DROM Taberna — Restaurant in Toronto

I wrote this review from a place of care! I'm a business owner and if my loyal clients of over half a decade were having this experience with my business, I would want to know. When I saw the other reviews that sound so similar to mine, it was validating as I can see I’m not alone. My friends and I have been going to Drom for 6 or 7 years now. We have been loyal customers and the biggest fans! Drom was always a unique environment that valued musicians and had the coolest vibe for both staff and customers. I feel sad to see it change for the worse by taking the community they created for granted and losing sight of what drew in its loyal customer base in the first place — a sense of mutual respect that kept the good times rolling!

At the end of June, my friend and I came in on a Sunday afternoon to catch up after one of us had been abroad for a year. A joyous reunion at our favourite Toronto establishment in our home neighbourhood! It was just two of us at first. The band was a bit loud so we asked to sit at the back of the patio. The waitress let us know that she may need to move us if they got busier in case a bigger group came in which I told her we would be happy to do. My friend and I ordered about $100 worth of cocktails and beers and food EACH throughout the course of a few hours. We had a third friend join after a couple hours who also ordered. Micha did his speech about supporting the band twice and we gave $20 or more each time. In total, my table spent a little over $300. So imagine my surprise when we were told to leave! We were not offered another smaller table as our original waitress had originally communicated (although we were a party of 3 by this point) and there was no reservation. The reason given was that we had “overstayed the usual sit time of 2 hours” (we had been there for about 4). They had never told us about a sit time before (on this visit or any other) which would have allowed us an opportunity to make different plans. Instead, we were spending a lot and planning to continue drinking and ordering and enjoying the music when we were suddenly asked to leave. I’ve never been asked to leave anywhere for any reason before. We just paid and awkwardly left after leaving an apologetically big tip. The embarrassment wore off as we walked away and other feelings came through like feeling disrespected and taken advantage of that we just spent so much money creating a nice vibe to have it end abruptly. I even googled and asked people in the days following “why would customers be asked to leave while still ordering?” And the main response was that they could make more money by flipping the table, which was also my sense of the reasoning.

In hindsight, I regret falling into Canadian customs of non confrontation and politeness that led me to not say anything and to actually apologize as if we had inconvenienced them and to tip when I felt embarrassed by them. I feel clearer now that this was an example of entitlement in the customer service industry, which has reached new highs in Toronto between this sense of entitlement of service workers to receive 18-20% minimum tips and the practice of timed seatings which gained popularity during Covid times (although during Covid, they had to TELL you that before you ordered which gave you an opportunity to decide if you wanted to go to that establishment which they did NOT do in this case). The plot has been completely lost — treat your customers with kindness and respect and set the standard that that respect is to be returned. Those were the principles that made me into a high spender at and big fan of Drom – it felt worth the money. I won’t give a single penny more to a one way relationship where they want my money and patronage up until the point that they feel like they can get more elsewhere. What a terrible experience.

You are not owed customers and you’re not owed our money or...

I've never eaten here but I've been several times and will never return. It appears my extremely poor experience with staff here has been echoed by other reviewers, and I think it is a shame that this is the state of live music venues in Toronto.

Door staff were more interested in watching boxing on their phones and asking women passing by how old they were than giving my friends and I any information on what was going on inside. Were extremely rude and then acted offended when I made a joke about being much older than I appear to be, (because they were asking girls passing by on the street if they were 19 or not) and responded with "I didn't ask." Then continued to watch whatever bloodsport he seemed to think was more important than working the door. When I tried to inquire about what event was going on inside our whole group was refused entry until my friend apologized (though we weren't even sure what exactly we were apologizing for). As a musician who plays a certain type of ethnic folk, I was excited to show this place to my friends and dance all night. We have all spent a great deal of time living/travelling in Eastern Europe and were looking forward to having fun but the staff at Drom made us extremely uncomfortable and made that very difficult to do. Once they afforded us the great honour of paying 50 dollars (for 3 people) to get inside, the two bouncers proceeded to call my friend arrogant when she tried to make a phone call on their patio, thinking she was vaping.

