"Street" Food Markets [Toronto]

Regional Dining Discussions Ontario
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Photo credit: Andrea Au (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Andrea_Au_Stackt_Market.jpg)

As the weather gets warmer, I’m a sucker for these outdoor food stalls. Like the semi-permanent ones that repurpose shipping containers as stores. I love places that allow owners to test different concepts before they find permanent locations or are rotated out by the landlords. Any stores worth trying at these markets?

Let’s omit food festivals and markets which are time-limited or those you need to pay an entry fee (CNE, ribfests, T&T Asian night market, food truck gatherings, etc…). Hopefully the vendor is there for a longer period so other readers can visit.

The ones I’m aware of are:

I’ll start it off with one that opened recently: Hangout Street (https://www.instagram.com/hangoutstreetgta/) at Parliament & Queen E. It seems not all stores are open yet, at least when I visited. The stores are:

  • TamalMex (Mexican)
  • Shawarma Dose (Middle Eastern)
  • Mansafji (Levantine)
  • Poutine Hub (International fusion)
  • Sanskriti Foods (Indian)
  • Sabores De Casa (Portugese)
  • Gigi’s Love Bites (Breakfast)

I tried mansaf at Mansafji which is the national dish of Jordan. As I’ve never tried this dish before, I’ve no reference. But I enjoyed the difference of this to other other “lamb on rice” dishes from the region. The fermented dried yogurt sauce was tangy and much richer than you’d expect… dare I say fattier. I’ve no clue how they make it. I’ll return for sure.

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I don’t know if this qualifies, but the mini food court at 214 Augusta in Kensington Market is similar in principle. A number of places that started here go on to create their own places subsequently. I have quite enjoyed stuff there.

I haven’t yet tried anything at Hangout St., despite it being close to my neighbourhood.

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Oh yeah, 214 Augusta definitely qualifies. I’ve tried all the current vendors except for the churros store. My favourite there (and the neighbourhood thus far) is Pico De Gallo’s tacos. All the meats there were good but the suadero, tripe, and lengua were outstanding. They’ve opened a location on Ossington too.

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We really like Pico de Gallo, particularly the suadero (really moist beef). The conchinita pibil at Ko’ox Hana is also quite good. We also really like La Chilaca and Birria Catrina.

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Indoors stuff:

Initially I omitted Chef’s Hall (https://www.chefshall.com) York & Richmond because it contained a lot of “outposts” of known restaurants. But I passed by today and not only did they drop the “Assembly” in the name, but some outposts have left (some still remain) and replaced with new vendors.

Opening next month is Waterworks Food Hall (https://waterworksfoodhall.com) Augusta & Richmond. I wonder if will be an outpost kind of deal or geared towards more new vendors.