The 12 Most Likely Rat-Free Restaurants in Chinatown
Following the various rat sightings and Toronto Health Inspection sweeps in Chinatown, it's understandable that many might be a bit reluctant to hit up the area for their next bowl of hot and sour soup or taste of chicken fried rice. Gone are the spotless records of the Dumpling House, Happy Seven, Swatow, Bright Pearl and Pho Hung. So where to eat now?
I've scoured the area to come up with some alternatives. In deriving this list, I've considered a number of factors. Key among them is if a restaurant is newish or modern and recently underwent a renovation the thinking is that their kitchen, storage and dining areas (and overall infrastructure) are cleaner and less rat-friendly. I've also given more weight to places on the first or second floor of a building versus the basement. The way I look at it, the closer to the gutter, the more accessible the place becomes to our rodent friends.
Sadly, this means that neighbourhood favourites like Chinese Traditional Buns and Mother's Dumplings don't score as well. I'm not saying they're not clean - just that the odds aren't in their favour given their age and sub-level settings.
So who made the list? Here are 12 destinations I'd bet a new winter coat are least likely to turn up some fur in unwanted places.
88 Restaurant
This long-time Chinatown resident formerly known as Pho 88 recently re-branded and drastically upgraded the interior making it perhaps the most sleek and contemporary place to dine on Spadina. More...
Laksa
Laksa opened two months ago but already it's proving to be the best option for Thai and Malaysian cuisine in the area. The extensive menus feature all the usual Southeast Asian favourites and prices are reasonable. More...
Asian Legend
This small chain of Chinese restaurants set up shop on Dundas West only a couple of years ago. Not only is the entrance a short walk up from the sidewalk, but the interior is sparkling. The decor and dining area is clean and modern. The food is good too. Don't miss the fried pancake with red bean paste. More...
E-Pan
E-Pan brings a touch of class to Spadina. Nowhere to be found are the familiar plastic tablecloths or neon signs. E-Pan does it up in a contemporary setting. Most dishes are priced at around $12 although the Peking Duck will set you back $32. More...
Queen's Patisserie
Queen's Patisserie is as spotless a bakery as they come. Not only is the floor polished enough to eat off, but all the baked goods from almond cookies to green tea buns to eggs tarts are wrapped in rat un-friendly cellophane. More...
Xe Lua
Years ago I found a bug in my bowl of pho at this restaurant and promised myself I'd never go back. But earlier this year they cleaned up their act and moved into modern digs on the second floor upstairs from Laksa. More...
Ka Chi
Ka Chi is always a class act and cooks up some of the best Korean eats in the city. Their second location (the other is in Koreatown) is nestled just off Spadina on the outskirts of Kensington Market. More...
Rol San
A favourite place for late night eats and dim sum on weekends, Rol San is so popular they wouldn't have anywhere to seat rats even if they tried. And here's hoping they never do as it would be a devastating turn of events for this destination that has become somewhat of a Chinatown institution. More...
Furama Cake and Desserts Garden
Like Queen's Patisserie, Furama plays it safe with baked treats like BBQ pork buns, egg tarts and cream-filled pastries. Prices are good too and there's ample seating to snack and watch the action on Spadina. More...
Noble Restaurant
A dim sum favourite, Noble always seems more spotless than most of its neighbours. The food here is surprisingly cheap but is not devoid of flavour. Don't leave here without trying the sesame balls or sticky rice in lotus leaf. More...
Shima
Sushi isn't the first thing that comes to mind in Chinatown, but Shima is one of a handful of places serving up fresh raw fish. But where competitors like Sushi Star or Simon Sushi might come up short, Shima wins with its extensive menu and relatively safe sub-level surroundings. More...
Kim Moon Bakery
Don't be fooled by the name, Kim Moon is more than just a bakery. There's a whole range of food and drink options to be had here, best of which might just be the congee and winter melon pastry. While The place could use a bit of a refresh it's always spotless and chances are you'll see someone cleaning the windows upon your arrival. More...
Comments (63)
this article strikes me as a little weird- granted, rats are rats, and they've been found in places they shouldn't have. but i'm not so sure you're doing these places any favours with a headline like 'most likely rat free.'
