Asian Legend

We were celebrating my brother-in-law's birthday and decided to go for Shanghai food. My in-laws are particularly fond of Asian Legend, so we decided this would be a good place for lunch on Thanksgiving Monday.

Restaurant: Asian Legend
Location: Scarborough
Meal: Lunch
Day: Monday
Son's Age: 6 months

Asian Legend is actually a chain, and it tends to look nicer and cleaner than a lot of typical Chinese restaurants. My in-laws have been graciously bringing me takeout from here on several occasions.

Accessibility: ⭐️⭐️
I thought that this would be accessible since there is a large parking lot and a ramp to get to the entrance. We placed the car seat on a chair at the table.

He seemed quite comfortable, and I noticed that there were also high chairs available for older (or less wobbly) babies. The washroom, however, was downstairs, which definitely means that this place is not exactly stroller friendly.

There is also no change table and barely any counter space. If your baby doesn't really wiggle, this might be fine for you, but my son is getting to a curious age where putting him on this counter could be rather precarious.

Service: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Another benefit of a chain restaurant is that the server takes a little more time checking in with you, rather than making you feel rushed. I found service was very good, and our server seemed very comfortable with a baby at the table. 

Food: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

We ordered a variety of dishes, starting with some boiled dumplings. 

These were good and tasted best with a bit of vinegar and ginger. If you like dumplings, though, you really need to order the xiao long bao.

This dish is always a favourite and they did not disappoint here. Asian Legend actually has quite a variety of xiao long bao, but I always prefer the classic pork soup dumpling. Next, we had fried rice cakes with shrimp and pork.

This is also a dish that Asian Legend does quite well. The photo doesn't do it justice - I know it looks plain but it tastes really good. Finally, the last dish was a braised beef noodle soup.

The soup is nice and hearty, which is ideal for a cool autumn day. There is also a little bit of spice to this one, although it's very manageable even for the faint of heart. Considering the whole meal, I think the food is pretty delicious overall.

Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️½
As I just said, the food is good and the service is reasonable. My complaint is that the setup of the restaurant isn't as baby friendly as I'd like, but it's still more than possible to bring your baby to eat here. 

Linda Modern Thai

I found myself in the Don Mills area one day and decided that I don't eat enough Thai food (that's not entirely accurate - I tend to get takeout), so my mom met me at Shops on Don Mills.

Restaurant: Linda Modern Thai
Location: Don Mills
Meal: Lunch
Day: Thursday
Son's Age: 6 months

Linda Modern Thai is an upscale restaurant brought to you by the people behind Salad King, aka the place that made me realize that I like Thai food. Obviously, I went in with high expectations.

Accessibility: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Right off the bat, this restaurant has an automatic door, which, to be fair, is probably meant for wheelchairs rather than strollers, but worked well for me nonetheless. The host seated us at a table for four and removed a chair so that I could park my stroller.

Side note in case you're wondering - my son can only sit unassisted for a little at a time and thus cannot sit in a wooden high chair yet, so I keep him in the car seat whenever I eat out in case I need to fold the stroller up. You probably don't actually care. I just feel the need to say it because my son does in fact now sit in the proper stroller seat. But anyway, back to the topic. Washroom!

This is pretty much the best scenario. Single washroom with more than adequate space for a stroller, plus a proper change table. Perfect!

Service: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
The service was good - I had an embarrassing moment where I figured what I wanted to order and loudly said "okay someone serve me now!", and immediately the server was at our table. I wasn't actually being demanding; I was just joking around with my mom, but man are they prompt. The server also commented on how cute my son was, which I always appreciate.

Food: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
The restaurant has a weekday lunch menu, which I like since dinner portions tend to be too large for midday. I ordered the panang curry with crispy beef.

I admit that I didn't know what I was expecting when I ordered this. I suppose I thought the beef would be entirely crispy somehow, although now that I say that I don't see how that makes sense. Anyway, the beef has a crispy fried skin around it, and is then sliced to reveal tender beef on the inside. It is also sitting in the curry rather than mixed in. I found overall it was quite good, although the beef was slightly on the dry side. The curry had great flavour, and there was just enough for the rice to soak up without a lot of excess sauce.

Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️½
The food is nice and the place is very baby-friendly, so overall I recommend bringing your baby here.

Noble Seafood

For my cousin's birthday, my family got together for a big banquet dinner in Markham. Now, going to Markham is a bit of a trek for me, which makes arriving on time difficult because I rarely get out of the house on time as it is, plus traffic issues have a higher impact on a longer journey. Additionally, I had to be home before my son's bedtime. This means that I was about half an hour late and I had to leave early, so I cannot comment on the entire meal or experience end to end.

