one-note. Then again, it was tasty. The banchan were warm deep-fried potatoes, kimchi, and sesame-seasoned beansprouts. Yum.
I had: Lunch special #3: stirfried squid with vegetables and rice
I paid: We paid $25 for the two of us for lunch, including tax and tip.
Verdict:
Speed: Okay, but not brilliant. I guess I was mostly noticing the delay because we were parked right by the door, and it's drafty. They have an airlock-style door, but that doesn't work when you always keep the front door of the airlock open.
Quality: Good. I really would have enjoyed the meal more if the stirfry had tasted more complex. I kind of got bored.
Value: Was this really worth $12.50? I guess I don't think so, but I'm starting to wonder if I just have weird calibration. See, my brain still always thinks, "you know, if you were home, you could go to City Café, and spend $6.75 on a great lunch. I guess rents in the Plaza are too high to make that possible there.
Would go back: Yeah, I expect so.
Tuesday 6 November 2012
Meet Point
This is a place in the far plaza (the same one as Just N Pita), which has a really large menu focused on Mediterranean foods. I had a pide, with chicken and cheese. Basically it was a calzone/pizza/... hybrid, made with hot, tasty flatbread, accompanied by a pretty generic salad (lettuce, tomato, cucumber, yogurt dressing).
The food was actually tasty (!), but felt way too slow. I kind of had to rush, because the person I was eating with had a 1:00, and we were a few minutes late.
And honestly, this didn't feel like it deserved to cost $11 for what was basically pizza and salad.
I had: A chicken/cheese pide with a side salad
I paid: $8.48 + tax + tip = $11
Verdict:
Speed: This was a problem: slow to get us menus, slow to get our orders, slow to make the food. I kind of think that's the idea ("come, sit, eat, relax!"), but, well, I have a job.
Quality: It was good. The chicken was tasty. But it was also kind of no different than any other pizza; if you put chicken, cheese, tomatoes, garlic and spices together, it's almost definitely going to be tasty.
Value: I think it was okay, but not stellar. I've had better value on this tour, I think.
Would go back: Maybe if I were less time pressured? Yeah, probably.
The food was actually tasty (!), but felt way too slow. I kind of had to rush, because the person I was eating with had a 1:00, and we were a few minutes late.
And honestly, this didn't feel like it deserved to cost $11 for what was basically pizza and salad.
I had: A chicken/cheese pide with a side salad
I paid: $8.48 + tax + tip = $11
Verdict:
Speed: This was a problem: slow to get us menus, slow to get our orders, slow to make the food. I kind of think that's the idea ("come, sit, eat, relax!"), but, well, I have a job.
Quality: It was good. The chicken was tasty. But it was also kind of no different than any other pizza; if you put chicken, cheese, tomatoes, garlic and spices together, it's almost definitely going to be tasty.
Value: I think it was okay, but not stellar. I've had better value on this tour, I think.
Would go back: Maybe if I were less time pressured? Yeah, probably.
Friday 2 November 2012
Da Won
Today I went with two colleagues, who had found the blog and commented on earlier entries.
We went to Da Won, which is the Korean place next to TCBY and Subway. (I still dread the fact that I have to go to TCBY on this tour. The '80s are over, and I no longer have to go to bad fro-yo places just to have a date away from the prying eyes of my parents. Anyhow.)
J. was very happy about getting pork bone soup, while O. and I both got hwaedupbap, which is basically little bits of raw fish over salad, with a spicy sauce.
I like this dish very much, and often get it at Tomu Sushi, at Erb and Amos, off campus. There, it's usually three or four different kinds of fish, plus a big bowl of salad with cucumber spears and red pepper and carrot, and a separate bowl of rice, plus miso. And a ketchup bottle full of hot sauce.
At Da Won, it had only one kind: salmon, and the salad was just lettuce with pickled carrot. And the rice was under the salad.
This was less exciting somehow. It was fun to have people to eat with (and they're both relatively recent hires in the School and it was good to spend time with them both), but the food didn't make me squeal with delight. That said, J. seemed very happy with his pork bone soup.
I had: hwaedupbap and barley tea
I paid: $13 including tax and tip
Verdict:
Speed: You know, with people I was talking with, the wait seemed less long. (No, this blog is not a blog about loneliness, I promise. I enjoy eating alone at lunch, too, and as my job is fairly talky, it's sometimes a great way of putting a pause in the middle of my day.) But I think it was fast.
Quality: I've had better, but it was fine. The banchan were in small portions considering that there were three of us. But I love kimchi, and my partner won't let me ferment it in our condo, so I only get it when I eat out.
Value: This wasn't super, either. I think if the salad had had more ingredients, or there were more and more different fish, I'd have been happy.
Would go back: Maybe? They had things on the menu that I also like, and I really love Korean food. Typically I go to Mirage, but it has a pretty small menu.
We went to Da Won, which is the Korean place next to TCBY and Subway. (I still dread the fact that I have to go to TCBY on this tour. The '80s are over, and I no longer have to go to bad fro-yo places just to have a date away from the prying eyes of my parents. Anyhow.)
J. was very happy about getting pork bone soup, while O. and I both got hwaedupbap, which is basically little bits of raw fish over salad, with a spicy sauce.
I like this dish very much, and often get it at Tomu Sushi, at Erb and Amos, off campus. There, it's usually three or four different kinds of fish, plus a big bowl of salad with cucumber spears and red pepper and carrot, and a separate bowl of rice, plus miso. And a ketchup bottle full of hot sauce.
At Da Won, it had only one kind: salmon, and the salad was just lettuce with pickled carrot. And the rice was under the salad.
This was less exciting somehow. It was fun to have people to eat with (and they're both relatively recent hires in the School and it was good to spend time with them both), but the food didn't make me squeal with delight. That said, J. seemed very happy with his pork bone soup.
I had: hwaedupbap and barley tea
I paid: $13 including tax and tip
Verdict:
Speed: You know, with people I was talking with, the wait seemed less long. (No, this blog is not a blog about loneliness, I promise. I enjoy eating alone at lunch, too, and as my job is fairly talky, it's sometimes a great way of putting a pause in the middle of my day.) But I think it was fast.
Quality: I've had better, but it was fine. The banchan were in small portions considering that there were three of us. But I love kimchi, and my partner won't let me ferment it in our condo, so I only get it when I eat out.
Value: This wasn't super, either. I think if the salad had had more ingredients, or there were more and more different fish, I'd have been happy.
Would go back: Maybe? They had things on the menu that I also like, and I really love Korean food. Typically I go to Mirage, but it has a pretty small menu.
Just N Pita
This is the quick service place at Al Madina.
Every time I go, I'm amazed at just how bad their workflow is.
Seriously.
Like, there's constantly people banging into each other, or weaving through each other, or accidentally cutting in line around each other.
It's exhausting for me, and I just eat there.
That said, my chicken shawarma was tasty. They have nine zillion possible toppings, but I just put tzatziki, garlic sauce (I think that's garlic mayo), tomatoes, onions, and a couple other things on it, plus hot sauce.
It was tasty. Maybe not as much tastier than Grab-A-Greek to justify the chaos, but it was tasty.
They have combos with fries and drinks, and they also have "chicken shawarma poutine", which is basically a works platter on fries with chicken on top, and they also have the same plate with salad instead of the fries. I've gotten the salad one, and it's roughly 2 meals' worth of food. Or one meal's, if you're a starving student, I suppose.
I had: a chicken shawarma
I paid: $6.99 plus tax
Verdict:
Speed: Dear me. Between waiting several minutes to pay, and then someone (entirely not his fault) cutting in line in front of me, and a bunch of people wanting "sandwiches" that were full of 25 different fillings (yay, undergrads), this took quite a while.
Quality: It was pretty good. I like their tzatziki.
Value: You know, I probably should've gotten one of the giant meals, but then last night, I made Mark Bittman's yummy wings with rice, and that was a meal I was glad to have room in my stomach for.
Would go back: Yeah, probably. This was actually a more forgettable meal than many of theirs are.
Every time I go, I'm amazed at just how bad their workflow is.
Seriously.
Like, there's constantly people banging into each other, or weaving through each other, or accidentally cutting in line around each other.
It's exhausting for me, and I just eat there.
