Low and behold

The windows are still mostly covered up at 362 Bloor St. W., formerly the Spice Kitchen and before that Shakespeare's Cafe, but the new sign is now in for the Annex's latest eating establishment.

And what a sign: lurid red, blue and yellow neon, depicting a cartoonish pig, chicken and cow. They're the namesakes (soundsakes?) of restaurant Grunt, Cluck and Low, which according to the Star's Amy Pataki was slated to open this month.

I'm guessing the meat-serving restaurant's star chef connections (It's being opened by Paul Boehmer and the ribs are to be supplied by Marc Thuet's new Atelier Thuet catering kitchen) won't be enough to save it from disgruntled Birkenstock-wearing, vegetarian Annex folks.

Inevitably the name will garner it some nicknames, none of which can be published on a family blog. 

-Shauna Rempel

Something's brewing

The coffee wars in the Annex are heating up, so to speak. Aroma Espresso Bar is moving in to 500 Bloor St. W. two doors down from the Bloor Cinema at the northwest corner of Bloor and Albany. The signs have been up for months (according to its website it should have opened in March) but now construction crews are hard at work and the call is out for baristas. Aroma is an Israeli chain now expanding into North America and Europe and this appears to be the flagship Canadian outlet.

The upcoming new flavour on the Annex coffee front is located across the street from Starbucks, which in turn is across the street from Second Cup, located at the southeast corner of Lippincott and Bloor. A few doors down from Second Cup, by Lee's Palace, is where Tim Horton resides. To say nothing of the Lettieri down the road in the Honest Ed's building or the numerous mom and pop places that offer coffee, bubble teas and other ethnic caffeinated goodies all over the Annex.

When I first moved to the area, I found the proliferation of sushi bars and health food stores on every block very confusing and a little redundant. I could argue the same thing with java huts. But with the weather heating up, being within five seconds of an iced Americano is a comfort.

-Shauna Rempel

Gallery of Gastronomy

Toronto has already got a shoe museum and a sugar museum. Why not a kitchen museum?

Kitchen utensil, or museum piece?

“I’ve been thinking about it for 25 years,” says Toronto filmmaker Gail Singer. Before she became known as a director of films such as Wisecracks, Watching Movies and You Can’t Beat a Woman!, she lived in Winnipeg and owned a kitchen store.

Kitchens embody history and culture. Singer’s museum would be a slice of Canadian social history. “Most Canadians have (this knowledge) from their mothers and grandmothers; it could be a collection of the nation’s ephemera.” The museum would also exhibit a sampling of kitchens from around the world.

Singer envisions a cooking space of the future as well as a working kitchen where a different international menu would be prepared each day.

Two locations she’s dreamed of are the Planetarium building beside the Royal Ontario Museum and the University of Toronto’s former Domestic Sciences building at the corner of Avenue Rd. and Bloor St.

Singer has been approaching  people in the food industry, other private and public sources for money to start up the project. “I’m looking for a museum daddy,” she says. Meanwhile, she’s also working on a film project, about the late John Hirsch, co-founder of the Manitoba Theatre Centre.

-Susan Walker

The meat and the motion

Last weekend's sunshine unleashed this town's pent-up patio demand - and every table on the Danforth was taken.

TONY BOCK/TORONTO STAR

Sure the french fry-filled gyro comes from a trendy eatery, but Messini's starchy version of the snack isn't for everyone.

Meanwhile, the sizzling gyros wars heated up the newly-renovated and trendy Messini taking on new challenger Louis Meat Market & Deli (449 Danforth) which now doles out its mountainous version of the meaty delight (pork, beef or chicken) right next door.

Sure Messini is in with the in-crowd, and yeah it stuffs French fries right in the pita - which is fine, if you like a mouth full of starch.

But when I want a gyros, you'll find me across the street, enjoying the sunshine in Alexander the Great square, scarfing down the juicy and perfectly spiced gyros - with feta for a buck extra - from that neighbourhood fixture Alexandros.

You can't pita that, baby!

-Antonia Zerbisias