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Roncesvalles staple Granowska’s Bakery to serve its last paczki at the end of the month

Granowska’s has presided over the corner of Roncesvalles and Fern for 39 years (Image: Joey deVilla)

On the morning of Thursday, June 13, 1972, after three straight days of baking, Elizabeth Klodas and her mother Maria opened the doors to Granowska’s Bakery on Roncesvalles, which they named after the family bakery they left behind in Poland. “That first day, we sold out in five hours,” she told us. “We were both so happy but then started crying when we realized we had to start baking all over again! We thought we had baked enough to last the weekend!” Now, after nearly 40 years in business, the bakery will be closing its doors for good at the end of the month.

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The Dish

Foodie Follies

December 8, 2011 | 5:35 pm

1 Comment

GALLERY: Our 10 edible picks from this year’s Toronto Christmas Market (mulled wine very much included)

The organic waffles at Über Delicious (Image: Caroline Aksich)

You don’t have to be a wide-eyed, rosy-cheeked tot to enjoy the second annual Toronto Christmas Market at the Distillery District. Heck, you don’t even have to be the world’s greatest fan of carollers and reindeer songs—because the edible offerings at this year’s cheery fest are the perfect remedy for holiday exasperation (especially the mulled wine). We hit the Distillery’s cobbled streets to seek out the best the market had to offer. Here’s what we found.

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The Dish

Read All About It

December 2, 2011 | 4:58 pm

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Reaction Roundup: what Toronto is saying about its new, hockey-themed grocery paradise (i.e., Loblaws at Maple Leaf Gardens)

(Maple Leaf Gardens image: Kevin Naulls)

In the seven years since news broke that the Maple Leaf Gardens would be turning into a grocery store, it’s become something of a bad joke, a symbol of modernity callously stomping on the past. But after Wednesday’s grand opening of the Loblaws flagship store, Torontonians have suddenly opened up to the idea with surprising vigour. And there’s a lot to love, what with walls of cheese, cupcakes, tea and aging meat, as well as plenty of relics from the days of yore, like a giant leaf sculpture made out of the stadium’s original plastic chairs and a red dot in aisle 25 marking the former location of centre ice. Here’s some of what other Torontonians had to say:

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The Dish

Restauran-TO

November 15, 2011 | 4:49 pm

6 Comments

J. P. Challet to open Le Matin, a new French boulangerie on Queen East

J. P. Challet at his new Queen East bakery (Images: Signe Langford)

Queen Street East has been steadily attracting culinary entrepreneurs for the last decade or so, but with prime spaces available for rent and condos and townhouses going up at every turn, the pace has really picked up. French ex-pat J. P. Challet, a culinary craftsman of many trades, is the latest to try his hand with Le Matin, a new authentic French bakery that’s slated to open in December.

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The Dish

Opening

May 13, 2011 | 9:35 am

4 Comments

Introducing: Nadège Patisserie. Queen West’s prettiest pastry shop joins the five thieves in Rosedale

Nadège Patisserie’s new 700-square-foot Rosedale space

Fourth-generation confectioner Nadège Nourian won over many Toronto palates when she opened her eponymous Queen West bakery and café almost two years ago—it’s become a destination for high-end pastries. This week, Nourian, along with her front-of-house manager and partner Morgan McHugh, opened a second store in Rosedale, bringing a little bit of Paris to the gourmet strip.

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The Dish

Opening

May 9, 2011 | 4:50 pm

5 Comments

The new retail outpost of caterer Bakerbots opens quietly for the weekends

Macarons and a small, custom-sculpted cake (Image: Catherine Gerson)

For weeks, we’ve been eyeing a little storefront at the corner of Bloor and Delaware, as Rosanne Pezzelli and her fiancé Christopher Stopa prepare the space for its grand opening. Bakerbots started off as Pezzelli’s catering business, but she’s expanding to include a storefront retail operation as well. Currently open only on weekends, the shop is warming up for a full opening in June.

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The Dish

Neighbourhoods

April 8, 2011 | 12:02 pm

34 Comments

Rosedale-Summerhill Guide: 23 need-to-know places along Yonge Street’s poshest stretch

Yonge Street’s poshest stretch, from Ramsden Park up to the Summerhill LCBO, has two strong suits: food and decor. Locals from the tree-lined side streets keep the shops going during the week, while the weekend brings floods of shoppers from further afield. Here, our list of 23 essential restaurants, food shops, furniture stores, clothing boutiques and beauty parlours along tony Toronto’s main drag. By Laura Cameron, Carley Fortune, Matthew Hague and Renée Suen | Photography by Jamie Hogge, Emma McIntyre, Renée Suen and Jenna Marie Wakani

START THE ROSEDALE-SUMMERHILL TOUR »

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The Dish

From the Print Edition

February 15, 2011 | 11:26 am

14 Comments

Toronto’s top five loaves

Loaf lovers are seeking out breads with character at indie bakeries.

1. ALSATIAN SOURDOUGH
With a crisp crust, chewy crumb and superior tang, Petite Thuet’s peerless sourdough has it all. Chef Marc Thuet’s secret? A family recipe that calls for organic flour and a 200‑year-old sourdough starter smuggled from his native Alsace. $6.50. 1 King St. W. (at Yonge), 416-867-7977; plus two other GTA locations.

