SNAPSHOTS | TORONTO 2024 | DAY 2

On day 2 of our trip, we ventured outside of downtown Toronto into the GTA, specifically Markham. Markham is to Toronto, as Richmond is to Vancouver. Asians. Asians everywhere.

 

 

To fuel ourselves for the commute, we hit up the breakfast buffet in the hotel lobby. Selection was more than decent considering everything was free.

The walk to Union Station only took around 15 minutes. It was a beautiful day to be out!

 

When we got inside Union, we found % Arabica, a Japanese coffee shop chain. There are currently 213 cafes around the world, including the 3 in Toronto and 1 in Whistler, BC. They're known for their sleek, minimal branding.

We ordered an iced Kyoto latte ($6.75) and a canele ($6.50). The Kyoto latte uses their proprietary blend base with a Japanese-style subtle sweetness. I had sticker shock when I realized the canele was almost the same price as the latte, but at least it was good. It had a crisp shell with a deep caramelized flavour, and a moist inside.

 

First time taking a GO train! We each got the $10 one-day weekend pass, which allows you a full day of travel anywhere on the GO network. It was pretty easy to navigate, considering we only needed to take one train to our destination.

 

Our destination being Pacific Mall. P-Mall, as it's affectionately called, is the largest Asian shopping mall in North America.  

It's a mecca of cheap phone cases, hair accessories, and medicinal herbs. It can get confusing inside since there are rows on rows of stores selling identical products. I swear, I had deja vu around every corner.

On the top floor, you'll cross a "lucky bridge" to find their food court.

I went to Onigiri KaiKyoTei, who went viral across Instagram and TikTok for their fresh, made to order onigiri. I ordered the creamy uni (sea urchin and egg yolk) onigiri ($5.99). Upon first bite, there was a strong hit of wasabi. It then mellowed out and was super creamy. It's probably not something I would go out of my way for, nor wait in a long line for, but it was worth trying. 

 

My parents went to a random stall and each ordered a BBQ combo on rice. No complaints from them.

 

 

They also couldn't resist Coffee Dak Lak for some Vietnamese coffee and dessert.

My favourite store at P-Mall was Ding Dong! It's a huge candy store with a variety of exotic candy, chips, snacks, and drinks. It was surprisingly affordable and I grabbed a lot of souvenirs and gifts here.

 

Always have to scope out the blind box stores. We love a trinket.

 

 

For a lil' sweet treat, we found RuRu Baked, an ice creamery that specializes in unique, Asian-inspired custard ice creams. Some flavours that caught my eye were tofu fa or che ba mau. Unfortunately, their flavours change quite often and were not in rotation when we visited. Instead, I settled on sinh to bo ca phe (avocado ice cream and coffee caramel) and miso crumble (miso brown sugar ice cream with black sesame crumble). The ice creams were both smooth and creamy, but I found them both on the sweeter side. I also wasn't a huge fan of the black sesame crumble because the bits and pieces throughout were rock hard.

 

 

During the next couple of hours, we took an Uber over to First Markham Place, a mall/strip mall hybrid with more Asian stores and restaurants. For dinner, we found ourselves dining in a food court again.

 

Most people were lined up for one of two Chinese BBQ stalls, but I decided to give Hong Bo a try. Hong Bo serves Asian-style burgers complete with housemade buns. I got the crispy shrimp burger combo ($13.50) which comes with a side and a drink. For burger buns, you can choose between the original with sesame seeds, beet, and charcoal. I doubt the buns taste any different besides their colouring. For a side, I got their green salad with sesame dressing. You can also get fries or honey butter corn, but I thought it would be nice to get some greenery while on vacation. For a drink, there is pop, lemon tea, or coffee. Iced drinks will cost $1 extra.

 

I loved this burger! It was a thick juicy patty made up of lots of shrimp. Shrimp burgers are pretty common in Asia, and should become more of a thing here. 

