Magic Noodle — Restaurant in Toronto

Omg, how have I never written a review for this place? I LOVE it!!

I've gotten delivery loads of times, and I finally went in to eat today. Service was fast and friendly. The restaurant was very clean and it was fun to see the chef make the noodles in the open kitchen!

There are lots of vegetarian options, and I expect they are easy to veganize (i.e., ask for no egg.) The menu clearly labels allergens and there are many options for all sorts of palates. Great prices and large portion sizes--they have daily lunch specials of full-size soups for just $10, and the other full size noodle items range from about $10-15. If you eat in, you can upgrade your amount of noodles for free when you order!

The noodles always have a perfectly al dente texture. I typically get the Red Splash (yo po mian--noodles with chilli oil, green onion, bok choy, fried egg, and plenty of garlic) with wide curtain noodles, and they always accommodate my request for less spicy, extra garlic. It's a simple dish, but super delicious!

I've also had their Veggie Friar (stir fried noodles), and it ALWAYS has a great amount of wok hei (the roasty toasty flavour you get from properly stir frying at high heat), so I think it'll please stir fry connoisseurs.

I'm not typically a soup person because I find most broths, but I tried my friend's beef soup today, and the broth was delightfully rich and flavourful. It had a really beefy flavour, so they definitely took their time making good stock rather than just relying on soup powders. They also braised the beef really well, so it was fall-apart tender without being stringy.

Their Pork Gamo (pulled pork sandwich) is always seasoned perfectly and braised perfectly, but I do personally find the sandwich itself a bit dry. I wish they'd put a scoop of braising juice on the sandwich rather than draining the meat. I think most people would still love it—I just prefer a very juicy sandwich. The bun is also really nice: a little crispy on the outside and very soft on the inside. It's a different, softer bread than most rou jia mo I've had.

Their beef and chicken scrolls are both yummy too! They're wraps with a great golden brown flatbread. I wish they'd make a vegetarian one...

I'm a first time customer. I came at 10:00PM on Friday, June 23rd and had a terrible service experience. There were two servers; one woman and one man. The woman never did anything to me but whoever the man was I felt just didn't like me as soon as I arrived. I never did anything to him, but for some reason he was treating everyone else with friendliness but whenever it came to interacting with me he seemed like he had something against me.

When he served my food he would just drop it on my table. There was a point where he was serving another group and when he finished, I raised my hand to ask for some water. He was smiling and laughing, but as soon as he saw me his face looked angry, and when he came back he dropped the water on my table like he was mad. When I was almost done eating I dropped my chopsticks. When I asked him for a new pair, his face got even more mad, said something in another language and clearly was frustrated to give me a new pair of chopsticks. At that point I knew he had something against me. When it came to paying I wasn't sure if they would come to me or go up to the front to pay. When I asked him, he just completely ignored me and walked away.

I don't want to assume it's racism, but I know what kind of person I am and I know that I never did him any wrong. I work and am a manager of a place that also does customer service and this is absolutely not the proper way to treat your customers. I enjoyed the food, but I will never come back to this place because of that server. For the owner, please acknowledge this because this whole province is very diverse and it's extremely unfair to be treated this way. You will most certainly lose a lot of customers if he keeps treating others like this. I've never in my life left a restaurant or any store without leaving a tip no matter how I was treated, but this restaurant and that server definitely deserves the first.

What a horrible experience.

Update: called the restaurant to get his name. His name is Martin. Martin, please treat...

No matter what day of the week it is, Magic Noodle always has me coming through their doors at ungodly times of the night. One of the best features of this restaurant is that it's open 24 hours a day, but unlike the other establishments also open 24 hours in the area, the food here is never hit or miss. What they serve is always on point, and especially this location is no exception.

You can get noodles anywhere in this area, but what makes Magic Noodle stand out is that they make theirs fresh in house, sometimes down to making your order right in front of you. You can instantly taste the difference vs what the competitors put out.

I've sampled most of their dishes at this location, but the Magic Chicken has to be my favourite. The Triple B and Smokey Duck round out my usual picks, with Magic Scrolls and my go-to appetizer. Always, always, ALWAYS add extra noodles as it's free. The Magic Chicken uses a chicken and pork stock mix, with enough seasoning to give it that "oomph" whilst still being light and not overbearing. The chicken is deep fried and cut into strips, much like a chicken katsu with different batter. However, it doesn't seem heavy and greasy and retains a fair amount of juicyness. The shiitake mushroom add a nice flavour and texture contrast to both the noodles and chicken.

Prices vary between soup and stir-fry dishes, but nothing isn't worth paying for especially with the quality you get.

Establishment is on the smaller side, with three 4-person booths occupying where a communal table used to sit, two 2-person booths where the where the long window table used to be, and 4 or 5 regular tables rounding out the dining area. This place can fill pretty quickly, especially around lunch and dinner times. The late-night crowd from the local bars next door also patron this place pretty frequently.

By far my favourite place to eat in the area. They just do it so well with the fresh noodles that I have no choice but to keep...