California Restaurant & Bar — Restaurant in Toronto

After many months of searching for a new (to me) Balkan-style restaurant to try, I finally made the trek to California Restaurant & Bar, excited to give their various ethnic dishes a try. I don't know if we caught them on an off day- it was dead when we went-, but sadly, the Karadjordjeva schnitzel we were served was very near inedible. The cut of meat used was extremely lean and overcooked + under-seasoned, and further, extremely thick- much thicker than is required for the dish. Frankly, the piece of meat used was downright repulsive. Further, the stuffing inside is a far-cry from what the dish authentically calls for, which is kajmak, though I see they see on the menu they state it's a cream cheese interior, which this was- but it's just not authentic, and makes a big difference. Our shopska salad, which is hard to mess up, seemed to have zero seasoning beyond the low-quality feta scantly sprinkled atop it, with tomatoes which we seriously questioned the freshness of. And speaking of freshness, the complimentary bread served to us was extremely stale. I'm giving two stars and not one, because the cevapi and gurmanska pleskavica we ordered were considerably better than that poor excuse of a Karadjordjeva, but not good enough to salvage the score anymore. Even for those two dishes, there are other Balkan restaurants in the city I much prefer. On the plus, our server was very warm and attentive. Hoping we just hit it up on the wrong day, want to give benefit...

I was about to treat my friend who was celebrating his birthday for some drinks and even though she didnt ask for secondary ID, she went ahead and was about to serve. She claimed my id was a fake and insinuated my friend was bringing a child in front of customers. Her excuse for her negative behaviour was that she was the 'daughter'. She threatened to call the cops which would not had mattered since I am of age. But didnt want to escalate more than a customer who had drinks already caveman rushed at my friend and the 'daughter' back away but still insisting i was underage therefore making my friend look like a predator.

A second experience was the waiter asking for a $10 tip because thats how they do things in their respected home country. And was quick to be annoyed and almost resulted in harassment until i handed him a 10 bill.

Not sure what kind of family business it is but they bring their problems to a public space and yell at each other while customers deal with...

My husband and I went to California restaurant for lunch, which we didn't have. We waited over 5 minutes for the waiter and waitress to finish their conversation before we were sat at the patio. They saw us standing there waiting and they continued their very important conversation before acknowledging us with a nod and no smile. Nobody was in the restaurant except for 6 adults and a child on the patio. It took another 10 minutes to get menus, no water, no drink order taken. Then we continued to wait over 10 minutes for the rude waitress to come back and she didn't, she was too busy talking to the waiter again. So, we left and walked right by them, she didn't say anything she just let us leave. Needless to say, the old owners were way better at keeping this business and customer service was also better. We haven't been back and neither will we ever again, sadly. To be fair and honest this experiences happened right before Covid hit and we haven't been back since....