Cinnamon buns can be found all over Scandinavia but no country does it better than Sweden. Denmark, Iceland, and Norway make a simple and boring roll. Finland’s version, korvapuusti, is a runner-up with its interesting angled cuts. In Sweden, the bun is intricately knotted, resulting in the most aesthetically-pleasing variant.
Sergels torg, Stockholm
Kanelbullar: the zenith of cinnamon buns
The Swedish cinnamon bun is called kanelbulle (singular) or kanelbullar (plural). It uses the same cardamom-tinged dough as other Nordic countries. The main difference is in its shape. At the better bakeries, the dough is braided and knotted. It results in a more airy bake. Also unique to Sweden, the kanelbullar are finished off with a sprinkling of crunchy white pearl sugar.
Sweden has a social ritual called fika. It’s essentially a coffee break with snacks. Kanelbullar is a popular option to accompany fika. If you consume them fast enough, you get cinammon and cardamon flavoured coffee, kind of like Indian chai.
As expected, the highest concentration of bakeries is in Stockholm. So, I set off on a quest to find the best kanelbullar in the city.
Mélange of Indian, Creole, and French on a granite paradise
La Digue, Seychelles
People visit Seychelles for the breathtaking beaches. The food isn’t as amazing. It’s either generic food, like pizzas and fried chicken, or homegrown Creole food. No prizes for guessing which one is worth eating.
Seychellois Creole food is island food with Indian influences and a touch of French. In Africa, Creole refers to any person of mixed ancestry from Africa and colonial Europe. Americans may associate Creole with Louisiana, but it’s really spread out from the Caribbean to the Indian Ocean.
The best place to get local food is on Mahé island because that’s where most of the population is. Unfortunately, it’s not where most tourists linger. They head to Praslin and La Digue, with more gorgeous landscapes and luxurious accommodations. So, this guide will cover those islands as well.
Partake in the largest celebratory feast in the Malayali (Kerala) calendar
This review is for 2021. Keep an eye out for the next onam sadhya on 2022-09-08.
Toronto’s burgeoning Kerala food scene explodes in one summer weekend of the year. That’s for onam sadhya, a feast celebrating the harvest festival. Restaurants shut down normal service and assemble the same onam sadhya set meals all day. Lines are long but most are in a jovial mood. It’s a fun activity to join in, even if you are not from Kerala.
Onam sadhya in Kerala
Kerala is a southern Indian state with a bountiful coastline. Its cuisine is not widespread in Toronto, so onam sadhya is a good occasion to sample them. I am not familiar with Keralan food. I was going to visit Kerala in 2020 but COVID happened. So, I can’t judge the authenticity of restaurants here.
Onam (ഓണം) is the harvest festival of the Malayali people in Kerala, falling between August and September. Sadhya (സദ്യ) means banquet. Put them together and you get the harvest feast. More than 20 items are splayed on a banana leaf. The meal is traditionally vegetarian.
Onam sadhya for takeout (Thanima Kerala Kitchen)
One of the first things you’ll notice is that the rice is not typical of the rest of India. It’s matta rice, a short-grained and plump variety. It has the texture of brown rice and is similarly coloured reddish-brown.
Red rice from Thanima Kerala Kitchen
Other food items in onam sadhya may include any of the following. I hope you like coconut.
Achaar (അച്ചാർ): Super sour pickle.
Avial (അവിയല്): Blanched, semi-dry vegetable mix with curd and grated coconut.
Eriserry (എരിശ്ശേരി): Pumpkin curry.
Olan (ഓലൻ): Ash gourd, black-eyed peas, coconut, and gigner.
Pachadi (പച്ചടി): Vegetables in yoghurt and coconut sauce.
Palada pradhaman (പാലട പ്രധമൻ): Dessert dish. Rice pudding with milk and dried fruits.
Pazham pradhaman (പഴം പ്രധമൻ): Dessert dish. Banana pudding with coconut milk and jaggery.
Pappadam: The familiar lentil cracker found throughout South Asia.
Payasam (പായസം): Dessert dish. Rice pudding with milk and jaggery.
Puli inji (പുളി ഇഞ്ചി): Thick sauce made from tamarind and ginger.
Pulisseri (പുളിശ്ശേരി): Sour yoghurt and coconut curry.
Rasam (രസം): Spicy tamarind soup. Also a Tamil mainstay.
Sambar (സാമ്പാർ): Spicy, thick lentil soup with vegetable chunks. Also shared with Tamil cuisine.
Sharkara upperi (ശർക്കര ഉപ്പേരി): Sweet banana chips in a jaggery batter, sliced in wedges.
Thoran (തോരൻ): Finely chopped vegetables with grated coconut and mustard seeds.
Upperi (ഉപ്പേരി): Banana chips, sliced crosswise.
Whole banana
This being Toronto, there aren’t exactly a lot of banana trees to pluck leaves from. And importing banana leaves is too expensive to feed the masses that slam Keralan restaurants for onam sadhya. So, restaurants here use a waxed, green-coloured paper instead. And in the era of COVID-19, it’s all takeout and DIY.