That said, my chicken shawarma was tasty. They have nine zillion possible toppings, but I just put tzatziki, garlic sauce (I think that's garlic mayo), tomatoes, onions, and a couple other things on it, plus hot sauce.
It was tasty. Maybe not as much tastier than Grab-A-Greek to justify the chaos, but it was tasty.
They have combos with fries and drinks, and they also have "chicken shawarma poutine", which is basically a works platter on fries with chicken on top, and they also have the same plate with salad instead of the fries. I've gotten the salad one, and it's roughly 2 meals' worth of food. Or one meal's, if you're a starving student, I suppose.
I had: a chicken shawarma
I paid: $6.99 plus tax
Verdict:
Speed: Dear me. Between waiting several minutes to pay, and then someone (entirely not his fault) cutting in line in front of me, and a bunch of people wanting "sandwiches" that were full of 25 different fillings (yay, undergrads), this took quite a while.
Quality: It was pretty good. I like their tzatziki.
Value: You know, I probably should've gotten one of the giant meals, but then last night, I made Mark Bittman's yummy wings with rice, and that was a meal I was glad to have room in my stomach for.
Would go back: Yeah, probably. This was actually a more forgettable meal than many of theirs are.
Tuesday 30 October 2012
Golden Mango
I'm not even trying to get the dinners that consist of soggy deep-fried chicken in a strange-flavoured sauce. I order random things, and still get that meal.
Today I went to Golden Mango, which opened around a decade ago, not long after my arrival here at Waterloo, and which I ate at a single (disappointing) time. I remember that I was disappointed at the time by just how much my "Vietnamese" lunch missed of what I like about Vietnamese food: no cilantro, no mint, no fresh chili peppers, no zing of fish sauce. And I naïvely assumed I'd find that food with flavour would be common in a "Vietnamese" restaurant.
Well, I went back today, and ordered one of the lunch specials (#5, "mango chicken with rice and deep-fried wontons"). I really expected that the chicken would be stirfried breast meat, with mango pieces, maybe some garlic, maybe some scallions, and maybe a little chili heat. I really had no idea what to expect from the advertised wontons, and was hoping to avoid pork dumplings.
No worries there.
What I got was the aforementioned soggy deep-fried chicken in tart sauce alongside some weird pieces of mango, with red pepper (largely raw: it'd be neat if the plaza restaurants could figure out how to actually cook the food they claim to cook), served on yellow fried rice (which didn't even have frozen vegetable medley).
And the wontons were basically little pieces of deep-fried wonton wrapper sitting on top. That's it.
I guess I'm full. And still depressed.
I had: Combo #5: mango chicken with rice and deep-fried wontons
I paid: $6.75. (One hopes that they pay their taxes: have you noticed how many of the plaza restaurants don't actually use the register when you buy your food?)
Verdict:
Speed: Not super fast, especially since there were not-very-cooked parts of my meal.
Quality: Not at all exciting.
Value: I will admit that this was pretty cheap. Also, I did eat most of it: a lot of these meals have been enormous, but this was the right size.
Would go back: No.
Today I went to Golden Mango, which opened around a decade ago, not long after my arrival here at Waterloo, and which I ate at a single (disappointing) time. I remember that I was disappointed at the time by just how much my "Vietnamese" lunch missed of what I like about Vietnamese food: no cilantro, no mint, no fresh chili peppers, no zing of fish sauce. And I naïvely assumed I'd find that food with flavour would be common in a "Vietnamese" restaurant.
Well, I went back today, and ordered one of the lunch specials (#5, "mango chicken with rice and deep-fried wontons"). I really expected that the chicken would be stirfried breast meat, with mango pieces, maybe some garlic, maybe some scallions, and maybe a little chili heat. I really had no idea what to expect from the advertised wontons, and was hoping to avoid pork dumplings.
No worries there.
What I got was the aforementioned soggy deep-fried chicken in tart sauce alongside some weird pieces of mango, with red pepper (largely raw: it'd be neat if the plaza restaurants could figure out how to actually cook the food they claim to cook), served on yellow fried rice (which didn't even have frozen vegetable medley).
And the wontons were basically little pieces of deep-fried wonton wrapper sitting on top. That's it.
I guess I'm full. And still depressed.
I had: Combo #5: mango chicken with rice and deep-fried wontons
I paid: $6.75. (One hopes that they pay their taxes: have you noticed how many of the plaza restaurants don't actually use the register when you buy your food?)
Verdict:
Speed: Not super fast, especially since there were not-very-cooked parts of my meal.
Quality: Not at all exciting.
Value: I will admit that this was pretty cheap. Also, I did eat most of it: a lot of these meals have been enormous, but this was the right size.
Would go back: No.
Thursday 25 October 2012
Grab-A-Greek
This is a gyro-and-pita-and-such place that opened a few years ago. It's in the plaza a couple doors down from Panda King (which I thought was Panda Express).
I actually went there today because I really felt like rice pudding, which they sell.
But I also got a chicken souvlaki. It was good! (This feels like it deserves an exclamation mark because, well, this has felt like we were totally stuck in the doldrums with this blog.) Though, well, how much of the tastiness is because of the squirt of rooster sauce in the souvlaki? Really, how much tastiness in general is due to rooster sauce?
It was drippy and gooey, but I at least enjoyed it. That counts for a lot.
I had: A chicken souvlaki pita, a bottle of OJ, and a large rice pudding.
I paid: $10.66 with tax.
Verdict:
Speed: Pretty fast. The line moves at a good clip, and it's assembled in front of you.
Quality: I enjoyed it. The bread was tasty, and the chicken souvlaki mostly tasted of the tzatziki and rooster sauces, but, well, that's okay, I think.
Value: This wasn't cheap, but they do have pretty cheap specials.
Would go back: Yeah, I would. The rice pudding was comforting.
I actually went there today because I really felt like rice pudding, which they sell.
But I also got a chicken souvlaki. It was good! (This feels like it deserves an exclamation mark because, well, this has felt like we were totally stuck in the doldrums with this blog.) Though, well, how much of the tastiness is because of the squirt of rooster sauce in the souvlaki? Really, how much tastiness in general is due to rooster sauce?
It was drippy and gooey, but I at least enjoyed it. That counts for a lot.
I had: A chicken souvlaki pita, a bottle of OJ, and a large rice pudding.
I paid: $10.66 with tax.
Verdict:
Speed: Pretty fast. The line moves at a good clip, and it's assembled in front of you.
Quality: I enjoyed it. The bread was tasty, and the chicken souvlaki mostly tasted of the tzatziki and rooster sauces, but, well, that's okay, I think.
Value: This wasn't cheap, but they do have pretty cheap specials.
Would go back: Yeah, I would. The rice pudding was comforting.
Monday 22 October 2012
Mikey's Eatery
So, why is "sesame chicken" entirely un-sesame-tasting? I mean, there's a handful of sesame seeds floating on it, but it's mostly unidentified deep-fried chicken bits in a salty sauce. It's practically Chicken McNuggets post-dipping-sauce, except I don't eat them. Why do I eat this? The McNuggets are probably tastier.
The "fried rice" that goes with them is in no way fried; it just lives on a steam table. It also features frozen vegetable medley, that international mix of peas, corn and carrot bits that seems to be necessary in order to make something unhealthy "healthy". Mostly, it's flavourless.
And the supply of mixed veggies was, of course our old friends broccoli and carrots, accompanied in this case by cabbage, instead of onion or green pepper. (The former is cheap, but the latter is not.)
This meal made me actively question my willingness to complete this project. I actually liked Waterloo SOGO, and I can't go back until after I eat another dozen (probably more) bad meals. This makes me sad.
But at least Mel's will re-open in there, too.
I had: Lunch special with sesame chicken and a can of ginger ale
I paid: $7.90
Verdict:
Speed: It's steam table food (again).
Quality: Not really great. I didn't question my will to live, but I did question my will to finish this project.
Value: Lots of meh food for not much money. What I'd give for a meal that gave me less food, but better!
Would go back: No.
The "fried rice" that goes with them is in no way fried; it just lives on a steam table. It also features frozen vegetable medley, that international mix of peas, corn and carrot bits that seems to be necessary in order to make something unhealthy "healthy". Mostly, it's flavourless.
