One Love Vegetarian Cafe
854 Bathurst St.
Phone: 416.535.5683
 Profile |
 Map |
One Love Vegetarian Cafe adds to my belief that we're pretty spoiled for choice in Toronto when it comes to vegetarian/vegan food. With everywhere from Cafe 668 to Rawlicious offering meatless incarnations of most types of food, trying to decide where to go can turn into a coin-tossing dilemma.
As someone who didn't partake of the flesh for 15 years before switching back to carnivorous ways, I have a pretty healthy respect for any restaurant that can put a new spin on vegetation-based eating - and that's what One Love Vegetarian is doing.
This lo-fi spot, serving Caribbean-influenced vegan meals, opened at the end of May in the Annex (and is extremely visible from Bathurst Subway station thanks to it's huge, vibrant green mural).
One Love started life as a soup kiosk in Harbourfront Centre's World Cafe food court and the no-frills, unadorned interior of the new location reflects this. 
Owners Ikeila Wright and Ras Iville Wright had so many customer requests for more selection that they moved to a larger capacity space on the corner of Bathurst and London.
As the menu is still pretty small we manage to order everything on it except for the Funky House Pizza ($3 per slice).
We're served by Ikeila, who is one of the most friendly, radiant people you're ever likely to meet. As she is one of only two people doing all the serving and food preparation, it takes a little while to order but it's definitely worth the wait.
The corn soup ($5) that made the original kiosk so popular contains whole sections of corn from the cob and enough spice to decongest our cold-ridden photographer, Emma.
A tasty, medium hot curried bean curd ($10) is made with ribbons of tofu and comes complete with organic salad and rice on the side.
My large roti with spiced pumpkin filling ($8) is mild with enough creamy pumpkin onion filling that I have no trouble finding volunteers to help me finish it.
We all agree that the Love Sun Stir Fry ($10) is the best choice. Its unusual mix of rich sun-dried tomato, roasted red pepper and mushroom reduction over tofu chunks, spiced rice with lentils and topped with plantains has to be tried to be appreciated.
A sweet berry smoothie ($5) takes a while to arrive but cools everything down nicely and comes with the option of soy or rice milk. 
With everything on the menu coming in at $10 or less, One Love is a great deal for the quality of food on offer and deserves to become a neighbourhood fixture.
Photos by
Comments (21)
I am already a tremendous fan of this new spot and can't wait to go there every excuse I get. Great for vegans who like Carribean food. I'd be sad to see it fail so go there already!
Ate there a week or so ago and it was tremendous. Welcome addition to the annex, and super low key.
One Love as at the Harbourfront? Are they doing the corn there? The same way? If so, I will be there on the regular!
"... on the corner of Bathurst and Bridgman."
Great review, great food. But the address is not right: it's at the corner of Bathurst and London St., a short block north of Bloor. (And the pizza is great!)
i love you pls can you contact me immedeaitly pls i have issue with you.
b_barristeralfred@yahoo.com
"I have a pretty healthy respect for any restaurant that can put a new spin on vegetation-based eating... This lo-fi spot, serving Caribbean-influenced vegan meals..."
Why is it a "new" spin? Or "caribbean-influenced"? It IS Caribbean food! Oh right, I must've forgotten, vegetarian/vegan food is white! Of course, it's white and raceless. How could I forget? And any vegan/vegetarian food that has more than mere salt and pepper (and rosemary, perhaps?) has some "ethnic" influence!
@ Sam
Absolutely - the "whiteness" of what people think is vegetarian/vegan food - especially shown in this review - is just so ignorant and frustrating. Tons of implicit assumptions about the people who are "conscious" enough to eat vegetarian/vegan - regardless of thousands of years of vegetarian culinary history around the world (I mean have the Chinese developed tofu/fermented soy products, and Indians have not been eating meat FOREVER).
There is a ton of vegetarian Caribbean food, from vegetarian west indian/trini food, to rastas eating only 'ital' food (in some cases).
Thanks for keeping "whiteness" as the invisible standard we must measure everything by BlogTO.
Sam,
One Love serves Italian baked pizza slices and sun-dried tomato stir-fry so it would have been misleading to label it Caribbean food and leave it at that.
The 'new spin' is just in reference to them incorporating disparate, hybrid influences into their dishes (and doing it very successfully).
@Sam
You're a total idiot. Have you even been there? Pizza is not caribbean food. Sundried tomato and mushroom stir fry is not Caribbean food. At least read the review before you open your mouth amaze us.
@MKB
You're a coward for just hopping on Sam's misdirected wagon. Go do something useful instead.
Tired of all the pointless complainers on this FOOD blog. Should be moderated. Far too many ppl with too much time on there hands.
Had dinner at One Love tonight. Everything was fresh and delicious. I'm so glad to have it in the neighbourhood-- and the service was amazing. It is dangerous knowing that I can have access to vegan coconut lime cupcakes at any time! I know I will be a regular.
Big congrats to Ikeila and Ras Iville!
Their love infused corn soup and roasted corns are heavenly and loved by Harbourfront Centre regulars. I believe that anything they prepare will have the same divine qualities.
Theirs are not just vegetarian food, it's sanctified food and the price is very reasonable! What can be better than that?!
For some reason, I found this blog today (I don't believe in conincidence). I know where I'm going for dinner tonight! :)
I wish them the very best in this new endeavour.
One Love~
LOL at the accusations of racism in the comments here, besides being just plain wrong as stated above, readers ought to expect blog posts on a blog to be blogged from the perspective of - wait for it - the blogger!!
It's very exciting that One Love has found a home and nice that it's downtown rather than crammed in somewhere on Egg West. I haven't had a chance to go in yet but wanted to check for a bTO review while waiting in this ludicrous CNE streetcar line at Bathurst. I thought this reviewer did an excellent job, as I've now got a pretty thorough idea of the additions to the menu and the pricing, and I'm not even on the streetcar yet.
Finally had a chance to try ONE LOVE today with my fiance. Loved it! Absolutely loved it. There was one table occupied and we were the only ones there for take out, so it took no time at all to receive our large corn soup and 2 rotis. We got the Chana/Potato in a whole wheat roti and the AMAZING curried TVP roti in Dhal Puri roti. The lovely lady behind the counter suggested the different flavoured roti wraps to compliment the fillings. We split each roti in two and were able to get the full on ONE LOVE experience. It was so much food for $22.00! DELICIOUS!!!
Can't recommend this place enough! Spiced pumpkin roti in THE BEST roti shell I have ever had is my favourite.
A Toronto treasure.
I have not had the time to go there yet but I've eaten the meals when my customer does a take out,I send in my order.
delicious!!. They will be in business a long time because they are right on time. Healthy meals for the right price I still have to taste the wheat roti. ONE LOVE
RSS