Thai in Toronto at Linda's

On our third night in Toronto we went to a really nice Thai place called Linda's on Yonge Street. It's a cozy and elegant room decorated in hardwood and brick, and with a huge Buddha mural on one wall. It's above another busy, brightly-lit Thai restaurant called the Salad King, which is owned by Linda's husband.

We had this very tasty appetizer, called miang kum. The leaves in the foreground look like spinach but are actually aromatic leaves called cha-plu. You take one and add a small dollop of each of the ingredients - lime, chili, red onion, dried shrimp, dried coconut, peanut and the sweet sauce - and wrap it into a little packet of hot, sour, salty and sweet flavours. It was delicious, and the chilies really made it pop. The service here was good too; a woman who we think was Linda came over to make sure we liked the food. We also had a calamari appetizer, four mains and a bottle of wine. The whole meal came to about $38 per person.

Linda's
335 Yonge St. (corner Dundas)
Toronto, ON
416.971.7041

Ematei - a Japanese Restaurant in Toronto

Agedashi dofu and beef tataki at Ematei in Toronto on Flickr by beFOODled.

Last week I was fortunate to make it back to T-dot, this time accompanied by S and two of our friends. We found a great Japanese place called Ematei, just a few steps away from Queen Street. We ordered my favourite appetizers, agedashi tofu and beef tataki (both pictured here), and shared a tonkatsu (a deep-fried, breaded pork cutlet) with rice and miso soup. We also got some sushi: unagi (BBQ eel and my favourite), hamachi (yellowtail and S's favourite) and also sake (tuna). To drink we had 2 Sapporos. Japanese beer always comes in two sizes - the standard sober 341 mL, which yours truly ordered, and then the whoopass super-jumbo bottoms up! size of 650 mL that S ordered. It was a really tasty meal and we weren't far off the estimate of $90 per couple in my iN Guide. The service was good too.

Ematei
30 St. Patrick St. (corner Queen)
Toronto, ON
416.340.0472

More Girl Food

Last weekend, I went to Toronto to visit with some friends and to go to an Oscar party. We went to this restaurant on Queen St. that sells roti takeout. I'd never had roti before but my friends just rave about it, so I was really excited to try this. It's basically a big flatbread bundled around your favourite curry. Both D and I got the mutter paneer and I decided to get medium instead of mild, a decision which turned out to be a big mistake! It was so hot, I had to follow every mouthful with water. S, who got a medium too, tried mine and agreed that it was indeed insanely hot. In the end D gave me some of her mild because I just couldn't finish it, what with the back of my throat being on fire. But once I could finally taste it, I had to admit that it was great!

And last night, my friend Ella hosted another girls-only dinner party. It started out as an afternoon at the spa, followed by a fantastic dinner that totally reminded me of springtime, and a raucous game of Cranium to end the night. Ella prepared this really tasty linguine with asparagus and red pepper that had a kind of alfredo sauce, and served it with goat's cheese on baguette slices. It kind of reminded me of a pasta primavera (which means "spring" in Italian), which is made with young spring vegetables. The salad was amazing too, and so so simple: spinach, tomato and tasted walnuts tossed with a sweet dressing of green pepper jelly (you could also use red), balsamic vinegar, olive oil and mustard. It was so tasty and a really big hit with my friends.

Hurray for girls' nights!