The Monk’s Table

After the Toronto FC home opener our entourage wanted to hit up a nice place uptown and away from the headaches of the downtown core.
Monk’s Table seemed to be in our target area, plus the name! …but most of all its reputation for good comfort food and craft beer.
Thankfully in this neighborhood, there’s plenty of parking and for those not driving, Summerhill station is just around the corner
AT FIRST I was quite disappointed when informed that they ran out of their schnitzel (main reason for coming here).however the Monk’s burger was nothing but PURE goodness. Thick, juicy, well presented but most of all, DELISH! Easy ⁵⁄₅
Adding the blue cheese created extra versatility to the dish. Served with their in house made fries, this complimented the burger.
To wash things down I opted for their Petrus Belgian beer that was served in chalice… Adding some icing to an overall great experience.

This pub is wonderful. I haven’t been in a while, so we decided to go there for dinner on Saturday. We showed up without a reservation, but the barkeep was accommodating and sat us on the first floor by the bar.
We had a few drinks (my husband absolutely loved ‘the doctor’ cocktail and my kid was in heaven with a very tasty shirley temple — seriously, it was delicious). We ate the zucchini fries and the cheese crock for apps. The zucchini was beautifully crisp and I loved the sriracha aioli. The cheese crock was decadent. It’s cheese. You really can’t go wrong.
For mains — my kid had a mini burger and my husband had the fish. I don’t eat fish, so I can’t comment but my husband was blown away saying it was one of the best he’s had in a while. The fries were delicious (I did sample some of those).
I was drinking wine and felt like a ‘real’ dinner instead of something that comes with fries. I had the special: chicken supreme with braised fingerlings and asparagus, all smothered in a delicious creamy dill sauce. It was simple, yet so tasty.
All in all, it was a great experience and I can’t wait to go back.
BEST PART of the night: a gruff, possibly-​drunk, regular walks into the bar, sits down and yells at the bartender, ‘hey! can you gimme a job!’. The bartender looks at him and goes, ‘sure, I’ll put you on door. You can yell at the customers when they come in. I hear it’s good for business’. Ok, maybe it’s not so funny typed out, but it was a seamless retort and we had a good laugh at the time. I

One of my absolute favourites places to go whether it’s for a meal or to just grab a drink with a friend. The food is AMAZING and the service is always great. I highly recommend trying it out!

This small and cozy pub is a good place to grab a pint to get through the long day! The staff here is very friendly and very attentive. The food was alright, nothing out of the ordinary. I can definitely see this place being a good place to grab a few friends for drinks and watch a soccer or a hockey game. Overall, it wasn’t a bad nor a great experience. Just «A-​OK».

I went to Monk’s Table on a week night with elderly family members. I was worried about accessibility but it wasn’t an issue; the staff were accommodating, allowing me to reserve a table on the ground floor to avoid the stairs. The food was good and the atmosphere warm, as was the service.

Review #200!
Came here for some fancy beers because we are tired of same old Canadian and Coors lite.
They got some nice selections on tap. We wanted to share some fries. Menu had zucchini fries. Ask for regular fries and ye shall receive (picture below).
Wonderful bartender. Great beer. Cozy bar. Quite quiet. I strongly recommend this place to all beer lovers.

This is my ‘not so local’ local Pub. I always check Instagram for daily specials, lunch and dinner, before making a dinning decision. Sunday roast is always great and their fried chicken Monday’s are amazing. Staff is fantastic and always on point. Easily my fav pub in midtown.

This is our local. Cozy. Welcomes its regulars. Pulls a good pint and serves good, reliable pub food. Kids welcome too.

I used to come here whenever I was in town but haven’t been back since it changed over from The Abbott. The service was great, we had the mussels and they were also great. And… Best. Fries. Ever.

I really like this place. It’s super low key. Their mussels [in lime curry sauce] are amazing. We always get those. They come with a side of fries and some bread. They have interesting daily specials, but we usually stick to the mussels and the buffalo shrimp. Too bad I have to share.
Service is always great.