It's true, it's easy to spinoff an article from the whole rats-invading-Chinatown scenario, and while this is all in "good fun", I'm not sure I agree with how certain places earned a spot on the author's list while others did not. Good fun, sure, but how fair is this to those not on the list? I can't help but wonder whether articles like this are helping the situation, or just encouraging assumptions and generalizations about the situation and - dare I say it?! - about the people trying to run a decent business in the area.
I like this post - thanks Tim. I personally used to frequent chinatown restaurants in the recent past - but kinda started avoided all of them after the rat sightings - now, partly because this, I'm willing to go back - to try some places on this list I've never been to. Yes, good fun - and good for business!
I agree with mmmmmmmmmmmmm, it is an informative article that encourages to try out some likely delicious places in Chinatown.
This strikes me as racist. I think it crosses the line between funny-haha and just plain discriminatory. blogTO, for shame.
Laksa - best option for Thai and Malaysian food?
Really? I wasn't particularly overwhelmed when I lunched there. Perhaps they were still getting into the swing of things.
Any favourite dish I should try?
How can you call this fun? This is misleading at best and I'm not sure Jen's wrong about the hints of (possibly unintended) racism that underly the over-coverage of this issue. If Bright Pearl hadn't been shutdown I'd bet dollars to donuts that it would appear on this list.
Noble was shut down with a red card last week too. Checking the DineSafe website first might have helped...
@o_O: Yes, I think unintended racism. In fact, the entire coverage of the rat-infestations in Chinatown are a form of unintended racism.
This is hardly a racist article. If anything this list will make people feel safer eating in Chinatown with its recent vermin problems. Would you rather people avoid the area all together for fear of eating someplace with a rat problem?
Tim really should have checked dine safe though. Most seem pretty good, but Noble has had some pretty scary inspections
if you had actually checked dine safe, Mother's Dumplings has a completely clear record. Why would you assume something and then write it in what appears to be a researched article? Just to make it harder for certain businesses to survive?
how can the article be racist if it's promoting Chinese restaurants? Racism would have been saying "now that we know all those Chinese restaurants are rat invested, let's suggest some good Caucasian Food restaurants instead."
Some of you people see racism where you want to see it. please don't let that cloud your better judgment.
We all know that all of Chinatown is inherently gross and rat-infested. Lucky for us some white guy who doesn't think to fact check lets us in on what might still be safe - at least for now. Thanks BlogTO!
Feel free to disagree with me. All these flattering comments are going to go to my head. :)
Anyway, this is meant to be a starting point only so by all means add or subtract from my list with places you think should (or shouldn't) be on it.
If these Chinatown joints were cleaner we wouldn't be making jokes about FAILS and safe places to eat. So not racist.
These filthy restos' contempt for their customers is laughable.
it is racist in that the focus is limited to Chinese restaurants, and generalizations made thereof. It doesn't matter whether the comments are positive or negative - the point is that they take ethnic membership and apply generalizations based on it. Why not look at other restaurants in the area, other than chinese? I'm sure that rats are not snobbish or racist in their appetites.
I think the ultimate test is whether this list would exist (with different places) if the problem was with another neighbourhood.
If Liberty Village or Queen West had a sudden rat infestation in it's restaurants, I'm betting we'd still see this list.
This has NOTHING to do with the Chinese people living in the area any more than a "The 12 Most Likely Rat-Free Restaurants in Queen West" has to do with the Hipsters living there.
"Why not look at other restaurants in the area, other than chinese?"
How many non-Chinese restaurants exist in Chinatown?
So, I guess we'll shortly start seeing articles labeled "The best cat-poop free Cheese Shops in Kensington?" Or perhaps "The best E-Coli-free Burger joints in Toronto?"
(Is the above unfair and reactionary? Yes. That's my point.)
I get that it's suppose to be a "joke", but fact that some of the recommendations don't have a clean bill of health (while Mother's Dumplings, which has a spotless record, was unfairly singled-out) doesn't lend much credence to the overall article.
And perhaps I just have a cast-iron stomach, but I would go back and return to Pho Hung ANYDAY than eat at the now sanitized (and mediocre) Pho 88 on Spadina.
This article is not racist, however the author might have thought twice about his choices.
