Vatican After Hours

Back in August, I travelled with my best friend, Sadaf, to Italy, France and Spain. It was a crazy fun two and a half weeks, the temperature was sizzling hot AND we went during the height of European tourism. In Rome, we stayed in a small, but modern bed and breakfast near Vatican City. One of the most enjoyable memories in Rome were the casual night walks to St. Peter's Square. The Square was surrounded by Bernini's beautiful larger-than-life sculptures. Couldn't get any pictures of the Swiss Guards, but I am pleased tell you they aren't bad to look at if you look past their funny attire ;)

Ra-ra-rahhh men

I haven't updated since July? That's just pure weaksauce. The weeks leading up to my European adventure was a little hectic. When I came back, I tried to squeeze the last remaining minutes of summer. Excuses, excuses I know, but now that it's getting cold, I will be hibernating at home dressed in my standard winter outfit (sweatpants and hoodies) blogging my Europe trip!

Before I left for Europe, I needed to devour as much Asian food as possible, I begged Julian to take me to eat ramen noodles at Kenzo. Kenzo is a popular Japanese ramen joint downtown. When I heard there was a Yonge and Finch location, I squeeled! That means I won't have to trek downtown to satisfy my sudden intense ramen craving on a cold winter's day *score!*

We pulled up to the tiny front parking lot (no joke). After reading reviews on my Urbanspoon and Yelp apps (yes, both, I'm crazy obsessive), I discovered this uptown location was not affiliated to the two downtown Kenzo locations. The sign looked a little different from the downtown location, but the menu was identical. It didn't matter because the ramen tasted just as good!!! Noodles were not too soft, al-dente to my liking, and they were not shy about loading up my bowl with chasiu (bbq pork), egg, sprouts, carrots, mushrooms, and grounded pork in a spicy ramen broth.

{ my fully loaded King of Kings ramen }

{ tonkotsu ramen: chasiu and egg in a pork bone soup }

{ gyoza dumplings with a chili vinegar dipping sauce }

There was poor ventilation in there for a muggy August day. I was sweating buckets while slurping on my yummy noodles. It didn't matter because it was SO GOOOOOD.


Kenzo Ramen
6180 Yonge St.
Toronto, ON
(416) 229-4526

Sunny Saturday // Pizzeria Libretto

My friends and I headed out to the Distillery District this past sunny Saturday. I've been anticipating the Food Truck Eats event for a couple of weeks now. Good thing I ate a bit of food before I left the house, because the line up for one food vendor was 1-2 hours!! RIDICULOUS. I don't know if it was the combination of the Jazz Festival or if it was the ton of foodies out in full force ready to nom. After walking around for fifteen minutes with my starving friends, we decided it was NOT worth the wait in the blazing sun and left to eat at Pizzeria Libretto, a recommendation by Amanda and Jeff. Boy was it a good call.

According to their website, Pizzeria Libretto serves "Real Neapolitan Pizza", using the fresh, local, and natural ingredients. Pizzas are cooked in a 3rd generation, 900 degree wood burning oven, hand-made and imported from Naples, Italy. Sounds legit eh? 

They have a regular Lunch Prix Fixe menu, an amazing deal, $15 for a three course meal! Julian and I shared this one since we weren't that hungry. We started off with bruschetta: one vegetable, two meats. The vegetable bruschetta was good, the bread was toasted with a creamy goat cheese spread topped with fresh tomatoes. The highlight of the meal I would say was the beef meat bruschetta. I haven't been blown away by bruschetta considering, well it's only bruschetta, but this one was delicious. The meat, the tomatoes, and the cheese just went so perfectly together, hmmm.

{ l-r: goat cheese bruschetta, beef bruschetta }

{ Amanda's pear and walnut arugula salad }

{ Sharon's caprese salad }

The server let us know we were able to substitute the Margherita pizza for any pizza of choice (with an extra charge of a few dollars of course). Julian and I ordered the Duck Confit, Bosc Pear and Mozzarella pizza (fancy I know). The pears were sweet, a nice contrast to the very tender shredded duck meat. The dough in the centre of the pizza was a little hard to cut and not as crispy as I would like, but it was very tasty overall.

{ Julian and I's duck confit, bosc pear and mozzarella pizza }

{ Amanda's house-made sausage, caramelized onions, mozzarella, and chili oil pizza }

{ Chris' hot peppers, tomato, house-made sausage, mozzarella pizza }

{ Jeff's salami, tomato, gorgonzola, roasted red peppers, mozzarella pizza }

{ chocolate gelato }

We finished off with a very chocolatey gelato, too bad it was slightly melted. With the substituted pizza, the meal came up to $19. Incredible value for two people!




Pizzeria Libretto
221 Ossington Ave.
(416) 532-8000
Website