Posted by Melissa Woycechowsky in kitchen equipment, shops on April 8, 2007 at 8:43 am
Tap Phong, located in the heart of Chinatown at 360 Spadina Avenue, is a restaurant supply store like no other. If you’ve ever eaten in an Asian restaurant and wished you could find the crockery, utensils, pots or pans used there, chances are you can find them here. A word of caution for neatfreaks: Tap Phong is big and disorganized. Many items have no prices. Some things are incredible bargains; others overpriced. Some of the merchandise seems like it’s been there since the 1970s, shopworn and outdated to the point of being back in style again. You really never know what you'll find, but it's always interesting to look. Take your out-of-town visitors for a shopping experience they just can’t get back home.
The best bargains I have found are the discounted ceramics in on the back wall. All sorts of odds and ends in the form of coffee cups, plates, ceramic soup spoons and bowls – always a bargain at twenty-five cents to two dollars. Especially impressive are the rice bowls at two for a dollar.
In disarray on shelves in the back corner are steel woks in various sizes. The largest, at two feet across, are $46.99 each. They seem big enough to stir-fry myself in. For your average home cook, a 17-inch wok with a wooden handle is a great deal at $16.99.
If you are looking for sushi or sake dishes, there is a section at the front of the store featuring sake sets, and individual melmac sushi dishes and soy sauce serving cups. Not your everyday dishes, for sure, but maybe a small inspiration to try something new in the kitchen, or at least a way to present take-out in something prettier than styrofoam. Since Tap Phong is across the street from the LCBO, a sake set and bottle of sake makes a great last minute gift.
There are many professional appliances, especially blenders and rice cookers. I would love to have the $169 blender, but I’m afraid I just can’t justify it. I bet it can actually crush ice, though, which is more than can be said for my discount store model.
Fans of dessert molds will be delighted by the selection here - there's a wide variety, in many different shapes, including a knockoff Hello Kitty. I’m not really into molded desserts, but some of them are interesting art objects, in and of themselves.
There is a section with takeout containers, including those old-fashioned cardboard box containers that I wish more restaurants still used. Cold Chinese leftovers taste better from a cardboard box!
When doing my research trip to Tap Phong, I only went in to look. Of course, I ended up finding something I couldn’t live without; a glass and metal French coffee press, and it is much nicer indeed than the plastic one I priced at the mall recently, and less expensive, too. To wrap up the Tap Phong experience in a couple words: minor chaos, unique bargains.
