The WORKS Gourmet Burger Bistro - Cooking With Beer

As if 50 gourmet burgers weren't enough, The WORKS has introduced three new limited time only burgers. From October 20 through January 4, 2015, the gourmet burger bistro will be featuring "Cooking With Beer" burgers. Think root-beer BBQ glazed pulled pork, beer barbecue sauce, and beer-battered beef patty. 

I was invited to The The WORKS' 
(Twitter: @WORKSBURGER, Facebook: The WORKS Gourmet Burger Bistro) for lunch last week for a sneak preview of their "Cooking with Beer" burgers. The WORKS opened its first restaurant in 2001 in Ottawa and has now expanded across Ontario and Newfoundland. It has won numerous awards including Ottawa's best Burger for the past 13 years in a row, Kingston's / London's / Milton's Best Burger, and MacLean's Best Small & Medium Employers in Canada. The WORKS now has 25 locations across Ontario.

The WORKS is a full-service gourmet burger restaurant offering over 50 hand-prepared gourmet burgers, hand-cut fries, milkshakes and beer, which are all 100 per cent Canadian. Guests can choose from seven different patty options (beef, elk, chicken, turkey, veggie, cheese stuffed beef and mushroom cap) as well as gluten-free and vegetarian combinations. 

It was an ideal day for the rooftop patio. We didn't even need to turn on the heat lamps.

The Stockyards: Smokehouse and Larder

Torontonians who love BBQ knows about The Stockyards, Tom Davis' modest BBQ joint on St.Clair West. If I can sum it up in one sentence, I would say that The Stockyards offers modern renditions of classic comfort food for all your BBQ cravings. Because whether it be a fried chicken over belgian waffles at 9am in the morning, a grab-and-go BBQ beef brisket sandwich for a quick lunch, or a big juicy Beast Style Burger or Butter Burger for dinner in front of the TV, The Stockyards has you covered (well besides Mondays when they are closed.) And if you ever find yourself in the mood for a "carnivorous binge", make sure you get your butt at the restaurant 5pm sharp on Tuesdays, Fridays or Sundays for their whole rack BBQ pork ribs and/or whole smoked chicken. Believe me, it is worth it and it will change your life. 

Despite the fact that The Stockyards opened four years ago in 2009, their 48-hour brined and marinated fried chicken and authentic wood smoked Carolina style BBQ still attracts a lot of buzz:

Ranked #1 in blogTO's "Best Fried Chicken in Toronto" (Jan 2011)
Toronto Life's "Eight of Toronto's Best Joints for Fried Chicken" (Jun 2011)
Post City's "Toronto's Tastiest Fried Chicken" (Jul 2012)
Ranked #1 in blogTO's "Best BBQ in Toronto" (Apr 2013)

Ranked #1 in NOW Magazine's "Toronto's Top 5 BBQ Restaurants" (Jul 2012)

Ranked #1 in Toronto Life's "Five Best Barbecue Restaurants" (Oct 2011)

With only 1,500 square feet and 18 seats, The Stockyards (@thestockyards) is a tiny restaurant with wood ceilings and a long, open kitchen. Guests sitting at the bar has a view of the kitchen where they can watch their food being prepared. With The Stockyards' limited space, it is obvious why take-out is so popular.

Crown Princess Fine Dining

In my opinion, unlike uptown Markham or Richmond Hill, where you will find a lot more average priced, middle-ranged Chinese dim sum restaurants, there are only two types in downtown Toronto, which are basically the two extremes: the cheap and the pricey. The cheap, semi sketchy-looking, hole-in-the wall dim sum joints offer traditional dim sum plates at bargain prices, and are typically located in Chinatown (or the general vicinity of Spadina and Dundas). The other type, the pricey, extravagant "fine dining" Chinese restaurants have fancy dim sum during the day and multi-course dinners at night (and often doubles as wedding banquet reception halls on weekends). These high-end restaurants often have over-the-top decor and aside from traditional dim sum, they also offer new creations and sometimes creative takes on traditional ones. They are also generally very keen on presentation and service.

Just by the picture below, you can probably tell that Crown Princess Fine Dining belongs in the latter category of dim sum restaurants. There are chandeliers on both the ceiling and the walls, where you will also find large fancy-looking paintings. The crown moldings, pillars, and the granite / marble bar completes the entire elegant ambiance that Crown Princess is striving for.

Fancy teapots and tableware at Crown Princess with porcelain rests for your spoon and chopsticks.

Dim sum are listed as either small ($3.10), medium ($4.30), large ($5.30), XL ($6.30) or Special / SP (no idea how much).

Pizzeria Libretto - Danforth

My favourite place for pizza in Toronto is Pizzeria Libretto (@PizzaLibretto). I know there is a constant, never-ending debate about who has "the best pizza in Toronto" but seriously, who cares? At the end of the day, everybody has different tastes and I personally like Pizzeria Libretto the best. I admittedly have not tried every pizza place in Toronto but so far,  Pizzeria Libretto is my favourite.


I started Food Junkie Chronicles back in April 2010 and one of my very first blog posts was about my love for the duck confit pizza at Pizzeria Libretto (still my favourite pizza there!) I haven't been back to Pizzeria Libretto for quite a while so I was really excited when I heard about their new Danforth location (@pldanforth).


My friend and I went to the Danforth location exactly a week ago around 7pm. We didn't make a reservation because it was a last minute decision to go. The restaurant was completely full and we were lucky to get the last two seats at the bar (it would've been more than an hour wait for a table).

The decor at this location is very modern, very "industrial" with the exposed piping, black and white walls, shiny concrete floors and the multi-coloured lights. This location is a lot more spacious than the Ossington location, which also has a more cozy and warm ambiance.

