2018-07-05

CLOSED - Spring Rolls - Yonge/Dundas (Pan-Asian)


Update 2021-Aug-16: Spring Rolls is no more... unsure when or why this happened so not calling it a COVID-19 closure just yet, but Google Maps and Yelp are both indicating it's permanently closed, its phone # is out of service, and Google Street View currently shows its windows are papered over. Sufficient to call it closed...
Spring Rolls is located in the heart of downtown Toronto at 40 Dundas, just west of Yonge Street in the Atrium on Bay, so is very transit-accessible being just west of Dundas subway station. It has a nice modern upscale decor with high ceilings, black marble tabletops and a granite fountain and pool in the centre of the dining area. Chopsticks are reusable as expected. Ordering is done directly from a waiter from the tasting menu of three pages. The entries on the menu page include photographs and are larger than normal, so there are far fewer items available then at most other AYCEs and the main courses have larger portions. Soft drinks are $2.25 and although they are fountain rather than canned are not AYCD. Soy sauce had a green lid but was still very salty. I asked and was told that this was low sodium soy sauce but I didn't believe it.

Seaweed salad was a bit sweeter than usual but Mishy indicated this was not an issue so no complaints. The green house salad had wakame on it; happily Mishy ate it for me but it still left a flavour remnant in the remainder of the salad; I personally don't care for it but opinions vary. As befits the name of the establishment, the spring rolls were definitely the best either of us have had, with thick savory filling and spicy plum sauce. Vegetable spring rolls were equally excellent with a different sauce which tasted a bit like plum ketchup. The wonton soup was fantastic with shiu-mai-style wontons and nice broth. Gyoza were likewise excellent, just about the best, with sauce which was excellent already on them. Shiu mai were excellent in a hot chili mustard dipping sauce we both enjoyed. There is Caesar salad which other pan-Asian AYCEs rarely offer and is a nice change from the usual green salad. Salmon nigiri was excellent and fresh. Cheese dumplings were like triangular cheese wontons with more filling and a raspberry sauce and we both found them excellent. Sweet and sour chicken had pineapple, green peppers and onions in a tomatoey sauce which was excellent and we both enjoyed it.

Sadly, there were quite a few items that were not (as) enjoyable: The miso soup was underwhelming, diluted and nearly savourless. General Tao chicken should have been called General Tao vegetables, as that's mostly what it consisted of. It also had too much garlic and little sauce; unlike any General Tao I ever had, it should not have been given that name. (Did they bring the wrong entrée?) Sizzling spicy honey and ginger chicken was somewhat good but not exemplary, Mishy said it was "meh" and the flavours were indeed not up to the presentation. Ginger broccoli beef is in oyster sauce, and really didn't taste like anything, its flavors did not get along and canceled rather than accentuated each other. The hot and sour soup was more like a bowl of sauce: too sweet and not even close to the genuine article. At this point I decided that the chefs were trying too hard to be inventive, without worrying over whether the final result was any good or not. Service was slower than most other places with longer wait times. The final disappointment were the desserts: the menu indicates the dessert is "mango tropical ice cream" but also to ask the server for today's selection. Well "today's selection" consisted of "absolutely nothing at all," leaving only one flavor of ice cream as the dessert. The so-called "tropical" mango ice cream was okay and fresh, but was far from the best I've ever had. As well on a very hot day there was almost no air conditioning, but I can't blame Spring Rolls for that as their walls between Atrium on Bay are partition and don't go all the way to the ceiling thus share air with the Atrium, which was was closed as it was a holiday so their air conditioning was probably off.

I would have expected better for the corresponding fewer items, because more time and effort and quality control can be applied to each offering, but this did not seem to be the case. The ingredients may have been quality, but their results not in several cases. I had almost forgotten that we had reviewed the other Spring Rolls when it was at Yonge south of Bloor... perhaps this is the "same" Spring Rolls and it merely moved locations rather than being a different establishment? I noted many similarities we found, including the menu formats and the similar over-experimentation in the entrées, and that we ended up both liking and disliking most of the same things as this location. We also weren't happy with the gougey no-refill fountain pop (I gave in and had one but Mishy refused and stuck with water.) The slower service was only a minor bother. Still, there were some items that we liked very much, and a couple in the best-of range, but I would expect this for the upper-echelon weekend lunch price of $20.49. I don't think I would return to Spring Rolls though, except for the utilitarian purpose of trying some of the items I had missed the first time.


Rating: 6.5-7/10

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