Restaurant: Noble Seafood
Location: Milliken
Meal: Dinner
Day: Sunday
Son's Age: 6 months

This restaurant is fairly new and meant to be high end Chinese food with a bit of fusion elements. Unfortunately, there is no website that I can find, and as I mentioned, I was late arriving, so I don't actually know what all the dishes are, nor can I cross reference with any menu online. I'll do my best, so here goes.

Accessibility: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Being in Markham, the restaurant has an attached parking lot. Furthermore, the restaurant has quite a bit of space, so I had no trouble bringing my son in his car seat.

The washroom also had a proper change table available, which is always appreciated.

I particularly like that the change table wasn't inside a stall, and there was enough room that I could have brought a stroller in. I believe they also had high chairs available, so very baby friendly all around.

Service: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
So the service is a bit difficult to rate, because I think the servers really were doing their best, but the situation was just...odd. First of all, I was half an hour late, and my family was just sitting down. Apparently, they had been seated at a table with lots of flies hovering around, so they requested to be moved. I didn't personally experience this, but the previous table was pointed out to me, and it was farther away from the entrance than the new table, so I don't really understand why there would be a lot of flies over there. Then, at the new table, my family noticed it was quite drafty, which I suspect was because we were now by the door but my aunts insisted was a result of the air conditioning. I guess they were right because this was later corrected. The pacing between courses was also a bit off; usually for Chinese banquets, each course is served after 10-20 minutes to give people a chance to finish one dish at a time, for the most part. In this case, some dishes were served really close together, while others had larger gaps of time. When I left, which was an hour and a half later, they were still waiting for rice, noodles, and dessert. My cousin asked me to wait because we had already been waiting a while so surely they would be served quickly, but unfortunately my son was beginning to fuss do I had to excuse myself. I found out afterward that they waited an additional 20 minutes before the rice and noodles arrived, so it was a good thing I left. As far as the rest of the service went, the servers didn't seem to be accustomed to portioning the food out, since some people had significantly more food than others, so finally my family asked them not to divvy up the food for us and instead let us serve ourselves. I've rated service three stars because the actual experience was pretty abysmal, but admittedly the servers did their best to improve the situation and accommodate requests. So...A for effort?

Food: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
So I will try my best to describe the dishes. We started with suckling pig, served with jellyfish and seaweed.

Suckling pig is typically served with jellyfish but not with seaweed. It was an interesting choice, and I quite enjoyed it, so it was quite a promising first course. Next there was a deep fried taro dish. I didn't get a photo of the whole dish, but here is my portion on my plate next to the suckling pig.

I was pretty excited for this because it looked good, and I must say it was disappointing in that it was shockingly bland. It seemed like a good concept but didn't really work for me. Next was a dish with scallops, chicken, and squid.

There was some celery in here too. Usually this kind of dish includes snow peas or some kind of green vegetable, but not in this case. They were quite generous with the number of large scallops, so that was definitely a plus. Next was the soup.

I have no idea what kind of soup this was, but I think there was abalone in it? It was okay, but not as flavourful as I expected it to be. After this was the lobster.

I think this lobster was steamed with butter, which sounds normal but is actually atypical for a Chinese banquet. Somehow, this made the lobster more bland than anticipated and as such, kind of disappointing. After this was the fish.

I have to be honest - as I'm writing this, I have no recollection of this one, which isn't very promising. Finally, there was chicken stuffed with sticky rice.

This was pretty good, but by no means unique to this restaurant. As I mentioned earlier, I missed the rest of the dinner, so this was the last course I ate.

Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️½
Accessibility is great, and this restaurant is incredibly baby friendly in that regard. The service was strange, although like I said, the servers were really trying their best. The food is interesting and different but not really my favourite. Overall, this isn't a bad place to take a baby at all.

Ravi Soups

Holy crap, my son has been alive for over half a year! I'm more than halfway through my maternity leave! This is like the equivalent of two co-op terms in university - meaning I've had desk jobs for half as long! Insane. Whoo. Okay, now that I got that out of my system (psych! That's like two trimesters!), let's talk about dinner with a good friend of mine who finally got to meet my loin fruit. 

Restaurant: Ravi Soups

Location: The Junction

Meal: Dinner

Day: Friday

Son's Age: 6 months (whattttttttt)

Ravi Soups has multiple locations and offer soups and wraps. It's cafeteria style, so you order and pay first and then sit down and wait for your food to be brought to you. Water is also self serve. The decor is pretty mismatched but somehow works. 