1)Noble (recieved a red)
2)Shima (in a basement)
3)888 (recieved a yellow not to recently)
4)Kim Moon Bakery (recent yellow)
@Ryan L: Red Room Cafe on Spadina near College. (Sure, it's on the edge of Chinatown, but it's pretty darn close.)
My boyfriend got a wicked case of food poisoning there once, and has never gone back. (He doesn't recommend the quesadillas.)
I'm not sure how this is a useful article. Judging a restaurant's "likely" cleanliness by recent renovation or decor? How about looking at their official records?
You did forget to include Starbucks, Tim Horton's, and Diary Queen on this list. All too shiny to have rats!
88 has had a conditional pass in the past, but that was in January. It does have the cleanest restrooms in Chinatown though.
Chinatown has had an infestation problem for a long, long time. The restaurants haven't done anything about it for a long, long time. Mentioning it is Racist, just like mentioning that Barak Obama relied on the help of an unrepentant terrorist to start his political career and went to a hateful church for 2 decades.
Truth = Racist if you offend the sensibilities of the Left. Funnily enough, some of the whitest people in the world are most sensitive to this "racism".
All of Chinatown (and all of Kensington) needs to be levelled. The buildings are incapable of maintaining a sanitary environment.
The funnies thing is that kensington (that truluuy horrific place that should be nuked) and burger joints get thoroughly villified and scrutinized when issues crop up. And rightly so!
People need to stop patronizing these horrific restaurants and stores. To be as cheap as they are, they are inherently cutting corners. They are also the stores and restaurants that create ridiculous blanket rules that deprive the city and country of interesting artisanal food. We have mandates for pasteurized cheese thanks to horrible stores like the ones in Kensington, and we have ridiculous hot dog cart mandates thanks to restaurants like those in Chinatown.
Stop the insanity - if you want cheese, got to All The Best, Alex Farm or the Cheese Boutique. If you want Chinese food, go to Lai Wah Heen. If you can't afford that, get a haircut and get a real job. Stop enabling shambolic and dangerous proprietors.
To everyone talking about how these restaurants are all Chinese, please acknowledge that Chinatown has numerous restaurants that serve Vietnamese, Malaysian, Korean and other non-Chinese food (like the ones on this list).
Just 'cause we look the same doesn't mean we all come from China.
@Reality Check
Your rant was so poorly written and so full of nonsense that I barely got through it.
But I do feel the need to mention that cheap haircuts in Kensington are teh awesome.
Andrea, you are right about that. I did generalize when I refered to the group of Asian restaurants in the area as Chinese.
Re: Yellow Card
A conditional Pass isn't necessarily a big deal. You really need to look at the details. Any restaurant owner can be caught with their pants down (lets hope not literally) with some of the rules.
" Operator fail to prevent gross unsanitary conditions "
is much different than minor oversights that are fixed during inspection.
totally racist article, whether or not racism is "intended" or not, doesn't change the fact that this article is pulling on stereotypes.
For those of you calling this a racist post you shouldn't throw around those accusations without justification - which none of you provided. For shame.
I think it's hysterical that most of the 12 listed have violations. In what way is pointing out Chinatown's filthy record racist? It isn't.
Maybe the rats are racist because they only hang out in Chinatown.
What kind of douchebag thinks this is racist? If people were snapping pics of vermin in the window of white-people restaurants and BlogTO refused to run them in an effort to make it seem like the Chinese/Viet/Thai people had the market cornered on filthy establishments... THAT would be racist. This is just a lighthearted take on the recent spate of rat sightings in Spadina diners. Get over yourselves.
Ok. Fair enough. I admittedly missed the reg flag on Noble....And should have mentioned the conditional passes on some of the other spots. BUT, just for the record, I went and inspected all these places a few days ago and they were all looking good, and my impressions were also based on my previous visits to each of them.
This post reads like a grade shcool research project someone procrastinated until the last night and then decided to forgoe any actual reasearch and just try and make their poster look shiny. Your "scores" are obviously arbitrary and baseless. I know you're not aiming to be W5, but I thought you were trying to do a little better than Godfrey Jones on Rock Bottom.
I took some time to look through the Dine Safe reports of places in Chinatown. I got to K in the area of Spadina from College to Dundas and Dundas from Spadina to Bathurst. I excluded places in Kensington and the College Tip of Spadina as those areas are arguably not part of Chinatown. I didn't get a chance to look at areas East of Spadina.
