Location:
1422 Gerrard St East, Toronto (Gerrard St. or Little India)
Cost: $10-15
The Indian McDonalds, we call it. Much like the famous golden arches the red Motimahal signage is iconic to Gerrard street.
(Top photo via Flickr: Andrew Alexander)
It's one of the oldest restaurants in Little India and definitely one of the best, if not the best. The consistent food and familiar tacky interior makes Motimahal a reliable (and recognizable location in Deepa Mehta's Bollywood/Hollywood) and satisfying place to dine in the East end.
The cafeteria-like "diner" setting, with slanted laminate seats, red tables and ceramic tiled walls (with only recent update of painted red swirls and circles) is all part of the charm. As is the plastic trays, cutlery and styrofoam cups filled with water from steel jugs.
Also, your urge to wipe the table or seats down with paper towels is entirely normal. As is suppressing the urge to pee so as not to visit the washrooms downstairs (which are, actually, not that bad). This place is not for everyone...and yet, everyone seems to come here. There is always a steady stream of customers chowing down on veg thalis (the best in the city), masala dosas, tandoori chicken and naan (my favourite), chaats, samosas, butter chicken (incredible), just to name a few. There is also a colourful array of indian sweets for you to choose from.
My favourite dish is the tandoori chicken with naan; ask anyone - this is what I will, 90% of the time order from Motimahal. This time I went with the tandoori WINGS (it was 3pm and this was our 'snack' time between shopping).
I don't know if I've ever mentioned how much I dislike cilantro, but I do. It's more the smell of FRESH cilantro that makes me nauseous. However, for some reason, and this baffles my loved ones (and me), I do like a good bit of cilantro chutney - the kind that comes with tandoori chicken and that little side of carrots and onions - it's just so tasty (with tandoori chicken and that little side of carrots and onions).
My sister's love for chaat is like my love for tandoori chicken. Whenever she visits; there's nothing like a good bite of chaat (mixture of potato cubes, crispy fried bread and chickpeas, garnished with onion, coriander, hot spices, topped with yogurt).
It's very simple...if you're looking for a place to eat in Little India, look no further than Motimahal (or Udupi for South Indian cuisine but I'll save that for another post).
Trimurti
Location:
265 Queen Street West, Toronto
Cost: $10-15 per entree
www.trimurti.ca
Trimurti is one of the other Indian restaurants on Queen street nestled somewhere in between Babur and Little India Restaurant AND India Palace (all of which I've eaten at, at some point or another). This was my first time trying take-out at Trimurti (sitting in wasn't any better).
I ordered the chicken biryani ($10.95), which although tasty was a tad on the greasy side. Lahore Tikka House's chicken biryani is still better (but nothing beats Mom's!).
The butter chicken ($11.50) came looking more red and tomatoe-y than buttery; and those who ordered it agreed that it wasn't the best they've had. It's a huge quantity that arrives in the take-out container, and doesn't include rice, so be sure to get a separate order of rice ($2.95).
Someone else got a Mulligatany soup ($3.50). The literal translation in Tamil for mulligatany is "pepper-water" but the variation at Trimurti was made with lentils and chicken, which was a bit strange.
The pakoras ($3.50) were overly greasy and not very flavourful.
Trimurti definitely has some competition being one of the three indian restaurants on Queen Street. I'd say, opt for Little India Restaurant or India Palace (which are both very good) when trying to decide which Indian place to try on the busy South side of Queen Street. Or better yet, save your taste-buds for the trip to to the East side and enjoy a veritable feast (albeit in a portable) at Lahore Tikka House.
Madras Palace: Take 2
Location:
1249 Ellesmere Road, Scarborough, Toronto
Cost: $40 for two (incl. tip)
www.madraspalace.com
The last time we went to MP, we had some service issues, but we've since realized that the key is to go when it's not crazy busy because the food really is exceptionally good.
This time we got there for dinner around 6:30 and while there were still quite a few diners preoccupied with their dosas, we still managed to receive plenty of attention from our servers.
The owners of MP, the Purushothams opened the restaurant in 1991; the first South Indian eatery in Scarborough. For this reason, you don't really mind the decor, which has already undergone an update into its current look of Floridian-style cane seating, dark green walls and wood paneling. Sure they could benefit from a sleeker design in keeping with current trends, but that would certainly risk losing it's homely, authentic feel. Although, I must say they could turn up the dial on the light switch and their bathrooms could use some revamping.
If you only need to wash your hands however, there's a sink placed conveniently on the same floor at the back of the restaurant. Anyone who's been to India knows that it's very common to have a sink in the corner of the dining room for convenience and hygiene, especially because South Indian food really requires the use of fingers for eating.
But, on to the food!
