Cheap Eats A frugal feast
From strip-mall gems and food-truck finds to downtown diners and holes in suburban walls — Ottawa Magazine's anonymous food critics evaluate dining options for penny pinchers.
Honey Town 710 Somerset St. W., 613-680-8100 At Honey Town, find Hong Kong-style desserts. Made from, say, black sesame seeds, sea coconut, tortoise (or grass) jelly, these might take getting used to. However, one mango dessert seems almost recognizable. A bowl of fresh mango, cut up, is dramatically served with a mound of thick black rice pudding and two sauces: mango purée and coconut cream. Soothing and refreshing, it’s called Mango Cream Paste With Coconut Juice and Black Glutinous Rice. Also almost familiar — delicate Strawberry Thousand Layers Cake. Lunch and snacks can also be had at Honey Town. Although Taiwanese popcorn chicken ($6.59), served with spicy mayonnaise, is hot, crisp, and salty, there’s little meat in each morsel. Sweet potato fries are done perfectly, melting in the mouth. Green spinach dumplings have wrappers made just like spinach fettuccine. Unfortunately, they suffer from uneven cooking, being both soggy and tough — straight from the freezer, are they? However, the scrambled egg filling is nice and mild. Finish with sweet milk tea ($3.59), Hong Kong’s black tea latte. Service fluctuates from indifferent to ever-so sweet. Honey Town’s bright, modern look attracts herds of youth — late hours, of course, are a bonus. Lunch/desserts/drinks $3.99–$17.99. Open Sunday to Thursday 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. Open till 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday.
OCCO 3018 St. Joseph Blvd., 613-424-7700 When he opened this tiny bare-bones takeout joint in an east-end strip mall a year ago, his colleagues and the city’s food insiders were just a little surprised. After all, chef Mark Steele was known around town as a high-powered executive chef, one who had planned menus for the Hilton hotel chain and at the Ottawa Marriott. But Steele shrugged off the raised eyebrows, explaining that it was time to get away from the administrative side of the food business and back to his true love — cooking. One year on, the skeptics have been silenced. OCCO is rocking, especially busy at lunchtime, when hungry fans descend for their fix of deluxe comfort food. Indeed, Steele has been so successful that the Orleans Chamber of Commerce honoured his achievements in January, naming OCCO the winner of the New Business of the Year at its annual Business Excellence Awards Gala. We second that notion! While it’s a predominantly takeout crowd for lunch and dinner, there are eight bar stools for those who want to enjoy their burgers or tacos straight from the kitchen. Though his burgers are the top seller (think fresh-made patty with everything around it — bun, ketchup, mayo, candied bacon, and pickles — made from scratch), the Newfoundlander has also amassed a devoted following for his Beau’s-beer-battered fish and chips and crispy fish tacos. We’re suckers for what we like to call “haute poutine,” hand-chipped Yukon fries and curds smothered in rich turkey gravy. For expats missing The Rock, note that this just might be the only takeout joint in town that serves up a side of Newfoundland gravy and dressing ($1.50). For those who prefer a more comfortable dining experience, keep checking the progress of OCCO Kitchen at 4240 Innes Rd., where Steele plans to launch a 200-seat restaurant in April. Salads $5–$13.50, burgers $9–$12, tacos $4.95. Open daily from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sam’s Café 102 Fairmont Ave., 613-728-0931 The friendly neighbourhood corner store may be a vanishing breed, but don’t tell that to the owners of Sam’s Café, tucked away in the back of Fairmont Confectionery. When Laos-born Sam Souryavong and his sister Sandy took over the rundown spot at the corner of Fairmont and Gladstone in 2014, their renewal plans included the addition of a tiny 10-seat café. Popular from the get-go, it draws a steady stream of construction workers from nearby building sites. Their lunchtime comfort food of choice? Easy-onthe-budget bánh mì— Vietnamese sandwiches known for their big flavours. In a compact galley kitchen, the owners of this exotic lunch counter quickly prepare dozens of the most popular option, known as The Classic. Here, a baguette-style roll is packed with Vietnamese sausage, ham, and pâté, as well as the couple’s own spicy sauce, julienned carrots, and sprigs of fresh cilantro. At $3 a pop, one makes a good lunch for an office worker, two for a hungry member of the building crew. Compelling though the sandwiches may be, for us it’s all about the Thai curries. Sam went to cooking school in Bangkok, and his vibrantly seasoned Thai soups and curries are worth the splurge. Check the daily special board, order a curry, and settle down at a simple table to watch neighbourhood life unfold