RootMeanSquare have confirmed the 2009 Olympic Island Festival. Previous years have seen Death Cab For Cutie, Modest Mouse, Arcade Fire, and Broken Social Scene play the early summer fest.
I love nothing more than a late Sunday morning meal of eggs, strong coffee and the weekly editions of Eye or Now Magazine. It’s a Sunday….errr…or sometimes Saturday morning tradition, and I want to share our Toronto-area brunch experiences. BlogTO has a pretty good best of brunch list, check it out. So over the few months, I’m headed out to find the best brunch in the city.
This past weekend, we were out in Leslieville Sunday morning (house shopping), so we decided to check out Barrio. Barrio is located in the dead centre of the neighbourhood between other local brunch favs Bonjour Brioche and Eddie Levesque’s Kitchen. Barrio is a decent sized space, which seats 35-40 people, plus about 7 more spots at the bar. The decor is comfortable, the banquettes and chairs are covered in a soft denim and throw pillows clutter the banquettes. The room is a bit dark, it feels more like a local watering hole than a brunch place.
We were seated almost immediately, which should have been my first indication that things weren’t going to be amazing, we’re use to waiting a bit for a table at Sunday morning brunch, especially considering it was prime time (12:30pm). Our waitress brought the menus promptly and took our drink orders. Menu is typical of Toronto brunch spots, maybe a little more bland than usual and priced are average ($15 a person with coffee). Barrio offers 4 versions of eggs benedict (my go-to order), as well as other staples like ommelttes, pancakes and waffles. I saw someone’s fresh fruit, yogurt and granola bowl and it looke great. Our drinks arrive, I ordered an Americano (Mark had tea). Barrio brews illy coffee/espresso, which is such a let down in my opinion for a number of reasons. It’s not good, it’s pretty tasteless and is overpriced. Secondly, there are so many options in the city where they could source their beans from (Intelligista now ships to Canada, Dark City Coffee Company delievers to businesses, hell, even fresh ground Starbucks would be better). My americano arrived, was too weak (too much water!!!) and not hot enough. We both decided on the classic eggs benedict that promised smoked ham. I ordered mine with half mixed greens, half homefries, Mark went with a side of homefries only.
This is where things started to go downhill. The restaurant was about 85% full, and I noticed that food was coming out of the kitchen pretty slow. There was a table of 8 near us, and their food trickled out over a 5 minute period (one of my pet peeves, bring it all at once!!!). It took about 35 minutes for our eggs to come. It looked pretty tasty, but the first thing I noticed that the “smoked ham” looked to be your run-of-the-mill deli counter style ham. The benny was built on crumpets instead of english muffins, which was a nice change. The ham wasn’t that great, it was kind of rubbery and tasteless. My eggs were poached perfectly, just the right amount of yolk, but the hollandaise sauce was too salty. The side of greens was okay, a bit too much dijon vinegarette and the homefries were a let down, basically deep fried new potatoes, unseasoned, and tasted like the grease they were cooked in. Many of my homefries were still raw in the centre.
Overall, a pretty disappointing experience. The quality of food was a notch above Golden Griddle, the service was a bit unorganized and slow. Would we go back, probably not.
Posted: April 6th, 2009 | Author:danieljosef | Filed under:Live Video | Comments Off
Who knew that Phoenix were popular enough to be booked on SNL? I mean, their only claim to fame in North America was that their song Too Young was featured in a Sofia Coopla film. Phoenix release their new album Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix on May 26th. From what I’ve heard, the album is actually really great. (videos via Stereogum).
Pitchfork are airing Arcade Fire’s tour documentary/concert film right now for one week only. Check the link here. Like what you see? Purchase the DVD version here.
Below are shows that have been confirmed this week. Tickets available at Rotate This.
Woodhands play the Phoenix on April 17th, tickets are $10, this is a 19+ show.
French Kicks play The Horeshoe on April 27th. Tickets are $11.50. Another 19+ show.
Crystal Method play Guverment on May 8th, tickets are a whopping $31.
Diplo spins at Circa the same night, advance tickets available now for $15.
Fischerspooner play the Phoenix on June 2st. The $25 price tag my seems high but from early reviews, the tour stage show is suppose to be pretty extraordinary.
Tiga, who’s new album Ciao! is out April 21st (or 27th depending on which website you check) on Last Gang Records and Turbo Recordings DJs Circa on June 5th. Tickets are $15.
Tickets are available right now via their website for $125 for a two-day pass, $295 for a VIP pass (which includes a VIP enterance, access to a VIP grandstand, VIP food concessions and private bathrooms) and single day tickets for $75. Seems as if the festival is piggy backing off All Points, which happens the same weekend in Jersey (many of the bands are playing both festivals).
We were seated almost immediately, which should have been my first indication that things weren’t going to be amazing, we’re use to waiting a bit for a table at Sunday morning brunch, especially considering it was prime time (12:30pm). Our waitress brought the 
It looked pretty tasty, but the first thing I noticed that the “smoked ham” looked to be your run-of-the-mill deli counter style ham. The benny was built on crumpets instead of english muffins, which was a nice change. The ham wasn’t that great, it was kind of rubbery and tasteless. My eggs were poached perfectly, just the right amount of yolk, but the hollandaise sauce was too salty. The side of greens was okay, a bit too much dijon vinegarette and the homefries were a let down, basically deep fried new potatoes, unseasoned, and tasted like the grease they were cooked in. Many of my homefries were still raw in the centre.
