Rawlicious

  Rawlicious

3092 Dundas St West

Toronto, ON

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8 out of 10

Raw Food

This is not the best raw restaurant ever. Still, I loved it. What it does have is an amazing location in the heart of the junction where a loyal clientele of people trying to healthy and happy come into the most sublime setting for a meal or a smoothie or a juice. The restaurant is a group of rooms winding from the front of the restaurant to the back, with a private room, different seating options (cushions at low tables for a lush eating experience) or high round tables café-style. Or more standard tables next to the middle room fireplace. So you can have an intimate dinner, a casual quick bite in the front window, or somewhere between the two. The other cool thing is it's an open-kitchen. Not a great design since the kitchen is the cash register area as well, but it's really nice to see the (non-)cooks putting the dishes together. So it's a beautiful space. Oh, there are all sorts of beautiful art work on the walls.

The juices? Great. the smoothies? Good. Mine had too much of an empty banana taste that I find happens with agave nectar and dates. So not as good as LIVE Organic Food Bar, but it's still very good. I also agree with the fact that here they don't have alcohol. Raw food seems a bit of a gimmick when you sell cocktails with alcohol. What about the whole "not polluting the body" thing?

So we've established they have good intentions here. My dining companion (who figures he doesn't like raw food) liked his smoothie a lot. He'd also liked Crudessence in Montreal. But then the Pad Thai came (pictured at the top). He didn't like that so much. It was really nothing like Pad Thai. It was actually still pretty good, but it wasn't pad thai. If you call a dish something and that's associated with certain flavours (sour lime, crunchy peanut, spicy sweet tomato and/or tamarind, slightly sweet egg) you need to live up to it. Mind you, Toronto does not have super Thai in the first place, but this version was just not pad thai. Just call it pasta and you'll be fine. I liked the creamy, nut-based sauce, though I asked for some kind of tomato hot sauce (ANYTHING!) to turn it into something that remotely resembled pad thai. I think the biggest problem was that there was way too much of the gloopy sauce. A lime please! Come on! Lime is even raw! Couldn't find any tamarind lying around? I'm being harsh, I know. Keep in mind that I like this place.

The springrolls were another Thai disappointment. There wasn't enough mint, they were soggy since there were marinated vegetables in there, and no crunch. the dipping sauce was even bland. Lack of lime again the problem, I think. In a restaurant specializing in nuts you'd hope they'd get the peanut sauce better.

Side salad? Excellent. Delicious agave-based vinaigrette that was sweet and a refreshing after the pad thai. If a raw restaurant can't do a salad well, though, there's a problem. That's kind of the meat and potatoes of raw food, so to speak.

Raw restaurants usually do amazing desserts. It's the perfect way to end a meal since it really fills you up with healthy fats. No sugar-laden carbs made of fluff and air. It works the same way cheese works but without the salt - you don't need a lot of it to be full. Also, eat too much, and you'll regret it. You do not want a second piece of cheesecake. Trust me.

The cheesecake was lovely. Lemon. Very fresh berry sauce, I think. Cheesecakes are always good in raw restaurants because soaked nuts taste deceptively like cheese from the slight fermentation. I mostly use cashew but macademia is very good. I forget what this one was made of.

The brownie? Well, I liked the vanilla icing since it tasted like pure sugar from the dates (but it lacked same depth that my smoothie had lacked, and for the same reason). The brownie itself should have been richer. Usually raw chocolate mousses are very rich and so this brownie (much denser than a mousse) could have used some more raw chocolate-y taste. Still it was funny to see the walnut pieces in it (they actually tasted a bit bitter) and know that the rest of brownie was made from nut too, but that stuff was ground fine so you don't think about it. Kind of like stuffing a chicken with an egg stuffing (sorry to all vegans for the imagery). It's weird but then you realize it's all raw so it's just a little joke to me. Probably no one else thinks that's a good one...

So I left here feeling so light and happy, and full. My body was giving me a pat on the back (up there with the chicken imagery, I know) and even if the dishes that I'd had weren't amazing, I would happily go back for another meal. I love zucchini noodles. I love big bowls of sauces made from nuts that replace the cream I can't have. I love knowing I'm eating something rich and a little sinful but it's so good for me nutritionally. Vegan food should be delicious, and this almost is. Take that, soy!

Expect To Pay: $18-$35 (for main and a dessert to a juice, entrée, main, and dessert including tax and tip...and a happy soul)
Hours: Tues-Thu, Sun noon-9pm; Fri-Sat noon-10pm
416-519-7150