Onam sadhya is a big deal in Kerala, similar to a Christmas dinner. I recommend pre-ordering to avoid waiting in line for an hour or more. Nearly all Keralan restaurants here offer online ordering.
A head-to-head comparison of the ultimate beef extravaganza
Bò 7 món (literally 7 courses of beef) doesn’t come up often in Vietnamese menus. It’s a splurge and it takes a lot of kitchen prep work. I only know of 5 specialists in Toronto in the last decade. Only 2 remain today: Bo 7 Mon Restaurant and Phở Cửu Long Miền Tây. If there are other good ones, please let me know!
Since there are so few contenders, it’s easy to do a head-to-head battle to determine who makes the best bò 7 món.
What goes in a bò 7 món
Bò 7 món is associated with Southern Vietnam, which is more affluent than the rest of the country. In fact, the oldest specialist in Vietnam, Au Pagolac, is located in Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City). There isn’t a prescription about what the 7 courses are, but there is usually one sausage dish, a beef hot pot (bò nhúng dấm), and beef congee (cháo bò).
The contenders
Bo 7 Mon Restaurant
The name says it all. It’s a weird name if you think about it, like a burger restaurant naming themselves “Burger Restaurant”. Although they can’t trademark the name, it does make it clear what they sell.
Bo 7 Mon Restaurant
This restaurant is in a plaza dominated by Vietnamese restaurants. They’re all better than average and have carved out their own niche to avoid direct competition. Although Bo 7 Mon Restaurant’s specialty is obvious, they also have regular noodles and rice meals for those who want something simpler.
Dining area of Bo 7 Mon Restaurant
Phở Cửu Long Miền Tây
This restaurant sits at a junction that has a cluster of Vietnamese restaurants. Đà Nẵng Restaurant is a few minutes walk away and also has bò 7 món, though they are better known for their Central Vietnamese dishes.
Where to eat Newfoundland specialties in St John’s
Newfoundland is like a different country. The people there have a distinct accent and their own dictionary. Place names seem to be made up by pirates. The level of development is 10 years behind the urbanized provinces of Canada. And the food appears to have branched off from Britain and Ireland in the 1800s and developed into its own, much like Quebec did with French cuisine in the 1700s.
St John’s
Here’s where to try the mildly intriguing foods of Newfoundland in St John’s.
Fries with dressing
Ches’s Famous Fish and Chips
No, not salad dressing. Newfoundland dressing is what the rest of Canada calls turkey stuffing. It’s a mealy mix of bread crumbs and summer savoury, the key ingredient. Summer savoury is a herb that was somewhat popular in British cooking but fell out of favour in the rest of Canada. Here, it lives on through dressing.
Dressing is usually found with fries and doused with gravy, leading some to call it “Newfoundland poutine”. Pubs and greasy diners serve them. For fish and chips with dressing, local institution Ches’s is a good introduction.
Ches’s Famous Fish and Chips
Ches’s isn’t the best fish and chips in St John’s (some say it’s The Duke of Duckworth) but it’s one of the oldest. My cod bites and chips were traditional British style. Rather bland flour batter and thick-cut chips. The magic is in the gravy and dressing (both sold separately). The dressing was crumbly and one could clearly see and taste the green savoury leaves. The gravy was one-note but combined with the dressing and fries, it was a novel and satisfying experience. It’s like turkey dinner without the turkey. 7/10.
Cod bites and chips with dressing and gravy from Ches’s Famous Fish and Chips
Where to eat Canada’s own shawarma variant and splurge on lobster
The number one iconic food of Halifax is surely donair. Yes, people may associate Halifax with seafood but it’s neither unique (Prince Edward Island, Maine, and New England also have similar species) nor cheap (when on sale, Nova Scotian lobsters are cheaper in Toronto). Donairs, on the other hand, scream Nova Scotia.
Halifax-Dartmouth ferry
Sweet and messy donair
Donairs are a Nova Scotian adaptation of shawarma and gyro wraps. Compared to the minor variants of shawarma around the Mediterranean and Middle East, this one is a significant departure. There are 3 defining characteristics of a donair:
Sweet garlic white sauce. With a foundation of condensed milk, this sauce has its lovers and haters. It’s slathered liberally, resulting in a messy, and some say soggy, sandwich. It’s popular enough to be bottled up and sold on its own. And it also pairs with other Nova Scotian foods like garlic fingers (more on that later).
Compacted meat. Although the meat is grilled around a rotating spit like shawarma, it’s minced so finely and packed so tightly that it resembles corned beef. One wouldn’t be able to tell what animal meat it is. It has a bouncy texture too.
Topping of raw white onions and tomatoes. For the purists, there are no other additions like lettuce, pickles, peppers, or hot sauce.
The donair was invented in 1973. To be more accurate, that was the first prototype. After some experimentation, the final form and name emerged in 1974. The creator went on to open King of Donairs, which is widely regarded as the modern birthplace of the dish.
Donair meat now appears in various incarnations that have proved just as popular: on donair pizza, donair subs, donair egg rolls, and donair poutine. Accompanied with the signature white sauce of course.