We already knew what we wanted, so we got a masala dosa to start, a Kerala fish fry (I admit, this is the same thing I had last time I was there!), the chilli chicken masala, one chapathi, some plain rice, a beer and we knew we'd have a coffee after.
I timed the wait, thinking it would be a long time before we got our dosa, but less than 20 minutes later, our crispy pancake arrived, piping hot!
The potatoes are spiced just enough to satisfy any pangs of longing for back home. Every finger-ful of dosa that's dipped into the separate compartments of coconut, tomato and cilantro chutney creates the perfect savoury combination on your tastebuds. The sambar is so incredibly tangy that you needn't have any accompanying dosa to go with it, it's delicious on it's own. It's just heaven on a thali (plate).
Everything went down really nicely with our Kingfisher Indian Beer.
We sure cleaned up well!
Next up was our Kerala fish fry, chilli chicken, rice and chapathi.
All I can say is Yumyumyum!
The Kerala fish fry was must better presented this time and the king-fish was fresh and well marinated, tangy and spicy very spicy. Also, curry-leaves are my all-time favourite herb (Karuveppilai in Malayalam or Kari Patta in Hindi are leaves that grow on small tree plants native to India). I love it fried and garnished like this, in everything, and hate to see it wasted on someone's plate! The aroma and flavour of them really highlights a lot of Indian cooking. It's sort of like the bay leaf in coconut milk curries. I also lovelovelove bay leaves.
Sigh.
Okay, moving on.
The chilli chicken was incredibly hot and spicy, but oh-so-delicious! The curry was dense and the chicken perfectly cooked to fall off the bone. We both felt our pores open and sinus's clear during this meal!
You will not have fully enjoyed a meal at Madras Palace without leaving with an excellent cup of
coffee.
I think you really have to know your stuff when you go to MP - or go with friends who know the food. I've read too many negative things about the food on Restaurantica because people don't know what to order! You don't order mattar paneer here, if you want mattar paneer, go to Lahore Tikka House or Babur! If you want really authentic Kerala/South Indian cuisine, this is really one of the best places to get it. The other place is Saravanaa Bhavan, but that's for another review.
Jodhpore Club
Location:
33 Baldwin Street, Toronto
Cost: $23
Way back before we knew how good Spadina Garden really was, we dismissed it and the buffet at Indian Flavour because all we really wanted was some tandoori chicken and naan. Really. That's all. So, when we arrived at Jodhpore Club at Baldwin Street - because Jodhpore had been a tried, tested and true choice (note I use past tense in this context) - we thought we couldn't possibly be let down.
Jodhpore, in the middle of Baldwin Street, is one amongst an eclectic mix of restaurants nestled within a residential area - away from the hustle and bustle of University and Dundas, nearby. The last time we'd been was in the summer of '06 and we sat outside, and I remember the food being delicious.
On this particular evening, it wasn't busy...perhaps it was the rain, or not...
As I type this, I wonder why we didn't end up simply ordering tandoori chicken and naan. That was really all we wanted, right? Instead, we asked our waitress what SHE recommended. Well, she recommended the 'special'. Which was a tava (pan) sabzi (vegetable). So I asked whether it included ALL the vegetables, especially okra and eggplant, and was assured that it did, indeed. Very well. We then took two more steps back and ordered the Hyderbad 'roadside' spicy chicken curry and whole-wheat rotis stuffed with peas. When our dishes arrived, we both thought we'd ordered the wrong dish. What we had on our table was a very rationed portion of "vegetables" which was really only cauliflower, onions and maybe some green peppers.
Hmm. We plopped a spoonful onto a plate, and then further dug around the serving dish looking for the so-called okra and eggplant. Not only was there no eggplant, there was no okra. What we found was a tiny slice of something I can only call "oak", the "ra" must have still been on the tava, ready to be served to someone else who was stupid enough to ask what the "special" was.
We beckoned to our server and asked her what our dish was to which she replied, "tava subzi". That's when I pointed out the lack of 'subzi'. I showed her the okra and said we wanted something with more than one piece of okra and not this. Her response was very clear. She asked us to return the spooned out subzi from our plate BACK into the serving dish and whisked the dish away. Aghast, we both turned to the chicken.
The measly portion and poor cuts of bone-in chicken definitely deserved the name 'roadside' Hyderbad chicken! It was overly spicy, the chilli so hot, it overpowered the palate.
And don't get me started on the roti.
Burnt, dry and stuffed with frozen peas.
Yeah.
Sometimes it's better not to stray away from what your stomach really wants.
Spadina Garden
Location:
114 Dundas Street West, Toronto
Cost: $50 for 2
One of our friends has been talking about this place for so long, claiming it to be his favourite chinese restaurant. Ever. And we had tried, on numerous occasions, to eat-in (and even do take-out from) there, with no luck.
