Wanda's Belgian Waffles

I was waiting in line for my noodles order, and across I see this waffles place. I told my client I feel bad for the owner since every time I pass by, he has no customers. My client agreed and seeing their deal of $2 a vanilla waffle, we decided to give it a try.

After it was freshly made and given to my hand, i was surprised at the weight of this waffle.

(The picture was taken after a few bites.) It was thick and heavy. It's not the typical soft and fluffy waffles at sit-in restaurants. It was high volume, hot, flaky and crispy, dusted with icing sugar. It wasn't too sweet which I liked, but you could taste the heavy butter in the batter.  This is probably the only type of waffle I wouldn't mind eating plain without any icecream or toppings. My only major concern with these waffles would be the calories. Trust me, even though the waffle doesnt look that big, considering how filing the waffle was, I suspect it to be roughly around 1000 calories.

Food: Very Good
Service: Good
Price: The vanilla waffles are a good deal, as for other options I would say they are a bit expensive. (I've never tried though)
Atmosphere/Decoration: They are definitely at the wrong place. People that go to Pacific mall are mostly Asian or looking for cheap food options. These waffles definitely wouldn't catch their eye.
Overall: I personally really like their waffles. I actually got a waffle at my last few visits at Pacific Mall. I looked up reviews on their waffles and majority don't seem to like it. Some find it expensive and some didn't enjoy the taste - but in the end, it's all personal preference of how you like your waffles. I would suggest giving their waffles a try, but not on a regular basis since they are a bit too heavy.

Wanda's Belgian Waffles
4300 Steeles Ave, E (inside Pacific Mall upstairs)

Piggy's Restaurant

If you ask me, I think they should have made this restaurant's english name the direct translation of it's korean name, "Piggy Piggy". Would sound a lot cuter than just piggy's. Anyhow, I suppose the only reason I planned a visit here was because of the cool restaurant name.

I liked how they had a variety of combos to choose from. Basically you pick a main dish from a list, one appetizer (of the 2), and either 4 bottles of beer or 1 bottle of soju. Since the restaurant's called Piggy, clearly we had to try the pigs! My friend and I decided to go for the Piggy's soju combo C. We chose the thin sliced pork belly, with steamed egg bowl, and 4 bottles of beer. All for a total of $34.95, pretty good deal if you ask me.

They gave us quite a lot of side dishes, which I liked. But none seemed to be the usual ones you get at other korean restaurants. When I first saw this dish of onions, I was confused thinking we eat it straight up.

(Wasn't until later I realized it was probably given to add in to your pork belly and lettuce wrap.)
Now look at this dish, doesn't it look interesting and different?

Not gonna lie, even after tasting it I still couldnt figure out what I just ate.
The kimchi was pretty spicy on it's own. The dish on the right is spicy lettuce. And the small dish at the top is super spicy squid. (I couldn't tell if it was raw or cooked) lol

You have the option of bbq-ing the kimchi as well, added a bit of crisp to it and less cold.

And here is the pork belly, look at all that fat!

The waitress rarely knew/spoke any english so we had a hard time figuring out how we were supposed to eat our meal. But within time we figured out we were supposed to wrap the pork belly into the given lettuce. (I even messaged my korean friend to confirm, just because I didn't want to look like a retard in the restaurant.)

The pork belly was so crispy. I normally don't like bacon, but I enjoyed this meal, although it was a bit of too much 'bacon'. My friend kept saying I ruined his love for bacon since we probably each had roughly 10 pieces on our own.
The egg soup was really good. Smooth and soft egg texture, tasting not too salty too.

We also ordered "Bi Bim Naeng Myeon" to share. ($9.95) On the menu it stated that it's sweet potato vermicelli noodles topped with marinated raw fish in spicy sauce. by stating "sweet potato vermicelli", somehow we were hoping that it would be the korean 'glass noodles' (chap cheh), but to our disappointment it was this really thin and springy white noodles which were hard to cut off (or should I say the noodles were red since it was intensely covered in hot sauce, nothing looked non-red). I thought this dish was a bit too spicy for my taste buds. Another funny thing was there were pieces of meat, but it was crunchy. Didn't taste anything close to fish, but because the color was so red, we couldn't figure out what meat we were eating. Just as a side note, the noodles were cold; this wasn't a hot dish. I personally didn't enjoy this dish too much.

