Very interesting piece by Chris Nuttall-Smith in the Globe and Mail on House of Chan, one of Toronto’s oldest (and possibly closing) inauthentic Chinese, authentic steakhouse restaurants. Get an insight on a dying era:
For more than half a century, the House of Chan, a steakhouse and Chinese restaurant near the corner of Bathurst Street and Eglinton Avenue West in Forest Hill, has stood as a de facto living room for the neighbourhood and a beacon to the city’s ruling class. Nightly, families that in many cases have been coming here for four generations gather together for rib-eyes and lobster and authentically inauthentic Canadian-Chinese chow mein. But most of all, “the Chan,” as its regulars call it, is beloved because while the world has changed all around it, in 50-odd years, the restaurant has hardly changed: The food is the same, the decor is the same, and the bow-tied staff here always seem to know your name. This past fall, the Toronto Transit Commission announced that it will need to demolish the House of Chan to make way for a new LRT station in 2014. Management is uncertain whether the restaurant will relocate or just close. The Globe and Mail spoke with the restaurant’s staff and regulars – including some of Toronto’s biggest names in business, entertainment, politics and sports – about the history of one of the city’s prime cultural landmarks, and what the city will lose when the Chan falls…
Nuttall-Smith, Chris. “A look back at 50 years of the iconic House of Chan.” Globe and Mail. 03 March, 2012
You can find the rest of the article here: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/toronto/a-look-back-at-50-years-of-the-iconic-house-of-chan/article550783/?page=all
A Gin Soaked Afternoon 