And the supply of mixed veggies was, of course our old friends broccoli and carrots, accompanied in this case by cabbage, instead of onion or green pepper. (The former is cheap, but the latter is not.)
This meal made me actively question my willingness to complete this project. I actually liked Waterloo SOGO, and I can't go back until after I eat another dozen (probably more) bad meals. This makes me sad.
But at least Mel's will re-open in there, too.
I had: Lunch special with sesame chicken and a can of ginger ale
I paid: $7.90
Verdict:
Speed: It's steam table food (again).
Quality: Not really great. I didn't question my will to live, but I did question my will to finish this project.
Value: Lots of meh food for not much money. What I'd give for a meal that gave me less food, but better!
Would go back: No.
Thursday 18 October 2012
Vegetarian Fast Food Restaurant
This place is between Kismet and The Grill. It is moderately fast. It includes plenty of non-vegetarian food on its menu.
It's strikingly cheap, and while the food is somewhat (okay, very) one-note, it's at least not, well, bad. It also didn't feel like I'd been given starch with starch with starch. Instead, my lemongrass chicken did have some lemongrass flavour.
Mostly, we're in that long stretch of mehness: I wish there were cilantro in it, or chives, or garlic, or something. I wish the veggies were more exciting than boring carrots, boring broccoli and boring cauliflower.
I also wish to go to the festival. But instead, I went to the Vegetarian Fast Food Restaurant, and had chicken.
I had: #109, lemongrass chicken with veggies and rice
I paid: $7
Verdict:
Speed: OK, but not super-fast. They have steam tables, but there was almost no food in them.
Quality: Meh. There was lemongrass flavour, but the chicken was kind of bland bits of nothing special, and the veggies were in pieces that hadn't actually done much more than steam. The sauce was generic-soy-y-gravy. Meh.
Value: Pretty much average for the Chinese places in the plaza.
Would go back: I just can't think of why.
It's strikingly cheap, and while the food is somewhat (okay, very) one-note, it's at least not, well, bad. It also didn't feel like I'd been given starch with starch with starch. Instead, my lemongrass chicken did have some lemongrass flavour.
Mostly, we're in that long stretch of mehness: I wish there were cilantro in it, or chives, or garlic, or something. I wish the veggies were more exciting than boring carrots, boring broccoli and boring cauliflower.
I also wish to go to the festival. But instead, I went to the Vegetarian Fast Food Restaurant, and had chicken.
I had: #109, lemongrass chicken with veggies and rice
I paid: $7
Verdict:
Speed: OK, but not super-fast. They have steam tables, but there was almost no food in them.
Quality: Meh. There was lemongrass flavour, but the chicken was kind of bland bits of nothing special, and the veggies were in pieces that hadn't actually done much more than steam. The sauce was generic-soy-y-gravy. Meh.
Value: Pretty much average for the Chinese places in the plaza.
Would go back: I just can't think of why.
Monday 15 October 2012
Panda King
See, I even wanted this to be an easy return, after I'd been in Portugal these past ten days. I figured I'd just go to Panda Express, get some simple takeout, it'd be largely inoffensive, and no big deal.
Unfortunately, today's Panda Express was much worse than usual.
All I got was General Tso's chicken and some mixed veggies with tofu, on fried rice.
The Tso's is soggy and not spicy and not interesting. You could probably convince me that it was any other deep-fried-chicken dish. Except, well, it's mostly just soggy.
The mixed veggies are steamed, but not even fully steamed. I do like broccoli and carrots, but that's basically it, except for some blah tofu.
Really, this is a lot more disappointing than what I usually get from them. Maybe their cook is depressed on Mondays.
Unfortunately, this made this Monday more depressing.
I had: Combo #2: mixed veggies with tofu and General Tso's chicken on fried rice
I paid: $7.49+tax
Verdict:
Speed: Already made: this is steam table food.
Quality: Really disappointing. Soggy chicken. Boring. Undercooked, in the case of the veggies.
Value: It's a lot of food, but it's so boring that I'm not finishing it. "Veggies" could be more than broccoli and carrots.
Would go back: Actually, probably not for a while. This really wasn't good.
Unfortunately, today's Panda Express was much worse than usual.
All I got was General Tso's chicken and some mixed veggies with tofu, on fried rice.
The Tso's is soggy and not spicy and not interesting. You could probably convince me that it was any other deep-fried-chicken dish. Except, well, it's mostly just soggy.
The mixed veggies are steamed, but not even fully steamed. I do like broccoli and carrots, but that's basically it, except for some blah tofu.
Really, this is a lot more disappointing than what I usually get from them. Maybe their cook is depressed on Mondays.
Unfortunately, this made this Monday more depressing.
I had: Combo #2: mixed veggies with tofu and General Tso's chicken on fried rice
I paid: $7.49+tax
Verdict:
Speed: Already made: this is steam table food.
Quality: Really disappointing. Soggy chicken. Boring. Undercooked, in the case of the veggies.
Value: It's a lot of food, but it's so boring that I'm not finishing it. "Veggies" could be more than broccoli and carrots.
Would go back: Actually, probably not for a while. This really wasn't good.
Tuesday 2 October 2012
The Grill Burger Kitchen
I think this is the new name of the 6-or-so-year-old burger joint in the plaza. They've remodeled as well, though really, it feels surprisingly unchanged despite the new paint and new furniture. The menu is slightly more comprehensible, though.
The burgers here are fine, and today's batch of fries was not soggy (which has been my issue with times I've been there in the past several years). I think they're better at Fratburger, down the street by WLU, but I probably also think that because Fratburger is licensed and has Grasshöpper on tap, and I like Grasshöpper, even though I also vaguely object to the fact that it is one of the beers I drink that always seem to come with a slice of citrus fruit attached to them.
Where was I? Oh, right. The Grill.
I think this place did help, a lot, when it joined the plaza a bunch of years ago: the fries, in particular, were really good, and a 2-person lunch, where you each got a burger and split an order of fries, was not bad. Maybe I'm just tired of burger and fries (dear me, what the hell am I going to do when I get to Burger King, and to Harvey's?), but this feels not so exciting. I think part of the issue is that yes, I do eat veggie burgers at burger joints, and the one here just isn't that exciting. But I remember getting their turkey burger, and having it be dry and flavourless. The one at Fratburger is tasty.
So I guess we're back at our usual rating for the plaza: meh.
I had: A "Big Kahuna" veggie burger (with swiss and a small piece of flavourless grilled pineapple), in the combo with a small order of fries and a ginger ale.
I paid: $9.20.
Verdict:
Speed: Fine. My student, whom I was eating with, had to wait a little while for the chicken fingers in his wrap to get out of the deep fryer, but this was certainly reasonable in speed.
Quality: The veggie burger is boring. I realize that most of you will say, "duh", but the problem was that so was the grilled pineapple, which I'd hoped might make this more interesting.
Value: Worth $9? I guess. In Fortune Cookie Chronicles, Jennifer 8 Lee (yes, that's her real name) comments that white people like going out for Chinese food in part because then their meal includes vegetables. I kind of felt that way after today's lunch. Not fat, just, well, unbalanced. I realize that I am speaking ill of the holy trinity in saying that I don't view burger-and-fries-and-a-drink as a brilliant meal, but it just isn't my favourite. But maybe that doesn't really speak to value? Hm.
Would go back: I hadn't been in probably six months, and I expect that's likely to be my usual pattern. Fratburger is substantially more expensive, but I really do think it's tastier, and it's just one iXpress stop away.
The burgers here are fine, and today's batch of fries was not soggy (which has been my issue with times I've been there in the past several years). I think they're better at Fratburger, down the street by WLU, but I probably also think that because Fratburger is licensed and has Grasshöpper on tap, and I like Grasshöpper, even though I also vaguely object to the fact that it is one of the beers I drink that always seem to come with a slice of citrus fruit attached to them.
Where was I? Oh, right. The Grill.
I think this place did help, a lot, when it joined the plaza a bunch of years ago: the fries, in particular, were really good, and a 2-person lunch, where you each got a burger and split an order of fries, was not bad. Maybe I'm just tired of burger and fries (dear me, what the hell am I going to do when I get to Burger King, and to Harvey's?), but this feels not so exciting. I think part of the issue is that yes, I do eat veggie burgers at burger joints, and the one here just isn't that exciting. But I remember getting their turkey burger, and having it be dry and flavourless. The one at Fratburger is tasty.