Poutine is the undisputed number one iconic food of Canada. The second is…um maple syrup? And that wraps up the list of famous Canadian foods.
So, if you are foodie, you have to go to Quebec, the birthplace of poutine. Montreal and Quebec City are strong contenders but food snobs like to point out that the best poutines are outside Montreal. I don’t know if that is true but I do know that Quebec City has Chez Ashton, a fast food chain with great classic poutines. More on that later. Moreover, Quebec City is fairly compact, so it’s an easy place to try different poutines.
Quebec City
What makes a great poutine?
There are just three components in a classic poutine. It’s hard to mess them up but also difficult to excel at them all.
Fries Medium cut. Crisp on the outside. Double- or even triple-frying is optional.
Gravy Dark brown, semi-thin, and salty with a deep meaty flavour. The gravy can be based on chicken, beef, or both. Vegan options have also appeared but the classic is heavy on beef.
Cheese This is the most difficult component to source but the easiest to prepare. The “cheese” is actually cheese curd, not actual cheese. They are a byproduct of cheese production and are like white, bite-sized cushions. It’s hard to find them outside of Quebec and Ontario.
The cheese curds must make a squeaking noise when you chew on them. Obviously, they must remain intact in order to squeak. That’s why they are added to the poutine at the last moment. The chef should ensure that the gravy and fries are not too hot to melt the curds. Any poutine that uses mozzarella, cheddar, or Cheez Whiz is sacrilegious. Heavily-melted cheese is also a sign of an inauthentic poutine.
Variations abound, from Galvaude (chicken and peas) to bacon. Restaurants with the best traditional poutine may not have the best all-loaded ones. For a fair comparison, only traditional poutine was ordered for this taste test.
Ottawa is supposedly the shawarma capital of Canada, based on the high density of restaurants. From anywhere in downtown, it’s at most a few minutes walk to a shawarma restaurant. However, in terms of absolute number or quality, the claim is somewhat dubious as Montreal and Toronto have a larger and more diverse Middle Eastern population.
The only true food specialty in Ottawa is BeaverTails, a flat doughnut. If you’ve already tried that, you might as well check out the everyday food of this city. Don’t expect gourmet options. The celebrated shawarmas cost less than $10 and are considered fast food. From what I can taste, there isn’t anything unique about it. It’s close to Lebanese-style and similar to other places in Canada.
Ottawa
Here are some shawarma places that are consistently at the top of “best of” lists. For a fair comparison, I ordered the same thing at all restaurants: a small chicken shawarma wrap with all toppings and sauces.
Voyage through Winnipegger and Manitoban specialties
Winnipeg has the most storied history of all the cities in the Canadian Prairies. Indigenous groups converged at The Forks, the confluence of two rivers. Winnipeg still has the largest number of indigenous residents among Canadian cities. Then, came the voyageurs: French-Canadians that used canoes to transport fur goods. Those who stayed spawned the Métis: people of mixed indigenous and French-Canadian heritage. Their food legacy survives as a derivative of Quebec’s.
The British moved in, followed in the early 20th-century by Greek, Polish, Ukrainian, and even Icelandic settlers. Mennonites from Germany and Russia also formed a sizable minority. Unsurprisingly, foods from all these groups can be found in Winnipeg today.
Winnipeg
With a rich history and opportunities for multicultural adaptation, it’s odd that Winnipeg has few unique dishes. The most unique dish, fatboy, was only created in the 1950s. And it’s not a particularly interesting dish either.
For the foodie tourist, the city’s culinary makeup is of modest interest. Skim the list below, skip the cuisines you’ve tried before and focus on Modern Canadian fare. I’ve listed the unique foods first.
Where to get the best chili-topped burgers in Winnipeg
Winnipeg has a couple of minor, obscure food specialties. But the number one has got to be fatboys. It’s the only specialty that is thriving in Winnipeg, so it can be rightfully considered to be Winnipeg’s representative dish.
Winnipeg skyline
What is a fatboy?
A fatboy (sometimes spelled as fat boy) is simply a hamburger with chili. Not Texas-style chili because that will just become a sloppy mess. Coney Island-style chili is used because it’s more viscous. And because the creator used to work in a Coney Island-style restaurant. Fun fact: both Coney chili and fatboys were invented by Greek immigrants.
It’s dubious to treat a regular hamburger with a particular topping as a local specialty, but it’s woven into the food fabric of Winnipeg and found nowhere else.
The name isn’t standard either. Perhaps to avoid litigation, some restaurants call it by other names. But it’s still a burger with thin, well-done beef patties, lettuce, tomatoes, white onions, pickles, mayo, and of course, chili. The “fat” part comes from the copious amount of mayo and large size. Well, at least larger than regular hamburgers from fast food chains.
The most important component for me in a fatboy is obviously the chili. Otherwise, I would just order a regular burger.
The fatboy restaurants in Winnipeg are old-school. They look like they haven’t changed since the 1960s and 1970s. Most are cash-only. Some close during the brutal winter season, so check ahead if you are visiting between December and March.