The Monk manages to somehow remain low key and unpretentious while offering some excellent food and booze. The overall atmosphere is very laidback and very much devoid of the douchery that endangers some of our town’s best watering holes!
What really elevated our experience to another level however was the service. Stef is one of the most personable and knowledgeable barkeeps I have come across in Toronto. She tried her best to accommodate some unusual cocktail requests and her suggestions for food/​Scotch were spot on. For a night of catching up with friends the Monk is a definite win!

Great place. The service is really good and so is the food.
Great choice on tab beers.
It is just a little pricey give
N the location.
I will be back there for sure

Pretty good place. Love the salad! Went there too early today around 5:20. We were the only one sat upstairs. The downside is the window can’t be open. Service is good as well. Worth to try!

I ordered the Chicken Biryani and it was so succulent! With this crazy, cold spring weather, rich Indian comfort food is a wise choice! I barely touched the salad, which had mango slices adding to a sweet flavour. Maybe next time. You see, these are rather large dishes that can visibly pack the pounds during dinner time!

I came here after work for a drink and bite to eat. Pearched on the bar, I got a nice scotch, a half pint and the sheppards pie. I solicited the bartendress’ advice for what scotch to get. The bar had a friendly feel and for 35 dollars including tip, I suppose it wasn’t too expensive. The girls who worked the floor were quite friendly.

Aren’t Monks supposed to be silent?
We headed to the Monk’s table for dinner and drinks on a Friday nite. We were put on a waiting list (table for 4) –a bit of a wait, but that was OK. My friend waited outside for us to arrive at the restaurant and then we all came in to see if we could get a drink at the bar while we waited for our table– a great chance to catch up with friends before dinner.
The server at the bar asked us if we needed a table and we told her we were on the list already. She told us to head upstairs, that they would have table for us
there. No problem… right!!!
So, we headed up there. Coming up the stairs we met this FRANTIC MONK and we told him that we were here for our table. He seemed very disturbed that we came up stairs and when we told him the situation the MONK got even more annoyed. I was completely bewildered that he was speaking to us that way. WOW – And the conversation continued to get heated by the Monk, in which he proceeded to
mentioned he was the owner… I think Adam, needs to take another vow of silence and not speak to his customers like that, EVER! I have NEVER been treated that way by any restaurant owner before and this will be the last time.
I am going to be a Rebel and head to the REBEL HOUSE instead; the service and food is much better!

The Hubster and I came here for our weekly Friday night date. We arrived around 12:30am and were greeted not once, not twice, but THREE TIMES before we sat down. Once was a guy going outside asking if we had a light, and then said that we were going to love the place. The second time was from his friend (I assume) who said hello cheerfully as we passed him on the way in, then the third time was from the bartender. Two out of three were just regulars at the place, I assumed, and I felt very welcome.
I was very impressed by their beer selection and enjoyed the ambiance, particularly the giant window that was open to the street.
Unfortunately, we left early since I was feeling kind of crappy, but we’ll probably return again since it’s only a block away from the subway and it was just so darn nice in there.

I’m not entirely sure why everyone keeps raving about the upstairs seating area. It’s dark, unhygienic and occasionally ignored by the servers. Now that I got that out of the way —
I LOVE THIS PLACE.
I will come here on a date, with friends, with colleagues, with my family, and when I’m down and need some therapy — alone.
They have a great selection of beer on tap. And the perfect bar to sit at, it’s wooden and worn. Just wish it wasn’t so small, it starts feeling cramped pretty early on weeknights.
I want to kiss their chef. Where ever he will let me.
This man is a genius. He can turn the most basic of homestyle classics into a gourmet feast.
Ie: The chilli with roll. Fairly simple concept. Not in his capable hands.
The chilli was fresh, all of the ingredients hand cut, there was a party in my mouth, and all the guests were carefully selected. My «roll», hah! if you can call it that. It was a delight on its own. Buttery, with so many levels — salty, sweet, savoury. I want to write a book on a twenty minute meal.
The chilli is just one example. I can’t review all of the delicious experiences I’ve had here because I don’t think the Interwebz can handle that much enthusiasm. Come here and see for yourself!