So, it became the perfect dinner venue for us on the night we saw WALL-E at the AMC theatre at Yonge and Dundas. There was no question where we really wanted to eat, even after a walk down Elm St. with all the fancier places (like Oro, Thirty-Five, Adega - which I actually DO want to try sometime) toting their Summerlicious menus and vacant patios.
Spadina Garden doesn't have a patio, but I suspect if it did, it would be packed. it does however, have a very nicely decorated interior with very comfortable chairs.
Since we had less than an hour to eat, we looked around at what other people were enjoying and asked our host what he recommended on the menu. His suggestions mirrored our own for the most part, so we went with the dry chilli chicken, the chicken in ginger sauce, a vegetable noodle dish and later decided we also wanted shrimp fried rice instead of plain rice.
We were warned that it would all be too much but we were inclined and happy to finish the rest the next day.
Our vegetable noodles came out in no time. Colourful and crisp.
Then our chicken in ginger sauce arrived....which I thought looked like it may have been the dry chilli chicken.
But then the dry chilli chicken arrived...
The fact that all the dishes reached the table separately bugged us a little bit. I'd have preferred having everything arrive together, at once, so that we wouldn't have been eating noodles first, and then chicken in ginger sauce and then dry chilli chicken.
And how about the shrimp fried rice, you want to know. Well, we had to double check that they'd received our order. They had. And there it was...
With lots of shrimp dispersed within the rice.
But, Foodhogger, how did it all TAAAASTE???
Incredible! Very spicy (we asked for it), fresh and not greasy. It's very good chinese food...maybe a bit haka-ish.
Speaking of spicy, we also requested a SIDE of hot sauce and this is what arrived at our table! None of that Tabasco s***.
You might be interested to know that the left-overs were even BETTER the second (and third - yep, that's right) time around. Highly recommended. Thanks friend.
Madras Palace
Original Post: September 22, 2006
Location:
1249 Ellesmere Road, Scarborough
Cost: great prices!
www.madraspalace.com
If you get there on a Friday or Saturday night and it's crowded, you may as well go home and order pizza. Your food will take sooooooooo long to arrive that not only will you have forgotten what you ordered but you'll wonder where you are because you are now 99 years old and have Alzheimer's.
We made the unfortunate mistake of reserving a few tables to accommodate our large group of coworkers, not realizing that that would further jeopardize our chances of receiving our meals in a timely fashion!
Still, our appetizers were tasty and filling...
The chicken pakoras were savory but we had to be careful not to over-fill on them because the rest of the food took so long to arrive.
I was told that certain items I wanted on the menu were in fact 'not available' that night....so I finally ordered a dish of Kerala fish fry and rice.
The Fish Fry...Kerala ishtyle is tasty and almost as good as Mom's home-cookin'!
It's late by the time everyone has finished eating, but a round of coffees is ordered to which an apologetic server replies "Sorry we cannot accomodate such a large group."
I'm perplexed....this IS a restaurant, right?
When our giant bill arrives, it creates an uproar since items which were not ordered have been charged to us anyway. However, everything worked out in the end thanks to the good attitude and service and we all leave content and loaded with left-overs.
Madras Palace is perhaps the only restaurant in Scarborough that serves traditional Kerala cooking that really does taste like back home. So, while the food is delicious, if you dare go on a busy weeknight or weekend, don't expect everything on the menu to be available or your food to get to your table on time.
I suggest going on a weekday for lunch...chances are you'll be quite satisfied (I've been back since for lunch, and the service was great and everything we wanted was available).
New York Sub
Location:
520 Queen Street West,
Toronto
Cost: $4-10
It's definitely NOT a sub. Not sure why they call it one, but one thing is certain, it's so tasty you won't be able to stay away. You'll wonder why you have pregnant-woman-cravings in the middle of the day, and you'll find yourself ditching your friends (who are heading out to Burrito Boyz - stupid them) so that you can savour the goodness that is a New York 'sub'.
Sure, it's a hole in the wall and when you sit down at one of the tables, your world will be slighted tilted..but what NYS lacks in ambiance it makes up for in taste. If you like Gandhi's, you'll like NYS...they're owned by the same person and both share the same great zest for flavour and spice. A NY Sub is almost like a roti of sorts...or a wrap...a wroti, if you will. It doesn't matter WHAT it is...alls I know is that it makes one delicious meal!
The beef burrito/sub/whachamacallit.
The shrimp burrito/sub/whachamacallit.
My ultimate favourite, the chicken burrito/sub/whachamacallit......Oh man, the photographs are giving me those cravings.....I'll be right back!