Susur Lee Reigns

Ah, the wonder of dim sum. The wonder of dim sum done well, and served well. And then the wonder of eating dim sum in a restaurant in Toronto where your table neighbors make conversation and talk about theatre and ask you for your thoughts on what you’re eating, and where the table group next to you has made plans to eat breakfast with their table neighbors – all in the span of 90 minutes. We went in expecting good food – after all, it’s Susur Lee – and ended up not only enjoying every mouthful and anticipating with wonder the next food to arrive – but also found that eating in a new city with complete strangers nearby could feel friendlier than sitting with family sometimes.

Maybe it was the kind of clientele that the restaurant attracts, maybe it was the weekend (a national holiday) and the joy of a beautiful and early fall weekend, and perhaps it was nothing more than people seeing friendly faces nearby and venturing a question, knowing that it would be received politely and with good humor. Whatever it was, and for whatever reason, our dinner at Luckee in the Soho Metropolitan in Toronto reigns as one of the best meals, and maybe the best environment we’ve eaten in, in many months. And we eat out a lot. In very nice places. Just saying.