So far it's a small selection of 14 places, some of which appear to be grocery stores instead of Restaurants, but here is what I found regardless.
Of 14:
-5 Have received Green Passes for the recording period.
-6 Have receieved at LEAST 1 conditional pass
-3 Have been shut down
One has received FOUR conditional passes and has remained open. It appeared to have some serious problems at every 6 month inspection and managed to clean up for the follow up inspections.*
*This is a particularly broken aspect of the dinesafe program. Inspectors can show up at anytime and catch a dirty restaurant in the act, but the follow up is scheduled, giving the dirty restaurant owner the oppertunity to sweep the problem under the rug and go about their business once the inspector passes it. This can keep happening (and often does) and the inspectors are powerless to close the place down for constant, repeated offenses.
Tim, I did explain why your post has racist undertones to it. If you want a fuller explanation, see Jonathan Goldsbie's Torontoist article.
This whole post is full of crap. Tim should apologize for its racist and unreliable content.
If Little Italy/Koreatown/Liberty Village/Yorkville had a string of Dinesafe closures due to rodents, blogTO would respond in the exact same way.
There is nothing racist about this.
The area of town has a rat problem. The fact that it's ____town does not mean that ____ people are ____ or ____ or whatever.
If you think it's racist to make recommendations for safe eating in an area of town that clearly has a hygiene problem, you must be making some kind of stereotyping leaps yourselves!
@ Tim
Bit of a straw man, don't you think - "I don't think that's how I positioned it....we're not 60 minutes or W5."
If you're have no regard for quality/accuracy then what's the point? Seems a bit irresponsible.
i think it's a bit of a stretch to claim this is a racist piece- and if you look at the intent (presumably to shine a little bit of the limelight on places worthy of your hard-earned dollars), it wouldn't add up.
that being said, it still strikes me as counterproductive. i mean, just because it LOOKS clean doesn't mean it is. having worked in the food service industry for many years, there's been countless places i've both worked in and observed that had clean service areas, and then abominations for kitchens and food-storage areas. and this doesn't even account for the personal, staff handling or preparation of the food.
in other words, unless you're a trained inspector or have complete access to the facility, you're not really qualified to say what's clean and what's not. sure, you can speculate, but that's really all it will remain.
additionally, i think the headline's a little inflammatory- say what you want, but i don't think any restaurant wants any association with the word 'rat,' whether positive or negative.
Just wanted to clarify again some of the picks on this list....and remind everyone that this is meant to be a fun, opinion based list based on subjective criteria.
88 - The conditional pass it received was back in January before it underwent extensive renovations.
Asian Legend - received a conditional pass for a single infraction --> "failure to protect food from contamination". (hardly any indictment that the place is infested with rats)
Ka Chi - received a conditional pass in March but has received passing grades on two subsequent inspections
Furama - received a conditional pass back in 2007 but has since passed all subsequent inspections
Kim Moon - has a long history of passing all inspections except for a conditional pass this September. But in a follow up inspection it received a passing grade.
The only place on this list I admittedly should not have included is Noble because it was shut down on October 7th.
And, yeah, I was hoping this post might promote some worthy restaurants that perhaps don't get as much love as places like Happy Seven and Swatow. But it's not a Toronto Tourism brochure so I felt no need to sanitize the title of the post.
I wouldn't mind seeing an ongoing 'Dinesafe' watch for restaurants city-wide. Even if rats weren't caught scampering along the window, I think it's still nice to have the information.
I frequented a pizza place that was constantly getting conditional passes. I wasn't aware of it at the time because I hadn't thought to check the website (I didn't know of its existance at the time) and their yellow, conditional pass was only up for a few days before the followup inspections.
I had even gotten sick a few times after eating there (but wasn't aware that the Pizza place was the culprit at the time)
It wasn't until someone told me of the constant problems they had and pointed me to the direction of the dinesafe website that I stopped frequenting the place.
Lots of people unloaded on Tim, some for good reasons (I'd count myself in that group:)), however, calling this post "racist" is a little too much. The trusty Merriam-Webster defines racism as:
1)a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race or
2) racial prejudice or discrimination
The post clearly does not fall into the first category and I strongly believe it does not espouse racial prejudice or discriminate based on race.
