If, at 3 a.m. on a weekend, you find yourself in the vicinity of Queen and Dovercourt, come on over to the Drake BBQ, where you will come face-to-face with some of the funnest drunk food in the GTA. It meets the twin criteria for booze-fuelled noshing: Grease and carbs. Why after-party eating requires grease 'n' carbs remains a mystery of science. Partiers believe that the carbs coat their stomach against the ravages of the alcohol and the grease goes down because you're too drunk to mind…or maybe it's simply a lube for the carbs. The jury is still out on the why.
But there's no debating the what. The Drake BBQ, which is next door to the Drake General Store and just east of the Drake Hotel, is dishing some pretty fabulous barbecue in the southern tradition that Toronto seems to love. They don't call our home Hogtown for nothing. Out back, the smoker cooks long and slow, turning pork shoulders and beef briskets into moist smoky nirvana. If you like that kind of thing.
"That kind of thing" is a tall sandwich on a nondescript white bun piled high with so much meat, you'll have a hard time getting your mouth around it. But forks are just wrong for this food. Take a deep breath, open wide, and dig in – when the house-made BBQ sauce dribbles down your chin, it's all good. The sauce is bright orange and not thick, its loudest notes being apple cider vinegar and hot sauce, pretty much everything I love about Buffalo wings (my dirty little secret) – except Drake BBQ substitutes smoke for crisp.
And so much smoke! Walk into the sweet little shop and smoke fills your nostrils. Go home and you still smell it. It's in your hair if you spend more than 10 minutes there. Mind you, most customers don't. The majority of people take their BBQ out to eat; a good choice, especially at this time of year. Eating in at Drake BBQ means sitting at a high black counter against the front window. There are a few uncomfortable stools and a fairly significant draft. I worry that the bun (especially the bottom part) will give way under the pressure of meat and sauce if there's delay between building and eating, but if you order takeout, you can always mop up with their fab salt-and-vinegar Covered Bridge chips from New Brunswick.
I like the 60/60 best. This is three ounces each of beef brisket and pulled pork. The meat overflows from the sandwich like Dolly Parton from a foundation garment, smoky and succulent and hot. I also confess to a weakness for both of the 60/60's components on their own. The pulled pork is the moister and sweeter of the two meats, but the brisket seems to take on more of the flavour of the sauce, especially its chili bite.
Health-food wimps and other wusses will want to know about the vegetables. Don't go looking for broccoli. At Drake BBQ, a vegetable is a pickle. A very nice pickle. Crisp, not too young, neither flabby nor sweet. Or coleslaw, which, like so much the Drake does, strikes out against the crowd and is not sweet/sour vinegary but instead slightly creamy slaw, and very lovely. They sell peanuts too.
They've added weekend brunch, but, despite requests for French fries, have no intention of putting in a deep fryer, because the meal as it stands offers enough grease and carbs. They are planning on smoking chicken and ribs.
There's one dessert. It is the kind of retro treat that you know is really bad for you, and you can't stop eating it. Whoopie pie, according to American legend, was first seen in the lunchboxes of Amish farmers in Pennsylvania (baked by their wives). When a farmer saw his dessert he'd yell "Whoopie!" As did I, upon meeting the Drake BBQ's version. The Drake Hotel's baker makes a chocolate thing that is, texturally speaking, halfway between cake and cookie. He then sandwiches thick white icing (a cross between buttercream and marshmallow fluff) between two of these miniature chocolate cakes.
Binge food. Resistance is folly.