As long as you don’t put too much stock into the annual Spam festival (amazingly, Hawaii seems to be singlehandedly keeping Spam in business after all these years), the fact is that Hawaiian food is incredible. Sweet, tangy and laden with pork and pineapple, it’s not Toronto’s most popular cuisine, but is definitely worth a mention for those of us living in TO. If you’re not here yet, come join us! This list alone should be enough to convince the toughest crowd.
Thanks to a few restaurants repping the tropics, there’s some pretty fab Hawaiian grub to be had in our city. With that, here are three Hawaiian restaurants in Toronto worth scoping out.
Big & beautiful.
Spam incorporated within rice balls: appetizer of champions. The Shameful Tiki Room in Parkdale makes food that’s far different from what other TO restos are serving up, and it’s pretty good, especially alongside their drink menu. Just try to order the humuhumunukunukuapua tacos. Just try.
All of them. In your stomach. Right now.
There’s nothing more stereotypically Hawaiian than a pig on a spit at a luao, and that’s the inspo for Liko’s Hawaiian BBQ – a pop-up food stand that’s a favourite at festivals and events around the GTA. They will send their chef to your event to roast a pig a la huli huli. At their food stand, you’re going to want the pork on a bun, the musubi (think Spam sushi) or the traditional plate lunch with kalua pork.
The only acceptable bowl is a pineapple bowl.
Whether you go for the food or the tropical-themed cocktails, Miss Thing’s may be a tad pricey, but the food is classy and good. Not that you’d normally call Spam classy (Miss Thing’s serves Spam pintxos), but this place on West Queen West makes canned meat taste pretty delectable.
Check out some more cultural eats:
- Flavours of Toronto: Cheap and addicting pho, bao, banh mi and vermicelli at some of Toronto’s best Vietnamese restaurants
- Flavours of Toronto: Cheap and delicious Chinese food in Toronto
- Flavours of Toronto: Tapas and wine are at their finest at these Toronto Spanish restaurants
- Flavours of Toronto: 7 Caribbean food joints for your jerk chicken fix
- Flavours of Toronto: The ultimate comfort food, found at Toronto’s Polish, Ukrainian and Hungarian restaurants