Food: Pretty good
Service: Alright
Price: Average
Atmosphere/Decoration: Nothing special, but the restaurant is quite big compared to the typical korean restaurants down yonge and finch. I do have to comment that my clothes smelled SO korean after i left. I personally dislike the strong smell of korean food on my clothes and hair, not to mention this place had bbq grills at each table.
Overall: I enjoyed my visit, although the pork belly was a bit too overwhelming for 2 people to eat. Would have been a better idea to go with a bigger group; a few friends snacking with beer. If you're not familiar with eating korean food, i would suggest coming with a korean friend, that way you wont look confused or not know what to order. I would recommend coming to this restaurant as I wouldn't mind coming back myself.

Piggy's Restaurant
5 Glen Cameron Rd, Thornhill

Cafe Mania

For a girls night out, my girl friend and I went on our dessert hunt and landed at this restaurant.

It's been awhile so i actually don't remember the name of the dishes, but I ordered one of their classic waffles. Topped with strawberry, banana, and a scoop of vanilla icecream.

Nicely displayed but I must say the scoop of icecream is quite small. Only the middle white ball shape is icecream, its squished by 2 blobs of whipped cream. The waffle was alright, I think the crepe tasted better.

My friend ordered the apple crumble crepe.

There were tiny pieces of walnuts inside, we both didn't like walnuts so we had to pick them out one by one, quite a hassle. The cinnamon taste wasn't too strong, so it was acceptable. It was slices of green apples inside, which i really liked. The crepe was just right, not too crispy and not too chewy. This felt like a light dessert selection, which was a good choice.

Food: Alright
Service: Alright
Price: Reasonable price, ranged under $10
Atmosphere/Decoration: It's quite small but I like the atmosphere. It was funny because for some reason this restaurant gave me a feeling that it would be a good location to schedule a blind date. The place is small so you can clearly see everyone, meaning it would be safe to meet up with a random, yet having still a romantic feel/atmosphere. Just a random thought.
Overall: I don't see myself paying another visit though. It's far from where I live and the food wasn't that amazing. If i were to head for dessert I would choose Spin instead. Not that the experience was bad, but it just didn't match my taste buds.

Cafe Mania
605 Yonge Street, Toronto

Shinobu

Yes I know I've disappeared, its been like forever since I updated this blog. I feel like i'm losing visitors like this too..I've actually been visiting a lot of restaurants in the past month, but just too lazy to update :P

Finally, I paid a visit to Shinobu with my brother. He's always been telling me their food is really good. For some reason, I didn't find it that amazing. I guess i'm still not over my awesome sushi experience at Mikado.

Shimesaba, seared mackerel sashimi. ($9.50)

Torched mackerel sashimi. It was alright, nothing special in my opinion. They do torch it infront of you at your table though.

This was actually my favorite dish of the night, Salmon Tartar ($7.50)

It's basically a big blob of raw salmon chopped into really shredded pieces. I suppose it would take a lot skill to cut it into that texture, soft and mushy not tasting like the normal thick salmon sashimi. Don't you think it looks like the raw shredded pork made through machine that you buy at the super market?

Tompei Yaki, Pork & egg Japanese pancake with onkonomi sauce ($8.90)

I know the flakey things are blocking the actual pancake, but its basically egg wrapping slices of pork inside. Sounds like an omelette, but pretty tastey.

Spicy Shrimp Tempura ($7.90)

It's really just shrimp tempura with spicy sauce on it. Yes, there are only 4 pieces of shrimp, meaning almost $2 per shrimp. If you ask me it was nothing amazing or special. Although I would comment they were nicely fried, but still definitely not worth the price.

Chicken Tempura with tartar sauce. ($9.50)

It was nicely friend, but then again nothing special to me.

and here comes the a-la-carte sushi we ordered.

I would say they don't make much effort in displaying their food, at least for sushi. There was a bit too much rice with their sushi. From top left to right, red tuna, yellow tail, salmon. From bottom left to right, scallop, sweet shrimp, unagi. Their fish is pretty fresh though, which is good.

Lastly, we finished our dinner with a spider roll. ($13)

Nothing special, other than mentioning it was huge but i still managed to stuff the whole piece in my mouth.

Food: Pretty Good.
Service: Good
Price: I would consider it Mid-priced. However, some dishes were overpriced in my opinion.
Atmosphere/decoration: There isn't really much decoration, but the place is really small. Probably 6 tables? You literally see the whole restaurant in one glance when you walk in. So make sure you make reservations if you decide to go.

Overall: Although my experience wasn't too enjoyable for some reason, (I do think it's because most of the food we ordered were fried, and im not a fan of fried food.) I still think the food was pretty good and I would come back. Apparently their Donburis are really good; definitely giving that a try next visit.

Shinobu
3403 Yonge Street, Toronto