So I guess we're back at our usual rating for the plaza: meh.
I had: A "Big Kahuna" veggie burger (with swiss and a small piece of flavourless grilled pineapple), in the combo with a small order of fries and a ginger ale.
I paid: $9.20.
Verdict:
Speed: Fine. My student, whom I was eating with, had to wait a little while for the chicken fingers in his wrap to get out of the deep fryer, but this was certainly reasonable in speed.
Quality: The veggie burger is boring. I realize that most of you will say, "duh", but the problem was that so was the grilled pineapple, which I'd hoped might make this more interesting.
Value: Worth $9? I guess. In Fortune Cookie Chronicles, Jennifer 8 Lee (yes, that's her real name) comments that white people like going out for Chinese food in part because then their meal includes vegetables. I kind of felt that way after today's lunch. Not fat, just, well, unbalanced. I realize that I am speaking ill of the holy trinity in saying that I don't view burger-and-fries-and-a-drink as a brilliant meal, but it just isn't my favourite. But maybe that doesn't really speak to value? Hm.
Would go back: I hadn't been in probably six months, and I expect that's likely to be my usual pattern. Fratburger is substantially more expensive, but I really do think it's tastier, and it's just one iXpress stop away.
Monday 1 October 2012
Marble Slab Creamery
I'm sorry I keep neglecting you folk. Thursday last week, the building I live in had an open house for realtors, which included tasty free food, and on Friday, I was at the Ontario University Fair, and after my shift, I had a very nice sushi lunch. And today, I was not in the plaza for lunch.
But!
Tonight I craved ice cream, so we went to Marble Slab. In the plaza! For my people! Er...
Anyhow, I'm really glad they now have a "small", which is 5 oz of ice cream. Previously, the "regular" was 8 oz, and that's seriously a lot of ice cream, particularly since their ice cream is 13% fat.
I think it's probably somehow déclassé, but I actually like this ice cream, and I have since they moved in. It's kind of anti-gelato (Gelato Fresco is more like 7% fat), but I enjoy the rich flavour of Marble Slab, and I like its texture.
It varies a lot what I get there: often, I get the fruit flavours, with fruit mixins, but this time, it was mocha, with coconut flakes added. I enjoyed it, and we had a good walk around campus with the dog. She enjoyed sniffing at trees and trash. All told, not a bad evening.
I had: A small cone of mocha ice cream, mixed with coconut flakes
I paid: $5.40.
Verdict:
Speed: Fine. It's made in front of you, so the preparation is part of the "entertainment" aspect of your ice cream.
Quality: So, this isn't brilliant, and it's "made in store", but I'm pretty sure that the "making" consists of dropping a bunch of mixes into ice cream freezers: Marble Slab is a franchise business. It's certainly consistent.
Value: Well, super-rich ice cream is expensive, and buying small-sized cones is the least money-efficient way to get it. They do sell by the litre and half litre, and I probably should just bring some of that home some time. I don't feel ripped off, though. Partly, it's expensive because the Canadian Dairy Board keeps milk and cream prices in Canada amazingly high.
Would go back: Yeah, sure. I probably should be more excited about either of the two gelato places here, but sometimes, you gotta eat the fattening stuff.
[And, sadly, because of this blog, I'll be eating at TCBY, before too long...]
But!
Tonight I craved ice cream, so we went to Marble Slab. In the plaza! For my people! Er...
Anyhow, I'm really glad they now have a "small", which is 5 oz of ice cream. Previously, the "regular" was 8 oz, and that's seriously a lot of ice cream, particularly since their ice cream is 13% fat.
I think it's probably somehow déclassé, but I actually like this ice cream, and I have since they moved in. It's kind of anti-gelato (Gelato Fresco is more like 7% fat), but I enjoy the rich flavour of Marble Slab, and I like its texture.
It varies a lot what I get there: often, I get the fruit flavours, with fruit mixins, but this time, it was mocha, with coconut flakes added. I enjoyed it, and we had a good walk around campus with the dog. She enjoyed sniffing at trees and trash. All told, not a bad evening.
I had: A small cone of mocha ice cream, mixed with coconut flakes
I paid: $5.40.
Verdict:
Speed: Fine. It's made in front of you, so the preparation is part of the "entertainment" aspect of your ice cream.
Quality: So, this isn't brilliant, and it's "made in store", but I'm pretty sure that the "making" consists of dropping a bunch of mixes into ice cream freezers: Marble Slab is a franchise business. It's certainly consistent.
Value: Well, super-rich ice cream is expensive, and buying small-sized cones is the least money-efficient way to get it. They do sell by the litre and half litre, and I probably should just bring some of that home some time. I don't feel ripped off, though. Partly, it's expensive because the Canadian Dairy Board keeps milk and cream prices in Canada amazingly high.
Would go back: Yeah, sure. I probably should be more excited about either of the two gelato places here, but sometimes, you gotta eat the fattening stuff.
[And, sadly, because of this blog, I'll be eating at TCBY, before too long...]
Tuesday 25 September 2012
Aunty's Cafe
This one's in the same plaza as McGinnis Front Row. I think it may have changed names recently? Not sure. I vaguely remember a juice bar in that storefront, previously.
This place is Pakistani, I think: biryanis, UK-style curries, and shawarmas and the type. After yesterday's debacle, I actually asked, "what's good?", and when I said I wanted spicy food, I was steered to the chicken biryani. Foolishly, I got the combo with naan, but it's my fault I got rice with bread.
I wouldn't say it was very spicy, but it was pretty good. Anise, clove, bay (I think? I don't think it was curry leaves), maybe some cinnamon in the rice seasonings. It came with a spicy raita (in a shot glass!), which did make it more flavourful. The chicken was a drumstick, and was decent if unexciting. (Fun fact: drumsticks are now the cheapest part of the chicken, now that wings are so popular.)
The combo includes a drink, so I did get a bottle of mango juice. I think this is one of those places where it's impossible to get water not in a bottle (grr!); it also has no visible bathroom (nor, really, even a place for one to exist).
I had: chicken biryani, naan, mango juice
I paid: $8.48
Verdict:
Speed: Excellent: my food was ready as I finished paying. (Then again, this isn't hard: biryani is a casserole...)
Quality: Tasty. Vegetables would make this meal better, but again, it was my own damn fault that I got it with naan, not salad. (I also could've gotten it with fries, and then I'd be even more full than I am.)
Value: Pretty good. I mean, it's not exactly expensive ingredients: rice plus oil plus spices plus a chicken drumstick. But I don't feel ripped off at all; I'm quite full.
Would go back: Maybe. It was pretty crowded (there are very, very few tables), and I was there before noon. I don't know what it's like in the middle of lunchtime.
This place is Pakistani, I think: biryanis, UK-style curries, and shawarmas and the type. After yesterday's debacle, I actually asked, "what's good?", and when I said I wanted spicy food, I was steered to the chicken biryani. Foolishly, I got the combo with naan, but it's my fault I got rice with bread.
I wouldn't say it was very spicy, but it was pretty good. Anise, clove, bay (I think? I don't think it was curry leaves), maybe some cinnamon in the rice seasonings. It came with a spicy raita (in a shot glass!), which did make it more flavourful. The chicken was a drumstick, and was decent if unexciting. (Fun fact: drumsticks are now the cheapest part of the chicken, now that wings are so popular.)
The combo includes a drink, so I did get a bottle of mango juice. I think this is one of those places where it's impossible to get water not in a bottle (grr!); it also has no visible bathroom (nor, really, even a place for one to exist).
I had: chicken biryani, naan, mango juice
I paid: $8.48
Verdict:
Speed: Excellent: my food was ready as I finished paying. (Then again, this isn't hard: biryani is a casserole...)
Quality: Tasty. Vegetables would make this meal better, but again, it was my own damn fault that I got it with naan, not salad. (I also could've gotten it with fries, and then I'd be even more full than I am.)
Value: Pretty good. I mean, it's not exactly expensive ingredients: rice plus oil plus spices plus a chicken drumstick. But I don't feel ripped off at all; I'm quite full.
