La Merceria [Coffee]

Passed by La Merceria (@lamerceria) many times and I kept saying how I should come by this cute café for coffee one day and never did until a few weeks ago.

After entering, I realize it's a café slash home design store with display of household items for sale.

LUSH obsessed [Beauty]

I have been obsessed with a few LUSH Cosmetics (@lushcosmetics) this pass year and what not to love with all the effective handmade products made from fresh organic fruit and vegetables and finest essential oils and safe synthetic. Everything is made fresh by hand with little or no preservative with minimal packaging. Here's a few favorite of mine.

Roots

I have super fine hair which make it difficult to find a hair treatment that doesn't weight it down but this is a miracle. This is a hair and scalp treatment with minty cooling sensation that revitalize the scalp and extra virgin olive oil and honey to soften and condition hair to make it shine. This totally give my dull fine hair volume and shine without weighting it down. 

Healthy hair does start at the root!!!

Ocean Salt 

A face and body scrub, no synthetic preservatives self preserving formula. Love this salt scrub instead of my usual sugar scrub, this is perfect for oily to combination skin or acne pron skin. The minerals in sea salt soften as it scrubs away dirt, dead skin and blockages for a bright, fresh complexion. With the fresh avocado and coconut added to the mix it hydrate while the like and vodka deep clean and tone the skin; so no irritation or dryness with this scrub.

Boxcar Social - Riverside [Café-Bar]

Boxcar Social (@boxcar_social) second location of this cafe-bar hybird and just off Queen East, this is the perfect location for a relaxing afternoon.

Bigger and better with an amazing high 18ft ceiling with expose brick and beams, what's impressive is that they made all the wood furniture ad countertops themselves which looks amazing.

There's something for everyone from coffee, beer, wine to whiskies.

Just like their original location, there's coffee flight tasting available which I will def be back for (see my post of 1st location here). And I read that they also have a Whisky Tango Flight that consists of two features espressos paired with two half-once bourbons or even a pour-over paired with a beer.

Maha's [Egyptian] - Brunch

Maha's (@mahasbrunch) is an Egyptian brunch spot that I have been meaning to visit for a while but was discourage a few time when I saw the line up outside, this past weekend with the extra hour we finally went. No reservation but we waited for around 30-40 mins for a table of 2 at around 11am Sunday, a very reasonable wait time but be warned that the space is rather small, so I won't recommend for party of more than 4 people.

Love the little counter as we walk in, there's so many action going oh with the pastries, coffee and cashier. And the shelf that separate the front from the kitchen. With this type of wait, they should definitely consider expanding since the space next door is vacant.

Honey Cardamom Latte $4.95

This is their signature drink and I really don't know anywhere that serve this in Toronto. I generally do not like any added flavor to my coffee but this was delicious especially for the fall weather. You can see them grinding the cardamon for each order and the smell is just amazing. All the flavors are so well balanced. They also have Turkish coffee which I would love to try next time.

Foole $4

This was so delicious, this arrived piping hot and make sure to order this with a side of Pita $1 to scoop up all the goodness.

Fresh City Farms [Recipe Bags] - CONTEST

Fresh City (@freshcityfarms) acquired Recipe Kit Company Fresh Canteen (see previous post here), now we can look foward to organic and locally focused recipe bag/meal delivered to our door.

We get to choose between vegetarian, fish and organic meat based meals which start at $7.75 to $12.00 per portion, feed up to four people and can include 2 to 5 meals per week (more details here)

On top of that, Fresh City's online market boost over 800 grocery items sourced from local farmers and markets from Ontario.

Love how the meat/fish are packed separately from the other ingredients.

Just like all the meal-in-a-box delivery, Fresh City's recipe bags include all of the ingredients and instructions for a healthy easy to cook meal. 

Compare to the other similar services I tried before, I find Fresh City's version include less steps with less prep/cutting which would be great for beginner cook (ahem, aka the bf).

All of below are portion for 2 people, the meat and fish dish portion was quite a generous portion but I find the vegetarian portion rather small or at least for the recipe I got.

The only con of Fresh City's recipe bags is that you do not get to choose the dishes that you want but only the type of meat/fish/veggie option.

Moroccan Chicken w/ Raisin Quinoa

This was easy and definitely something that I would cook at home, I especially love how they list out the amount of each ingredients in the Moroccan Spice Mix so that I can make my own in the future, especially if I want to recreate this dish. Please make sure to keep the recipe cards included for each meals in the future.

Pukka [New Menu Media Preview - Indian]

This is my 5th time at Pukka (@pukkatoronto) and that says a lot since I barely go back to restaurants that many time (see previous post here, here & here)

Food being delicious at Pukka is a known fact but this time around, what a huge improvement on the cocktails as well compare to the last few time I've been there. There was 4 feature cocktails for us to try that night.

Mumbai Sour
~ Bombay Sapphire, Aperol, grapefruit, cardamon bitters, egg white
Varanasi Sling
~ white rum, mango + cherry + orange liqueurs, almond, lime, pineapple juice
Lyte Martini
~ cachara, coconut liqueur, coconut water, lemongrass syrup
Pom Cosmo
~ vodka, pomegranate liqueur, pom juice, lime

And remember Pukka does amazing wine paring for all their dishes with Peter Boyd as their Sommelier. You would be surprise how well Indian food paired with wine. I personally think that white is better then red with the curries.

Okra Fries

~ mustard taita

These are so good that I can munch on them all night and I would be satisfied. With the batter, the okra doesn't have the usual amount of gluey-ness to it.

String Tikka
~ string vegetables, moong sprouts, rice crisps, pomegranate, mango, chutneys + yoghurt

A Pukka all time favorite, it's a must with all the ingredients packed into a bowl.