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| - We love the downtown location (we visit it every once in a while) and were very excited to see the Koyoi name in North York when we drove past it the other day. We had to go give it a try!
It was a very early dinner on a Friday night, we arrived at the place just 15 minutes after 6pm. The place was pretty empty which made sense with the time and that I felt that it probably just opened in the last few weeks (or days?) or so.
The service was like what we would experience from the downtown store - got our water pretty quickly and they'd always refill without us even have to ask. (But then it wasn't that busy at the time of course.) In fact, I think I recognized one of the waitresses to be from the downtown location.
Very much to our joy the menu was very similar (if not almost exactly the same) as the one downtown - they've got the koyoi salad, the beef tataki, spicy fries...and then we realized there wasn't a "fried" section. This was a bit of a let down because we absolutely LOVE their karaage (japanese fried chicken), with lemon/salt or with nanban-style with tartar sauce. The waitress said they don't have the fryers installed yet - so we really hope that'll happen some time soon.
Other than that, the food tastes great, the same as what you'd get from the downtown store. There was only two of us so we didn't eat a whole lot, just our regulars that I've mentioned above. We also had their okonomiyaki for the first time since we kind of lacked hot food without the fried stuff (and we didn't feel like any rice or udon dishes). It was decent and had some seafood in it. I can't really comment because I've only had this from the Okonomiyaki House downtown before.
They have a pretty good drinks menu with beer on tap, bottled beer, cocktails, sake, umeshu, chuhai, etc. Their 650ml Kirin price is the same as downtown and we love that.
All in all, although there wasn't as many food options as the downtown store, I guess I could understand since they called this one "Bar Koyoi" instead of downtown's "Restaurant & Bar". A pretty decent place for having some drinks. Would definitely visit again unless we happen to be downtown. Really hope they get those fryers!
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