Barque Smokehouse — Restaurant in Toronto

“Toronto BBQ: A Masterclass in Culinary Delusion” By someone who’s eaten actual BBQ

Supposedly, Toronto is a city. A big one. A self-proclaimed cosmopolitan playground where culture and cuisine collide. But when it comes to BBQ? It’s less a collision and more a slow-motion car crash—right where the 401 and DVP merge—painful, predictable, and no one’s getting out without regrets.

Toronto wants to do BBQ. It wants to be Texas, Tennessee, the Carolinas—all at once—but ends up as none of them. Instead, it produces the culinary equivalent of a cargo cult: brisket-shaped things, a whiff of smoke if you really squint (and imagine), and enough garnish to distract you from the fact that everything tastes like it was cooked in the back of a condo gym.

It’s BBQ designed for Instagram; not people and definitely not souls.

And this place? No exception.

HEB in Austin, Texas sells better microwavable brisket. Hell, their expired microwavable brisket has more bark, bite, and dignity than what was served here.

I’ve had better brisket on a flight with EgyptAir. Let that marinate for a second. This place is below airplane food. That should be a federal warning label, not a sentence in a restaurant review.

The sausage? It tasted like it was seasoned in the streets of London during the Blitz—grey, confused, and deeply apologetic about existing.

The pulled pork? Solid. Solidly on par with canned sloppy joe’s found at your local Winn-Dixie between Gulf Breeze and Navarre Beach, Florida. Not offensive. Just depressingly familiar, like a divorced uncle’s attempt at comfort food.

Then came the corn. I thought I knew bland. I thought I’d been through things. But this corn made me realize bland is a spectrum—and this place has unlocked a new low. Air has more flavor than their corn on the cob. It has all the right colors, but no flavor at all. That’s an impressive amount of work to make corn taste as bland as water. Honestly, Toronto should take a few hints from Indiana farmers—because even they don’t make their corn this tasteless.

The cornbread? It made me feel like I was stranded on Arrakis with a leak in my stillsuit. Dry doesn’t even begin to describe it. One bite and I needed an emergency extraction and a full glass of water just to survive the swallow. I’ve had gas station corn bread in Dothan, Alabama that was tastier than these pebbles.

Now, the hot sauce — Not bad. Genuinely had some heat and flavor to it. But here’s the thing: good BBQ shouldn’t need sauce. You should be able to eat it bare—savory, smoky, juicy—and feel like you’ve just uncovered a primal memory. Don’t get me wrong, saucy BBQ can be great too, but it should be cheaper, because it skips the slow-cooked finesse and just drowns everything in sugar and vinegar. If you’re charging a premium and drowning your meat in sauce, you’re hiding something. And in this case? It’s the complete lack of flavor.

The only reason this place gets a 2-star review instead of 1 is the staff. They were kind, attentive, and clearly doing their best. It’s not their fault the food has less seasoning than colonized countries after the British left.

To be blunt, the “BBQ” in this “smokehouse” is offensive. Not in a cute, edgy, rebellious way—but in a “how dare you charge money for this?” kind of way. It’s culinary cosplay—playing dress-up with burnt ends and brisket, but no real pitmaster in sight.

Toronto really needs to either: Stop doing BBQ, or Start charging less for this sad charade.

But of course, neither will happen. Because human stupidity is a constant in the universe. And in this city, it’s served with a side of slaw and a $19...

We came to Barque on a Sunday night and had the set menu which consisted of Arugula Frisée salad, Hilltop Wings, an assortment of pulled pork, beef brisket and ribs followed up with a Coconut cream pie in a jar dessert - $35/ea. There was a $15 corking fee for our wine which was fine, the salad came quickly but was nothing to write home about, a little tart but otherwise fine. The Wings were not to my liking, perhaps it was the spices as I don't believe the chicken wings themselves were an issue. The honey mustard on the side was nice though. This is where things derailed, there was a 40 min delay between the wings and the main course BBQ platter, needless to say we consumed a lot of complimentary popcorn during the wait. When the platter came out, we were all really hungry and dug in, most didn't like the cornbread as it was laced with spices (probably pepper) as they couldn't handle the heat, i thought this was the highlight of the platter along with the corn and loaded potatoes! The brisket was ok as was the pulled pork, nothing special here. However, the ribs were rubbed with typical spices vigorously and looked charred but wasn't really, a couple of bites in and it revealed tough, chewy almost jerky like meat that was far from 'falling off the bone.' I only had one to realize I wasn't interested in having more as it was even difficult to cut with a knife. The portions were enough for us as most of us didn't eat all that much since we didn't enjoy the food but most would be disappointed with the portion size. Many reviewers speak of how much better the BBQ is here over Nashville etc... while I've never been to Nashville, I can say that the BBQ places I've been to in California, New York State and Florida are far superior. Even Smoke Meat Pete's outside of Montreal was better. Well, we tried it, didn't like it and won't be back. The exorbitant fee ($3/ea) for cutting 10 pieces of birthday cake is ridiculous, so we left the...

Barque surprised us in many ways. First with their forward thinking when it comes to tipping. They pay their employees enough to not need tips and are proud of it, as they should be. Of course, this comes with the food prices being a bit higher BUT the quality is worth it, I assure you. Before I get into that though, the other way they surprised us was with how humble they were about the mistakes they made. For some reason our order took forever to come out, so much so, that the table next to us got their order first even though they arrived a lot later than us. We were understandably upset but they were super apologetic and at the end of our meal they offered to take 50% off our order total. I've gotta say though, the waiters did seem a bit inexperienced, they would often forget to bring us things we asked for and we'd have to ask twice for it. So I would take half a star away for that if I could, but I'm sure they'll get better at it quickly. I want to emphasize how much the food made a difference in this entire situation, it was absolutely amazing. The brisket especially was the best brisket I've ever had, fall-apart-in-your-mouth and super tasty... amazing. The ribs with the Obama sauce were delicious as well and then we had three of the sides, shoestring fries were fresh, crispy, and perfectly salted, the mac n cheese was creamy and perfectly cheesy, the coleslaw was a bit too watery for my taste but it still tasted great, oh and we had Kansas style wings as a starter that were cooked to perfection as well. Other than the menu, the only thing I remembered to take pictures of was the wings, I was too hungry by the time we got the rest of our food and I'm sad I can't show you what it looked like but you won't regret ordering any of that. My mom had the pulled pork and loved it as well. I don't think you can go wrong with anything on the menu, really. Enjoy. And I hope you don't have to wait as...