Address: 15 York Street (inside Longos)
Type of Meal: Dinner
Unless you
live around Maple Leaf Square (or know someone), you probably haven’t heard
about Corks. When my friend suggested going there before heading to a show at
ACC, I was intrigued – there’s a sit down restaurant inside Longos? Indeed
there is! Once you get off the escalators, go left past the cash
registers, look for a Starbucks and to the right of that you’ll find Corks.
If you’re
looking for an affordable meal, fast food isn’t the only answer. At Corks there are plenty of tables available - just find a seat and someone comes over to you shortly. You will find a variety of pizzas, sandwiches and other shareable eats for $10 or
less. They also have daily specials – on Thursday it was half a dozen
oysters and a beer for $10.
We opted to
share glasses of wine ($7-$12 for a 6 oz glass), a cheese board and two pizzas
amongst the four of us. The “Sinfully Soft” cheese board ($10), contained:
- A creamy and buttery la sauvagine from Quebec;
- The Devil’s Rock from Thornloe. It was creamy with the sharp tang that’s synonymous with blue cheese;
- A lovely Saint-Andre triple cream cow’s milk cheese from France; and
- On the side a plate containing plenty of crostini, sweet fig compote, dried apricots and almonds.
The 10” stone
oven pizzas ($8) won’t beat the ones you’ll find at Mangia and Bevi, but are still
tasty and filling. The meat lover’s had big chunks of pepperoni, Italian
sausage, bacon and chicken breast. With plenty of cheese, I was glad it wasn’t
overly oily despite the sheer amount of meat.
The pesto
primavera pizza ($8) was more up my alley with mushrooms, tons of artichokes
and blanched rapini mixed with cheese and a flavourful pesto paste. The crust
is a fair thinness, chewy and a toasted well on top but could use a bit more
time on the bottom.
Service is
friendly and efficient at Corks. As the food arrives, we were offered a variety
of toppings (olive oil, sriracha and chili flakes) for the pizza. Of course,
there’s no beautiful bottles of chili soaked olive oil here, but with such
great prices that can be overlooked.
Overall mark - 7 out of 10
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____________________________
Gastro World's Grading System
- Anything under 5 - I really disliked and will never go back
- 6 - decent restaurant but I likely won't return
- 7 - decent restaurant and I will likely return
- 8 - great restaurant that I'd be happy to recommend
- 9 - fantastic restaurant that I would love to visit regularly and highly recommend
- 10 - absolute perfection!
