Toma Burger Addiction offers Angus beef patties, daily house made brioche buns, and 16 different varieties of burger. At the higher end of the price scale, the toppings include truffle oil and prosciutto. Sadly, we stuck with the more standard fare.
I ordered La Boheme and took advantage of one of two no bun options, the other being a side salad. Thus, my beef patty, blue cheese, homemade onion and bacon marmalade, swiss cheese, spinach, and tomato arrived wrapped in lettuce. Though the lettuce leaves appeared too small for the task, I still found myself searching for the burger. The waitress, who noticed my peering, reassured me that my burger was indeed in there.
The beef patty was juicy, fresh and flavourful, playing well with the pungent blue cheese. Most of the marmalade had settled into one section of the lettuce wrap, so I can confirm that, on its own, the condiment is quite delicious. However, when combined with the rest of the burger, I found the sweetness of the marmalade jarring.
My significant other ordered the El Rio Grande. In between two fresh buns lay a beef patty topped with cheddar, guacamole, Chipotle mayo, double smoked bacon, jalapeños, lettuce, and tomato. Once again, the fresh ingredients could not be faulted, but one topping failed to complement the burger. In this case, the mayo was the weakest element.
Perhaps we would have been more impressed with the higher end options, in which case, Toma Burger Addiction should probably cull their menu. Alternately, we may have been just as dissatisfied with an incongruous topping on a pricier burger.
I will mention that the restaurant decor attempted to buck the hipster trend, choosing to go the sushi restaurant turned diner route, instead. Clearly, the owners would have done well to get a professional interior designer, as there was a suspiciously amateur vibe to the restaurant thanks to the decor. For the first time, I turned down sitting at a booth, because they were uncomfortably massive. Seated at a table, I faced the word, ‘BURGER’ spelled out on the wall in a typeface that was inexplicably horrendous since it failed to match the one on the menu or the sign outside.
Unremarkable burgers with questionable toppings in combination with clumsy interior design equals a fail in the competitive Toronto burger scene.
★ ★ ★
Toma Burger Addiction, 712 Queen St W, Toronto
Dined September 2014 – Junggugeo Kaenada 중국어 캐나다
Noonas Over Forks 