Emma's Country Kitchen — Restaurant in Toronto

My partner and I are frequent visitors of Emma’s Country Kitchen! The food is always amazing especially the pancakes 🥞 The atmosphere is friendly and welcoming starting right when you enter the door. The host greets you with a smile and the food feels unpretentious.

That being said, the past few times we’ve come to Emma’s we usually order the blueberry compote and citrus butter on the side as the table signage sign says “by request only.” (We also are fine with paying extra for the jam/and even extra sides because we love it here so much.)

The last time we visited was a few days ago, we requested for the blueberry compote and our server (an elderly lady who seemed sweet at first) made this side comment that shifted the aura.

When we had requested it she had a condescending tone and said “Now you can’t have that. It only comes free as requested for two meals on the menu, and you’re ordering the breakwich so why would you want to slather blueberry jam on that?”. She walks away and I say to my partner “That was a slightly weird reaction to our request because why is it her business how we want to eat jam?”

When our server comes back we request it again. She gives us a blank stare and her voice becomes monotone and cold goes “You know I have to charge you for that right?” And my partner goes “Yes we know, we still would appreciate a side of it.” And she punches the item through to our table’s tab and hands us the jam. Once we got that jam we used it on our side of pancakes… not even the breakfast sandwich that she assumed at the start.

I just felt that it was such an odd interaction that slightly soured the moment we had because we have no issues paying extra, we just did not appreciate the cold attitude towards it - plus the table signage says “served by request”. It just felt like we were simply idiots for not having known it was only applicable to two meals on the menu, wish our server could have mentioned the extra free in a graceful and kinder demeanour and not needed to make extra side comments or assumptions about how we want to make use of...

Hello Ladies & Gentlemen. This is my first review of restaurant in my life. Please Enjoy and Comment !

First of all, The inner decoration is nothing fancy but it really kind of bring you back to nature because all the tables and desks(Except The sofa). The servers are friendly. The only thing is that When I asked for the credit machine, then I waited for about 5 minutes(I think it is because there were a lot of customers came in and there were actually only 3 servers plus a server who I thinks responsible to the Bakery Section).

Secondly, I ordered a Fresh Squeezed Grapefruit juice and Emma's Benny. The juice was fresh and cold which helps me to clear my mind after I traveled for almost one hour to get there; The skin of roasted potato was little crispy, as whole it tasted flavorsome. The buttermilk biscuit topped with house cured peameal bacon, soft poached egg is very harmony. Why? The topped layer is Poached Egg which is Soft, the middle layer is peameal bacon which it required a mount of force from your teeth, the lowest layer is biscuit which is also soft. And I want to mention is that the peameal bacon is little salty which I could accept. The only awkward thing I think is when I was eating the biscuit with toppings , either take a whole slice of biscuit or cut it to half, the problem for eating as a whole slice is that the Poached egg was very easy to slide; the problem for cutting to half is that the peameal bacon is so hard to cut it and also it will damage the egg... Maybe I need to know some kind of technique to solve this problem..

Finally, the Soft Poached Egg is my favorite and it was a very pleasant experience! It definitely worth to eat breakfast.. Hope this...

UPDATED REVIEW: I've come here a few more times since my last review and it's about time I update. The food has always been really good, from the breakwich, to the peameal bacon hash (when it's on special), to the avocado toast. I like that their pancakes change with the season. I haven't had a chance to try them yet b/c so far they haven't had a flavour I'd like, but one day I will. The service has always been great as well. Very nice, accomodating, and attentive.

I took a star off b/c although I do like their biscuits, they're a bit too hard on the outside for my liking. As a result, you have to eat the breakwich with a knife and fork so I don't hurt the roof of my mouth. Also, it's a little expensive. My partner and I both had coffees, he had the peameal hash, I had the breakwich, small fruit salad and we shared a side of bacon. With tax and tip it was $70. We like going for breakfast every other weekend, but not when we're spending that much money.

OLD REVIEW: I've wanted to try this place for a little while. There's always a line up, so I I figured it must be good. We came on a Saturday around noon, thinking the wait wouldn't be too long, but it was still 45 minutes. Fortunately there are a lot of little coffee shops nearby to wait.

We sat at the bar. The service was nice. The food was very average and not worth the wait in my opinion. I had really wanted to try the biscuits. They were somewhat dry, and I don't like orange, so I didn't want to put the orange butter on it.

I do want to try their pancakes - which I understand change frequently - so I'll wait until they have a kind I like and I'll come...