Ciro’s

Visited last night around 8PM
A place with a backyard patio on Bloor = AWESOME.
Super chill atmosphere. The patio is a deck (the whole place looks like a house converted) with cool artsy decorational pieces everywhere, a loveseat swing, a dart board and lots of seating spread out nicely.
Server was sassy and hilarious (Judith) — she’s a saleswoman for sure! I was in a pretty relaxed mood when I came in last night but would have otherwise been annoyed at being pushed to order seconds after walking in the door, at the payment counter, before being seated.
I ordered the Hey Jude burger with salad. Meat was super juicy, the bun was from a supermarket and not fresh, kind squished. All veg were super fresh. Salad was kale with some kind of delicious seasoning on it.
Partner ordered the BBC burger (Bacon Blue Cheese) and they forgot the blue cheese… Judith ran it back with good cheer and came out to woefully share that the kitchen was out of blue cheese and didn’t even tell her so she had the burger redone with his share of cheeses and he loved it. He got their house chips (crumple style on the juicy side) with a dill dip.
They also sent out shrimp chips and more chips (fries) on the house to make up for the blue cheese mistake.
Partner ordered a whiskey sour that he loved. I had her surprise me and she delivered with a creamsicle (a sure winner since one of my favorite drinks is the Orange Bacardi Breezer).
So the server was awesome (she works M-​F, 4-​close), food came out quick and was pretty good BUT the bill (with a 10% discount, again, to make up for the blue cheese) was $ 40ish (would have been around $ 45) which seems like a lot to me for two burgers and drinks — and they’re definitely not gourmet burgers. Really solid experience but I would rather go try some place new than return.

One word… Pathetic
This has to be the worst beer bar I’ve ever been to. I’ve actually seen Ciro’s listed as a top 10 beer bar in certain articles over the years and always had it in the back of my mind to try it. Boy… was that a mistake. They had 4 – 5 boring tap beers (Wellington and something else) and the beer fridge had a weak collection of maybe 7 – 8 beers with no European imports. I ended up with a Dragon Stout from Jamaica which was so disgusting I couldn’t finish it. The fridge didn’t even keep the beer cold.
As bad as the beer collection was the crowd. Nobody was there on a Saturday night except 4 – 5 people by the bar there who looked like they just got out of prison and reeked of urine. One of the drunk loud guys had a switch blade hanging from his jeans and large unkeep dogs chained up outside. The place reeked of cigarettes, the décor was terribly dated, and it was filled of degenerates. This place needs to close down ASAP. I have no idea how they stay open.

Wow, what a disappointment.
Why didn’t I read the reviews before coming here! As soon as we walked in we knew we’d made a mistake. The bar is dimly lit and overtly dated (not in a hipster-i’m-so-cool-retro way) with tables along the wall, mounted tube tv’s, an open door to the mess of a kitchen, and a dumpster lined walkway through to the back patio. Finding no one out on the patio at 10pm on a Saturday night should have been a warning sign but we said «Naw, let’s give it a try»… Mistake #1.
We came back in and sat at one of the tables for a bit until the we gave in to the apathetic, inattentive and downright horrible server and went to him at the bar to order our drinks… Mistake #2.
Getting a closer look at the two dark and mostly bare glass doored fridges behind the bar we counted 7 bottles of beer. No, not 7 kinds of beer, (which would still have been disappointing) but 7 bottles of beer; a couple Chimay, some Innis and Gun, Sapparo and a Red Cap. This was SATURDAY NIGHT! «Oh yeah, our beer comes in tomorrow» said the hipster server, finally taking notice of us.
Moving on from the fridges I inspected the draft selection; Sapporo, Blanche de Chambly, PBR, Wellington and 3 or 4 of the regular major brands. How is this one of the best places to grab a beer in the city! Relentless in our forgiveness though we decided that if we were here we might as well get a drink… Mistake #3.
Unlike my two compatriots who ordered bottles (the smart choice) I opted to get the draft Chambly. «Oh, keg’s almost done, it will be a bit, I’ll bring it to your table». «Ok» I replied. Mistake #4.
When the beer did arrive it was room temperature and flat. We drank our drinks, paid and left.
We will never return.
In retrospect I can’t blame the bar, I can only blame myself. This place must be going downhill as it was once (2013) highly touted as a great place to find new beers. Today it’s a sad excuse for a bar with a bartender that will single-​highhandedly put it out of business.

Whoa Ciro’s! What happened!!!
Last time I visited Ciro’s (about a year ago), there was a row of impressive beer taps and a double-​sided menu that boasted a seemingly endless list of imported bottled beers (they even had the shitty Portuguese beer that I grew up drinking — Sagres!) I remember going here with my beer-​drinking afficionados and making a night of it. The food was always reasonably good and the servers knew their beers.
I went yesterday to find that there were only standard, corporate brewery beers on tap (Sapporo, Wellington, etc.), and their fridges were bare! I asked the server where the double-​sided menu of bottles was, and he said «oh, I don’t give that out anymore because I’m tired of telling people that we’re out of what they want to order».
My friend and I reluctantly ordered our pints and sat down. We asked the server if we could order some food after he neglected to give us menus. He said that the cook wasn’t in today, so there was no food?! Sure enough, I turned around in the direction of the kitchen to see that all of the lights were out.
Did this place change management or something?

