The food was as bad as these photos.
(Movie screening means no big cameras.)
First let me just say that I was really, really looking forward to eating here. We wanted to check out Greens Vegetarian before the last screening we went to, but ran out of time. The reviews on Yelp were good, receiving 4 our of 5 stars with plenty of compliments on the food, so we made sure to head downtown early.
When we arrived, the place was pretty much empty save for a table who were paying their bill. I chalked it up to it being a slow time of day; after all, it was 4pm on a Thursday. After browsing the menu, we decided on three dishes knowing we'd have leftovers to eat when we got home from the movie.
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Okay, okay maybe we shouldn't have ordered Pad Thai at a Chinese place, my fault, but what came to our table was inexcusable. Now, I'm totally okay with unauthentic Pad Thai- that ketchup-y sauce isn't all that bad when you have a hankering for it (which I did), but this brightly coloured mass was bland and boring. Think watered down ketchup with vinegar and shiitake mushroom flavoured noodles. Cheaping out on limes is another thing.
Not being one who likes seeing food go to waste, I tried to salvage the noodles once I got home...but it was hopeless. Not even the most delicious spicy peanut sauce could salvage it.
This was the best dish out of the three. The eggplants are sliced and deep fried then stir fried in a thick sweet and savory black bean sauce. We chose to pay extra for chick'n to be added in the mix and while we thoroughly enjoyed the flavours and the texture of the eggplant, the chick'n was actually just a few cubes of plain tofu. Not what we expected. I even waved the waitress down to make sure we got the correct order. If it's tofu, just call it that. Mock chicken is entirely different.
Regardless, the left overs were delicious cooked with some Gardein Beefless Tips.
Beef Chow Fun Noodles are Rich's (and my) favourite. I love the authentic version, with real beef and order it on the regular at Chinese restaurants, but we have also had excellent vegan versions in the past. Unfortunately one glace at this sad blob of noodles and we knew it was going to suck. The colour alone wasn't right- but combine that with the few pieces of soggy, kind of sour tasting mock beef slices tossed in along side the random carrot, celery and mushroom bits...disaster. There were barely any bean sprouts, no green onions and no flavour.
It's supposed to look like this.
All Rich could taste were the shiitake mushrooms (which he isn't a fan of) and I couldn't taste much at all. The flavour was as pale and faded as the colour of the noodles. We took most of this home and I stir fried it with homemade garlic/chili oil and a splash of magic sauce (Maggi). It all of a sudden became delicious.
I would not return or recommend Green's Vegetarian Restaurant. The prices maybe cheap, but they aren't cheap enough for the quality of food being served. We ordered three dishes and we packed all three of them to go in hopes of doctoring them up so they'd taste better. Two out of three were salvageable, but we left the restaurant hungry.
I'm starting to think the reviews on their Yelp page maybe untruths or the reviewers have no idea what decent (Chinese/even Americanized Chinese) food tastes like. Overall experience 2 out of 5.
Greens Vegetarian Restaurant 638 Dundas Street West Toronto, Ontario M5T 1H8