Accessibility: ⭐️⭐️

For starters, there's a step just to get into the restaurant, so that's already a bit of an obstacle with the stroller. I do have a large stroller so I had to move a chair to park him next to the table. 

Luckily the place wasn't busy, because otherwise I'm pretty sure the stroller would have been in the way. The washrooms are in the basement, so again, not stroller friendly. More importantly, there is no change table. 

Also I don't think I could change him on that counter. I give it two stars, though, because I did see high chairs for babies that can sit unassisted easily (aka longer than a few seconds). 

Service: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

As I mentioned, this is cafeteria style, so service is pretty minimal and therefore unmemorable. 

Food: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This is by far my favourite place to get soup. If I'm feeling sick or the weather is bad, nothing warms my heart and stomach like a bowl of soup from Ravi Soups. I ordered a soup and wrap combo. 

The soup was corn chowder with blue crab, Thai basil, and crispy shallots. The wrap was curried lamb with baby spinach, roasted yams, edamame, mango-pineapple salsa, cilantro, and green aioli. The soup was warm and creamy with a bit of a kick, and it really hit the spot, with the shallots providing a nice crunch. The wrap had a great meat-to-veggie ratio so I was satisfied but still felt like I was being somewhat healthy. The lamb was warm and tender and also a little spicy. I also like how the food is served on a lazy Susan so I can spin it around depending on whether I wanted the soup or the wrap without having to rearrange the dishes. It's a seemingly small detail that helps make life easier.

Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️½

This is undoubtedly the best place to get soup in the city, but the baby-friendly aspect is a bit lacking. It's still worthwhile to check this place out, but my recommendation is to get takeout to save yourself some hassle. 

Shangri-la

To celebrate my father-in-law's birthday, my husband and I decided to treat him for dim sum. The best dim sum tends to be in the northeast part of the GTA, so we found ourselves at Shangri-la in Markham.

Restaurant: Shangri-la
Location: Markham
Meal: Brunch
Day: Saturday
Son's Age: 25 weeks

This restaurant is particularly nice because it is also a banquet hall and convention centre. This means that the venue is spacious, well decorated, and clean, and to be honest, it's pretty rare to find a good dim sum restaurant with all these qualities, so that's already a big plus. It's also set up as if for an event (probably to entice people to book their weddings here), which means the tables have clearly marked numbers, so when my in-laws were seated, they let us know which table they were sitting at, which made it much easier to find them once we arrived.

Accessibility: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Since there is a large parking lot, we opted to just bring the car seat in and place it on a chair.

It turns out that if we had decided to bring the stroller inside, there was plenty of room for us to navigate to our table, so that's nice to know for the future. I believe I saw high chairs also but I can't be sure. The washrooms are both large and clean, which is amazing and again could easily accommodate a stroller, but more importantly, there was a change table available.

It's nice because it is not inside the larger stall, nor does it block anyone else using the facilities. From an accessibility perspective, this restaurant is perfect for bringing baby. The noise level in the dim sum restaurant also means that if you have a fussy baby, you don't need to worry about disturbing other patrons, but you can still hear each other and carry a conversation, so again, perfect for bringing a baby.

Service: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Service was unremarkable - in fact, they served our dessert dish first. It's pretty much what you would expect at dim sum restaurants - you mark your order on a paper, your server takes the paper from you, then brings your dishes out as they are ready. Very little interaction, but they get the job done. 

Food: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I've mentioned this in previous posts, but I always have difficulty rating Chinese food simply because I've had so much that I usually greatly enjoy the food, but can't tell if something is particularly outstanding or just average. I can recognize when the food is bad, though, and the food is not bad at all here. Because dishes are served whenever they're ready, I couldn't capture everything in one photo, so I will just post a bunch and comment intermittently. As I said earlier, we somehow started with dessert, which was a sweetened pancake with peanuts. 

It was sweet but not too sweet, so it wasn't that big an issue that it came first. Next was deep fried taro dumplings and turnip cake with preserved meat. 

Turnip cakes are one of the dishes I almost always order at dim sum, and this place did not disappoint. I don't typically have taro dumplings though, and these were really good - crunchy on the outside but smooth on the inside. Then we had siu mai with fish roe and beef balls. 

Both these dishes were tasty, as expected. We also had beef tripe with ginger and green onion as well as spare ribs.

These dishes were both fine albeit unmemorable. We ordered some congee for the table.

Again, fine but not memorable. This was followed by bean curd rolls.

This was nice and juicy - they did not skimp on the sauce here. Finally, the last dish was char siu bao, or buns with BBQ pork.

This was a good finish to the meal, and pretty much what you'd expect for a char siu bao. Overall, I was very satisfied with the food, and there is a decent amount of variety that you can order from, which is great when you are eating with a large group of people.

Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
This is probably one of the better dim sum restaurants to take your baby. The food is great and the place is clean and spacious. Not to mention, the presentation of the food is slightly nicer than most Chinese restaurants. I would definitely come here again. 

Korean Village Restaurant

I was craving Korean food (I swear I'm not pregnant again), and my husband suggested taking our son to Koreatown and picking a restaurant. Since he was in a stroller, we were a bit nervous about some of the smaller places, but we knew Korean Village Restaurant was quite large so we decided to take our chances there.

Restaurant: Korean Village Restaurant
Location: Seaton Village
Meal: Dinner
Day: Sunday
Son's Age: 24 weeks

When you enter, there is a wall with photos of celebrities who have been here, including Jackie Chan, Sandra Oh, and Nelly Furtado, so I guess this place is kind of a hot spot. There's a random unused piano in the back of the restaurant, though, and the decor looks a bit dated. This is also so far the only Korean restaurant I've been to that uses disposable wooden chopsticks, which admittedly is easier to use than the thin, flat, metal chopsticks that are usually provided. Not really a plus or a minus, just threw me off a little.

Accessibility: ⭐️⭐️
Despite the size of the restaurant, we were asked to fold up the stroller and place the car seat on the chair. We were seated at a booth so it was a bit of a tight squeeze, but we managed to get the car seat in.

The washrooms are located in the basement, so definitely not stroller accessible, and there was no change table.

While there is counter space, the only area where you might be able to change a baby is on the edge, which is also a head injury waiting to happen if your baby likes to roll over. 

Service: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Service was fine albeit unmemorable. This is not a place to come to for outstanding service, but food came out relatively quickly. Side note: I did not need to ask for more banchan but I hear that they don't give free refills here, which, if true, is pretty odd. 

Food: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

There were five banchan dishes that were pretty decent - about what you would expect at a Korean restaurant. 

For my meal, I ordered a spicy chicken bibimbap in a stone bowl. 

It came with a side of miso soup. I love bibimbap and this tasted really good, but I'm not sure how authentic it is because I've never seen bibimbap done this way. It was mostly chicken and onions with few other veggies, and also included broccoli. Bibimbap means mix mix rice, and usually there is a lot of different veggies that you mix together with your rice, but in this instance it was mostly pre-mixed. Again, this doesn't make it bad; I actually quite enjoyed it. Just saying that if you are looking for a more traditional bibimbap, this isn't it. My husband ordered the seafood pancake. 

Not bad, although to be fair the last time he had one of these was in Busan so it was jam packed with seafood. In this case, the egg-to-seafood ratio was a little higher than what he would have preferred. Again, not bad, but certainly not the best. 

Overall: ⭐️⭐️½

The food and service are okay, but it's not the most accessible place for a baby. I wouldn't say no to coming here again but it's not a place I would aim to revisit. 

Mildred's Temple Kitchen

A good friend of mine was visiting from Hong Kong and his wife had heard about the infamous pancakes at Mildred's Temple Kitchen. I previously had not dared to go because they don't take reservations for brunch, and I don't want to wait for a table when I have a baby in tow. Luckily, my friend agreed to go first and let me know how long the expected wait would be, so I just had to arrive later!

Restaurant: Mildred's Temple Kitchen
Location: Liberty Village
Meal: Brunch
Day: Saturday
Son's Age: 24 weeks

If you live in Toronto and love brunch (and frankly I feel like more often than not, the two go hand in hand), you know how ridiculous brunch lineups are. I informed my friend of the brunch scene here, and emphasized that Sunday at 11 is pretty much suicidal. He decided to be on the safe side and go on Saturday at 10:30. In my experience, Saturday at 10:30 at most places means you can waltz right in. Not at Mildred's. The wait time given was 45 minutes - but we ended up seated around noon (this actually worked in my favour because I was running late, so our table was ready just when I arrived.

Accessibility: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
For the record, Mildred's is legitimately wheelchair accessible. There are automatic doors and ramps, with plenty of space between tables to maneuver a stroller - and, I imagine, a wheelchair. Since my son could not sit unassisted yet, I kept him in his stroller by the table.

And then my husband promptly took him out of the stroller so my friend could get a good look at him. I swear he was there! Anyway, worth noting - the high chairs they provide are the IKEA high chairs, so not the typical wooden high chairs that most restaurants have, which to me is a huge plus. Unfortunately, the washroom does not have a change table.

There is, however, plenty of counter space, so if your baby isn't at that wriggly stage yet, this should be sufficient. There is also a larger accessible washroom, so if you were here alone with your baby, there is no problem bringing the stroller with you while you do your business.