Two wood burning ovens at this location compared to only one at Ossington.

My "Nongshim" Oven-Roasted Spareribs

You're probably thinking, what the hell is "Nongshim" spareribs? Do I mean "Korean Spareribs"? Or some fancy "fusion" spareribs? Nope. None of the above. Let's just say these spareribs came to be due to pure laziness on my part. 


It was really gloomy a few Sundays ago; it was rainy, dark, and cold. It was basically a perfect day for staying-in and doing nothing at all. I had in mind to make spaghetti and meatballs for dinner that night and had planned to go grocery shopping for ground meat and other necessities. But when I woke up that Sunday afternoon (notice "afternoon", not "morning"), I've already decided that I did not want to go out, but rather, lounge in my pajamas all day. So what's in store for dinner then? I told my boyfriend to check what he has in the freezer, and he busted out some items that were of no interest to me. Suddenly, he pulled out a whole rack of pork spareribs which he said he got on sale last week but he only realized, after he bought it, that it takes super long to make and he said it's simply not worth it for one person (he cooks for himself during the weeknights). I immediately took on the challenge of tackling these ribs. 


I had to find a ribs recipe somewhere first. Contrary to what you may think, this is actually a very hard task considering that my boyfriend's place does not not have a lot of spices, sauces, or generally just cooking essentials or equipment. I looked online; a lot of recipes for ribs, yes, but I was always missing many essential ingredient. I finally found a recipe in this America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook  that my boyfriend gave to me as a gift a few days ago.

I had almost everything to make these spareribs happen with the recipe, all that was missing was two ingredients for the dry rub: 1) chili powder, and 2) cayenne powder. I had EVERYTHING else but those two ingredients, which I think were quite important for the ribs considering it asked for 1/2 cup of chili powder (I wouldn't think a dry rub with just brown sugar and black pepper be any good). My boyfriend had no spicy dry ingredient whatsoever - only spicy sauces, which will not do. It was frustrating to say the least, I needed spicy dry substitutions BAD. I was just about to give up on the ribs altogether when I saw my favorite instant noodle in the kitchen cabinet - a light bulb immediately went off in my head...

BBQ Pulled Pork

I've never made pulled pork before. I've certainly had pulled pork sandwiches and have always loved how tender the meat was and appreciated the tremendous amount of flavor it contains. But I've never thought about making it because pulled pork is usually cooked in big batches, so obviously it has no place when it comes to just cooking for me and my boyfriend. However, when my boyfriend mentioned that he wanted to host a party, I immediately thought of making pulled pork sandwiches. What better way to feed a group of 10 (mostly guys) than pulled pork? It is easy, economical, tasty, and most importantly, it is all meat and nothing but meat - all my boyfriend's friends are carnivores.

The great thing about making pulled pork is that you don't need to buy expensive cuts of meat like tenderloin or boneless pork chops; all you need is an inexpensive cut of meat (i.e. pork butt, pork roast) because it's gonna be in the slow cooker for many many hours anyway. I got some pork butt and it was very cheap. 

Note, there was no "regular" pork butt, just "supreme" pork butt....whatever that means hehe.

Father's Day BBQ

We shucked oysters at my brother's house for Mother's Day, and a month later it is Father's Day. Should we go out to eat this time? But like most of the time, we didn't feel like getting ripped off by restaurants, especially Chinese restaurants, with their "Father's Day Special Set Menu", nor did we feel like joining the herd of people trying to get a table, and ending up eating over-priced mediocre food. So should we stay in again? If we stay in, what were we gonna eat? Don't know if we feel like oysters again lol. Well thank goodness for the beautiful weather this past Sunday, my Dad suggested we get together at my brother's place for a nice little BBQ to celebrate. 


The weather on Sunday was actually perfect for BBQ-ing. It was not humid, and even in the shade you wouldn't feel cold. At times there was also a nice little breeze. The weather on Sunday, being the day before the first day of summer, was way better than the weather we are having right now in Toronto as I'm typing this (today is the day after the first day of summer, and its pouring outside, with the forecast predicting rain for the rest of the week *sad*).


My brother and my sister-in-law prepped everything, from the cutting of veggies to marinating the meats, to grilling the food too. Oh yeah, my Mom prepped the salad as well. That leaves only my Dad and I, so I guess our duty was to eat. O, how lucky we were =) 

Bar-B-Q Short Ribs with Grilled Asparagus and Cherry Tomato Salad

I had my mind set on making this Beef Short Ribs in Red Wine dish from Sass and Veracity. I picked up all the ingredients I needed on a late Sunday afternoon, and suddenly realized that the LCBO has already closed for the day! My boyfriend and I then went back to his parents place to see if they had any red wine lying around. This was the scene: his parents were out, nobody was home, we dashed right to the alcohol cabinet, and started pulling out each bottle frantically and checking the label. Thinking back, it was kind of funny...to think that we were doing all this for my short ribs, rather than sneaking out alcohol or something (we are about 10+ years too old for that). Anyhow, no luck - only ice wine, whiskey, brandy, and various kinds of hard liquor in pretty bottles or pretty boxes.

I was sad and disappointed as we went back to my boyfriend's place. He asked if could skip the red wine or substitute it with something else. I told him there was no way I can omit the 2 cups of red wine in the recipe, I cannot imagine how tasteless the short ribs would turn out. And as for substitutes? Eh...the kind of liquor at my boyfriend's place consists of Pomtini, Strawberry Zinfindel, and Moosehead. Obviously, the Pomtini and Zinfindel are for my boyfriend, and the Moosehead for me (haha). But no, those definitely will not work. What should I do now with 6lbs of short ribs?