I first learned about Pi Tom's Thai Cuisine about 2 years ago, and dined at their now closed Jarvis location. The one on Jarvis was located in a non-high traffic area with very little foot traffic, so I wasn't surprised when it closed down. However, Pi Tom's Thai Cuisine's original location is still open, and we ordered delivery from time to time. Pi Tom's Thai Cuisine is one of very few locations that offer the authentic pad thai on their menu, where it's wrapped in an egg.

They offer free delivery for order more than $25 (before tax) and it takes about 45 minutes to an hour. They usually do deliver in the allotted time frame, and I don't recall a time where they went over an hour.

 The Authentic Pad Thai ($12.95) was quite interesting as I have never tried it anywhere else in the GTA. This authentic dish contains a serving of rice noodles with a generous amount of chicken, shrimp, tofu, bean sprouts in a sweet and sour tamarind and coconut sauce. The one difference is that the entire Paid Thai is wrapped inside of a fried egg crepe.

The Pad Thai ($11.95) was Thai rice noodles sauteed with egg, chicken, shrimp, bean sprouts and tofu in a sweet and sour (ketchup) sauce. Unlike the authentic dish above, this one contains ketchup instead of tamarind which you can definitely taste. It's a little surprising that the restaurant tout themselves as serving authentic Thai, and then uses ketchup in their Pad Thai. This dish was edible, but unfortunately it was only average when compared with other Thai establishments that I have dined at. The Authentic Pad Thai fared a lot better if you compared it by taste.

The shrimp rolls ($8.50) contained 6 pieces of deep-fried marinated shrimp rolls and spicy sauce. I absolutely loved these crispy appetizers, as it was not oily and delicious.

Address: 235 Jarvis Street, Toronto, ON, M5B 2C1

About: I have been to Dragon Legend four times since they first opened, and it has surpassed the other places to become my favorite buffet. As many people probably know; Dragon Legend is the sister restaurant to the equally popular Pearl Dragon. They even share the same interior decor with red walls, and decorated with Chinese ornaments, and television screens hung on the walls. Its spacious dining area allows the customers to have a more enjoyable dining experience and not have to maneuver in cramped spaces.

Food: The buffet selection at Dragon Legend is abundant enough without overcompensating quantity over quality. Their buffet options showcases an array selection of both Western and Asian dishes. Additionally, they also have a sushi/sashimi station, Teppanyaki grill station, Peking Duck, and an impressive dessert station. There is a good amount of choices for the average diner, and should be something for everyone if you like buffets.

Price: The weekend price may be slightly steep at $29.99 for Friday-Sunday dinners, but I thought it was pretty worth it. The quality of the food was rather good for a buffet, and could justify for the cost (for example, you could load up on Peking duck). The price for their Monday to Thursday is comparable to other nearby buffets at $24.99 per adult. I dined here on four occasions (and on different days); Monday, Thursday and two Saturdays. I was surprised to find that no matter what days I went; it was completely busy around the late dinner time (7:00 pm'ish. I haven't tried out their lunch buffet yet but the prices are as followed: M-F ($13.99) and Sat-Sun ($19.99).

Service: On all visits; I thought that the service was excellent as the staff were attentive, polite, and promptly removed our used dishes. The wait for a table didn't take too long when we had a reservation.

It's highly recommended that you make a reservation on the weekend as it can be quite packed. On those busy nights, the front desk would take your name, the number of your party, and hand you an alarm (that would blink when your table is available).

 Fried food (including ribs, tempura shrimp, french fries, popcorn chicken).

The salad bar, and the cold seafood bar (mussels, shrimps, and crab legs).

 Peking Duck station.

 If you order Chinese tea; it's $1.80 per person.

 They have a wide selection of sushi and sashimi for a buffet instead of the just the usual rolls. Be warned though that the station is often watched by a staff member to ensure that people don't overload on the fish. They usually limit customers to 3 slices of sashimi per visit to the station. 

 Honestly, I would skip the dim sum dishes as I found some of the items to be bland. The plump dumpling looked aesthetically cute, but the non-translucent skin tasted extremely doughy to me. 

Additionally, they also have a steak station where the chefs would cook steak cubes on order. This can be a hit or a miss depending on the amount of salt that the chef seasoned it with.

 One of the main reasons why I love Dragon Legend; they offer Peking Duck. The staff would place the cooked duck onto a platter, and everything is self-served. Just note that on extremely busy days; they do limit each customer to four pancakes containing Peking Duck on each visit to the station. I saw a girl on a moderate night (around 8:30 pm) taking 10 pieces and they didn't say anything, so it really depends on the nights. The crispy texture of the skin was absolutely divine with the sauce.

 The salad bar was decent with different kinds of leaves, veggies, and salad dressing.

From what I can recall; the dessert station has a selection of waffles, cupcakes, cookies, cheesecakes, jello, fruits, green tea mousse cakes, chocolate covered strawberries, crème brûlée, puff pastries, ginger milk pudding, and various flavors of ice cream.  

The Kinka Family has added another successful restaurant to their food empire earlier this March. Yakitori Kintori opened a little more than a month ago, and specializes in yakitori (grilled skewered chicken). The restaurant is housed on the second floor of Kinton Ramen 2 on Bloor in Koreatown. Additionally, the space is small so reservations are highly recommended if you're planning on heading there on the weekends.

 Prior to our date night to watch Captain America II: The Winter Soldier; my bf and I decided to eat here before the movie. I made a reservation a week earlier for a seating at 8:30 pm. When we arrived, there were a few people waiting upstairs for a seat, so I was glad that we had reserved two seats.

We were seated at our reserved table (reserved card on top), and were each given the menu to peruse. The menu was a stand-alone, and printed on both sides with items such as skewers, vegetables, beef, pork, desserts, and drinks. I liked that the menu clearly illustrates the many parts of a chicken that customers can order to consume. 

 

 We started the night off with the tofu & kaisou salad ($7) [tofu & seaweed with ponzu jelly]. The portion was more than enough for the two of us to share. The salad was refreshing, and I really enjoyed the chewy seaweed in it. However, I am not a fan of tofu so naturally, I didn't eat any of it.

 

We also ordered the butabara [pork belly] ($2), negi shio gyu [beef with scallion sauce] ($3), and yakiniku gyu [beef with BBQ sauce] ($3). The negi shio gyu  was included in the Chef's Selection, but I liked it a lot that I re-ordered an additional skewer of it. Out of the three, my least favorite was the pork belly as it was fatty but wasn't as flavorful as I'd have liked.



Our last two orders of skewers before dessert was the mentai mayo tsukune [cheese meatball] ($2.30)  and enoki bacon [bacon with enoki mushroom] ($2.30).

 

The kitsune udon ($7) [deep fried tofu & udon noodle in dashi broth] was a creative dish, and arrived in a small bowl with three tofu-wrapped pockets. When you remove the sticks holding the tofu together; inside reveals the cooked udon. I absolutely loved the dashi broth as it was light, and perfect for after eating the skewers.

The night ended with Houji Cha creme brûlée [roasted green tea] ($5). It was a wonderful treat as the texture of the custard was creamy and explosive with the flavor of green tea.

The reservation indicated that if they're extremely busy, then you are allotted a 2 hour seating limit. I would say that is more than enough as we only took 1.5 hours. The washroom was clean, and they even provide mouthwash to rinse, and toothpicks.

Although the skewers are priced very well; it can really add up once you order the other items off the menu. Our bill for two came up to be around $77 (with tax and tip). Yakitori Kintori is a great addition to Koreatown, and I will definitely be back to try out the other items on the menu.