Restaurants
Cardinal Rule
Cardinal Rule is comfort food at its finest. The dim lighting, the cozy wood tables, and the food, oh the food. The place is perfect for a pub stop, some intimate conversation, or the post-hangover meal - maybe all at once.
Located at 5 Roncesvalles (at Queen), Cardinal Rule has a simple teal exterior. Walking into the diner, I pass the kitchen and the bar, which has a selection of regional beers on tap, including Steamwhistle, Wellington and Beau's.
It's too early to start on the drinks; I am at Cardinal Rule for Sunday Brunch. We are immediately greeted and ushered to our seats with menus, but take awhile to decide. The options are all intriguing: Breakfast Pie; Hawaiian Stuffed French Toast; Quinoa Coconut Pancakes; Hail Caesar Eggs Benedict; or The Chwaley, a family breakfast for two or more that includes a pitcher of Caesars. In the end, I choose the Breakfast Pie, sold on its crust of bacon. My eating companion orders the classic Eggs Benedict with potato latkes.
The fillings of the Breakfast Pie ($9) alternate regularly. Today's version features the standard bacon crust, with Italian sausage, provolone cheese, eggs and potato latke inside. The pie is soft and flavourful, the eggs and cheese delicately blended. It melts in my mouth. Despite the combination of meat, cheese and potatoes, it is not overly dense, nor too heavy. The crispy bacon gently counters the taste and texture of the filling. To balance the pie is a simple salad of mixed greens, doused very lightly in vinaigrette.
The Eggs Benedict ($10) are also a success. Set on English muffins and peameal bacon, the eggs are poached flawlessly, falling apart when prodded by knife. The hollandaise is light but flavourful. My friend much appreciates the modest dollop, a fresh change from the hollandaise drown that often accompanies an eggs benedict.
The potato latkes are crispy on the outside, and soft on the inside--creamy almost, and not in a mushy-potato way. Leaks are added for flavour. These latkes need no sour cream or applesauce on the side; they are not dry, and are savory all on their own.
IOur total bill for two is $23.50, one of the cheapest and most delicious brunches I've had in this city. This includes our meals, one coffee and an orange juice. Right now, payment is by cash-only; for those unprepared, an ATM is conveniently located beside the bar.
Cardinal Rule takes the standards of home comfort food to a whole new level, with a cozy neighbourhood vibe. Food is prepared with care and creativity, and despite the hearty meals consumed at my visit, they offer veggie, vegan and gluten-free options. Cardinal Rule is exactly what I need on a Sunday morning, or for that matter, any other day of the week. Whatever rule this place is playing by, I want to stay in the game.
Photos and text by Jenna Lianne.
Discussion
22 Comments
Sort By Oldest First / Newest First
Subscribe
the canned pineapple situation from last weekend was a one day incident and has been gloriously rectified with an even better improved pineapple chutney. I welcome you to come and try it!
Cheers. :)
I ordered a gluten-free club with fries a few months back. The menu made it sound delicious, but what I got was lunch-meat turkey on teeny-tiny gluten-free bread. The tomatoes were nice and fresh, but the lettuce was lacking. The bacon is VERY average. The fries were small in portion and easy on the delicous. In all, it was 14$. Too steep for me when the food is hovering somewhere around the average.
Ok, so, maybe one meal does not an opinion make. But, what annoyed me more than anything was the staff. Sorry guys, I know you're a small group of gals trying to make good, but i've walked into this place twice, ordered once, and each time I came in it felt like I was interupting you. You guys seems to just be hanging out a lot, and that's cool, but from a customers standpoint it doesn't make for a comfortable dining experience. Chatting, laughing and general tomfoolery with a bunch of other people in the restaurant while neglecting my drink and food service is just plain annoying. Do you know what it looks like to leave my food somewhere, where I can see it, while watching and listening to the waitress talk to her friends?
Anyway, nice try, hope you succeed, but I doubt i'll be back.
Also, LOVE the latkes!
I had the hawaiian stuffed french toast with an extra side of bacon, and was very impressed. The pineapple chutney was definiely fresh cut pineapple. $4 for a side of bacon seemed a little steep but it went so well with the french toast, peameal bacon, pineapple, and syrup I'm willing to look past that.
My girlfriend had the breakfast pie and enjoyed it.
Breakfast x2, coffee, a pint of KGB Raspberry Ale (after all, brunch is technically lunch right?), came to around $40 which seemed like a fair deal given how good the food was.
Food is incredibly overpriced considering it's average quality and the decor falls on the wrong side of kitchy (think Portuguese dive bar made over by someone from Etsy). Menu is uninspired save for the cute but gimmicky macaroni.
The entire place feels slapped together on a shoestring budget by amateur designers and cooks because they thought it would be cool to say they own a restaurant, rather than because they had something fresh and exciting to add to the mix.
ALways a nice surprise to find things like this online when stalking oneself. :)
We keep planning to upgrade as we can round here and keep feeding you all and making you welcome in our home away from home.
xo
Cardinal Rule
It feels like their top priority is to hang out together, not run a business. They sat around and talked loudly to each other most of the time.
No one wants to listen to your conversations. It's weird.
We waited extra long to receive undercooked and cold french toast, an okay grilled cheese sandwich with warmed up frozen sausages and a vegan breakfast burrito that was full of flavourless tofu with a few beans and corn kernels thrown in, with no standard breakfast sides included. A sad little burrito for 9 bucks? Sure tax is included, but taste certainly wasn't.
I was so excited to see so many veggie friendly and interesting options on the menu, but it seems like someone who doesn't know anything about cooking is preparing them.
Sorry, CR, I really wanted things to work out between us, but I will never be coming back.
Unfortunately for CR, I won’t be going back.
My roommate and I were on an afternoon stroll to the lake when we came over the sunnyside bridge STARVING, so we decided to pop into the Cardinal and see what the fuss was all about (did they not get NOW's best of 2011??)
Off the top...was the smell. Not sure if it was just that day, but there was defiantly a sent that was not pleasing. Now this may be a 'leftover' of the days of cigarettes in restaurants, I'm not sure.
The food was dismal. I had the beet salad, it had almost no flavour and the beets were warm. The burger was horrible. And speaking of strange smells - the beef had a strange order to it as well that seemed to seep into my salad. I ate it all and I'm happy to report that I was not sick or anything like that afterwards....but that smell...I will never forget. It was against my best judgment to eat it - but as I mentioned, we were STARVING, so I did.
As for the service, they are a friendly bunch - but I must agree with some of the other comments here that it does seem a bit like you're putting them out by asking for service. I know we're all friends - but I've been to other restaurants with the same friends vibe and I don't get the feeling that I'm interrupting that way I did here.
I hope the smell was a one-day only thing - and a little bit of professionalism will go a long way for the Cardinal.