Service: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Service was great - our server was very pleasant, and most importantly, he kept my coffee cup full. I also appreciated that we were not rushed at all, since I needed the time to catch up with my friend (although I admit the leisurely pace is probably what contributed to the long wait time upfront). Other than the initial wait, I'd say the overall experience was very pleasant.

Food: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
My husband decided to order two things and share. He got a brunch special, and I have to be honest I forget exactly what it was but here's the photo:

I do remember that it was delicious and extremely filling. It was also a good savoury complement to my order, which of course had to be the infamous blueberry pancakes.

So I must tell you, the description of "pancakes" is a bit misleading and frankly it's the only reason I don't give the food a full five stars. These pretty much tasted like large, delicious, fluffy scones. Don't get me wrong, I love scones, and if you love scones then trust me you will love these pancakes. My issue is that people describe these to me as fluffy pancakes, so I expect them to taste like pancakes. You know on Top Chef when contestants make something delicious but mislabel it and then Tom Colicchio gives them a hard time (unless you're Richard Blais and called your pilaf a paella but it was so good that no one cared)? This is one of those situations.

Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
I give Mildred's a solid four stars. If you have someone willing to wait in line for you, or if you have one of those magically patient children that I sometimes hear about, this is a great place to go on all counts.

Lasa by Lamesa

My husband has wanted me to try Filipino food for the longest time (does Dale Talde's halo-halo in Brooklyn count? I suppose authentic Filipino food doesn't have Cap'n Crunch...), so when Lasa opened up nearby, we decided to check it out.

Restaurant: Lasa by Lamesa
Location: Wychwood
Meal: Dinner
Day: Friday
Son's Age: 24 weeks

This place is cafeteria style, so you go to the front, order your food, and pay, then you find a table and sit down. At this point, they don't have their liquor license. I figured that taking my baby to a new, cafeteria-style restaurant early on a Friday night shouldn't be too hard. Apparently I wasn't the only one because there were quite a few families with babies that also showed up!

Accessibility: ⭐️
The woman at the cashier lamented that they did not have high chairs yet, but noted that they would get some soon, so for the time that I was there, they weren't quite ready for babies. That's not an issue for us since my son can't sit up unassisted yet, but the restaurant is also quite small so we had to do some maneuvering to get his stroller to the table.

Luckily, since the restaurant was quite new, there weren't a lot of people, so we had no problem choosing a table and then parking the stroller there. If it were busier, I don't know that this setup would be as easy. Oh, and no, I didn't bring an empty stroller - he was a bit fussy so my husband took him out right away. The washrooms are also in the basement, which means that it definitely isn't stroller friendly.

As you can see, there is literally no counter space and definitely no change table. The good news is that they are single bathrooms so if you really need to change a diaper, you could probably put the toilet lid down, but it certainly won't be easy. 

Service: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

With a cafeteria-style restaurant, service is pretty limited. Water, cutlery, and condiments are self serve. As such, I'd say service was fine but not memorable. 

Food: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

The food was brought to us on a tray. We ordered the BBQ pork skewers, the Lasa salad, the chicken adobo, and garlic rice.

Oh, and of course, the lechon kawali - crispy pork belly.

First of all, those pork skewers are fantastic. They are marinated in 7up, ginger, and soy sauce, and I could eat them forever. Next, the salad is ridiculously good. It has tofu, mango, avocado, and cashews. I suspect it's not quite authentic but it's definitely one of the best salads I've had. The garlic rice was quite nice and a welcome substitute to plain white rice. If that had been the extent of my meal, the I would have given the food five stars. Unfortunately, I found the lechon kawali to be quite dry. I tried dipping it into vinegar, and then tried soy sauce, but neither improved the dish. The chicken adobo was fine but not particularly outstanding. Those two dishes brought down the quality of the overall experience for me. They did not, however, hinder us from ordering dessert.

I mentioned that I've had halo-halo before, so when I found out that they had it here, I had to try it. This was also really good - taro ice cream with shaved ice, fruit, and Rice Krispies (okay seriously, is this authentic or not? Now I'm rethinking my earlier question about the Cap'n Crunch). It was a perfect ending to the meal.

Overall: ⭐️⭐️½
I'm sticking to my rating system where I average my ratings of accessibility, service, and food, which makes this 2.5 stars. I feel like that doesn't really reflect my experience because overall, the atmosphere was really great for a baby (provided you don't need to do a diaper change) and parts of my meal were extremely enjoyable. That being said, I feel like I was lucky it wasn't crowded, because the accessibility is pretty much nonexistent.