Momofuku Daisho

Posted on April 25, 2013 by TOFoodReviews Staff in Downtown, Financial District

3 Stars

- Torontonians have welcomed Momofuku with open arms and with satisfied stomachs. Last month, David Chang, founder of Momofuku and internationally renowned chef, was in Toronto to play host in an unexpected arena: The TIFF Food on Film series. He joined a sold-out theatre of fellow foodies (including us) to watch his favourite culinary film, Ang Lee’s “Eat Drink Man Woman”, and then engaged the audience in an informal Q&A session that spanned topics ranging from film to the trappings of celebrity chef-hood.

Three hours of salivating over delectable Chinese food on the screen left us craving more than popcorn, so we decided to check out Chang’s Momofuku Daisho shortly after…

Momofuku Daisho’s ambience is definitely the highlight of the experience. It’s open concept and top to bottom glass gives it a simplistic, modern feel. After a successful debut in NYC & Sydney, Chang was lured to Toronto by what he says was a ‘perfect and unique’ opportunity presented by the Shangrila Hotel: to house three, different takes on his cooking in 1, single building.

With the accessible Noodle Bar already a favourite of ours and a recent lacklustre (and wallet-busting) venture to the top-rated Shoto, we were eager to try our hand at Momofuku Daisho a mid-level offering that centers the menu around pre-ordered, ‘family-style’ dishes.

As you can probably imagine, it can be challenging enough to pick options in the moment, let alone coordinate an order for our group of 7 a week in advance (of which we were), but eager to get the full experience, we pre-ordered the much hyped about fried chicken and beef short ribs. The waitress kindly cautioned us to tread lightly when considering the rest of our order, on account of the deluge of food on the way. (Warning: Consider your wallet and alternative menu opportunities prior to committing to the pre-order. On a do-over, we would have banked one family style dish and ordered the rest off the menu.

First we enjoyed two dishes of lightly pickled, chilli-infused cucumbers. If these cucumbers are the Asian take on ‘bread and butter’ the West is in more trouble than economists predict!

Next came the Spicy Sausage and Rice Cake dish, inspired by Chinese Szechuan cuisine: these melt-in-your-mouth rice cakes punctuated by spiced sausage and Asian greens are a quintessential menu creation, packing flavour of Momofukian proportions!

We then indulged in a Momofuku classic: a pork-style bun, this time of the deboned chicken wing variety, coupled with dill, a glazey hot sauce and crudité; a real crowd pleaser for our group of 7.

And then, the massive plate of fried chicken arrived in all of its glory. Included with vegetables, scallion pancakes (oily and delicious) and a fancy soya type sauce.

Lastly, we tried the beef ribeye shortribs flanked by white Kimchi, bean sprouts and some sticky white rice. In our not-so-humble opinion, the ribs were a tad on the fatty side,

We decided to end the night right and order the chocolate – five different textures of it. A healthy spectrum of liquid to solidity; an interesting experience, but we’d suggest the more intimate smaller size, even for a larger group like ours.

All in all, we were blissfully overfed at Momofuku Daisho. It was lovely dining with David Chang in town and we luckily caught him at the restaurant to snap a pic. Good friends and good food – what could be better?

- Marissa and Moez

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Earls Kitchen and Bar: King Street

Posted on December 7, 2011 by TOFoodReviews Staff in Financial District

4 stars

Earls is nestled amongst the business giants at King and University and was teeming with suits and loosened ties on the Thursday night I paid a visit.  The place was packed, and I soon realized that this was not only attributed to its convenient location.  Earl’s serves up some seriously good food.

 I’ll be totally honest right out of the gate and say that I rarely frequent chain restaurants.  If I do, it’s because it’s for a birthday or office party where the show of hands wins.  Chain restaurants don’t usually sell me on coming back for more.  Earls did.

