Not Like Nilus

I couldn’t help but lament to Joey about our city’s saturated cafe market. It seems lately no matter where we find ourselves, there’s one on every corner, staring us brazenly in the face, knowing they can strong arm any spot their owners feel like paying for. Day by day, I feel myself urged more and more to crowd multiple pastry shops, bakeries, or cafeterias into one review, feeling that their differences don’t really matter. If the height of my grief seems too aweless, likening the café as the English student of the restaurant world might be offensive enough to make you understand. I won’t say that when someone’s at a culinary impasse they decide to open a café; but again, it sure does seem like there’re a lot of cafes with nothing spectacularly different about them.
 

My grief was at its height when Debrodnik’s Real Bake Company seemed like any other place. Another bakery or café in another plaza, bombed with illustrations on its windows advertising fresh sandwiches and what not. It too even holds up a little part of the aesthetic bargain. You can believe there’s a wall to sit against festooned with the fanciest decorative floral print wallpaper. You all know the next word I’m going to utter too: rococo. Luckily, it’s reserved to a single space. Beyond that is a more humble area with no spectacular colour schemes, just sandwich tables, pastry fridges, and playfully framed wall illustrations. Beyond that though, a spectacularly playful and spunky menu of simple, yet very creative sandwiches which, in hindsight, were carefully considered and work. How could a poutine sandwich not have been? Or a mini quiche in a bagel? If you’re reading this with any kind of my usual acrimony, please don’t, because Debrodnik’s is a fantastic change of pace. With meatball sandwiches, deep fried cinnamon buns, and proverbial black and white cookies, Debrodnik’s brings us workable comfort food, junk food, and good food. Yes, there are also fresh deli sandwiches. It’s an eight item menu, and I hope it never grows. It doesn’t have to, especially when it’s matched with some of the most creative pastries I’ve seen in a while.

Joey and I mowed down on a meatball sandwich and a gut busting poutine packed in a Kaiser, aptly named, ‘the Gut Buster.’ Weighing in at over one pound, a chewy Kaiser with an immaterial doughnut like sweetness was stuffed with fries, cheese curds, and more fries. Then, topped with gravy, it was carefully pressed together, ensuring its cheesy scaffolding would hold. And before you think something so carbo-loaded couldn’t work, guess again. Crispy fries, cheese curds that actually melted (in a poutine, heaven forbid), and spicy gravy matched the texture of a Kaiser that was buoyant and without all that flakiness we are always sadly expecting. Not here, however. Debrodnik’s creates a novelty sandwich that won’t be novelty for long; it’ll be Canon. 

Our Meatball sandwich was a close second. Crammed with roasted red peppers, mozzarella cheese, parmesan, tomato sauce, and a meatball the size of a little girl’s fist, we couldn’t believe it stayed together, but the sandwich’s creator knew a thing or two about balance.

And if we weren’t comatose enough, we made sure we would be by the time we left, finishing our visit off with a raspberry mocha slice- a cake stacked with rich raspberry mouse, cake, mocha mousse, and a brownie like bottom. A little rich for our fat selves, with a mousse a little more jellied than we would have liked, but a creative ensemble nonetheless. Next was the choux pastry baked black and white cookie topped with, what else? Black and white frosting. Cake like, but with body, it reminded me of so many of the pastries my grandmother shoves in my face. But the deep fried cinnamon bun was the favourite of the bunch. With a crispy exterior cased around a soft chewy inner bread laden with cinnamon and sugar, and coated with a thick heavy frosting we had to stop and put it down, think of how good it was, and pick up where we left off.

Debrodnik’s is the kind of stuff we dream about, see on TV, hear about on cosmopolitan food trucks, but anchored in a locale we can always come to visit. A place I’m wishing I kept a secret, what with its inexpensive and great food. Food, as far as I’m concerned, that easily shames every other blazeh bakery around.

Debrodnik’s Fresh Bake Company

(519) 888-8378

220 King St North  
Waterloo, ON 
N2J2Y7

MON-SAT: 11-7

ANY PAYMENT

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One Restaurant at a Time

271 West passes pasta test

I'd post the review here, but it belongs to the Record. So click the link for the full review! Enjoy!

