geekent’s stuff’n things

Working in downtown Toronto provides lunch options a-plenty, and working in the same building as my new bride allows us the enviable (well, enviable depending on how much you enjoy spending time with your wife, but I love it so, yes, I say enviable) capability to eat lunch together. These are the places we routinely frequented and some we didn’t exactly frequent, and others which just don’t make the cut (of course this was all before we realized we were spending $100 a week on eating lunch):
Fusaro’s Kitchen: long line-ups are expected from noon to about 1:30, but in under 20 minutes you’ve usually paid for and received your food. Have an alternative place ready to take with your take-out, especially once the patio is closed as there aren’t many chairs and tables inside to eat-in. The cuisine is extra-Italian and well worth the extra buck or two. Daily sandwich and pasta and meat specials are on the board with all the regular favourites available. I’ve crafted my own “Graig special” over the past four years, which is a meatball and an arancini (breaded rice ball with mozzarella in the centre) for $5.50. The gnocci is always a good alternate.
Famous BBQ Express: No, I don’t really know where the “Famous” part of it came from but this place is indeed great, with David the owner being one of the most genuinely pleasant chaps you could meet, calling every male customer “brother” like a much less annoying Hulk Hogan. The menu has Korean inspirations (bulgogi is a particularly tasty option) and our favourite, the steak sandwich is crave-inducingly fabulous. Their Canadian burger special is awesome when they have it, and their fries are particularly tasty. Short line-ups are common and take-out is generally your best option with only a half doze tables kicking around.
The Sandwich Box: a peculiar surprise when it first arrived, both a craft-yourself salad bar and sandwich bar with daily soup specials. This was Toronto’s first real taste of gourmet sandwiches, with over a dozen breads to choose from and your choice of 8 or 9 spreads, cheeses and meat and veggie options. The salads are way too expensive, but the sandwiches are always worth it. The line-ups have dissipated over the past few months, somewhat inexplicably, and there’s a little more chaos behind the counter these days, but it still tastes the same. I’m enjoying the fresh-made juice mixes and lemonades as of late.
Fox and the Fiddle. Ever since the Bishop and the Belcher moved to Church and Bloor, the Fox has become our “beer lunch” joint of preference. Above average pub food with a few different options. The crispy chicken sandwich coated in (thankfully mild) hot sauce was distasteful at first but now one of my favourites (accompanied with excellent wedge fries). The beef dip sandwich is a favourite amongst the gang I go with (they declare it one of the best in the city) and other selections have all proved tasty eating. Not an hour lunch place, though.. at best an hour and a half.
Swatow: Many call this the best Chinese food in Toronto, and they might be right. Served fast and tasty, you may have to wait 20 minutes for a table during the lunch rush but when you want the good stuff, this is the good stuff. My palette for Chinese is still developing so I still routinely partake in the gwilo-expected rice dishes. The General Tso is my favourite in the city, and Aden loves the black bean beef. Their crispy fried noodles are nice and I’ve yet to try it, but the Fuk-kin fried rice makes me giggle every time I read the menu (it’s a mix of peas, shrimp, crab, scallop, chicken and fried egg apparently).
The Ave (Avenue Diner): A homecookery of the European sort, Aden and I go to the Ave with “the boys” to talk hockey over smoked meat, ribs, burgers or whatever the special of the day is. Sometimes soup is involved, sometimes fries, but regardless there’s always more than enough no-frills, no-nonsense belly-filler. The place is tiny, with three booths and a sit-down stools, but usually the line-up is there for the take-out. Cost is usually about $6-$8 per meal and usually in and out within 40 minutes.
Java Hut: Aden and I would hit here when we had the craving for breakfast for lunch. Sometime during the two years we’ve been eating at this joint the pancake plate went from three pancakes to two, but, two panckakes, two eggs (or bacon or sausage or ham) and fruit salad all come for about $5. They have a great selection of teas (an utterly potent ginger tea), and probably coffee too (but don’t really know). An atypical selection of thai food also adorns the menu alongside schnitzles and sandwiches… all better than you’d expect for the price. There’s always room to sit (the patio fills up in the summer though), and service is average speed, getting in and out in under an hour.

Occasional favourites

The Secret of Asia - $7 thai plate with spring roll or soup starter. Good food, rarely busy, but not exceptionally expedient.
Ackee Tree - Jamaican jerk chicken, roti, and other spicy assortments. Tasty, but about $10 for takeout (discount for bringing your own container)
Burrito Boys - Always a line-up, but always worth it. A small should fill up the largest of appetites, a large means you won’t eat dinner until much, much later. Try the halibut accompanied by with a Jumex Strawberry juice for dessert.
Mama’s Pizza - they bake cheese into the crust… that’s their secret. Good thin-crust slices, but only if they leave it in the oven long enough to melt the cheese again.
Ghandi’s - don’t even bother with mild-medium-hot mentioned on your order, this is one spicy roti.
Trimurtri - in the Queen Street Indian restaurant strip, Trimurtri is my fave. It’s excellent indian buffet for less than $10.
Pizzaiolo - a thicker crust pizza with a great flavour. The Godfather deep-dish, stacked with meat is the best belly filler. Slice and a drink $5 plus tax.
New York Subway - not like the usual Subway franchise (one right beside it) but an excellent fusion of middle eastern cuisine and traditional sub/wrap fare. Not cheap, but about as much as a typical sub, so not so pricey either. I burned myself out on these by eating one per week for a year. Pace yourself
The Train Place (Xe Lua) - blunt service made up for by cheap, tasty and quick food.
HoSu - Korean and Japanses fusion. Decent but overrated.
East - overpriced Asian. Nice atmosphere, some interesting coctails, but the food is mediocre for the cost.
Le Gourmand - upscale cafeteria food. Interesting, perhaps good even, but not that good.