 

After dinner, we were pretty tired so we called it a day and hopped back onto the GO train to home base.

 

 

- CT

SNAPSHOTS | TORONTO 2024 | DAY 1

This past summer, I found myself back in Toronto. It had only been a couple years since my last trip but this time around I had my parents in tow. It was their first time in the big city, so I became the unofficial tour guide.

 

We flew with Porter Airlines for the first time and we had such a good experience. Surprisingly, it was the most affordable option we looked at. What sets Porter apart is free Wi-Fi and no dreaded middle seat. Space is still tight but it's such a game changer. Especially when there's enough overhead bin space.  

 

Flight attendants also came around twice with snacks (all Canadian-made), and free beer or wine served in glassware. It was 7:30 in the morning but my dad still indulged in a beer. Because why not? It's free.

 

 

We ended up staying at the same hotel I stayed at last time (the Residence Inn Toronto Downtown/Entertainment District). The location is just 5 minutes from the CN Tower, making it super convenient and walkable. Each room has a kitchenette and there's a free breakfast buffet in the lobby every morning. We also got upgraded from their studio to a 1 bedroom suite!  

 

 

Chinatown is an easy 15 minute walk away. It was actually quite hot and busy, understandable given that it was a Saturday. 

 

For lunch, we hit up House of Gourmet. It's almost a Toronto institution. Bustling at any time of day, the restaurant is open 7 days a week until 1am, 2am on the weekends. They're known for quick service and a massive menu. You can opt for a more casual meal. Think congee, wonton noodles, and Chinese BBQ on rice. Or you could eat family style with their very affordable combination dinners.

We chose the latter and ordered the peking duck special combination. The price starts at $93.99 and increases with the number of entrees you add on. It comes with soup, your choice of the daily broth, hot & sour, cream of corn, or tofu thick soup. The hot & sour soup was served scalding. It's not my favourite soup, but it was sour, tangy, and spicy. A generous amount of ingredients laid within, including shrimp, tofu, and mushrooms.

 

The peking duck came out next, with a pile of skin in the middle and thin meat slices around the perimeter. Wraps came steamed, along with the usual accompaniments of hoisin sauce, cucumber, and scallion.

 

The peking duck wasn't great unfortunately. The skin wasn't crispy and it was overly greasy. The only plus side was that the portions were generous, making our wraps fully loaded.

 

The leftover duck is stir-fried with your choice of ginger and green onion or with bean sprouts. This was mostly bones so we didn't touch much of this dish. 

 

 

For our entrees, we got three kinds of seafood with seasonal vegetables. There was shrimp, scallops, and squid, sauteed with gai-lan (Chinese broccoli). Generous with the seafood and the shrimp were quite big and meaty. A clean tasting dish. 

 

 

To round out our meal, we ordered the house special fried rice. It appeared to have chicken and BBQ pork. This was pretty good with decent wok hei.

 

 

We walked around the rest of Chinatown afterwards, and found a random stall selling egg waffles in one of the malls. Egg waffles are so nostalgic for me, but this wasn't a very good one. Super bland.

 

For dinner later that night, we planned to take it easy at the hotel, tired from our early wakeup call and travel day. To supplement our leftovers, we stopped at Banh Mi Nguyen Hoang, a grab and go deli famous for their cheap banh mi. It's cash only so you know it's legit. 

 

We got the banh mi thap cam ($5.50) which is basically assorted cold cuts with pate, pickled carrots and cilantro. The bread got soggy by the time we dug into it so it suffered a lot from that I think. The best banh mi should shatter into a million crumbs by the end. If it's not scraping the roof of my mouth, I don't want it. 

 

 

Another quick stop on the way back to the hotel. SOMA chocolatemaker, a bit on the pricier side but a great place to pick up souvenirs.

 

 

Who doesn't love chocolate?

 

View from the hotel room. We had an early night to prepare ourselves for the busy day we had planned tomorrow.

- CT