Grand Electric :: Round 2 with Memie & Gordon

Guacamole & Chips ($8)

Tuna Ceviche ($11)

Baja Fish & Pork Belly Tacos ($3)

Spicy Chicken & Baja Fish Tacos ($3)

Grand Electric

1330 Queen Street West

Parkdale, Toronto

416.627.3459

website

La Carinta :: Birthday Dinner with Fontaine & Carson

I have been wanting to try La Carinta for quite sometime and finally had a chance to go on my birthday! Dinner service doesn't start until 5pm so my friends and I had to wait outside until they let us in, despite it being cold outside. The atmosphere and service staff were quite relaxed and "hipster". Since we had an early dinner since I had classes afterwards, we were one of three tables. 

Assortment of Tacos

Tostada de Ceviche ($6.25)

swordfish, guacamole, coconut milk, habanero tomato, cucumber served on a hard taco

After eating the Tuna Ceviche from Grand Electric with Mike, I was super excited when I saw the Tostada de Ceviche on La Carinta's menu. Since the Tostada de Ceviche was $3.25 more than the tacos at Grand Electric, I was expecting something of similar quality. While the Tostada de Ceviche was good, the waitress informed us that La Carinta only had one hard shell taco featured on the menu - which was on the daily specials - so the Tostada de Ceviche's hard taco surprised us. Despite being pretty filled up on top, the hard taco made it difficult to eat the Tostada de Ceviche. Additionally, the ratio of toppings on top of the hard taco had an imbalance of swordfish. Both Fontaine and I noted that we could barely taste the presence of the swordfish, and for $6.25, we expected more fish meat opposed to onions. The Tostada de Ceviche had a slow burn to it as well. Overall, the Tostada de Ceviche was good, but the tuna ceviche & the guac combination at Grand Electric was tastier and cheaper. 

Pollo Frito($4.75)

peanut mole sauce, pickled green cabbage & salsa fresca

Carson had the Pollo Frito.

Tortilla Chips 

with ancho chili powder & one side ($6.50) or all 3 ($13). sides include: guacamole, corn salsa, and cashew hummus

The way the menu was formatted I didn't think it was clearly marked that having all 3 sides would cost an additional $6.50. When I ordered the tortilla chips, the waitress didn't even warn me. She just asked "Do you want the guac, corn salsa, cashew, or all three?". The way she said it made it sound like there was no price difference between the four "choices". I was also quite disappointed with the fact for the additional $6.50 no extra chips were provided - since the side to chip ratio was obviously unbalanced. However, of the three sides, everyone agreed that the guacamole was the best. It was refreshing with a touch of lemon. My second favourite was the corn salsa. All three of us agreed that the cashew was only decent. The consensus was that the chips and all the sides were also quite spicy. Just like the tacos, the Tortilla Chips were good, but not as good as Grand Electric's (or as good of a price).

Overall, La Carnita was decent. The food was good, though it did not meet my expectations after visiting Grand Electric. However, where La Carnita failed was in their service and I also felt their food was a little pricey. Perhaps it was the waitress we had, but she seemed very uneducated about the menu (as she failed to recognize that there were more than one hard shelled taco) and failed to warn us about the price differences of ordering one side to three sides despite us telling her it was our first time visiting La Carnita. What La Carnita has over Grand Electric is that it is much closer to Eatons, Ryerson, and University of Toronto.

La Carnita

501 College Street

Toronto, ON

416.964.155

website 

Grand Electric :: First Impressions with Mike DG

Tuna Ceviche

Words cannot be used to describe how delicious this Tuna Ceviche was... It was so amazing, that we ordered a second dish! The Tuna Ceviche also tasted phenomenal with the pita chips from the Guac & Chips! Since no description is provided on the blackboard or Grand Electric's website, it tasted like seared white tuna marinated in a creamy white sauce (possibly sour cream?), with lemon/lime juice, thinly shredded turnips, and onions. It was delicious. My mouth is drooling writing about it.

Scrapple, Baja Fish, Beef Shoulder Tacos (T/CW)

I throughly enjoyed all three tacos. I couldn't really pick a favourite of the three since they all were delicious - I really enjoyed trying the Scrapple Taco since it was my first time trying scrapple. For those who don't know what it is, Scrapple is a mix of pork scraps mixed with cornmeal! The Baja Fish Taco was battered well - light, crispy, and buttery - and not too thick. All three tacos were scrumptious, moist, and extremely flavourful. Eventually, I hope to try all the tacos (ie: the Crispy Cauliflower Taco!)

Guac & Chips

Even a simple dish like Guac & Chips, Grand Electric managed to hit the nail right on the head! I believe the chips were made out of pita and the large wedge stuck in the guacamole was a fried pork rind wedge. Both the chips and the rind were amazingly delicious. The rind was crispy and light. The guacamole was perfectly balanced - all flavours were apparent and did not over power each other (as some guacamole have an overpowering onion or cilantro flavour). The salsa was great as well - substantial enough that it wasn't watery and not that spicy. 

Despite the huge hype, Grand Electric surprisingly exceeded my expectations! It took me a couple months before I was able to cross Grand Electric off my hit list, but I'm glad I did (and wish I did so sooner!). I was expecting Grand Electric to be extremely Mexican, but in my opinion its not really that Mexican. At most, I would say its because of the tortillas in the tacos, that Grand Electric would be classified as Mexican. If anything I would classify Grand Electric as comfort food. The food is delicious and leaves the stomach very happy. I throughly enjoyed my meal and despite the tacos being on the small side, both Mike and I left full! We were lucky arriving at around 8:30pm and having to wait for approximately 15 minutes as I heard the line can get quite lengthy at times. The one complaint I have with Grand Electric is that the music is very loud and a tad too dim. I wouldn't recommend this place for a date (due to the loud atmosphere) but it's a great place to check out with friends (and its relatively cheap!).

Grand Electric

1330 Queen St W 

Toronto, ON M6K 1L4

website