Last night my husband and I went on a pub crawl with the Toronto Beer Lovers Meetup Group.
It was led by Ken Woods, President of Black Oak Brewing Co.
The first stop was the Monk’s Table.
Adam, the owner, took really good care of us. He had an area upstairs reserved. He provided complimentary appetizers … mussels, shrimp, fries, dips and chicken wings.
They also gave us a taste of Gouden Carolus Cuvee Van De Keizer Rood/​Red … it was yummy!
There were about 20 of us. They took such good care of us that it was hard to leave.

I don’t give ⁵⁄₅ ratings. I blame it on my years in the academy: scholars are trained that near-​perfect anything is, effectively, an Platonic ideal that will never be achieved in the real world. The Monk’s Table challenges that basic academic presupposition but, unfortunately, falls short of successfully overturning my scholarly resistance to awarding perfect scores.
I came to the Table because I wanted some decent European beer. It’s bloody hard to get a good selection in Victoria (where I’m usually based these days) and so I was excited to get past the ‘typical’ beer lists that you get a so-​called Irish and Scottish bars/​pubs. I was not disappointed. The list is regularly changing, with selections from Scotland, Ireland, the UK proper, Germany, and (though not technically on the menu) France. It’s a good sized list — about 15 different items on tap — but admittedly is selective rather than excessive.
The Monk’s Table sells itself as a British pub and it comes close in most regards. The food menu generally features fare that I find when travelling through Britain though (fortunately!) the food is better spiced than what you normally find in the UK. I ordered the shepherds pie with cheddar cheese topping for lunch, and my dining partner a chicken sandwich and green salad.
The pie was excellent; it’s been some time since I’ve had an authentic version of the dish, and this was about as authentic as it comes. The lamb was moist and the vegetables that were included were diced to an appropriate size where you saw them for what they were without them ever dominating the fork. Also, the veggies retained enough ‘crispness’ that they nicely balanced the softness of the mashed potatoes and were large enough that they visually set themselves apart from the ground lamb. So, what went wrong? Not much, but the two pieces of bread that were served with the pie were accompanied by a very cold ball of butter.
Little balls of butter annoy the living sh*t out of me. It sounds small, but when I want to add some butter to bread I don’t want to have to fight with the freaking butter, and bread, and have a part of the bread that has an entirely uneven distribution of butter. Thus, all butter ought to be served should be at least at room temperature. (This rule really should be a Kantian imperative of bread and butter serving.) The Monk’s Table doesn’t serve butter at room temperature, alas, which weakened my overall happiness at the meal.
Another thing that upsets me: when cook or wait staff fail to listen to people who make (minor) substitutions. In this case, my partner was lactose intolerant and so asked for no cheese to be put on his sandwich. Unfortunately, this communication was lost somewhere and his sandwich came with cheese. Now, he didn’t see this as a big deal because *this kind of thing happens all the time*.
Accidents like this SHOULD NOT happen so often than diners just get used to being given incorrect meals. Bad form Monk’s, bad form.
Now, this said: the sandwich was excellent. Big pieces of chicken, beautifully cooked onions, and a plentiful green salad (though without any oils or dressings being offered). On the whole, it was great, though the price for adding bacon to the sandwich was steep at a few dollars.
After we’d been there for a while — three drinks in, after lunch — we decided to get the drumlettes. You get about 8 of them, plus veggies and dip, as well as some fries. I was impressed with the drumlettes; they were large, juicy, and had a nice BBQ flavouring to them. The fries could have used some salt, though that was easily added. The veggies and dip were exceptional in their lack of exceptionality. While a bit steep at $ 15, I certainly didn’t feel ripped off when I ordered this post-​lunch appetizer.
The staff was acceptable, though the two servers seemed to have problems coordinating things between them. Once we had a single server our experience was much improved; water was topped up regularly, he was there whenever drinks were getting low, and had helpful suggestions for our post-​lunch snack.
Would I go back? Yes: The Monk’s Table has become what I consider an essential drinking space in the city of Toronto if you’re anywhere near the area. The beer selection alone is worth the trip, and the food only makes it that much more interesting. They do the British Pub tradition proud, and the fact that they have *so much* imported European beer on tap that isn’t the crap (*cough* Stella, Heineken, etc *cough*) you get everywhere else really makes this place special.
In short: Come for the beer, enjoy the very good food, and then enjoy some more beer!