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| - I was so hopeful for this restaurant ... with very positive yelp reviews and listings in best new restaurants, I would think this be as good as Tanto or Bar Sybanne. I'm not sure if it's a case of a bad night with poor service and missed dishes or "the emperor has no clothes". I honestly feel a 3 Star is on the generous side for my experience.
Before I dive into the review, I do have to wonder why Mayrik refuse to put up a menu... even if its a sample one (like Buca) when their menu changes often. It just helps so much.
In Leaside, Mayrik sits on a nice quiet street with many other small restaurants and boutiques. I feel Mayrik is a little different as it has more of a modern edge with a feel that normally you'd see on King St. It's mostly white walls are accented by interesting tiles framing the open kitchen and charcoal woods. If you're a party of 2, expect to be jostled since you're awkwardly sat in the walkway right beside the tables along the wall. I've seen the staff and other patrons constantly hit the tables. If you're sat along the wall, it's better but there still isn't a lot of space.
One thing that stands out immediately is the staff... we easily counted 7 people on the floor from the hostess to the servers. For a smaller restaurant, this was a surprise. Tanto only had 4 and service was impeccable. Bar Sybanne maybe had 3 and it was still very strong. Here ... it was really lacking. From the moment we sat to the moment we asked for the bill... we constantly waited, made eye contact with every service person, and waited some more. I've never seen 5+ people totally and actively ignore a table clearly ready to capture someone's attention. I do feel with such a heavy staff, service should have been one of the best in the city instead it's one of the unfortunate worst in the past year.
I did read a bit about Armenian cusine and they said they use more fresh herbs in addition to garlic and salt to season. In our dishes, everything except the soujouk tasted muted and underseasoned. I'm not sure what went wrong but flavours seemed lacking.
Babaghanoush - a different and interesting take on the traditional eggplant mezzo dip. Instead of puréed, it is mashed so it leaves more of the eggplant soft and intact. The flavour was muted and quite subtle... almost feel like it was under seasoned. The one frustration is that they give you a sizeable portion with a tiny warmed up flat bread. It's the size of a tea cup plate. We maybe only ate 40% before running out of bread ... if you want another tiny bread, it's $5 extra. My rec is to either give another bread so the table can eat most of the dip and reasonably charge for the extra bread ($13 for dip and 3 tiny breads seem much) or reduce the dip amount to suit the bread size and reduce the cost. 3/5
Mante dumplings - we had similar looking ones at Byblos but Mayrik ones are quite different. These dumplings do not have a supple thin wrapping. They're quite heavy and bready. They cradle a drier meat (seems like beef) that was more similar to a dry burger patty. Though it had yogurt and dried spices dashed on top, this too seemed under seasoned and very subtle in flavour. It just tasted like a bready mini dry burger. It was missing the bold flavours we've had previously at Byblos. 2/5
Soujouk sausage - the only dish of the night to have a flavour that captured our interest. The sausage and stewed (braised?) tomatoes had a good spice kick that balance on sweet, lightly tangy, and flavourful spice. It did come with a tiny bread again ... definitely not enough to eat all the tomato that comes with it. 4/5
Qarnabit roasted cauliflower - I've seen this at Fat Pasha and a few other places. This one was ok... with the roasting, it added a nice nuttier flavour to the vegetable but I felt the stem was still very hard to cut into and not quite cooked through. Though it supposed to have garlic, cheese, and cilantro on top, the flavour was not coming from them but only mostly from the roasting. 2/5
Fasolia green beans - green beans in tomatoes, garlic, and shallots. These green beans were quite al dente... id say they were lightly blanched. I'm not sure if it was intended that way but what happens then the beans don't absorb any flavour ... they had none of the tomato taste. So it just tasted like plain raw beans. I like vegetables but I know a lot of people would like seasoned vegetables at least. 3/5
One thing I didn't like so much was the staff offering extra bread as if on the house and never mentioning it was $5 extra. We had to double check before the brought it out to see if it was an additional cost. Just seemed a little underhanded.
I feel if you want a great night out for Mediterranean food, Byblos and Bar Sybanne offer wonderful flavours and service. I just feel Mayrik had the popular crowded atmosphere but missing in delivery of taste and service. Don't let the hype fool you ... like it did to me.
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