Take the Toronto Hydro 10/10 Summer Challenge. Use 10% less electricity over July and August and you pay 10% less on your fall bill. Register before July 17th (double check that date because I heard it on 680 News).

It’s not all about Summerlicious in the summer. There’s lots to do in Toronto during the summer months that involve yummy food. A Bread & Honey Festival this weekend, Toronto Drinks Show the following weekend (June 12-13), Toronto Taste (June 14), The Cooking Fire Theatre Festival (June 17-21), Taste of Little Italty (June 19-21), Father’s Day Brunch Cruise (June 21), Toronto Ribfest (June 26 – July 1), Strawberry Festival (June 28)

Fresh Wednesdays
Date: Every Wednesday (July 15 to August 26)
Time: 8 A.M. to 2 P.M.
Location: Nathan Phillips Square

Starting on July 15 until the last Wednesday of August, you can shop for fresh fruits and vegetables at the Farmers’ Market at Nathan Phillips Square and enjoy some live music. The Farmers’ Market at Nathan Phillips square will run until October 14–there’s just no live music.

Tasty Thursdays
Date: Every Thursday (July 16 to August 27)
Time: 11 A.M. to 2 P.M.
Location: Nathan Phillips Square

Starting on July 16 until the last Thursday of August, you can taste foods from some Toronto restaurants. Samosas, mango salads, vegetable spring rolls, and vegetarian sushi. All for $5 or less! This year they are starting to serve their food in eco-friendly containers.

Mariposa Cruises’ Fireworks Dinner Cruise
Date: Sat, June 27; Wed, July 1; Sat July 4
Time: 7:00 P.M. to 11:30 P.M.
Location: Toronto Harbour

Cruise around the Toronto Harbour on Captain Matthew Flinders for four hours while you enjoy the fireworks and a buffet-style dinner.

The 43rd Annual CHIN International Picnic
Date: July 1, 4, 5
Time: Noon to 11 P.M.
Location: Canadian National Exhibition

A music festival, picnic, sporting events, Mr. and Mrs. CHIN International Bikini Contests, petting zoo, K-9 Dog Challenge, and a 100,000 square foot bazaar at the C.N.E.It’s a great excuse for the family to go out and enjoy the sun.

Taste of Lawrence
Date: July 3-5
Time: 8 A.M. to 11 P.M. (Fri), 11 A.M. to 11 P.M. (Sat), 11 A.M. to 6 P.M. (Sun)
Location: Lawrence Avenue East (Warden Avenue to Pharmacy)

Enjoy Lawrence Avenue East without the smelly traffic and replace it with great food and lots of things for the kids to do.

Mariposa Cruises’ Fiesta Friday Dinner
Date: July 10
Time: 6:30 P.M. to 10:00 P.M.
Location: Toronto Harbour

Sail around the Toronto Harbour on the Mariposa Belle for three hours. Enjoy a Mexican buffet-style dinner with DJ, dancing and a cash bar.

Live Green Toronto Festival
Date: July 25-26
Time: Unknown
Location: Yonge Street (Dundas to Queen)

This festival will showcase hundreds of green products for work, home and play. Browse around and taste some local foods and listen to some live music. You can even get information on how to organize a project that will turn your neighbourhood green.

Irie Music Festival
Date: July 30 to August 3
Time: See Schedule
Location: Nathan Phillips Square and Queen’s Park

There are a whole list of events for the festival. The main events of the festival are reggae and world music performances but you’ll find lots of other things to do as well, including art vendors, Caribbean dance showcase and food.

Toronto Festival of Beer
Date: August 6-8
Time: 4 P.M. to 10 P.M. (Thu, Fri), 1 P.M. to 7 P.M. (Sat)
Location: Exhibition Place

Beer, BBQ, beer, live performances, beer, grilling demos, and more beer.

KRINOS Taste of the Danforth
Date: August 7-9, 2009
Time: 6 P.M. to 11 P.M. (Fri), Noon to 11 P.M. (Sat), Noon to 8 P.M. (Sun)
Location: Greektown; Danforth Avenue (Broadview Subway Station to Jones Avenue)

The ever populaire Taste of the Danforth takes place in the heart of Greektown. Enjoy music and food in the world’s largest Greek festival outside of Greece!

This year, Summerlicious runs from July 3 to July 19. Reservations will be taken for Summerlicious starting June 18, 2009. I’m told the “good” restaurants fill up quickly. By your standards, I’m guessing those are the restaurants that offer steaks and seafood, so I’m pretty safe.

I always say I’m going to go to Summerlicious, but I never end up going. The restaurant listing still lists which restaurants have vegetarian courses. This year, they’ve even included which courses are vegetarian in the menu. It might have been my wave of emails to every vegetarian-friendly restaurant to ask what was in each dish that didn’t look like it had meat, egg or cheese in it.