Would go back: Maybe. It was pretty crowded (there are very, very few tables), and I was there before noon. I don't know what it's like in the middle of lunchtime.
Monday 24 September 2012
Waterloo Star
This is one of the numerous Chinese places in the plaza. I don't typically go to many of these, mostly because none of my Chinese colleagues have definitively told me, "this one is the right one".
I'd never been to this one before. It's pretty generic from the outside: formica tables, cheap chairs, a counter, nothing special on the walls. Pretty bare-bones.
It took a long time to get a menu, and even longer to successfully order; I think that the people who arrived after me (and got fed before me) likely ordered their usual when they arrived. I was a little annoyed, though, as it was a long wait.
I ordered "chicken with mushrooms" casserole. This basically was a soup/stew with a bunch of cut up chicken legs and thighs (bone-in, skin-on, quite a few pieces were just bone) in a brown stock that had a bunch of re-hydrated black mushrooms, a small amount of bok choy, and some glass noodles. The stock was meaty, but not especially flavourful, except maybe some star anise, and perhaps some clove or Sichuan pepper (I know they're different, but they both anesthetize the tongue). It was also served with a bowl of white rice.
This isn't a way I like to eat, and I really didn't care for this meal. It's very hard to eat chicken on bones without a place to put the bones (I just tossed them back in the stock), and the mushrooms weren't very appealing (sometimes, rehydrated mushrooms come out with a good tender texture, but much of this was stringy and inedible).
I suppose I should have gotten white people Chinese food (say, kung pao chicken, or the like, which was on the menu), but there were a lot of these casseroles going around to people, and I figured that I might be happy, as when I went to Waterloo SOGO a couple weeks back.
I've been told by European and Asian colleagues and friends that the preference that North Americans have for meat without bones is somehow juvenile, and indeed, I kind of think there's some validity to that. (Query: where on the body of a chicken is to be found the "nugget" or the "finger"?) But this meal really was hard to eat: each piece of chicken (and there were probably a couple dozen) had very little meat on it, and a bunch of bone. It also just wasn't that tasty.
I had: #51, Chicken and mushroom casserole
I paid: $13 including tax and tip
Verdict:
Speed: not acceptable, particularly given that I was on cup #2 of tea before my order was taken. I almost missed my 1:30
Quality: this just isn't food I enjoyed, but on top of that, I'm not convinced they're using very good ingredients. Chicken fatty, not meaty; mushrooms not edible even post-rehydration
Value: Not very good
Would go back: No.
I'd never been to this one before. It's pretty generic from the outside: formica tables, cheap chairs, a counter, nothing special on the walls. Pretty bare-bones.
It took a long time to get a menu, and even longer to successfully order; I think that the people who arrived after me (and got fed before me) likely ordered their usual when they arrived. I was a little annoyed, though, as it was a long wait.
I ordered "chicken with mushrooms" casserole. This basically was a soup/stew with a bunch of cut up chicken legs and thighs (bone-in, skin-on, quite a few pieces were just bone) in a brown stock that had a bunch of re-hydrated black mushrooms, a small amount of bok choy, and some glass noodles. The stock was meaty, but not especially flavourful, except maybe some star anise, and perhaps some clove or Sichuan pepper (I know they're different, but they both anesthetize the tongue). It was also served with a bowl of white rice.
This isn't a way I like to eat, and I really didn't care for this meal. It's very hard to eat chicken on bones without a place to put the bones (I just tossed them back in the stock), and the mushrooms weren't very appealing (sometimes, rehydrated mushrooms come out with a good tender texture, but much of this was stringy and inedible).
I suppose I should have gotten white people Chinese food (say, kung pao chicken, or the like, which was on the menu), but there were a lot of these casseroles going around to people, and I figured that I might be happy, as when I went to Waterloo SOGO a couple weeks back.
I've been told by European and Asian colleagues and friends that the preference that North Americans have for meat without bones is somehow juvenile, and indeed, I kind of think there's some validity to that. (Query: where on the body of a chicken is to be found the "nugget" or the "finger"?) But this meal really was hard to eat: each piece of chicken (and there were probably a couple dozen) had very little meat on it, and a bunch of bone. It also just wasn't that tasty.
I had: #51, Chicken and mushroom casserole
I paid: $13 including tax and tip
Verdict:
Speed: not acceptable, particularly given that I was on cup #2 of tea before my order was taken. I almost missed my 1:30
Quality: this just isn't food I enjoyed, but on top of that, I'm not convinced they're using very good ingredients. Chicken fatty, not meaty; mushrooms not edible even post-rehydration
Value: Not very good
Would go back: No.
Thursday 20 September 2012
Three other lunches
This turns out to be a bad week for this blog: I had lunch Tuesday at the Grad House on campus, Wednesday at Bread Heads in downtown Kitchener, and today at the University Club. Tomorrow we have our annual Cheriton Symposium, where we celebrate all the ways that David Cheriton's gift to the School has improved our research, and that will also have a dinner.
We'll resume normal service next week...unless you folk want reviews of non-plaza restaurants. Let me know.
We'll resume normal service next week...unless you folk want reviews of non-plaza restaurants. Let me know.
Monday 17 September 2012
Chen's
This is the place in the plaza right next to Mongolian. I feel old to remember when it was a computer store, Back When.
I've been getting food from there for quite a while, though it's not exactly exciting. Perhaps it's better if one doesn't get white people Chinese food, but regardless, I did get General Tso's chicken with rice. (Yes, I do know that that dish has a surprisingly complicated history. And yes, I realize that what's in Canadian restaurants bears only the most vague resemblance to what's in China. And fortune cookies are Japanese.)
Overall, it was a little less crunchy than it should've been, but the sauce is properly garlicky/gingery/spicy. The book cited before says that General Tso's in the US typically includes broccoli ("white people love broccoli"), but this one had green pepper instead.
This isn't great food, but I guess it's lunch. I had really terrific food in some of the places in Slovenia. And now I am home.
I had: General Tso's chicken and rice
I paid: $7.90
Verdict:
Speed: Surprisingly fast. I was reading something on my phone, and my food appeared way faster than I expected
Quality: Not bad; at least it's flavourful, but the chicken isn't great, and wasn't yummy.
Value: It's pretty cheap, and there are other comparably cheap things on the menu. It feels like a big lunch.
Would go back: Yeah, probably? I'm jetlagged, and wanted someplace I didn't have to walk far to get to. But this ain't great.
I've been getting food from there for quite a while, though it's not exactly exciting. Perhaps it's better if one doesn't get white people Chinese food, but regardless, I did get General Tso's chicken with rice. (Yes, I do know that that dish has a surprisingly complicated history. And yes, I realize that what's in Canadian restaurants bears only the most vague resemblance to what's in China. And fortune cookies are Japanese.)
Overall, it was a little less crunchy than it should've been, but the sauce is properly garlicky/gingery/spicy. The book cited before says that General Tso's in the US typically includes broccoli ("white people love broccoli"), but this one had green pepper instead.
This isn't great food, but I guess it's lunch. I had really terrific food in some of the places in Slovenia. And now I am home.
I had: General Tso's chicken and rice
I paid: $7.90
Verdict:
Speed: Surprisingly fast. I was reading something on my phone, and my food appeared way faster than I expected
Quality: Not bad; at least it's flavourful, but the chicken isn't great, and wasn't yummy.
Value: It's pretty cheap, and there are other comparably cheap things on the menu. It feels like a big lunch.
Would go back: Yeah, probably? I'm jetlagged, and wanted someplace I didn't have to walk far to get to. But this ain't great.
Thursday 6 September 2012
Kismet
It's a Bengali place, but I think the food still largely fits the UK curry pattern. Today's lunch was the "fairly hot" chicken pathia, which wikipedia tells me is a UK curry, not from the subcontinent.
Regardless, it's tasty, but not exciting: it's sour, sweet and hot, but also kind of thin: I think it's primarily a tomato-based curry, but there's nothing to it other than just five hunks of (fairly dry) chicken breast floating in a sea of sauce: no potatoes or other veggies, say. I had it with garlic naan, which I do like, but I kind of wish there were more to pick up with the bread!