 -w 

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I Can Remember It For You Wholesale

Thank goodness for Joey, because I know nothing about anything shawarma. Though the Levantine ritual of packing meat in a wrap and selling it in as many competing hasheries in Waterloo as possible has existed for as long as any Canadian Chinese food place has, I’ve never taken the time to go in, order, and see what the buzz is all about, largely in part because I could never come to terms with the price for something so simple. That said, the only perspective afforded me in regards to the shawarma, the falafel, or the gyro, all came in retrospect to what the shacks in the University of Waterloo’s campus court plaza’s bodega of culinary delight has to offer. Joey too has his own understanding. His understanding being that Australia has the best gyros, shawarmas, ‘whatevers,’ he has ever eaten. And who am I to deny it? I know nothing of the sort.

Highland Halal Shawarma had us both hankering curiously for whatever it was that drew people into its small corner. Aside from our usual sniggering at anything food and anything attention grabbing, we figured the traffic must have been some indication that Highland Halal Shawarma was doing something right.

Its menu’s small, its food inexpensive. No meal will run you over 10 dollars. And if you deny yourself the option of a combo and stick to the puritan disposition of its wraps, you’ll have a bite that’s even cheaper, but just as satisfying. Before I took a bite this was my favourite thing about Halal Shawarma; before its tiny space, before its two stool bar on-looking a parking lot crossed out by iron, before its mirrored walls that make an infinitely small space look on, humorously, into infinity. But I’m not complaining; I liked it. I liked the white noise, the bright lights. It was a space that stirred in me all the fantasy of food joints in big cities. When I went in, I could pretend that when I went out something big and urban was waiting, steam rising from sewers, people smashing elbows- not sprawl and neglected suburbs, not strip malls. Just me, Joey, and whatever shawarma was. Whatever cheap shawarma was.

Joey was first up; he knew what he wanted. All the fixings on the side, cautioning me that he fills his own pita because some people really load up his wraps; that, for whatever reason, doesn’t sit right with him. I was indifferent. And, of course, lacking any perspective I ordered a falafel wrap (5.30) and a shawarma wrap (6.64), as well as the novel, yet not for faint-of-heart, Ayran than-koto yogurt drink, making sure Joey got one too.

 

Lobbed in front of me and cuddled in a paper bag were two separate wraps, each in two even smaller paper bags. In each, warm pitas cocooned snuggly around respective fillings of fried chickpea patties and chicken- shaved from a conical spit. Any other fixings were up to the eater; they could include brightly pickled turnips, radishes, pickles, and the lesser more mundane everyday vegetables.

My resilient, chewy pita counterpoised the chaotic stuffing of crispy chickpea falafels, slippery pickles, and spicy lip puckering hot sauce. It was a fun thing to chew, and a great way to manage fillings that have a potential for making a big mess, especially when a falafel as perfectly crisp as mine gave way to a soft sumptuous cumin centre. My tender shawarma was no different. Its tender meat, a savoury hot roast against cooling pickles pulled up again by a humming hot sauce was a great first experience. Our tart yogurt drinks too. We both wondered if they tasted as sour as each other’s. They did. We laughed. We loved it. Sour and savoury quenched with even more sour and savoury. Staring out into the parking lot, it was a good way to spend a lazy Saturday afternoon.

HIGHLAND HALAL SHAWARMA

(519) 741-8300

200 Highland Rd. W.

Kitchener, ON N2M 3C2

Tue-Sun 11 am - 9 pm

ANY PAYMENT

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Touch the Lion

I’d be remiss if during my days of culinary ethnography I didn’t at least once wax nostalgic about a place so dear to me if only because it was dear, at one point in time, to my dear Old Master. Yes, its eaters made it famous; there was a time when even Bolo Yeung himself would occupy its dining room with none-other than the Iron Fist. And there are still times when my dear brother and I visit, romancing the newspaper clippings proudly mounted on its lobby’s walls, honouring our Old Master, connecting us with him if only in the span of a lunch hour, and lamenting the fact that though we once did thousands of kicks under the moonlight as children, we don’t anymore. Life, huh? But no matter what it’s like, at least there’s food. 

Lai Lai Chinese Restaurant’s reputation obviously precedes it. And beyond its retrofitted, home exterior, beyond the stone lions guarding its doors, there’s good reason. To me, it lives as an extensive historical bricolage of the Chinese food offered in Kitchener-Waterloo for so long. Absorbed in a space of fish tanks, pastel pink walls, hanging dragons, a Buddhist library, and the passionate colours of Red China, there’s a dining room abuzz with familiar customers, some never tiring of typical Chinese Canadian fare, others always happy to have the most estranged eats. 

