Grand Electric, A taco fiesta with a hipster twist.

My buddy David has been dying to check out this new place since it opened…reviews have been good and apparently line ups are pretty intense if you don’t arrive before 7pm, otherwise it can potentially be a very long 2hr waiting list.

Bff and I decided to meet up around 4ish to grab some Nadege and then make our way over to Grand Electric to grab seats. Just as we were beginning our journey it was side tracked via shitty TTC as one street cart broke down,  meaning we weren’t going to be able to ride the cart to where we needed to go. So we decided to walk as far as we could…our starting point was from Osgoode subway station to far Queen West.

With wind chills hitting our faces at -12, we never looked more Chinese in our lives, with our mouths cringing and eyes squinting at the bitter cold…the walk seemed pretty damn impossible, but my encouraging words (not really) gave Jackie hope and so our frozen toes trekked onward.

It was pretty hilarious, the adventure took forever, roughly every 5-7 minutes we couldn’t stand the cold and ran into whatever store was in sight…to absorb as much heat as we could and went back outside to continue. We did check out some stores we never been to before so the walk wasn’t too too bad, though when the street carts were finally running back up, temptation to catch the cart struck our cold brains pretty often.

We finally made it to Nadege, like 1.5 hours later…we grabbed a pepito croissant (delicious) and some mini madelines  and walked onward to find the next Starbucks to get a latte.

Finally, it was time to head out to the restaurant and yes we took the street cart our toes couldn’t take it anymore, we had enough…we saw the street cart and waved that driver down like it we were on the sinking Titanic and he was our savior.

The place is very small, I don’t think it can even hold any more than 30 patrons…it has a very thrown together design but it seemed to work, very hipstery but alas I am in their territory, at least me and Jackie mesh in with everyone else me thinks.

Luckily for us, we did get the last big table situated right by the window. It was a nice spot until people start opening doors…

While we were waiting for the boys to arrive, we ordered Guacamole & chips, delicious and simple a good app to start.

Dave ordered some beer and a weird egg white bourbon sour cocktail, it was really strong otherwise tasty.

Let us move onto the main event…tacos!!! Grand electric sells fancy tacos for a very reasonable and good price. $3.50 each or 3 for $10. We ordered 3 of each off the menu :)

Fish taco

Pork and pineapple

Beef cheek

Spicy chicken

I’m not going to review each taco on their own because well…they are all fantastic..!!! I have no complaints what so ever with any of the tacos, all the meats were nicely flavoured, juicy and tender. These 3-4 bite (for a girl) tacos are sooooo delicious, I will definitely return for just the tacos.

The tacos are a bit small, but it will add up if you have one of each 4 tacos can definitely fill my tummy and easy on my wallet.

Shrimp Tostada, a citrus and creamy the shrimp is raw-ish and fresh so it leaves you without a fishy aftertaste.

Tuna Cheviche a tuna tartar dish where the raw fish is soaked in a vinegary lime juice that cooks it slightly. While we were having those spicy chicken tacos, we cooled down our palettes with this refreshing dish.

Pozole Rojo $12
So far everything is fantastic, no complaints…except this dish. The soup was bland and had no interesting kick to it, kinda reminded me of a watered down korean kamjatang, which while I was having this soup…really made me craved for some pork bone soup. I would not order this dish again.

This little pie in a jar was the finisher to our meal, of course it was a lime themed dessert, very refreshing and sweet, we were way too full to have our own individual desserts and having one spoonful each was perfect.

The bill for the night was very reasonable, we had our fill and the staff were all very friendly. The food came quickly and music was all over the place but it suited the place anyway.

Oh a funny of the night, since we were right by the window, we were graced with watching the many patrons struggle and be baffled by the door entrance. The door is a PUSH in, but trickery lies in the design as it has a long vertical bar that people will naturally assume it would be a pull to open. So after a few frustrated pulls, people think the restaurant might even be closed…but eventually their brain starts working and they decide to try another option and push their way through. haha.

Anyways, I want to go back already…I really wish they had lunch hours :(

Recipe to Riches: Glos’ Lucious Lemon Pudding Review

Food Networks new television program called Recipe to Riches is an interesting concept for a food show…it is a combination of an idol show, instead of singing you are cooking, and Dragon’s Den, selling the potential of your product.