This place has existed for quite a while, and is a spinoff of a no-longer-controlled-by-them restaurant on Phillip Street (my lunch companion suggested that we should actually draw a map of which restaurants share origins with which other ones).
Having gone many times, I can note that I really should just stop getting the lunch curries: a tastier lunch, for example, is the mulligatawny with a handful of onion bhajia, say. I'm not sure why I always get curry with garlic naan.
I had: chicken pathia with garlic naan
I paid: Well, I didn't; my companion did. But I think he paid $24 for his lunch and mine, and he had a lassi
Verdict:
Speed: Good, and it usually is. We had a lot to talk about, but the food probably arrived within 8 minutes or so.
Quality: Not bad, but not brilliant. I'd prefer it if their meat curries were more veggie-heavy; it otherwise feels kind of like a few hunks of meat in soup.
Value: I don't think it's great, honestly: the cost of putting together the various curry sauces isn't that high, as they don't include expensive ingredients. And there's not a lot of meat in the meat curries, either. That's part of why I don't go all that often.
Would go back: I go roughly every few months, and I expect that'll continue.
Regardless, it's tasty, but not exciting: it's sour, sweet and hot, but also kind of thin: I think it's primarily a tomato-based curry, but there's nothing to it other than just five hunks of (fairly dry) chicken breast floating in a sea of sauce: no potatoes or other veggies, say. I had it with garlic naan, which I do like, but I kind of wish there were more to pick up with the bread!
This place has existed for quite a while, and is a spinoff of a no-longer-controlled-by-them restaurant on Phillip Street (my lunch companion suggested that we should actually draw a map of which restaurants share origins with which other ones).
Having gone many times, I can note that I really should just stop getting the lunch curries: a tastier lunch, for example, is the mulligatawny with a handful of onion bhajia, say. I'm not sure why I always get curry with garlic naan.
I had: chicken pathia with garlic naan
I paid: Well, I didn't; my companion did. But I think he paid $24 for his lunch and mine, and he had a lassi
Verdict:
Speed: Good, and it usually is. We had a lot to talk about, but the food probably arrived within 8 minutes or so.
Quality: Not bad, but not brilliant. I'd prefer it if their meat curries were more veggie-heavy; it otherwise feels kind of like a few hunks of meat in soup.
Value: I don't think it's great, honestly: the cost of putting together the various curry sauces isn't that high, as they don't include expensive ingredients. And there's not a lot of meat in the meat curries, either. That's part of why I don't go all that often.
Would go back: I go roughly every few months, and I expect that'll continue.
Tuesday 4 September 2012
Admin note
Gosh. I seem to have been reddit'd. Huh. Can I just note how depressing it is that probably more people will read this blog than the vast majority of my papers. *sigh*
I'll likely not post here most Wednesdays, as work at home on those days. And this Thursday, I leave for a week in Europe, so we'll have a disruption then as well.
After I've fully eaten the plaza, I might start posting reviews of other food around here, but for the time being, we'll stick to the original mission.
I'll likely not post here most Wednesdays, as work at home on those days. And this Thursday, I leave for a week in Europe, so we'll have a disruption then as well.
After I've fully eaten the plaza, I might start posting reviews of other food around here, but for the time being, we'll stick to the original mission.
Waterloo SOGO
This is a new place in the plaza; it's in the space that used to be Iron Chef.
My understanding is that this is connected to an existing place in a NW Waterloo neighbourhood I don't go to much.
I asked, and they're serving food from Shanxi (or maybe Shaanxi; I guess they're next to each other); I'm sure I can't hear the difference between those words.
I had a bowl of cold steamed rice noodles with cucumber in a sauce that tasted of rice vinegar, sesame, soy, cilantro and scallion, and had a handful of roasted soybeans. It was also pretty spicy. And quite tasty. Cold noodles are refreshing.
I also had a crepe; they make them filled with egg, scallion, a salty brown sauce, and crunchy pieces of what is probably deep-fried crepe batter. (This is kind of like the postmodern pancakes at Shopsin's, in NYC.) This was less exciting; it vaguely reminded me of the taste and experience of eating takoyaki in Japan, but without the yummy pieces of octopus.
Still, this is a welcome place to add to the plaza: it's Chinese food that isn't from the standard menu that we always see. Seems quite busy, but today is the first day of Orientation, and so everyone's back on campus. There were very few people speaking English at the restaurant.
I had: A bowl of cold noodles and a Chinese crepe
I paid: $10, including tax and tip
Verdict:
Speed: Pretty good. They sat me at the bar (which made me somewhat wistful, because I remember the previous tenants), and brought me the noodles first, and then a few minutes later, the cook, who was right in front of me, finished making my crepe and handed it to me.
Quality: This was good food. There are other cold noodle dishes I like more (I think I prefer peanut sauces to this more vinegar-y sauce), but it was refreshing. The crepe was messy to eat, but I enjoyed it.
Value: I kind of wasn't sure if I needed more food than the bowl of noodles. They have lots of small things on the menu (congee, etc.), but I decided I'd get both the noodles and the crepe. That wasn't a cheap lunch, in the end, but I think it might have been okay with just one or the other.
Would go back: Yes. I just wonder if it'll get slammed once school starts in earnest next week.
My understanding is that this is connected to an existing place in a NW Waterloo neighbourhood I don't go to much.
I asked, and they're serving food from Shanxi (or maybe Shaanxi; I guess they're next to each other); I'm sure I can't hear the difference between those words.
I had a bowl of cold steamed rice noodles with cucumber in a sauce that tasted of rice vinegar, sesame, soy, cilantro and scallion, and had a handful of roasted soybeans. It was also pretty spicy. And quite tasty. Cold noodles are refreshing.
I also had a crepe; they make them filled with egg, scallion, a salty brown sauce, and crunchy pieces of what is probably deep-fried crepe batter. (This is kind of like the postmodern pancakes at Shopsin's, in NYC.) This was less exciting; it vaguely reminded me of the taste and experience of eating takoyaki in Japan, but without the yummy pieces of octopus.
Still, this is a welcome place to add to the plaza: it's Chinese food that isn't from the standard menu that we always see. Seems quite busy, but today is the first day of Orientation, and so everyone's back on campus. There were very few people speaking English at the restaurant.
I had: A bowl of cold noodles and a Chinese crepe
I paid: $10, including tax and tip
Verdict:
Speed: Pretty good. They sat me at the bar (which made me somewhat wistful, because I remember the previous tenants), and brought me the noodles first, and then a few minutes later, the cook, who was right in front of me, finished making my crepe and handed it to me.
Quality: This was good food. There are other cold noodle dishes I like more (I think I prefer peanut sauces to this more vinegar-y sauce), but it was refreshing. The crepe was messy to eat, but I enjoyed it.
Value: I kind of wasn't sure if I needed more food than the bowl of noodles. They have lots of small things on the menu (congee, etc.), but I decided I'd get both the noodles and the crepe. That wasn't a cheap lunch, in the end, but I think it might have been okay with just one or the other.
Would go back: Yes. I just wonder if it'll get slammed once school starts in earnest next week.
Friday 31 August 2012
Sweet Dreams
I actually like eating here, and when I asked the owner today if it'd been 11 years, she said, "no, 13!" And then we joked about how we were both in our 30s, and it was a fun moment. I don't go all the time, but it's tasty.
I am told that the soup they use is beef-based, but I'm pretending not to hear that (I don't eat mammal), much as a vegan friend, a long time ago, pretended not to hear me when I told him that Ethiopian food is cooked with clarified butter.
I wish it were a little quieter in the restaurant; it's one of the ones where I consider wearing earplugs. But I guess there's not much to be done: they do make blender drinks.
I don't like bubble tea, but they also do serve regular tea (though too hot), and so I'm always happy with that.
This isn't exactly a seasonal meal, as it's 30C outside and I had a large bowl of soup for lunch. But I'm certainly happier with it than with any of the other four I've so far blogged here.
I had: spicy ramen with fish balls and veggie dumplings, a cup of jasmine tea.
I paid: $6.77 + tip
Verdict:
Speed: Not super fast, and this is sometimes the biggest problem with Sweet Dreams. Today was fine.
