MANDARIN 
7555 Montrose Road, Niagara Falls On., L2H 2E9 Chinese Buffet

We received a gift certificate for the Mandarin, so my wife and I decided to try it on our way to the Fallsview Casino.
After a circuitous and frustrating drive to find the place we finally found the front entrance.  It was typical of most Mandarin Buffets with the typical decorations and selections.

We decided to order a bottle of Valpolicella to help us digest our meals.  Our meals mostly consisted of deep fried, garlic covered  buffet items that seemed to have sat too long.  We found the shrimp  balls and panko covered shrimp soggy and salty.  Most items we tried were very salty and rather ordinary buffet items.  There were no real standouts in this buffet - even the sushi items were bland and tasteless.  Our waiter was very good and attentive, but we are not big fans of buffet food.  One of the partners came around and greeted the patrons in the restaurant, which was a nice touch.



http://www.mandarinrestaurant.com/

EAST SIDE MARIOS 

119 Osler Drive, Dundas Ontario, Dundas On., L9H 6X4 

Went to East Side Marios in Dundas University Plaza.  It is a gigantic place with a number of rooms with tables and a large bar area.  It also has an outside patio facing the parking lot.  This restaurant is not typical of most other East Side Marios because of its size and ability to seat many patrons.  It is not sophisticated but reasonably priced and family oriented comfort food.

We began with the typical Marios dinner - a salad and garlic bread.  It was good and appetizing.  We ordered a bottle of Valpolicella to go with our meal.

We began by ordering a bottle of Valpolicella wine, which seems to always be our first step.  Then the bread and salad arrived.

We ordered fried calamari for an appetizer.

I decided to order chicken piccata with capers and mushrooms and a side of spaghetti with herbs.  It was yummy and filling, especially after the salad and bread.

 My sister in law Kathy had the chicken Roma which was a breaded piece of chicken on top of pasta.  It was also quite good.

Our meals where quite filling and substantial, they hit the spot along with the wine we had.  It was reasonably priced meal in a nice environment.  Our waitress was distracted by some friends but somehow served us fairly well.


http://www.eastsidemarios.com/

LA BETTOLA DI TERRONI 

106 Victoria Street (at Richmond) (416) 504-9998 Toronto On. 

We had dinner at La Bettola Di Terroni on a beautiful Saturday night in January.  My son Mark was at the Terroni on Adelaide and was told by the hostess there was a one hour wait (even though he saw a lot of tables empty).  Myself and my son Thomas decided to try our luck at La Bettola, which is only a couple of blocks away at the corner of Victoria and Richmond.

We got lucky - one of the hostesses here at Bettola actually made a real effort to have us seated in a packed house (unlike the hostesses at the original Terroni on Adelaide, which seem to treat customers like crap). She found us a table for four by doing some juggling of tables.
We were greeted by a friendly waiter who was patient with us, since three of us were waiting for Mark, who left the Adelaide Terroni (not very happy), to join us here.  The hostesses at the original Terroni should be given lessons in customer service!!  I have been there many times and found them very pretentious and uncooperative.

We began by ordering a bottle of Refosco.

A rustic bag of bread arrived at our table with olive oil for dipping.  

Mark and I decided to order appetizers so he ordered crab cakes (polpette di granchio) and I ordered Sicilian deep fried rice cones with mozzarella, peas and veal ragu (arancini di modica). The arancini were delicious, but I have had better crab cakes.  The appetizers were very small for the price and in the future I would stay away from them - they were not worth the price.

crab cakes

Sicilian rice cones (arancini)

Mark, Thomas and I decide on Agnolotti filled with shredded beef, we have had them before.  They were delicious, very rich and just filled with wonderful tasty shredded beef.  This time it appeared to be a larger portion than in the past (we all agreed).  

Katie had the cavatelli alla norma (hand made cavatelli with fried eggplant and ricotta salata) it was delicious and filling.

We were so satisfied there was no room for dessert, although we saw many going by our table that looked fabulous.  It was extremely noisy in the restaurant, which needs some noise reducing materials that are softer.  We have been here before and will probably return again.

http://labettola.ca/

WANDA'S PIE IN THE SKY

We decided to have a pit stop in Kensington Market before going for dinner.  We stopped at Wanda's to have a coffee, even though we were tempted to try everything we saw in the display cases and counters.

YUM!

PRICEY

RUSTIC

WOW!

COFFEE ON THE PATIO IN JANUARY 12 DEGREES CELSIUS

PANORAMA SHOT OF KENSINGTON MARKET IN THE EVENING

Since we were going out for dinner I did not rate our experience here.  We only had a coffee.  We will be back for a desert here soon and then we will rate it.  It was a very laid back comfortable feel here for sure.

THE BLACK BULL 

289 Queen Street West, Toronto, On (416) 593-2766

We decided to have a snack of nachos and a libation after a bit of walking on a beautiful 12 degree celsius evening in January on my favourite street in Toronto - Queen Street.  So we came to the Black Bull - this is the first patio to open in spring on Queen Street in Toronto.

random Queen Street Busker

Tom and Katie decided to have beer - it looked ice cold and delicious.  They have a lousy selection of beers!  They really depend on their location and their summer patio and really that is it.

I had some red wine - didn't feel like beer today - it was a Jacobs Creek and was just OK.  It was the only red wine on the menu - this is supposed to be a bar!!

Since we were going out for dinner later we decided to just share a plate of Nachos with chili.

They were accompanied by sour cream, guacamole and salsa on the side and were great to share because they were covered in a mountain of cheese.  We didn't have anything substantial here but what we did have was OK.  The service could have been faster, it was way too slow - since it was not busy at this time on a late Saturday afternoon.  Ordinary pub food nothing special.  We have been to far better pubs in Toronto.

 

HARBORD HOUSE 

150 Harbord St. (647) 430-7365 Toronto On. Sun - Mon 11 am to 11 pm, Tues - Sat 11 am to 1 am  Serving brunch Sat and Sun and Holidays

Went to the Harbord House with the gang (six of us) for dinner on Saturday evening.  We had walked and biked (using Bixi bikes) by it a number of times in the past, so we decided to try it.  It is a very homey atmosphere on a winter's evening and just screams - have some comfort food.  

We began by ordering a couple of bottles of California Cabernet Sauvignon and one of us had the St. Ambroise oatmeal stout beer. 

The menu choices here are quite varied for a pub (gastropub) and include a range from French onion soup to chicken wings, to pulled pork sandwiches, to grilled arctic char.
We decided to share some apps so we ordered a couple of plates of calamari and a couple of plates of buffalo shrimp.  The calamari were rather small and ordinary, but the buffalo shrimp and the sauce they were in was delicious.

calamari with lemon aoli dipping sauce

crispy buffalo shrimp in tasty cocktail sauce

We decided on a variety of mains.  Carolyn had the vegetarian chili in tomato sauce with jalapeno bread.  

Katie had the house mac and cheese with cheddar, jack, and ermite cheeses, with herb and garlic crumb topping, served with organic greens.

Mark and Tom had the Berkshire pulled pork sandwich with sweet potato fries and coleslaw.

My wife and I had the potato crusted Jail Island salmon fillet with lemon horseradish cream, herbed basmati rice and grilled asparagus.  We really enjoyed this dish.

We were seated on the second floor of the restaurant which meant that our food had to be carried up the stairs (some of it could have been a little hotter).  The server was constantly going up and down the stairs, but she was fairly quick with our table.  The food was quite good, we found it flavourful and filling.  The atmosphere was quite homey and warm.




http://www.harbordhouse.ca/hh/