2. FOCACCIA
Best known for her pastries, Lesley Mattina, owner of OMG Baked Goodness, also bakes regal rounds of focaccia glistening with garlic oil and crunchy with sea salt. They’re so good that Dundas West it spot Enoteca Sociale down the street orders them daily for its bread baskets. $4.50. 1561 Dundas St. W. (at Sheridan Ave.), 647-348-5664.

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The Dish

From the Print Edition

January 14, 2011 | 3:14 pm

2 Comments

Modern comforts: Chris Nuttall-Smith takes on Woodlot and Ici Bistro

Two neighbourhood restaurants serve up light-handed renditions of our rib-sticking favourites By Chris Nuttall-Smith

(Image: Vanessa Heins)

The comfort food revolution has brought us much to be thankful for, including cheaper, more casual restaurants, and the glories of deep-fried mac-and-cheese, but it hasn’t exactly delivered a surge of culinary innovation. Spurred on by a sputtering economy, the comfort trend spawned a wave of barbecue joints, gourmet burger shops, neighbourhood pubs and by-the-book bistros, and it introduced childhood-evoking staples like cookies and milk to scores of restaurant menus where the “licorice root, three ways” used to be. It offered certainty when everything else around us seemed ready to collapse, not only for diners but for restaurateurs, too.

Comfort eating, like love and psychotherapy, is driven by equal measures of longing (for simpler times) and industrial-grade denial (s’mores are less fattening when they’re made with single-estate chocolate from São Tomé), powerful motivators both. So most chefs have been happy to feed our cravings without letting their own high-minded notions get in the way.

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The Dish

Opening

December 23, 2010 | 12:21 pm

7 Comments

The Canadian Pie Company is coming to Riverdale

(Image: Signe Langford)

Confused by that tantalizing “A Pie to Remember” sign on Queen Street East near Boulton? So were we. It’s there, but doesn’t represent what’s going into the space. Turns out the place changed names when the owner, Cordon Bleu–trained chef Erez Hadad, discovered that the name Canadian Pie Company was available and decided to change the title of his new bakery. “We thought it was a better name.”

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The Dish

From the Print Edition

August 4, 2010 | 12:08 pm

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Best of the City 2010: 14 picks for the top food in Toronto

Leaf fan: Matchbox Gardens grows rare and wonderful lettuces (Image: Jay Shuster)

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The Goods

From the Print Edition

May 6, 2010 | 1:03 pm

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High-Maintenance Man: the secrets of sophisticated post-oughties men who embrace their inner femininity

The advent of the mid-’90s metrosexual made it OK for a dude to wear a pink V-neck and treat himself to bimonthly lowlights, but that’s about as far as mainstream hetero Toronto would stretch its definition of masculinity. Until now. Men’s fashion designers are seeking sartorial inspiration in the female closet, and man-pampering beauty brands are encouraging even the straightest-edge guys to make like RuPaul and primp. Toronto now has a niche industry to support the new fad. Call us sissy sympathizers, but we think it’s a refreshingly femmy antidote to the bearded, burly look of last year. Here, a survey of the city’s gender-bending cosmeticopoeia.

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The Dish

Neighbourhoods

April 22, 2010 | 4:01 am

41 Comments

The Roncesvalles Guide: Our 25 favourite eating and shopping destinations along Parkdale’s Polish drag

Referred to as Little Poland by long-time residents and Roncey by the younger crowd, the Roncesvalles strip is one of the few neighbourhoods in the city that has earned its “hip” label without been invaded by raucous nightlifers. Progress keeps marching forward here, despite an ongoing road rehabilitation project that has claimed a few business causalities. We recommend spending a spring Saturday visiting these 25 spots. By Karon Liu. Pictures by Jenna Wakani.

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The Dish

From the Print Edition

April 8, 2010 | 12:01 pm

29 Comments

The eight best bets in St. Lawrence Market

St. Lawrence Market, with its beckoning butchers and weekend crowds, can be a trick to navigate, so we compiled a directory of our favourite market finds.

The peameal sandwich from Carousel (Photo by Daniel Shipp)

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The Dish

Culinary Curiosities

April 1, 2010 | 9:38 am

4 Comments

New trend: food tattoos

Ink and icing (Image: Ann Larie Valentine)

More and more, the Globe is spotting trends in the manner of children after shiny objects. To wit, the paper has turned its attention to foodie tattoos. “When I decided on this [tattoo theme], I’d never even seen a food tattoo. Now I see so many girls getting, like, cupcake tattoos and candy and pie, cake and stuff like that,” says Amanda Tanos, an amateur cake decorator from Ajax. “I think it’s just become part of fashion now.” For others, an epidermal ode to cheap sweets is more than just a fashion statement—a food tattoo can acknowledge the complex social and political dimensions of one’s eating. At least that’s what Vicki Fraser of Ladner, B.C., thinks. She is planning to get a small cupcake tattooed on her arm or ankle. Mind you, when pressed, she admitted, “I just thought it’d be nice to have something really cute and sweet and just happy and have no stupid attachments to it. And plus, who doesn’t like cupcakes?”

With mancakes now on the scene, the answer ought to be “nobody.” And since they’re here, why not get a mancake tattoo?

• Food tattoos take off [Globe and Mail]
• Mancakes are selling like hotcakes in Toronto bakery [Toronto Life]

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