Lai Lai certainly has one of the most extensive menus I’ve seen too, and though I’m often jawing about how these dynamics can work against a place, Lai Lai’s has refused to pay it any mind for a long, long time. There are lunch specials, dinner menus, options that can take, so I’ve been told, up to half a day to prepare for the customer who so desires. Intense stuff.

To this day, we’re not yet that adventurous, but nothing stops us from a good communal ordering of the most sentimental food. Me, hoarding the most inexpensive bowl of braised beef noodle soup all to myself, and my company waiting on dumplings, fried eggplant in special sauce, and curried beef, ready, despite my own self-indulgence, to share every bit with me.

My soup was a joyful return to the warm spicey aromas I had spent years trying to cook all by my lonesome. Anise suffused in a sweet and savoury broth drowned soft noodles that entangled chewy cubes of stewed beef and crisp bok choy. Our fried eggplant carried the sweet and savoury motif with a little saltiness. Caramelized eggplant gave way in our mouths, crispiness juxtaposing the smooth pulp of the eggplant’s soft flesh. Our curried beef was a simple, familiar flavour of sambar powder stir-fried alongside crisp green bell peppers and onions. Lastly, our boiled dumplings were a chewy treat of roped wonton’s stewed in a savoury broth, exploding with pork and ginger, and accompanied by a vinegared dipping sauce of sesame oil and chili peppers.
But what we were and always are most excited about is Lai Lai’s special gelatin desserts; complimentary thimbles of gelatin flavoured with whatever the house could come up with: coconut, taro, red bean, the list goes on. They were as good as we remembered them, and Lai Lai’s still the paradise it always was in our minds.

Lai Lai's Chinese Restaurant
175 West Avenue
Kitchener, ON
Canada N2G 1R9
Tel:  (519) 579-3031


Monday & Sunday   11:30 am -  9:00 pm
Tuesday -Saturday  11:30 am - 10:00 pm
Holiday                   4:00 pm -  9:00 pm

Any payment

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Purity and Danger

*Enjoy this old, old post- that for some reason wasn't online. It is now. And check out Thrive. Menu changes all the time! My allusions to Academia... not so much.

To be honest, I wasn’t sure if it'd be worth setting foot in Thrive Juice Bar. My own eating prejudices did a good job of reminding me that a trendy and upscale place may not necessarily equate memorable, worthwhile food. More often than not, the food could be redundant and echo the meal options of so many of its counterparts today. It took a lot of guts to enter. If it wasn't the look of the space or the clientele within that made me feel undeserving, it certainly may have been the feeling that I wouldn't be satisfied with what was offered, and I don't like to offend. But hey, that's what menus are for, and since last week's good, almost serendipitous, food venture I figured I just may be able to make it a twofer. Or if anything, feel a little cleaner.

Thrive Juice Bar sets itself in the nitty-gritty of the Bauer lofts. And yes, I'm being ironic and misleading, though I can't see why not, especially in an area that was planned as an 'indoor market place' with a 'vibrant lifestyle of dynamic community.' But my job isn't to debate the semantics of cultural space, only the food that tries to match it and construct a fantasy lifestyle. Otherwise, Thrive Juice Bar is the perfect thing to deconstruct.


Beyond its exterior's glass walls not only do we view a fantasy screen of what our dining experience could be, but how we have access to a kind of social elevation by merely buying clean, healthy shakes and the brand products that are placed on the place's shelves (in case you need a healthy colon) and flat screen television over the bar. Its straight lines, mute grays, sleek blacks and shiny trimmings do good to express its clinical influences, and from there communicate to customers just how sophisticated Thrive is, mimicking the restaurants I know exist in the world but can't afford. This is merely just one symptom of today's trendy food scene. Empowering that dynamic is the space's placement of green. The sign with a leaf dotting the 'i' of the place's name, the bamboo plants growing out of glass centre pieces- all come together to signify that if you come in, you can very well come out feeling clean. It's those kind of things that make a devout eater a little wary.