Quality: It's not earth-shattering, but the soup is tasty. There's a sameness, and the only vegetable in it is the bok choy. But I've had much worse. This week, even.
Value: Pretty good, actually. I'm quite full, and I carried most of my cup of tea back to the office with me to nurse through the afternoon.
Would go back: Yes, unless someone shows me the beef bones they're using to make the soup broth. Hint: please don't.
I am told that the soup they use is beef-based, but I'm pretending not to hear that (I don't eat mammal), much as a vegan friend, a long time ago, pretended not to hear me when I told him that Ethiopian food is cooked with clarified butter.
I wish it were a little quieter in the restaurant; it's one of the ones where I consider wearing earplugs. But I guess there's not much to be done: they do make blender drinks.
I don't like bubble tea, but they also do serve regular tea (though too hot), and so I'm always happy with that.
This isn't exactly a seasonal meal, as it's 30C outside and I had a large bowl of soup for lunch. But I'm certainly happier with it than with any of the other four I've so far blogged here.
I had: spicy ramen with fish balls and veggie dumplings, a cup of jasmine tea.
I paid: $6.77 + tip
Verdict:
Speed: Not super fast, and this is sometimes the biggest problem with Sweet Dreams. Today was fine.
Quality: It's not earth-shattering, but the soup is tasty. There's a sameness, and the only vegetable in it is the bok choy. But I've had much worse. This week, even.
Value: Pretty good, actually. I'm quite full, and I carried most of my cup of tea back to the office with me to nurse through the afternoon.
Would go back: Yes, unless someone shows me the beef bones they're using to make the soup broth. Hint: please don't.
Thursday 30 August 2012
Subway
I don't know why I just went there. The dude in front of me in line was practicing his martial arts. (Seriously.) It smells like Subway, that not-really-yeasty-but-still-kind-of-bready smell. I don't like that smell.
My sub. Um, did I just actually eat something, aside from the bag of Sun Chips? (Why are Sun Chips "better for you" than regular chips? I mean, yes, they're tasty, featuring both salt and "autolyzed yeast extract" ~ MSG, but still...)
Um, I think it had turkey in it, and some random mayonnaise-chipotle-y sauce. I guess it's mildly fusion-tastic to have that on the parmesan-oregano bread, but I've seen someone else get a chicken teriyaki sub there with similar saucing and bread, so I'm a piker by comparison.
Meh.
I had: a turkey sub with a bag of chips.
I paid: $5.90; it was the $4 sub-of-the-day, which means I would've paid just $4.20 if that'd been all I got, thanks to the lower rate of tax on such purchases. I'm not sure the chips were worth that much more...though they were more flavourful than my sandwich.
Verdict:
Speed: fast. Sensible workflow. Why are all of the other sandwich shops so bad at this?! Is it intellectual property of Subway?
Quality: meh. Yes, this is the standard vote here already. Welcome to the U Plaza.
Value: I guess it's okay? I mean, I already have largely forgotten the sub existed. As fleeting moments go, it was pretty damn ephemeral. But it was cheap.
Would go back: I haven't been to a Subway outside an airport or roadside rest stop in years, and I can't see why I would change that.
My sub. Um, did I just actually eat something, aside from the bag of Sun Chips? (Why are Sun Chips "better for you" than regular chips? I mean, yes, they're tasty, featuring both salt and "autolyzed yeast extract" ~ MSG, but still...)
Um, I think it had turkey in it, and some random mayonnaise-chipotle-y sauce. I guess it's mildly fusion-tastic to have that on the parmesan-oregano bread, but I've seen someone else get a chicken teriyaki sub there with similar saucing and bread, so I'm a piker by comparison.
Meh.
I had: a turkey sub with a bag of chips.
I paid: $5.90; it was the $4 sub-of-the-day, which means I would've paid just $4.20 if that'd been all I got, thanks to the lower rate of tax on such purchases. I'm not sure the chips were worth that much more...though they were more flavourful than my sandwich.
Verdict:
Speed: fast. Sensible workflow. Why are all of the other sandwich shops so bad at this?! Is it intellectual property of Subway?
Quality: meh. Yes, this is the standard vote here already. Welcome to the U Plaza.
Value: I guess it's okay? I mean, I already have largely forgotten the sub existed. As fleeting moments go, it was pretty damn ephemeral. But it was cheap.
Would go back: I haven't been to a Subway outside an airport or roadside rest stop in years, and I can't see why I would change that.
Phat Cat
The last time I was here was...2004? Not too long after they opened, actually. I was on campus in the evening because I needed to proctor a final exam, and they gave me a Greek salad with moldy feta. I never went back: it's not as though I don't have alternatives.
This is one of the zillions (5? more) of pita-shawarma-falafel-... places in the plaza, which do provide the useful service of feeding our students enough cheap food that they'll want to have a nap during afternoon classes.
In service of you, Gentle Reader, I got a chicken souvlaki yesterday. Hooray. They allow up to 4 toppings and 2 sauces: I had mine with onions, cucumbers, tomatoes, tzatziki and hot sauce.
It was fine. The pita was actually tasty (probably because of its having been grilled?); the chicken banal, and the hot sauce a bit too prevalent. It was badly assembled, and wanted to fall out of its wrapper.
I got: a chicken souvlaki
I paid: $4.50+tax
Verdict:
Speed: Quite fast. This place has bad workflow (you come in, and immediately are at the "receive your pita" end of the line, not the "order your pita" end). But it's certainly better than a couple of other places which will wind up on this blog in due course.
Quality: Meh. Nothing to write home about.
Value: Pretty decent. You can get two souvlakis for $8+tax, which would be a good cheap lunch for two people. I think they're a fair sight more at the franchise places elsewhere in the plaza, and at Just N Pita, which I think has better food.
Would go back: Probably not, but I could understand if someone who wanted cheaper lunches than me did.
This is one of the zillions (5? more) of pita-shawarma-falafel-... places in the plaza, which do provide the useful service of feeding our students enough cheap food that they'll want to have a nap during afternoon classes.
In service of you, Gentle Reader, I got a chicken souvlaki yesterday. Hooray. They allow up to 4 toppings and 2 sauces: I had mine with onions, cucumbers, tomatoes, tzatziki and hot sauce.
It was fine. The pita was actually tasty (probably because of its having been grilled?); the chicken banal, and the hot sauce a bit too prevalent. It was badly assembled, and wanted to fall out of its wrapper.
I got: a chicken souvlaki
I paid: $4.50+tax
Verdict:
Speed: Quite fast. This place has bad workflow (you come in, and immediately are at the "receive your pita" end of the line, not the "order your pita" end). But it's certainly better than a couple of other places which will wind up on this blog in due course.
Quality: Meh. Nothing to write home about.
Value: Pretty decent. You can get two souvlakis for $8+tax, which would be a good cheap lunch for two people. I think they're a fair sight more at the franchise places elsewhere in the plaza, and at Just N Pita, which I think has better food.
Would go back: Probably not, but I could understand if someone who wanted cheaper lunches than me did.
Mongolian Grill
This wasn't lunch: a friend is leaving Canada and so we went there for a going-away. I like the friend, even though I don't like Mongolian Grill, so we went there for dinner.
So, the deal with this place is that you "pick your own meal", which is to say, you take a bowl, fill it with random raw ingredients or cooked noodles, and then they grill/stirfry it on a giant flat griddle. You eat it with rice or tortillas. You go back for as many bowls as you want, for $16-$18 at dinner time.
For lunch, you can get the "lunch quickie", which is one bowl (I think they're smaller than they once were) for something like $9+tax+tip. This isn't...too bad? It'd be around as much food as the lunch pastas at ESM, I guess, given that they do give you rice and tortillas.
But the problem is that the actual supplied food is so...meh. There are lots of meats, but they're all the second-order meats: teeny shrimp, dark-meat chicken, squid, beef and pork (I don't eat these), unidentified white fish. All of them quite often still have ice on them, since they're straight from the freezer. There are lots of starches (because, hey, if you eat wheat or rice noodles as part of your all-you-can-eat "feast", so much the better for them!), and random fresh veggies, though "seasonal" would be something of a joke. If, in the best August for tomatoes in recent memory, tomatoes look like the ones we get in January, then You're Doing It Wrong. There is fresh garlic.