I’m thinking that the wife and I should be setting a lunch budget once the two households finish amalgamating mid-to-late October. You see, we work together…well, not side by side but in the same office building (which is only partly responsible for how we met, the local comics shoppe being the other factor) and we tend to eat lunch together practically every day. We don’t keep track of how much we spend either, but it likely works out to $10 a day per person, which isn’t bad, and in fact, I want to keep that figure in place. That’s $100 a week for lunches for us together, which is kind of insane to think we spend about $5000 a year on our lunch, but there you go.
We really need to hardline that budget though, and make sure we’re not spending over that. I’m not quite certain how we do that yet. I mean, if we had better security around the office I’d suggest we keep cash in our desk drawers, $50 per person every week and all the change just goes back in… that way if we have a little extra left over sometimes we can do the beer lunch with the boys. If we run out then we have to brown bag it.
I suspect Aden didn’t eat out every day until she met me and I was eating in the in-building cafe (around $6 per day) regularly before I met her, so we could actually probably do with cutting back the budget by 20% (or $40/week) or even more… 50% even (that would actually give us a challenge).
It’s funny, because as adults I feel like we should be able to do what we want, eat where we want, whatever we want, when we want to, but the harsh reality is money is finite and if we don’t watch ourselves we’ll spend everything, save nothing, and never be able to afford the things we really want, whether it’s a house or a dog or what have you.
This “growing-up” thing is a bitch.

in addition to denying myself some various entertainment pleasures in 2008, I’m instigating a food moratorium now. It’s some weird penance thing I’m on.
Kidding.
It’s somewhat dietary, but in part just realization that my metabolism is slowing down, and that thanks to a rather unhealthy summer I’ve lost some of my nice physique (really haven’t gotten fat, but I’ve lost some muscle due to inactivity). To stave off further degradation and ballooning, I’m taking a couple of vices out of the equation for a while until such time that I can appropriately measure my intake:
- Pop aka Soda aka Coke (an easy one… done it before can do it again)
- Booze aka Alcohol (going straight-edge… fyi, I’ll no longer be fun at parties) update: I’ve excluded wine from “booze” as it’s more civilized (yeah, that’s it)
- Potato Chips (also includes nachos, tortillas and corn chips)
- French fries (mainly forcing me into the salad route)
- Chocolate (it’s going to be bad when the cravings hit… mainly referring to chocolate bars here)
- Hamburgers (mainly because I’ve been having terrible indigestion with them lately)
- Fast food (the bad ones… and, oh, no Wendy’s…ach! Pizza and subs and Mediterranean is okay)
- Mayonnaise (as much as possible)
So far that’s the list, but more may be added.
When I was in San Diego, I realized that because I was so sick and my throat so sore and swollen that I ate incredibly healthy, since if I was going to put something in my body that would cause me great pain to start, it better help me out in the long run. I wish to maintain that thinking without being a Granola Nazi about it like those freaks at Veggie Hut who keep pestering the fine folks at Meat Shake.
or whatever.

One thing I didn’t realize about Toronto is how abundant it was in cherry trees. When I lived at the Ronces I had a cherry tree there but unfortunately it was a worm-ridden tree two out of the three years that I was there, and so, despite the additional grub nutrients, I didn’t really partake in the fruitful bounty of the old tree.
There was a big storm with heavy winds on 19th which blew down a few trees in Aden’s neighbourhood… one big branch that hit the ground was loaded with cherries and that when I began to notice all the cherry trees in her neighbourhood. Testing the cherries off that branch, Aden and I knew her backyard tree would be ripe for the picking in about a week. Well, this past weekend the fruits were all red-dy (narf!), and with the wee one’s help, Aden had picked two buckets. When I arrived I picked another couple batches, much of which was dispersed to friends and co-workers.
After a few heated days, I realize the fruit wouldn’t be ripe on the branch for long, and promptly picked another bucket (each bucket probably about 3 litres), using a step-stool to reach higher on the tree and actually clearing off every branch I could reach. Of course, I didn’t go to the extent of climbing the tree (I couldn’t climb and hold the bucket at the same time…) but a good harvest it was. Now… now I’m on cherry overload.
Hurrah. It’s been a long time since I was on cherry overload.

unrelated quote

“The weed of crime bears bitter fruit you old hag”

Marmy made me a birthday cake as part of my Aquaman-themed birthday (which has also included an Aquaman HeroClix, the 13″ Deluxe Aquaman action figure, a kickass vintage Aquaman Pepsi glass, and yes, the Aquaman cake… next, an Aquaman tattoo[half-kidding])
Looks like Octopus, tastes like chocolate cake. Awesome!
Thanks Marmy!

Some of what you need to know about expiration dates
also:
A Guide To Shelf Life

Because I have the mentality of an 8-year-old sometimes, I find this very funny