Cora's courtesy of Google Maps
Cora’s has become quite popular in the last decade. Infact, I don’t know a single person living in Toronto who doesn’t know what Cora’s is… except for my mom! To put it simply, I told her that it’s like eating from a greasy spoon but with piles of fruit on that spoon. Yes, in my world, Cora’s has always been known as the place you want to go when you want your filling of fruit.
Whenever I go to Montreal, it’s not hard to find a Cora’s. They’re as abundant there as Starbucks in Vancouver. Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for Toronto, with our lone Cora’s downtown sitting way down by John and Front streets. Thankfully, this summer, a new Cora’s opened up on Carlton St, just east of Yonge.
Sara, Antony, and myself went this past weekend for brunch around 2pm and the place was packed. We had to wait in a 15 minute lineup and there wasn’t really much room to stand. I can see this being a problem going there on a cold yet busy day, where the lineup easily pushes beyond the front door leaving you standing on the street. The funny thing about this new location as well is that from the entrance, it looks quite tiny. But once you’re actually inside, you’ll see that the place is pretty huge. I can’t remember what ambiance music they play in the background at the Front St Cora’s but at the Carlton location, they seemed to be pumping it with the Top 10 dance/club hits that morning. I wonder why this is. Perhaps due to the store’s location to the village.. who knows?
Cranberry, raspberry, strawberry smoothie
Sara and I ordered the special smoothie of the day while Antony got an English breakfast tea. The smoothie that day was a blended puree of cranberries, raspberries, and strawberries. It was pretty good although I personally felt it could have been filtered a bit more. Sara, on the other hand, enjoyed the fact that with each slurp, you could bite down and pop the tiny seeds in your mouth.
The tea "vase"
As for the tea, well we all agree that Cora’s tea pot isn’t the greatest. It’s actually kind of cheap, but in an Ikea sort of way. You see, even though there’s that black plastic grip at the top for pouring, it was still nearly impossible to hold onto without burning your fingers. The fact is it actually looks like it’s supposed to be used as a vase for flowers.
For our main entrees, Antony and myself both went with the 1990s Harvest, a plate containing two pieces of chocolate brioche dipped in french toast batter (which is eggs with cinnamon and nutmeg), along with bacon and an egg, topped with a mountain of fruit. Sara went with her favorite, but always good, theo’s omelet. It comes with a variety of vegetables in the omelet and topped with melted cheese and a side of fries with toast.
1990s Harvest
Antony’s entree was ordered with bacon extra crispy and mine with sausage and the egg scrambled. When Antony’s order came, the bacon didn’t come crispy. Fortunately, our nice waitress noticed that and got him an additional place of bacon on the side, this time extra crispy. The french toast like brioche was pretty good, and had just the right amount of chocolate in it to make each bite an amazing one. One thing about this dish though is that there are way too many sweet things on this plate and not enough savory things. I suppose having one egg scrambled on your plate doesn’t look as plentiful as having a sunny side up egg, but looking at the amount of scrambled egg on my plate, I felt a bit gypped.
Re: bacon extra crispy
Sara’s omelet came with the cheese sort of sprinkled on after it was made. This resulted in unmelted cheese, yuck! Our waitress quickly had them melt the cheese for Sara so in the end, it was all good. Sara’s omelet was fantastic and as she says, “is always a safe choice”. I didn’t try it this time so I can’t really comment on the taste of it but at least it looked pretty good. One thing Sara did note is that she felt her fruit was a little bit on the unripened side. For some reason, her kiwi still had its skin on too.
theo's omelet
Cora’s is a safe choice if you want a nice sit down brunch. Almost all of their food options are great and their menu has pretty much remained the same for years. On the downside, some things are a bit pricey compared to other brunch places (2.50 for tea?!) but the quality and quantity is what justifies it.
Average Price: $8 – $14 per entree
Hours: Mon-Sat 6:00am-3:00pm, Sun 7:00am-3:00pm
Address: 27 Carlton St.
Phone: 416-340-1350
TTC Directions: Get off at College subway station and walk half a block east on Carlton on the south side of the street. (note: Carlton turns into College on the west side of Yonge St.). Alternatively, if you take the College/Gerrard streetcar, you can just get off one stop east of Yonge too.