Two Chefs and A Table

I’m lucky enough to get along really well with all of the people in my department; they are funny, witty, and overall pretty fantastic. We work really hard so it’s really rare that we take a proper lunch break (ok, I try to). So on Tuesday my co-workers and I went out for lunch at Two Chefs and a Table, our second time there. It’s located on Alexander street, a little outside Chinatown (down the street from Sunrise Market, if you know the area). It’s surrounded by warehouses and industrial looking buildings, and the little white restaurant really stands out among its nest of trees. It’s pretty hip inside, with black wooden tables and white walls, really cool art (the Tomato is quite striking), and beautiful linear crystal chandeliers. The namesake large communal table stands at the centre of the room, but there are enough tables and chairs to seat about 25 people. On this particular day we arrive early to avoid the lunch rush, and are the day’s first customers.

The atmosphere is clean and modern, with a little bit of Tudor flavor. The cool thing is that the kitchen, which takes up about half the restaurant, is open to observers.

After waffling between the mac and cheese (really delicious here), and the burger, I chose the burger with fries ($9). It came promptly, with a portion of ketchup in a wee espresso cup. The burger was on a soft whole wheat Kaiser bun, with lettuce and yellow tomato, the patty was thick, well-done, and very tasty. The ‘Italian Style Meat Mix’ gave the burger a savoury deliciousness, kinda like a sausage burger. I like meat to be well seasoned and this was really good. I didn’t even miss the pickles, mustard, cheese, bacon, or any of the other stuff I usually like on a burger. My only complaint was that the patty was way too small for the bun. I know, greedy, right?

The fries were delicious: peeled, golden, crispy, and extremely well seasoned. So well seasoned that it didn’t need any ketchup, which is really unusual. Normally fries are seasoned after frying, but these folks did something very special to these spuds. Everyone at the table loved the fries, and they were almost all gobbled up, even though we were a table full of ladies....

Mary is a great fish fan, so she ordered the Salmon burger. However, what she ended up with was their Smoked Salmon CLT (cucumber, lettuce, tomato). Yes, they made a mistake. But good thing, because she ended up loving this sandwich, especially the in-house smoked salmon, which was really, really good. She even ate the yellow tomatoes in the sandwich, despite hating tomatoes.

Allison ordered the veggie burger, which was made from lentils. The patty seemed quite large. I think she liked it, but it was probably a little bland since I observed some salt shakin' action there.

Brigid got the chicken papaya sandwich. This was a love--she said that the chicken was moist and flavorful, the bread was great, and it was a fabulous sandwich. She was particularly enamoured of the fries, which she told me was in her top three (this from a very big gourmet).

We were all impressed, especially for an under $10 lunch. By the time we left the seats and tables were full, and so were our bellies.