Prior to going, I previewed their menu online and was looking forward to trying some of their new items that promised “West coast flair” and seasonal flavours.  To stick with the seasonal theme (and just because it’s a deadly beer) I ordered a pint of Muskoka Brewery’s Double Chocolate Cranberry Stout to chase everything down.   It turned out to be a fine choice if I do say so myself, especially where dessert was concerned.

We started with the Tuna Poke Nachos ($11.50).  Served on crispy wontons, and loaded with cubed raw tuna, cucumber, avocado and tomato, they looked like they would be a task to eat.  I envisioned myself taking a bite and (if the toppings made it as far as my mouth without falling off) having it crumble, leaving me with half of a naked nacho, or in this case, wonton.  They surprised me though by maintaining their structure (and toppings).  The spicy mango coulis they were drizzled in leant a nice kick with some crushed macadamia nuts paying tribute to the Hawaiian roots of the dish. I’m not normally a big fan of sushi, but in this case the texture of the tuna and avocado married nicely with the crispiness of the wontons.

Next was the Gnocchi with Italian Rose Sauce ($10.50).  I love gnocchi, but it is associated with being too heavy and too filling often because, well, it usually is.  Not in this case.  Earl’s handmade potato gnocchi was the perfect consistency throughout.  Consistent consistency if you will.  And true we shared it, but it was a generous portion and neither of us felt weighted down afterwards.  That wasn’t the best part though.  The title of the dish doesn’t do it justice.  This gnocchi isn’t served in just any ordinary rose sauce… it’s served in a rose sauce made of San Marzana tomatoes, burrata cheese and fresh basil.  This, my friends, is the Margharita pizza of gnocchi.  Enough said.

Being ambitious (see: gluttonous), we welcomed the Pulled Pork Sandwich ($13.50) and Potato & Leek Soup ($7) to our table.  I’ll start with the soup…although in reality that wasn’t the sequence of events.  The soup was creamy and filled with chunks of potato (skin still on…because that’s where all the vitamins are!).  It was good, but let’s face it, it didn’t compare to the main event of this course.  Even halved, our plates were dwarfed.  This is one behemoth of a sandwich.  Piled with tender BBQ braised pork and coleslaw then dressed with a fiery chipotle mayo, this sandwich was a nice balance of spicy and sweet.  It was messy like it should be so keep the napkins close at hand.  I had almost reached my limit but I knew dessert was on the way, so I exercised some will power (says the girl on her third course) and left a few bites on my plate.  I would be lying if I said I wasn’t sad to see it go.

You might think that by this point we were too full to even consider the possibility of dessert, and by daily caloric standards, we probably should have been.  But we laughed in the face of those standards and pushed onward…onward to Warm Gingerbread Cake ($8).  Rarely do I find myself at a loss for words, but this cake found me there.  It might have had something to do with the fact that my mouth was full of the aforementioned cake, but also because it was really, really good.  I could use a plethora of colourful adjectives to describe this cake (see: heavenly, divine, decadent) but it all feels so cliché, and none of them would do it justice anyway, so I’m sticking with good.  Damn good.  It was served warm (as promised), drizzled with salted caramel sauce and with sides of brown sugar apple slices and vanilla bean gelato.  Now on any given day, I’ll take a cookie over a slice of cake, but not on this day (or any day going forward where I’m given the choice between a cookie and this particular cake).  It was impossibly moist and as we ate it we debated about what made it so.  We came to the conclusion that… well, we didn’t really come to any conclusion, except that it was killer, and we would be back for more.  Whoever is slicing the cake at Earl’s isn’t stingy (bless their soul) but that was one plate that went back to the kitchen devoid of crumbs.

Now Earls isn’t the place to go for a quiet date.  The people are loud (because there are a lot of them), and the music is loud (because it fights to be heard over the people), but the food is excellent and the service, equally so.  It’s a hike from my house in High Park to the Financial District, but one I’m willing to make again.  Three words folks… warm, gingerbread, cake.  Do yourself a favour.

- Rebecca

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