Chanuka has arrived very early this year (Nov 27-Dec 4) but I’m not complaining. It just means that I’m able to eat my favourite foods a little earlier. p.s. I’m referring to potato latkes and sufganyiot.

This year I decided to do a sufganiyot crawl. But before I began, here’s the definition of soufganiot (according to Wikipedia)

A sufganiyah (Hebrew: סופגנייה‎ or סופגניה; plural, sufganiyot: סופגניות) is a round jelly doughnut eaten in Israel on theJewish festival of Hanukkah. The doughnut is deep-fried, filled with jelly or custard, and then topped with powdered sugar.^[1] At Hanukkah, Jews observe the custom of eating fried foods in commemoration of the miracle associated with the Temple oil.

Here’s a photo of a pretty nice lookin’ sufganiyah.

My crawl led me to five places in my neighborhood: Dr. Laffa, What a Bagel, Richmond Bakery, Tastes Like More, and Kosher City Plus.

Three of us, sat down and sampled each and every one of the above sufganiyot. It was a tough job but someone had to do it!!

We discussed:

• The Jelly: was it sweet? too sweet? was there enough jelly?
• The dough: was it tangy? fresh? yeasty?
• The appearance: too much icing sugar? not enough icing sugar

All of them were devoured within 5 minutes which meant that we loved each and every one of them!

I had so much fun doing the “research” for this blog post that next year I’m going to do a potato latke crawl.

Happy Chanuka – to all my Jewish readers.

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I grew up eating bagels in Ottawa (remember Bagel Bagel?). Infact we even had a cockapoo called “Bagel”. In my neighborhood in Toronto, bagels seem to be everywhere (I’m not complaining), so I decided to compare them. I know that I’m opening a can of worms as EVERYONE has a different opinion about their favorite bagels.

I bought bagels from Bagel World, Bagel House, What A Bagel, Gryfes, and St. Viateur (direct from Montreal – but stored in the freezer).

I put little pieces of paper under each one and then started to nibble away not knowing where the bagel was from.

Here’s my thoughts:

Bagel World: It was doughy, sweet and tasty. YUM.

Bagel House: It was yeasty, dense and chewy. A favorite – probably because I liked the chewy factor.

What a Bagel: Oily and bland.

Gryfes: I’m going to make a lot of people upset but I found this bagel to be oily and airy.

St. Viateur: very chewy, dense and very different than all the others. Hands down – my favorite.

Don’t get me wrong. I would never refuse a bagel – no matter where it’s from. A toasted bagel with butter, or jam or cream cheese IS SIMPLY DELICIOUS.

It was an interesting experiment but I was sorry that I didn’t include bagels from Harbord Bakery. Next time.

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