Friendly Restaurants

Last Friday I met 2 friends at a restaurant in a plaza on Lawrence Ave. This place fulfilled our lunch requirements: it was easily accessible, and it had some interesting food items on the menu. The choices are vegetarian; no meat is served. But there are lots of fish options and interesting salads. And their specialty, bagels, are a good choice any time. Finally: it’s almost next door to Winners!

The 3 of us, and often another friend, have been meeting over food for almost 40 years. It all began at work. We were teachers at a high school and every Friday we would celebrate the end of our week with a drink and munchies at Diana Sweets. We called it Period 5. It was a place and time to shed our school issues. We heaved sighs of relief as we contemplated a couple of days to rebuild our strength and shore up our lesson plans. We began to relax as we drank vodka and orange juice and nibbled on quesadillas, and potato skins.

After we all retired, we stayed in touch. Diana Sweets closed down so we had to find other places to meet. Our days were free and we could meet any time; for example, lunch! One place that attracted us was Red Lobster. We discovered that their seafood chowder was delicious and the rolls were all buttery and warm. We could even ask for extras to take home. And the restaurant, located close to a highway, had a huge parking lot.

Another place that caught our eye was downtown on the subway; The Queen and Beaver Pub. It had a great menu with delicious salads. Because we were so healthy on the first course, we decided to try their sticky toffee pudding for dessert. WOW. It was out of this world. Which led us in another direction – a search for the best sticky toffee pudding in the city. We scoured the internet and found sticky toffee pudding at the Pickle Barrel. We tried 2 different locations but their STP was no match for the one we had at the Queen and Beaver. So we gave up and focused on something else: shopping.

Since we were retired, why not combine lunch and shopping? One of our favourite places to shop was Second Nature, a high-end consignment store on Mt. Pleasant Ave. We found some unique clothes there, even a wedding dress! But it took a lot of energy to browse all 3 floors. We needed to fit lunch into our plan. Lo and behold, there was a fish and chips store nearby.

Penrose Fish and Chips was an iconic spot; a family business started in the 1940’s. The entire family worked there, frying up the fish and rolling it in newspapers. Their menu was short – fish and chips and coleslaw. And maybe a coffee. Sadly, this historic spot closed down in 2014. We tried a replacement on Laird Drive. The fish was quite good but the parking was terrible and there was no transit or shopping. So we moved on.

One place that served well as a replacement was Swiss Chalet. The quarter chicken dinner with fries and coleslaw could always be counted on. The meals were reasonably priced and the restaurant had clean washrooms. It was our back-up when other ideas failed. In fact we went there so often that, when one of us was about to celebrate a milestone birthday, she jokingly mentioned Swiss Chalet. She was pretty surprised to see 12 of her closest friends gathered there on the appointed day.

Recently one of our group moved into a retirement apartment at Christie Gardens, so naturally we had to try out the restaurant. It’s large with bright windows looking onto a patio and garden. The meals are displayed on a table at the entrance, so you can actually see what you are going to order. The seats are comfy and the wait staff very friendly and patient. Three courses are offered: soup or salad, a main course and then a dessert trolley with many choices, although sticky toffee pudding hasn’t appeared so far. And there’s a small gift shop too.

This past weekend I finished reading the latest book for my book club. The story covers life in a Veterans’ hospital built in Toronto during the first World War. The story briefly touched on the food served to the vets – cheap, with little variety and cooked in huge batches. The ending shocked me: the hospital was torn down in the 1960’s and replaced with Christie Gardens! Too bad the vets didn’t get to eat there.

Sue