Then you add oily sauces and random dried spices, and they grill them. The spices are "Thai" or "Lemon" or "Soya" or the like. I vaguely thought they once had one I liked that was gingery, but, um, not anymore.
This means that getting tasty food is not easy. I once upon a time would make garlic/ginger/spicy squid with broccoli as my only dish there, but nowadays, I can't even do that. I tried to make something vaguely Thai, but they don't have curry paste or coconut milk.
I don't get the appeal, honestly. I mean, I get how they make money (they stuff people full of salty carbs with some cheap meat or veg), but going there never really did it for me.
I had: dinner "feast", which for me was two bowls of food: one was garlic squid with broccoli, the other rice noodles with chicken and garlic and "lemon" sauce. A pint of, um, some IPA.
I paid: I think around $27? The "feast" is $16+tax+tip on Tuesdays.
Verdict:
Speed: They were slammed the night we went there, so getting bowls, or refills, or tortillas, was slow. Once the host realized our waitress had gotten monopolized by another table, he took good care of us.
Quality: I think it's gone down, and I was never a fan.
Value: Lousy for dinner. For lunch, I guess it's okay. I mean, you get what you "want". I just don't want what was on offer.
Would go back: I'm sure I will, but I try to keep it infrequent.
So, the deal with this place is that you "pick your own meal", which is to say, you take a bowl, fill it with random raw ingredients or cooked noodles, and then they grill/stirfry it on a giant flat griddle. You eat it with rice or tortillas. You go back for as many bowls as you want, for $16-$18 at dinner time.
For lunch, you can get the "lunch quickie", which is one bowl (I think they're smaller than they once were) for something like $9+tax+tip. This isn't...too bad? It'd be around as much food as the lunch pastas at ESM, I guess, given that they do give you rice and tortillas.
But the problem is that the actual supplied food is so...meh. There are lots of meats, but they're all the second-order meats: teeny shrimp, dark-meat chicken, squid, beef and pork (I don't eat these), unidentified white fish. All of them quite often still have ice on them, since they're straight from the freezer. There are lots of starches (because, hey, if you eat wheat or rice noodles as part of your all-you-can-eat "feast", so much the better for them!), and random fresh veggies, though "seasonal" would be something of a joke. If, in the best August for tomatoes in recent memory, tomatoes look like the ones we get in January, then You're Doing It Wrong. There is fresh garlic.
Then you add oily sauces and random dried spices, and they grill them. The spices are "Thai" or "Lemon" or "Soya" or the like. I vaguely thought they once had one I liked that was gingery, but, um, not anymore.
This means that getting tasty food is not easy. I once upon a time would make garlic/ginger/spicy squid with broccoli as my only dish there, but nowadays, I can't even do that. I tried to make something vaguely Thai, but they don't have curry paste or coconut milk.
I don't get the appeal, honestly. I mean, I get how they make money (they stuff people full of salty carbs with some cheap meat or veg), but going there never really did it for me.
I had: dinner "feast", which for me was two bowls of food: one was garlic squid with broccoli, the other rice noodles with chicken and garlic and "lemon" sauce. A pint of, um, some IPA.
I paid: I think around $27? The "feast" is $16+tax+tip on Tuesdays.
Verdict:
Speed: They were slammed the night we went there, so getting bowls, or refills, or tortillas, was slow. Once the host realized our waitress had gotten monopolized by another table, he took good care of us.
Quality: I think it's gone down, and I was never a fan.
Value: Lousy for dinner. For lunch, I guess it's okay. I mean, you get what you "want". I just don't want what was on offer.
Would go back: I'm sure I will, but I try to keep it infrequent.
East Side Mario's
East Side Mario's, of course, is Canada's answer to the Olive Garden, so it's not as though I can realistically expect them to make brilliant food. But a lunch pasta there is not much food, comes with a single small loaf of salty, slightly garlicky, over-buttered bread, and costs $15 with tax and tip, even with just water to drink.
We go there with co-ops because it's affordable, if not cheap, and inoffensive. They let us order in advance. They cope just fine with having a dozen guests at once.
But I still don't quite get why I pay as much as I do. Last year, they had a cancer fundraiser where you could buy a box of pasta from them for $5 and they'd give the rest to a breast cancer charity, and it turns out they use De Cecco pasta. Which is great (and is the kind I use at home), but, well, I still don't see why my little bowl of pasta with 4 mussels and a couple shrimp or scallops is worth $11.50+tax+tip.
I had: seafood linguine lunch special, water to drink.
I paid: $15 with tax and tip.
Verdict:
Speed: neither fast nor slow. Pretty fast given that we order in advance
Quality: okay? Kind of generic. High on the salt. Fish not bad, decent tomato flavour. Mostly, just banal.
Value: Not really good. Did I eat more than $2 worth of food? Why is this a $15 lunch?
Would go back: I will, but not because I wanted to.
We go there with co-ops because it's affordable, if not cheap, and inoffensive. They let us order in advance. They cope just fine with having a dozen guests at once.
But I still don't quite get why I pay as much as I do. Last year, they had a cancer fundraiser where you could buy a box of pasta from them for $5 and they'd give the rest to a breast cancer charity, and it turns out they use De Cecco pasta. Which is great (and is the kind I use at home), but, well, I still don't see why my little bowl of pasta with 4 mussels and a couple shrimp or scallops is worth $11.50+tax+tip.
I had: seafood linguine lunch special, water to drink.
I paid: $15 with tax and tip.
Verdict:
Speed: neither fast nor slow. Pretty fast given that we order in advance
Quality: okay? Kind of generic. High on the salt. Fish not bad, decent tomato flavour. Mostly, just banal.
Value: Not really good. Did I eat more than $2 worth of food? Why is this a $15 lunch?
Would go back: I will, but not because I wanted to.
Goal for this blog
I'm dan brown; I'm a professor in the Cheriton School of Computer Science at the University of Waterloo.
Summer 2012 has been a really challenging summer for having good food here at lunchtime, because my usual place for getting lunch, the Grad House, has been closed for renovations.
I've been eating in Uptown Waterloo more than usual, particularly having zoup! at Zoup!. This is fine, but I wish I could just enjoy eating in the University Plaza, the bunch of stores and restaurants adjacent to our campus.
But the reality is that, well, I don't. There are places I'm okay with there, but it's certainly not Collegetown in Ithaca, or Baldwin St. in Toronto, or anything that wonderful. My favourite restaurants that have opened for lunch in the last two years are all not there: the Burrito Boyz and Fratburger are both by Laurier, and the German Bakery and Zoup! are both in Uptown Waterloo.
Still, last week, because of a going-away party for a friend and the lunch we throw for our co-ops at the end of their term, I wound up at both Mongolian Grill and East Side Mario's. And while I was on my way to ESM, I realized I'd not eaten at Curry in a Hurry in more than half a decade. Maybe this time is different!
(Probably not.)
So, I have resolved to eat lunch at every single restaurant in the plazas, over the next few months: the ones I do eat at, the ones I don't eat at, the ones I swore I'd never return to, all of them.
Welcome.
Summer 2012 has been a really challenging summer for having good food here at lunchtime, because my usual place for getting lunch, the Grad House, has been closed for renovations.
I've been eating in Uptown Waterloo more than usual, particularly having zoup! at Zoup!. This is fine, but I wish I could just enjoy eating in the University Plaza, the bunch of stores and restaurants adjacent to our campus.
But the reality is that, well, I don't. There are places I'm okay with there, but it's certainly not Collegetown in Ithaca, or Baldwin St. in Toronto, or anything that wonderful. My favourite restaurants that have opened for lunch in the last two years are all not there: the Burrito Boyz and Fratburger are both by Laurier, and the German Bakery and Zoup! are both in Uptown Waterloo.
Still, last week, because of a going-away party for a friend and the lunch we throw for our co-ops at the end of their term, I wound up at both Mongolian Grill and East Side Mario's. And while I was on my way to ESM, I realized I'd not eaten at Curry in a Hurry in more than half a decade. Maybe this time is different!
(Probably not.)
So, I have resolved to eat lunch at every single restaurant in the plazas, over the next few months: the ones I do eat at, the ones I don't eat at, the ones I swore I'd never return to, all of them.
Welcome.
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