Here’s a round-up of the food & drink articles in Toronto’s papers today…
National Post:
- Gina Mallet loves Mengrai Thai on her first visit, but starts to reconsider on her second.
- Margaret Swaine has wines from Portugal, Bordeaux and Washington State amongst her picks from today's Vintages release.
- Sarah B. Hood has a hot time at a dosa eating contest at Udupi Palace in Little India.
- Jon Bricker and Kate Swoger don't care if the food at Afghan Village is 100% authentic, as long as it's good - which it is.
- A. Brouwer & A. Wilson put an assortment of non-dairy ice creams to the Shelf Life taste test.
- Bonnie Stern borrows some wild mushroom recipes from Quebec City's Panache restaurant.
- A non-bylined article gives the latest on the listeriosis outbreak, while Brett Bundale reports on another food scare: a salmonella outbreak in Quebec that has killed one person and left many others ill from infected cheese.
Globe & Mail:
- Beppi Crosariol thinks that it's time for Spain to become the next big thing in the wine world.
- Lucy Waverman is all about the fresh local tomatoes, and offers some tasty recipes in which to use them.
- Sasha Chapman is also all about the fresh local tomatoes, and uses them to help preview upcoming foodie gatherings Feast of Fields and Picnic at the Brickworks.
- Liz Walker chats with workaholic chef Roger Mooking about his kitchen work at Kultura and Nyood, his music work as MC Mystic, and this television work on the upcoming program Everyday Exotic.
- Josh Wingrove tells us that stupid celebrities at the stupid Film Festival will be drinking lots of stupid bottled water.
- John Szabo uncovers a few hidden (and not-so-hidden) gems in Niagara wine country.
- Sasha Chapman reviews The Slow Food Story, a recent book on the history of the Slow Food movement by Geoff Andrews.
- The Maple Leaf listeria situation gets looked at from several angles by Karen Howlett, Bill Curry and Matthew Trevisan, while Josh Wingrove looks at how Cheese Magic, an independent cheese shop in Kensington Market, has been somewhat unfairly dragged into the scare.
Toronto Star:
- Corey Mintz slips an obscure Simpsons reference (see if you can spot it!) into his review of Niagara Street Cafe.
- Gord Stimmell recommends his last batch of summer-friendly wines for this year.
- Mark Bittman uses some of the season's bounty to make tomato jam.
- On the busy food safety beat, Susan Bourette explains why we shouldn't have been surprised by the listeria outbreak, Dana Flavelle looks at the impact it might have on Maple Leaf's bottom line, and Paola Loriggio does double duty with an update on the latest meat products to be recalled, as well as a bit on Quebec's cheese recall.
Whew! I got the Simpsons reference. I would have been quite shamed if I hadn't.
I didn't even think of "embiggened" as a Simpson's reference. It's just a good word.
Ooh, Gina Mallet makes me mad, as in crazy like bat-shit crazy. Her inference that true pad thai doesn't contain "chinese bean sprouts" is dead wrong, in at least as many plates of the stuff I've eaten while in Thailand. And I have the pictures to prove it Gina Smarty Pants of Know Nuthinville.
What's more, having recently been to Mengrai Thai for a friend's birthday dinner, I can wholeheartedly tell you that Sasi's food bears little resemblance to the well balanced, florally fragrant, hot-sour-sweet-salty deliciousness of thai food prepared in Thailand. Sasi's food is indeed sweet, but mostly sickly so. Oh, and try getting a properly made drink at the place without getting up to make it yourself.
As for good (read the real deal here) Thai in Toronto I have but one recommendation: Sukothai on Parliament, directly acroos the street from the first phase of redevelopment in Regent Park. The owners there are from northern Thailand as well, but perhaps more recently so, as their memory of what true Thai tastes like is on point.
It's hardly the type of place to sit and linger, but do yourself a favour Gina dear; get ahold of one of their menus, pick out a few things including the tom zap (hot and sour beef soup), and the pad thai, give 'em about an hour or so before you bother going to pick it up, and I promise you'll likely not embarass yourself again by writing another dumb-ass review of yet another lame-duck Toronto Thai restaurant.