Competitors bring our their recipe that goes through a vigorous taste test, large batch test and marketability test.

In the end, an adorable older lady named Glo won the judges over, and lets be real…i’m sure everyone was rooting for her..she’s so sweet…just like her pudding haha.

Anyways, after watching the episode I felt the urge to give the recipe a go and see if the judges were right in making her the winner.

Typically the dessert should be made in a large baking dish and served out accordingly, but I thought it would be much cuter to put them in small ramekins.

I’m not gonna lie, I made this last night and I #$%@ed up badly, silly me forgot to add in sugar for some reason, I rushed the dessert and wasted an entire batch.

Obviously I needed to redeem myself from that horrid episode, so I made a successful batch and the end result seemed good in all its glory, I was so eager to test this dessert, the winning recipe that Loblaws would place on their shelves for a weekend…

It tasted, drum roll please….

Like a lemon tart with a dinky amount of sponge cake…?

Ok wait wait, you are telling me…the dessert that blew everyone away and was put up against so many competing recipes was this overly simplistic lemony dessert? Don’t get me wrong now, it tastes good…but I was hoping for something more special. Glo had a back story with her mother’s mother handed down the recipe, been in the family for years, and it was something they enjoyed during the wars etc…but seriously?!

I am disappointed, it tasted like the lemon tarts I made occasionally, the filling was that of a custard and the cake was fluffy but not enough to really notice it when you eat the two together.

I’m sure I didn’t mess up a second time, the recipe and ingredients are very basic and easy to follow…why was I expecting so much? Was it because it was televised…and I automatically assumed it was going to be something special.

Overall, still very tasty, an easy dessert to make for any occasion. Would I make it again? Nah…I rather substitute the cakey part for a buttery tart!

If you would like to give this recipe a try, food network has posted the recipe here http://www.foodnetwork.ca/recipes/luscious-lemon-pudding/recipe.html?dishID=12109

 

Skulls & Tacos for lunch

Sunny day out in NYC, Soho. We were browsing around, attempting to find something worthwhile and make the best of our trip…then came along a shop we passed by that quickly caught our eyes. No this surely was not a clothing store or anything to do with fashion, but instead a shop of peculiar oddities.

It seemed most boutiques in Soho are dazzled with large store fronts with a contemporary modern atmosphere, but not this place…cluttered and relied on artificial lighting, you would think walking in it would have some sort of musky odor, luckily not. Instead our eyes took a gander at the store of Evolution, a shop nestled in between shops down a busy strip that strictly sold artificial/real animal bones, parts and pieces.

They carry all sorts of animal bones/parts you can think of, it felt like a museum was for sale.

A pretty obvious theme going on in the store, lots of different skulls to choose from, whether it be human or animal, artificial or real, they had it all.

It was interesting to see they sold bits and pieces of different animal parts…but my question would be, what are people doing with these parts?

Alligator head that Scott ended up picking up for his room, cute little bugger don’t you think?

I really like this, I kind of regret not picking it up…maybe because the laziness in me probably won’t even build it.

The back walls are littered with organized frames with all sorts of pinned bugs, the staff was also very attentive and occasionally asked if we need help or had any questions, very lovely people.

So worth the check out, they have two floors, upstairs contain posters and expensive pieces…I left the boutique with a pair of skull earrings and Scott took a dead animal head home with him hah.

Of course naturally you would be hungry after looking at dead stuff right? We saw an interesting Taco truck on a busy street and decided to give it a try.

Yeap, they were very delicious. Scott went back for seconds.

Great menu, so many interesting options and toppings, the line up built up very quickly for good reason.

Tacos were well priced too, freshly made and none of that minced meat crap, the tacos were roughly $3 depending on what you want.

Mine was sooo good, I forgot what I ordered :( something to do with deliciousness though

We passed by this obnoxiously looking yellow truck and realized it was fancy pants ice cream…how could we resist? Ice cream for dessert!

They carried really interesting and lovely sounding flavours, such as Red Current cream, Giandujia (Chocolate & hazenlnut) and different tea ice creams like Earl Grey…the truck had many other flavours but the Earl Grey was the only one I was focusing on so I kinda disregarded the rest.

Gourmet Ice cream definitely made me a happy camper, although I was extremely full from all the tacos…I kinda didn’t finish my ice cream and ditched it mid way :S oh how I regret that so…