Summerlicious 2009 Restaurant Listing

Who knows? Maybe I’ll go this year. Has anyone seen a vegan list somewhere online for Summerlicious?

Time to start making the vegan list. I’ve contacted a number of restaurants that had what looked like veganvegan opt options. I’m still hearing back from all of them. To keep track of my progress, I like to make lists. After the first week of emails, it looks like the others that I’ve tried to contact about their menu aren’t going to respond.

• Arriba Restaurant, Renaissance Toronto Hotel Downtown1 Blue Jay Way, 416-341-5045
  Special Reservations Through Correspondent
  No vegan options on Summerlicious menu
• Brassaii
  461 King Street West, 416-598-4730
  Lunch Starter: Salad, Special Request (SR): No cheese
  Lunch Entrée: Vegetarian Sandwich, SR: No mayo
  Dinner Entrée: Nightly Vegetarian Option, SR: See least note
  Dessert: All include dairy, SR: Fresh fruit
  Reserve seats two-days in advance and tell them on the phone that you’re vegan and the chef will cook accordingly that day. When you’re seated on the day-of, let your server know.
• Noce
  875 Queen Street West, 416-504-3463
  No vegan options on Summerlicious menu
  Outside of Summerlicious: “we can prepare any vegan dish you desire.”
• Five Doors North
  2088 Yonge Street, 416-480-6234
  “There are a couple of Vegan options on the menu and we can also modify other to accommodate” I asked which dishes…
• Café Moroc
  49 Front Street East, 416-961-0601
  Starter: Harira (tomato-based soup), Café Greens
  Lunch Entrée: Grilled Vegetable Pita, SR: No cheese
  Dinner Entrée: Keskesu Casablanca (Coucous with grilled vegetables)
• Bistro 990
  990 Bay Street, 416-921-9990
  Starters: “most of our salads are vegan”, SR: Vegan soup or vegetarian spring rolls
  Entrée: Fusilli with Fresh Tomato, Spinach, Mushroom, Roasted Garlic Broth
  Dessert: No vegan options, SR: “The chef will provide you with a vegan dessert alternative.”
  When making reservations, tell them of the special requests.
• Jaaadu Restaurant
  1415 Yonge Street, 416-944-8885
  Dinner Starter: Curried Squash Soup
  Dinner Entrée: Alu Gobi Masala

Restaurants I have contacted by email who have still not replied yet:

• Alize Restaurant
• Autogrill Restaurant
• Canoe
• City Grill
• Coca Tapas and Wine Bar
• Coppi Ristorante
• Edward Levesque’s Kitchen
• Fat Cat Bistro
• Jaipur Grille
• Lolita’s Lust
• Millie’s Bistro
• Monsoon Restaurant and Lounge
• Sequel Restaurant
• Spice Route
• The Superior
• Veritas Local Fare
• Victoria’s
• Zaffron

The following restaurants didn’t have an email available or I received a mail error but the restaurants may have vegan options. So I’ll leave this list here for when I feel like calling in and going through the hostess/host to ask the chef what’s in their food:

• Amaya, The Indian Room (Bounced; Over quota)
• Cataplana Restaurant (Bounced; Over quota)
• Eight Wine Bar (Bounced; Failed permanently)
• Cajú Restaurant
• Celestin
• Four
• Imperia
• La Bruschetta
• Marcel’s Bistro
• Matignon Restaurant
• The Citizen

If more people start asking about vegan options they’ll probably change it for next year’s menu. I should email them from different email addresses and ask them about vegan options, then they’ll get the idea. :p

Last year, I attempted to go through all the Summerlicious menus and pick out vegan-friendly restaurants. That list was incomplete. The number of restaurants I had to sort through seemed overwhelming, I was on the Toronto.com website and the way the menus were posted was horrible. This year, I was on the City of Toronto website and I was looking at their Special Events section and I saw Summerlicious posted. They have the Summerlicious menus on the City of Toronto website and it clearly shows you which restaurants are vegetarian-friendly. If the City of Toronto website had this available last year, I didn’t know. I was probably doing a web-engine search and the first thing that popped up was the Toronto.com website. So here is the City of Toronto listing of Summerlicious restaurants:

Summerlicious 2008 Restaurant Listing

Now that the list already screens out the vegetarian-unfriendly restaurants, I might find some time to pick out the vegan ones for personal reference.

By the way, this year’s Summerlicious is taking place from Friday, July 4 to Sunday, July 20. Start making your reservations early if you’re planning on visiting during the weekends, I’m told the “good” restaurants fill up quickly.