I don't know who Grant Van Gameren is but apparently the fact that he took over Harry's is suppose to be a thing. A friend told me about the place and frankly I should have known better than to fall prey to the rattlings of the hipster grapevine. Came here with a friend for a burger, grilled cheese sandwich and fries. Really wish I hadn't.
The old diner aesthetic is indeed still very much in place with the decor, right down to the coin operated table jukeboxes. You can imagine an older generation of blue-collar working class folk coming here for a beer and cheap eats back in the day. If you're looking for that vibe you can find it here or many other diners still alive in the city. As for the food...Now, I've eaten in my fair share of diners all across Canada. Some were surprisingly good, others were barely survivable. Harry's food though not toxic (I suppose that's why everything but the fries were near chard black...Y'know...food safety) is also rather bland and uninspired.
My friend's grilled cheese was toasted till black and my burger, what little there was of it, was like a chewy piece of charcoal. I guess I didn't read the menu well enough but usually a "Banquet Burger" has things like lettuce, tomato, pickle, onions...Not so at Harry's, I guess near $15 for a burger a little veg is too much to ask. The fries were most likely the frozen $1 per kilo variety that you can find at any nofrills grocery store (hey whattaya know there's a nofrills right next door to the place).
The service I suppose was competent enough albeit done with a nonchalance. I don't think our waitress ever did a quality check with us the whole time we were there. Perhaps she knows better than to ask "How is everything?"
When you can have a burger of far superior taste and quality for less than 1/2 the price at the new A&W Parkdale location I can't imagine the retro diner aesthetics of Harry's being worth the trip. Take it one step further you'd be leagues better off at Burger Priest or the nearby Cardinal Rule or The Rude Boy than at Harry's. Unfortunately Harry's food has only taken the worst aspects of cheap diners and brought it to those who are foolish enough to think nostalgia is everything.