mother bar toronto

A bar in Toronto has transformed into something completely different

Many restaurants in Toronto have pivoted to takeout and delivery in light of dine-in service being cancelled, but what of our cocktail bars? One spot in particular is making a total transformation.

Mother Cocktail Bar on Queen West near Trinity Bellwoods is turning from a bar into a pantry box delivery service.

Dear friends, guests and drink lovers. Hope you are all safe, feeling strong and ready to cope with these hard times economically and more importantly, emotionally. As you might know here at Mother we truly believe in real family values. We care for our guests and our team! During this difficult time we have decided to temporarily TRANSFORM our beloved bar into a unique project where the MOTHER team and Ration Food Lab (@ration.food.lab) is collaborating with chefs (@fwords / @jjhomoki) and local farms to provide high quality Pantry Boxes that can be delivered to your house or picked up at our location. In aligning with our standards that MOTHER has always provided, we want to be able to help and support each other’s families and business to stay alive and healthy! The reason we are doing this at this time is because we want to show support and love to our communities and offer the services needed. We also honestly need you support!

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"We are gathering suppliers from our connections and then creating the boxed based on orders so to not increase our waste," says Massimo Zitti of Mother.

"Mother and Jef Edwards from Ration Food Lab have teamed up to collaborate with Chefs and local farms to provide high quality 'pantry boxes' that can be delivered to your house or picked up at our location," reads their website.

They deliver west to Mississauga, east to Scarborough and north up to Hwy 7 on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, for free if your order is over $100. They request minimum orders of $40 or a service fee may apply.

First and foremost we wanna THANK all those people who commented and appreciate our previous post, really, means the a World to us...second ... HERE’S THE LINK Mother-cocktail-bar.myshopify.com (also click on the link on our Bio) to start supporting our new project. As mentioned, together with @__anotherdude / @ration.food.lab, chefs @fwords @jjhomoki and bartenders @melletjosh @thirsty_dreamer we are happy to begin this side-project where hopefully we will help and support local businesses. Please put through an order before 9pm today and read carefully the instructions. Stay safe and sending positive vibes to y’all ❤️ #motherdrinks #mothercocktailbar #drinkwithmother #eatwithmother #surrounding #connections #newmenu #50bestbars #canadatop100 #drinks #mixology #drinktoronto #bestbars #torontococktailscene #torontococktailbars #cocktailculture #artdrinks #finedrinking #westqueenwest #trinitybelwoods #trinitybelwoodspark #torontolife #torontodates #blogTO #imbibe #livemusic #sundaylivessessions #pantrybox

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They're mostly offering fresh produce like asparagus, squash, celeriac, beets, pears, corn and much more, as well as staples like eggs and milk. There are also house made items like kombucha and sourdough.

There's also an option to add a donation, which you should really do if you can afford to since this is such a fabulously creative way of dealing with a dismal situation.

Lead photo by

Hector Vasquez


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