Both bartenders I mentioned the incident to asked me what I must have done to offend them. (Shout out to the person working coat check for genuinely being lovely and fun). So I took the incident to the manager, who at first was willing to hear my story but when we went to discuss the event with the bouncers quickly switched to treating my friends and I like trash. The bouncers conveniently left out the part of the story where they were ignoring us in line, asking women on the street whether they were 19 or not, and lied about watching anything on their phones. Insisting I had been treating them "as human ATMs" which is a statement so nonsensical I am still baffled by its meaning. My foreign friend who was visiting the city tried to explain that he had come from across the ocean and that I just wanted to show them this bar, to which the manager replied "this is Toronto, nobody cares where you are from", said it was "weird" that I didn't remember the exact words I had said to offend door staff, and implied that they were right to treat me with suspicion because I was "presenting as male and asserting myself". (The one who said this appeared very masc, had a longer beard than me and was much taller than me but happened to be wearing a skirt and a neat little army beret, like a militant warlord, so I guess they win the gender-queer Olympics.) They also kept using the bar's location on queen street as an excuse for their behaviour, which is irrelevant and assinine. All in all this was a ridiculous experience and the rude, hyper sensitive, judgemental and unprofessional staff dealt a very serious blow to the morale of our night. There were more instances of rude and judging comments but this post is already long enough. I cannot recommend anyone attend a show here. They make a mockery of the concept of an inclusive space by using progressive and tender-queer language to excuse the childish abuse of power and harassing (particularly towards young women) behaviour of their staff; and in doing so damage the reputation of real inclusive spaces.

Save your money and save yourself the headache and go spend your time somewhere that actually seems to care about more than feeling superior to their...

THE BASICS

We’ve been huge fans of Drom Taberna from the day they opened and want to find a way to support them during the Covid lockdown. They've quickly established a well-deserved notoriety for its genuine underground culture vibe, delicious Eastern European food and, of course, the spectacular live music.

Lockdown note: we’re always nervous about ordering takeout from restaurants that focus on dine in, but in this case we needn’t have worried. Drom’s food travels well and reheats well.

THE SERVICE

While it may seem odd to include comments on service for a delivery good service is good service, no matter what the circumstances. In this case the folks at Drom were super helpful. We called two days in advance and asked them to put together a menu to celebrate a special evening at home for under $100. They put together a lovely meal on budget, and delivered it precisely on time and with good humour. Great end-to-end service.

THE FOOD (*Note: all prices are before 13% HST)

The menu is a mix of Eastern European and Balkan fare. It’s all very sharable and suits a casual evening of grazing with a loved one. In the pre-pandemic world it's great food to share with friends while listening to music and indulging in a few (OK, many!) drinks.

Goulash - This is possibly the best goulash we have ever had, rivalling our previous “best ever” (a heavenly goulash we devoured at a renowned Hungarian restaurant in Warsaw). This meaty stew is great cool weather noshing, and all-season comfort food. We mop up every drop of the rich sauce at the end, leaving our plates spotless before they hit the dishwasher. Pro tip: for two people order the large portion and save a little bit for breakfast. This goulash with a runny yolk, fried egg is outrageous (it would be awesome with a poached egg as well). $16.95 (half portion $10.17).

Ćevapi - Full disclosure; we’re addicted to these wonderfully grilled Bosnian beef and veal kabobs bursting with juicy flavour. Tuck one into some of the bread provided, top it with the red pepper relish (ajvar) and the cream cheese sauce (kajmak), then add a generous amount of paper-thin slices of onion, and enjoy! 5 pcs. $13.56; 10 pcs. $23.56.

Mushrooms - Eastern European cuisine is famous for its mastery of all things mushroom. These king oyster and cremini mushrooms were cooked with garlic, onions, kale and herbs, all tossed in a delicious green adjika sauce. This is a dish full of deep flavours - umami for days!. $15.85

Potato - these pan roasted fingerling potatoes are a thing of beauty. Cooked with garlic butter and green adjika they have a creamy texture that melted in the mouth. They were so good that we broke our long-standing rule about keeping some fingerlings for next day pan frying and just devoured them all at our evening sitting. $7.91

Burek - This dish is similar to spanakopita: buttery and flaky pastry filled with spinach and feta. It was the best one we’ve had! ($10.17)

THE BOOZE

Misha - Drom Taberna’s face to the world - has been creating his own vodka infusions. They’re delicious. We enjoyed one flavoured with clementines and bitters. It made for a perfect digestivo for two. Perhaps fittingly we’ve forgotten the price of the booze on this night - oops!

THE PRICE

We’ve listed prices for all the dishes so will summarize by saying that Drom Taberna’s prices are very reasonable, particularly in light of the quality and quantity of food that you get in each order. Our entire meal came in at under $100 (mystery priced booze, HST and delivery included). Great...