To Jerrod's earlier point, just because this particular problem happens to be centered in Chinatown, writing about it does not make one racist. Neither does writing about the plight of poor black youths in the Jane and Finch area or about alcoholism among First Nations people.
It is HOW you address these above topics, how you present your argument and how you treat your subject that may - or may not - make an article racist. Does Tim make the case that rats are in Chinatown because Chinese are too lazy to clean? Or they are - as a race - incapable of maintaining basic hygiene? I did not see evidence of anything remotely close to these or similar points.
As I said, this post is guilty of a few things but racism is not one of them. So those of you who yell "racist!" without thinking - stop and think, please.
@ Sparky
You killed it! Too funny!
"Maybe the rats are racist because they only hang out in Chinatown"
We live in Chinatown. It's really dirty here, there is a lot of garbage around and there are tons of rats. People piss in the streets, hork and spit all over the place and even have the audacity to camp out on my damn porch with their families and leave their crap on my doorstep. We live here because we got a great deal on a great house, and we're moving just as soon as we find something else. And I bet there isn't a single Asian person who lives, shops or eats here that would a with argue with any of that.
I also bet the people who are accusing people of being racist are white. I am so, SO exhausted by white people who shout out about racism every chance they get. I know it makes you feel better about being white and makes you feel smarter than the rest of us but please. get over yourselves.
I am also exhausted by white people's fascination with what they imagine about Asian people and their cultures. It is a weird, twisted obsession, mostly perpetuated by men and their fucked up assumptions about Asian women, and also perpetuated by white women with no culture of their own.
I have to wonder, if another area of the city were infested with rats, would any of you give a crap about what people say?
Oh yeah, two great and spotless grocery stores to try are Good Luck Market and Lucky Moose on Dundas. I have yet to see or smell anything dirty in these stores.
@opensource
But it's *not* limited to Chinese restaurants. From lazily glancing at the list I see: Thai, Malay, Korean, Chinese and Japanese cuisine. The fact that they all happen to operate in Chinatown doesn't make them Chinese.
There could be more snark here... but I'm caffinated, so I'll save it.
I'd have to agree with Michelle. I don't see how this is racist at all. It's factual. Although the retaurants mentioned may have have some problems, the fact is that this part of town has a very consistent issue with rats and hygiene. The author did not make any remarks regarding the behaviour of Chinese or Asian people in general.
Are Jewish bakeries racist because they close on Saturday? That's racist towards non Jews. Give me a frikken break. Is a Steakhouse racist because it serves beef and could offend Hindus? Give me a break....
Rats notwithstanding How come Mothers Dumplings gets no love. Best dumplings in Toronto, hands down
To quote Ryan "This has NOTHING to do with the Chinese people living in the area any more than a "The 12 Most Likely Rat-Free Restaurants in Queen West" has to do with the Hipsters living there."
Are you guys all idiots??? Racism is called Racism for a reason and considered an offense, a hate crime for a reason. For people too busy being bigots in their childhood to remember something called "THE CANADIAN CHARTERS OF RIGHTS AND FREEDOM" or even the UN Charters - you would have probably learned that it is considered a hate crime if people are discriminated for qualities such as Ethnicity, Gender, Race, Religion, Sexual Orientation - THINGS THEY CANNOT (or should not need to) CHANGE ABOUT THEMSELVES.
So Yes, there is a great difference between mocking a Hipster (which is a lifestyle and a group of that one can easily enter and leave) and a Chinese person (who can't change that about him/herself).
The consequences of this article is dire - if we start associating everything CHINA with DIRTY and RATS - we just might end up creating a social Holocaust.
This is one of the most hilarious comment threads anywhere on the blogto website!!! Thanks, Tim.
And now I'm gonna take my twisted white male delusions and go find an Asian girl on Spadina so we can keep each other warm on Michelle's porch.
I'm a chef, and actually have worked in a LOT of Chic looking expensive restaurants on Bay St, and King West....and you have no idea how many of them have rodent and pests problems. They've just learned all the tricks to hiding the signs a lot better than these restaurants know how to. But trust me, the trendiest, chicest modern restaurant has these problems. I refuse to name names, but don't be misled.
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