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| - The Hoof Cafe was the undisputed culinary highlight of my trip to Toronto this past week. I came with Susan C. and Vivek S. (thanks, guys!) for a brunch on a Friday afternoon and sat at the bar.
As Martin S. notes, it's a cool twist on classic brunch items. And seriously meat-tastically cool at that. Seamlessly integrating the often-divergent genres of charcuterie and unthreatening, comfort-ish brunch food, Hoof Cafe is some seriously good grub.
The wildest thing is that while you're eating pigtails, tongue, or pork bellies, nothing is jumping out at you being all "look at me! you don't usually eat me! Aren't I novel!" Nope. It's just chilling out, unpretentiously waiting for you to enjoy it. I can easily see Hoof Cafe turning charcuterie haters into serious addicts.
The pigtails and grits were phenomenal, with coarse, cheese grits served alongside of stew of flavorful pigtail bits topped with thin-sliced scallions and a sunny-side up egg. The tongue grilled cheese was equally awesome -- not knowing it was tongue, you might think it was just extra-delicious pastrami served with a bit of coarse mustard on buttery bread.
My personal favorite was probably the pork belly pastrami. It looked like bacon, but had that fantastic melt-in-your-mouth goodness that only pork bellies can really achieve.
I also had my first Caesar cocktail here, the Hoof Caesar, and will never malign Clamato juice again.
Amazing (yet accessible) food, friendly and conversational service at the bar, cool homey space. Looking for a foodie experience? Eat at Hoof Cafe. Looking for a damn good, rich and greasy brunch? Eat at Hoof Cafe. Hoof hoof hoof hoof
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