around you as you nosh. Smitten? A fridge filled with Sam’s made-from-scratch curry sauces ($4.99 for a 500-mL container) encourages you to ad lib at home, steaming some rice and adding the meat and veggies of your choice. Sandwiches $3–$4; curries $11–$13. Open Monday to Thursday 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., Friday and Saturday 8 a.m. to 9 p.m., Sunday 9 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Taqueria Kukulkan 1730-A Montreal Rd., 613-680-5055 Who doesn’t have a taco on the menu these days? But though on-trend and tasty, most of these spicy treats can best be described as fusion cuisine — a taco shell holding all manner of fillings, some Mexico-inspired and some not at all. That’s all well and good, but on a cool spring day when summer seems so far away, we want to be transported to the real Mexico. Enter Taqueria Kukulkan, a compact 35-seat strip-mall restaurant on Montreal Road, its simple interior festooned with festive banners in Mexican red, white, and green. Here, the cooks serve up authentic and superlative tacos, including their specialty, tacos al pastor, in which stacks of marinated pork filets are roasted, the meat shaved off a rotating shawarma spit, topped
with a bit of onion and a sliver of pineapple, then tucked into a soft corn tortilla. Go for the daily lunch special ($11.50), which includes a soup of the day (often a delicately seasoned tortilla soup) and two tacos al pastor. If you have kids with you, they’ll love the similarly priced quesos fundidos (a.k.a. melted cheese). Ours are particularly fond of choriqueso, a soupy mix of said melted cheese and crumbled chorizo designed to be messily scooped into flour tortillas ($12 for three). It was restaurant critic Anne Des Brisay who opened our eyes to the wonderful churros here — deluxe tubular doughnuts served warm and rolled in cinnamon and sugar. Got a big appetite? Plan to head to the taqueria on a Sunday, when it hosts $19.95 all-you-can-eat tacos al pastor. Mains ($17–$28) are not for the super budget-conscious, but tacos are priced at $4.25 to $5.75 each. Open Tuesday to Thursday 11:30 a.m. to 9 p.m., Friday 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m., Saturday 5 p.m. to 10 p.m., and Sunday 4 p.m. to 9 p.m.
Wild Oat Bakery Cafe and Catering 817 Bank St., 613-232-6232 Has it been only 20 years since the Wild Oat, the Glebe’s favourite granola-head bakery, first opened? Of course, the spot is also a café, devoted to vegans, vegetarians, and pescatarians. Although, hallelujah, there are no rules here regarding abstinence from alcohol. Try Nickel Brook’s hopped-up Canadian version of American pale ale, Naughty Neighbour. Then consider a few items on the menu: a grilled cheese with Îlesaux- Grues cheddar; a buckwheat, seed, and nut burger; and crepes. Find lasagna and curries in the bakery section. Wild Oat’s traditional $6.95 breakfast/brunch is a fave: free-range eggs, done to a T, with caramelized home fries. The buttered toast with homemade blueberry jam is good and wholesome. Stodgy buckwheat crepes, though, are not. For lunch, the $9 Pizza-Gone-Raw with a dehydrated flax almond crust is actually quite tasty. Its atypical topping of sun-dried tomatoes, avocados, and sunflower pesto works a charm. Over in the bakery are more conventional pizzas and, naturally, plenty of baked goods. Fat cinnamon Danishes hit the spot. Black brownies, not too sweet, are dense with chocolate. Raisin bread, if you like whole wheat, is the best in the city. Mains $5–$11.75. Open daily for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
Zest Catering & Gourmet Sandwich Cafe 45, rue Laval, Gatineau, 819-771-3456 When Zest owners Gil and Janet Roberge say “gourmet,” they mean it. Lunch needn’t be a tired old ham and cheese! With a seasonal menu switching things up weekly, Zest’s imagination is in high gear. You’re always welcomed warmly into this compact 13-seater — what’s more, their open kitchen delivers orders lickety-split. Yes, lunch is a soup-salad-sandwich menu. Except the soup ($7) turns out to be, say, truffled cauliflower with Pecorino; the salad ($7), greens and fennel dressed with Champagne vinaigrette; the sandwich, one of at least five ($10–$13), an adobe-braised lamb taco. Further details: Red Thai lentil soup is bursting with lime, ginger, and chilies. The swirl of coconut cream on top with crispy slices of shallot further revives the spirits. Kale salad, too, is perky with cranberries, oranges, and pepitas. Chihuahua, Mexico, meets Louisiana in a blackened fish burrito — tilapia takes to the charring well. Rice and black beans with Creole remoulade, avocados, and mango salsa soften its moderate spiciness. Clean-tasting slow-cooked barbecued brisket inside a bun with sausage just melts away. Meanwhile, the accompanying fries are good and hot. Lunch $7–$13. Open Monday to Friday 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m.