I sat myself down at the bar making note of the intrusively loud music that echoed throughout the lofty space and asked the 'cook' behind the glass separating us if they offered food, not just drinks. Luckily, they did. It was food for clean living, and though I may already be exhausting the idea in this review, it's not without due cause. With expensive blended drinks full of energy boosts and proteins I know nothing about, as well as wheat grass shots with orange chasers, you better believe there's going to be an array of vegetarian and vegan meal options for a particular charmed circle of eaters. No meat though. I can respect that. Meat’s dirty. I sensed that the notion of liking to eat any animal compromised a little self purity and came with a little danger. I myself was grabbing my collar when one of the servers asked me after my meal if I was a vegetarian or vegan.

Thrive's no place for the faint of wallet either, the reason probably being the ‘clean,’ ‘healthy’ food you're paying for. Either that or the clientele they expect to attract is in an area built for bigger wallets. I've said before that palettes influence the food we eat; well, the same goes for social class.

When it came to 'eating' at Thrive, my conjecture was that what you were seen eating was more important than what you were actually eating. Don't get me wrong, the food has merit, but I couldn't help but wonder if it suffered from the residue of Nouvelle Cuisine. Regardless, it's a smorgous board for the health conscious eater. Vegan soups, vegan hamburgers, big green smoothies (8.99), melon salads, Japanese beans, vegan pad thai. Any association with green and clean, they have it. Although, they do have something called a dirty rice bowl. A good attempt at badassery; however, in the end, clean and good for you.
Mine would be a small meal, I knew right away. But maybe it could be salvaged by the healthy ingredients that were loaded with supplement powders. I started off with a kale Mojito. A Hemingwayian paradox in a place that, I'm sure, favours peace, good food and clean living; not fighting, fishing and- well, you know . . . What would Papa think' if he came here and asked for a Mojito made with kale? Either way, stuffed with fresh kale, lime juice and zest, as well as fresh mint and organic cane sugar and coconut water I was still interested in seeing if it had any life to it. I'd like to say it did. And even though it didn't have any unappealing kale flavour, I was kind of disappointed that it didn't taste a little original. I could taste the citrus, the mild mint, and a general sweetness expectedly given off by the sugar cane. No coconut though. In terms of having those general Mojito flavours, it hit the nail on the head. But again, I was expecting more. Setting my drink down and watching its ingredients separate into two homogenous parts I waited after I ordered an 8" oblong spelt pizza. I'll save you the suspense of its shape because I think the menu may have been referring to the size of the plate. Topped with sun dried tomatoes, artichokes, basil, arugula pesto and a mozzarella I've no urge to remember, the dish was a whopping 9.50. The spelt crust may have been a bad choice on my part. Resembling the dry, hollowed caverns of an unevenly baked flat bread it lacked that firm bitey that comes with the ideal pizza crust. And the attempt to drizzle olive oil over it did nothing to alleviate this flaw. Since there was no bread between the crust to absorb the oil and soften it, it just made the thing feel slippery and wet. Still, if there's anything to mention about the crust it's that it didn't lose its crisp constitution. The pesto was surprisingly bright, and the bitterness that is usually a big part of arugula absent, negated no doubt by the lemon in the sauce. This also worked against the pesto however, because in an attempt to hide any bitterness, the nuttiness that usually comes with arugula’s pungent bite was gone, and so was any nuttiness that came from the almonds used to make the sauce. To top it off, there was also an odd burnt underpinning to the pizza’s flavour, though I couldn't see any markings on the bottom of the crust. Maybe I was missing something. Ingredients were notorious for getting away from me, the cheese doing little to hold anything together. And though I can appreciate a little cheese on pizza- too much being a bad thing- too little can be just as bad, drying out and having a gluey texture doing nothing to lock any moisture in or keep ingredients on. I would have liked more cheese, and less oil if anything.


Near 20 dollars later I was still hungry. I had a desire for the desserts the television offered me, but thought I better cut my losses. Thrive's heart is in the right place, its drinks offer a lot of options, and its menu a pu-pu platter for healthy eaters, there being a little bit of something for everyone- from Korean BBQ tofu to, Ruben sandwiches. So, don't let me deter you; if anything, let your wallet.

Thrive Juicebar 
(519) 208-8808105-191 King St S
Waterloo, ON 
N2J 1R1 

Mon-Fri 9-6; Thurs-Fri 9-7; Sat 10-5

Any Payment

*Original publication 03/2011

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