Toronto just got shot down hard by BlackBook, an arts and culture rag from New York. In a new post today, BlackBook accuses Toronto chefs of “biting New York’s style.” To support its thesis, the magazine lists a whopping two examples: Porchetta & Co., which quite openly emulates NYC’s Porchetta, and The Burger’s Priest, because apparently making burgers out of fresh, never-frozen ground beef constitutes plagiarizing the Big Apple.
The magazine doesn’t stop there. It also points out that Toronto is a “vanilla version of New York City,” prone to “wallowing in its own sense of inferiority.” It also takes a rather low blow at Susur Lee for blaming the economy, and not his food, for Shang‘s failure to catch on in the States.
BlackBook may be right on a few points – New York is a great city, worthy of our admiration – but we can’t help but think that it’s come down a little hard. We certainly don’t blame it for only thinking up two solid examples (but really, only one) of Toronto “biting” NYC’s style; it’s Friday, and nobody wants to work hard. Following its lead, we have one example of the greatest, bestest, and most original city on Earth “biting” the style of its neighbour to the north: poutine.
