Canyon Creek

1900 The Queensway, Etobicoke, ON                                               RATING: Average to Good

“A Hit and a Miss”

My husband and I had reservations at Canyon Creek on New Year’s Eve. We arrived to a packed lobby but were promptly led past the crowd of people to a booth in the bar area. Make reservations, people!  I usually prefer being seated in the main dining room of a restaurant because the bar area is often loud and cramped; but the booths in the Canyon Creek bar were spacious and comfortable. Our servers were knowledgeable, pleasant and efficient.  We split an appetizer, both ordered mains, drinks and desserts and the bill was $100 before the tip. Quite reasonable.

The appetizer we split was the Cool Ranch Ribs. Five medium sized pork ribs that were deep fried and served with a ranch dipping sauce.  They were definitely fall-off-the bone ribs as promised, but they were also quite greasy which shouldn`t have been surprising given that they were deep fried.  It was an ‘okay’ appetizer, but I couldn`t get past the grease dripping from my fingers to really enjoy the experience. I would never order that particular starter again.  

My husband's main course choice was the Coffee Crusted Steak that was accompanied by steamed carrots, golden beets, and buttery mashed potatoes.  Our server informed us that this particular steak is coated in crushed coffee beans and then blended with brown sugar to cut the bitterness of the coffee. It`s finished off with a tangy BBQ sauce.  An odd combination but my husband was game to give it a try.  He found it noticeably spicy and after I sampled a taste I was unpleasantly surprised by the fact that it could have been any type of meat underneath that spicy exterior because I couldn’t taste the steak. This was surprising because there was nothing in the description that indicated it would be spicy. When we inquired as to the mystery ingredient in the coating, we were told that it was the tangy BBQ sauce.  I don’t think so.  What obliterated any flavour of steak was not a tangy flavour. Maybe the chef reached for the ground pepper instead of the coffee grounds in error. In any case, it was a shame because at $23.95 it was an expensive searing of the tongue. 

My main course was from the Simply Steaks section of the menu, and consisted of a 7 oz top sirloin steak accompanied by buttery mashed potatoes.  This restaurant relies heavily on top sirloin as their primary cut of steak.  It is a less tender, more flavourful cut of meat and my steak didn’t disappoint because it was perfectly cooked to medium rare and was as tender as a top sirloin can get.  I couldn’t fault the mashed potatoes because they were melt-in-your mouth delicious. My main was definitely two thumbs up while my husband’s was one thumb down.

For dessert I was looking for something rich and chocolately.  I was on the verge of ordering the Double Chocolate Brownie but the server wisely explained that it was a more cakey brownie as opposed to rich and fudgey.  I dodged a bullet there because I ended up with the Molten Chocolate Cake that nicely tamed my chocolate craving.  A scoop of vanilla ice cream finished off this delicious dessert.  

My husband ordered the Banana Coconut Cream Pie.  Now this was an odd dessert because we were expecting a triangle wedge of pie.  It IS pie, right?  But it was pie in a jar.  Layered like a fancy bar drink, the top layer was whipped cream, then coconut cream beneath it and a layer of crust at the bottom of the jar.  Interesting and tasty, but it would have been nice to just have a piece of pie.

All in all, this was a good experience for me, and a not-so-good experience for my husband who ended up with several hours of indigestion from who-knows-what part of his unfortunate meal.  

I gave this an Average to Good rating which is a balance between our very different dining experiences at this restaurant.

Restaurant website: http://canyoncreekrestaurant.ca/sherway/