This weekend the Wife and I decided to check out a Boston Pizza (a Canadian-based restaurant chain) near our residence. There was an added attraction this time around - the Boston Pizza locations in and around the Greater Toronto Area now offer Halal options!
Usually when we want a halal pizza, we go to Pizza Pizza's (some of whose locations carry halal options). With Boston Pizza being a more upscale place, we decided to give it a try.
While I am not really a big fan of Boston Pizza, I think it's great we can now go and order from the same menu as everyone else and not be restricted to seafood/veggie entries (although I must confess I really love their Cajun Shrimp pizza even more than the meat ones!).
When I asked about the halal options, I was told I can order any of the chicken items, except ones that are breaded. We ended up getting chicken wings and a Tuscan pizza which had grilled chicken in addition to other stuff.
Overall, it was good and different, although a bit pricey. I wouldn't go there all the time but once in a while it's fine. I found the pizza a bit too oily for my taste, although the Wife liked the dough and feta cheese combo on our pizza. If you are in the GTA, you should give it a try (and do ask for the halal options). If you are used to usual halal pizza joints (which despite cleanliness being considered half of the Islamic faith are hardly the epitome of hygiene), Boston Pizza was a refreshing change.
Hopefully more mainstream restaurants will now start offering similar options.
14 comments:
Would definitely stop by Boston Pizza next time I am in Toronto.
@Zany, let us know how it was! :-D
Yummy pictures, Mezba! But what did you think about the chicken wings? I love chicken wings.
@Nadia, the chicken wings were pretty good. Really good. Not very oily, not scalding hot, done just right.
It could be because they were oven roasted and not deep fried. They told us not to get the deep fried wings because the oil is used for non-halal meat (so it was nice to see Boston Pizza even aware of cross-contamination issues which some minority of Muslims take to heart).
The oven roasted made it really good and tasty.
Ugh. Not a good post to read when I am hungry ;)
Will def try though, I've never been to Boston Pizza before.
It's a wonderful news and glad that both of you enjoyed your meal.Pizzas and most burger joints here are halaly certified.So no problems here.
Just want to know what's in the breaded chicken that makes it non-halal.Do you know?
And how did they separate the non-halal and halal food? If they serve both types of food,how can muslim customers be certain of the halalness of what they eat? It borders a lot on trust.I'm not that cautious really.But some muslims are.You used the word minority there but here it's the majority and I'm in the minority! :) You get what I mean?
@Muslim Girl, let us know what you think of it! I am planning to let Boston Pizza know I appreciate their offering the 'halal' options.
@@Lat, I think (my theory) the breaded stuff comes pre-made from the franchise headquarters and is non halal, plus it's fried in oil. The halal chicken are probably stored separately and therefore grilled or oven roasted only so there's no cross-contamination issue. Our server told us all the fried stuff was non-halal and anything halal was the grilled or oven roasted chicken stuff. Some KFCs here also offer halal chicken, except the burgers and nuggets that come directly from the franchise while the halal chicken are locally bought from Muslim stores. They even have a halal certificate.
Yes, a lot of it is just trust. After all, how cautious can one really be, short of going into the kitchen and examining their purchase order and stocking methods?! :-D
interesting.. I will definitely be trying that out with hubby when we are in Canada soon insha'Allah
@Adventurous Ammena, do let us know what you think of it!
Now I want pizza
@Geeki, there's one on the Nuite Blanche route!
hehe....great post, Mezba....will need to go there the next time i need to celebrate an occasion ;)
Taha
and now that there' a Halal Boston Pizza, there's no need to resort to the measly vegetarian options :)
@Taha, no need to resort to the measly vegetarian options
right on!
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