Inside Cafe Landwer, Toronto's new all-day Middle Eastern diner
Cafe Landwer has landed in downtown Toronto and already it’s bustling.
Located at the corner of University and Adelaide, the restaurant is the second Canadian location for the Israeli chain following an outpost in Richmond Hill that opened last year.
For the uninitiated, Cafe Landwer is a casual all-day spot where the menu spans breakfast, lunch, and dinner and features Western comfort foods with a Mediterranean inflection.
Sunny eggs with chopped salad over fresh focaccia, shakshouka, and signature breakfasts boasting a little bit of everything are standouts on the breakfast menu. Though sweet tooths can sidestep these tahini-doused selections for pancakes and benedicts too.
The menu continues on with salads, sandwiches, pasta, pizza, schnitzel, kebabs, vegan shawarma, hummus bowls… it goes on.
It’s not just the abundance of options that are notable but also that every dish on the menu features a plenitude of colours, textures, and flavours. Take the Halumi Salad loaded with crispy nuggets of squeaky cheese over a medley of crunchy peppers, pistachios, over a giant bowl of greens.
Butternut squash ravioli in a chestnut cream sauce is also easy to like and is just one of the many fresh pastas on the menu, all of which are fully customizable (of course) with a choice of noodle and sauces.
Big appetites Sinia Kebab that sees minced beef kebabs and roasted eggplant, tomatoes, and charred onions presented in a focaccia bowl and finished with tahini.
You’d be wrong to think this restaurant hasn’t considered every possible craving including dessert.
Loaves of babka and golden danishes line the coffee bar, meanwhile, halva ‘Rosalach’, New York style cheesecake, and chocolate fondue are among the hot options off the dessert menu.
Being in the Financial District, the weekday lunch rush is as brisk as expected, but in even better news for the influx of recent brunch-starve condo dwellers that call the downtown core home, the all-accommodating Middle Eastern diner will also be open on weekends.
Cafe Landwer
Address: 165 University Avenue, Toronto
Phone: 647-748-1165