Kanpai - Toronto

Stumbled across this place when we were shopping for food and decided to visit for dinner. A great atmosphere and trendy place to eat.Our server recommended the fried chicken which does take time to prepare but was worth the wait. The spices and crispy peppers and peanut topping were delicious. We also opted for the steak dish and the cauliflower with some steamed rice. The beer selections were excellent and we had a really lovely mealDefinitely worth a visit if you are in the area

The good:- good craft beer selection- nice atmosphere for a drink and snacks after workThe not so good:- fried chicken!!! Was crispy and well fried but had no flavour at all. We were very disappointed. We ordered the 8 piece.- prices for other apps such as the baos are a little over priced ($6) - and you can't really share them Bonus: - 90s hip hop was greatSuggestion - drinks only...

Real Taiwanese food. I would definitely recommend this place. The food is really good and so is the staff.

Unless you like loud hip-hop blaring while you eat bring some earplugs because the food and drink are worth a visit. This is Taiwanese street food eaten seated. It's very reasonably priced and everything that we tried was great. Never having had a bao before I was hard-pressed to analogize to any other bread product that I'd ever eaten. Bring a group so that you can order a ton and try lots of stuff. No reservations for less than 6, though. Also, be forewarned that you sit on stools not chairs. Still, you'll be leaning in to get your fair share of the plates anyway.

Let me start by saying Kanpai has some positive things going for it - a nice decor in a small charming resto, a seemingly good environment for libations and a good selection of drinks (most notably the rotating tap from Great Lakes Brewery). The menu items look and sound interesting, and it is tapas style dining so that is always a great combo with drinking. Prices are not bad. However, despite all the positives, the food is what matters the most in a restaurant - this is where Kanpai falls flat. The first thing when we sat down was to put in an order of their famous Taiwanese Fried Chicken, which can take some time to prepare. We then took our time to decide what else to order. For the 2 of us, we ordered: Taiwanese Fried Chicken: Chicken just by itself tasted ok, it is not as flavourful as what I would consider very delicious fried chicken, but it's hard not to like fried chicken in general. With the plum (??) sauce however, it becomes overly salty and almost unbearble to eat. Other reviewers seem to note this as well.OG Bao (pork belly in steamed bun) - presentation was good. The taste falls flat and it's overall "meh". Again, it's hard not to like anything pork belly but definitely better steamed pork buns at Banh Mi Boys or even at Momofuku.A Tribe called Hakka (hakka style spicy stir fry of pork, squid, tofu and veggies) - this was the most disappointing dish of the night. First off, there was no tofu in there, not a big loss. There is a lot of scallions in there, which are "throwaways" for us; very limited amounts of meat or squid. The dish itself is a tad spicy, but the big negative (again) is its extreme saltiness. We were told that it is best to pair this with a rice dish, which brings us to Sticky Fingaz....Sticky Fingaz (sticky rice with pork, mushrooms, dried scallops and village sauce) - the village sauce is just a sweet and sour sauce drenched over this ball of rice. The sweet and sour sauce made the rice taste salty (again with the salt!) and is kind of overwhelming. The rice itself is nothing special, but pair the sauce and the Hakka dish that it is supposed to be good with, and you end up with a spicy salty mess. It was not good.Overall, the dinner itself was not pricey. But the one-dimensional taste (salty) of the food and the lack of wow factor in the "top 10 best fried chicken in the city" made this visit disappointing for us. Needless to say, unless something big changes in the kitchen on how the food is flavoured, we will not be back. If you were to try Kanpai, I would suggest only getting the fried chicken (without using sauce) and the pork belly bun.