My friends and I ate here last night; it was the first time I had been to Ciro’s in years, certainly not since moving east of the Don. I am unsure I’ve been missing too much.
I think things have changed here a bit since I first found it in 2007, shortly after moving to Toronto from LA. It was one of the few places that had Newcastle on tap. This was kind of a big deal because it was my favourite beer at the time.
(getting off track here) Why Newcastle? Because this was one of the few decent beers you get easily get when going out in LA back about 10 years ago. No joke. I know things have changed there quite a bit but LA, like many parts of the US, was just not into beer. All you could usually get at a restaurant’s or club’s bar were the usual bland culprits: Coors, Bud, Miller, etc. Guinness was one of the first to make inroads and a lot of places I went to had Newcastle and Bass on tap. To this day I still love Newcastle.
(back on track) My memory is also that Ciro’s used to have this double sided, laminated menu of bottled beers. Am I just making this up? Anyway, all this seems to be gone now. There were many bottles and taps but not like when it was.
What hasn’t seemed to change is a pretty electric menu: pad thai, butter chicken, burgers, doubles – something for everyone. Last night’s burger jived with my memories: decent, basic, nothing extraordinary. And that is OK. I actually wanted something kind of plain and simple and was very pleased.
Unless you live in the area (walking distance) and don’t want to travel, it is hard for me to enthusiastically recommend this joint. Don’t get me wrong – it is a perfectly fine place to grab a pint, or drink, and/​or a bite. But there is nothing so special about it to warrant any TTC involvement.

Because of one 73 lb, imbecilic hipster, server, I have washed my hands of this dive. We went in with the intent to get onion rings and wings and this severely skinny guy in leggings took our drink orders before letting us know the deep fryer didn’t work! Stupid! Thanks for letting us know before we got our drinks jerk! So we sat and drank and then I wanted to taste my boyfriend’s drink but there was some crap in it. Looked like grains of sand; probably from the dishwasher or a cup that dried with dirt in it. Gross! When my bf showed the stupid server, the SERVER got mad and accused him of trying to hustle for a free drink. The server, who had a deeply indented butt chin, didn’t care that the drink was dirty or that my bf may have just drank a pint of debris, he was more interested in the fact that my bf drank ²⁄₃ of the pint. I think he told my boyfriend to barf the drink back up if he wants a refund or something stupid like that. Unreal! My boyfriend showed incredible restraint by not suplexing the guy, honestly. My boyfriend then waited outside for me to pay for my ginger ale and the server said, «he ran off and left you.» Can you believe the audacity of this clown? He left me cuz tables were about to get flipped! In all the history of people who’ve received uppercuts, never has someone been so deserving of an iron-​fisted upper cut right between the cheeks in his butt chin. Who’s half baked idea was it to leave a tiny hipster guy with an explicit butt chin and long, stupid, greasy hair in charge? ! Afterwards we saw him smoking outside and he started to say some inaudible crap to my bf. Each time he spoke, his butt chin clenched tighter. I wanna out a cigarette in his stupid butt chin.
1 star!

Amazing burger! Totally delicious, best in the neighborhood for sure! Other amazing apps include the doubles. Mmm!
The pint prices are pretty good, and there’s a relatively good selection of draft beers.
Their patio is okay too, smoking is allowed which rocks! Awesome service, I love the bartenders and cooks. Pretty cool crowd usually too.
The only thing they could work on is the bathrooms — yikes! Totally straight outta a horror film. At the same time, it’s not the most upscale joint but those burgers keep me coming back :)

This place has gone off a cliff.
They usually have a solid selection of beers but the last few times I’ve visited the selection has been very thin — to the point where the coolers are nearly empty.
It’s always dead when I’m there and the service is so-​so. It’s like they want me to go across the street for $ 10 strip club Canadians.
The place is in awful shape and the bathrooms are a nightmare.
Here’s a fun game — try to count as many ceiling spiders as you can while you’re pissing. My record is three.
People eat here!?!

We used to love going to Ciros — heck I celebrated a milestone birthday there. Wonderful hole in the wall. However, the food kept getting worse and worse… fresh food — because I can seem them carry it in from their car in the front in No Frills bags but it all tastes the same. The Indian is the same as the Thai is the same as the… piled with sprouts. We got it figured out. We don’t go here anymore — maybe for a beer on the back patio :)

We used to come to Ciro’s after floorball just down the street. It might look like a dive bar from the outside but inside is anything but. Great atmosphere, good beers on tap, and the food is really good. I’d say one of the better burgers too — hand made patties. The garlic burger was my favourite. They also do some good thai and indian dishes as well.
Good date spot, or casual place to meet for drinks.

This place has an extensive, expensive beer list, and if that’s why you’re headed here, then bump my start review up a few notches.
If, however, you plan to eat here, well… don’t bother. From our group out last night, we had the following items:
Mediocre-to-«doable» fish tacos, with a side of what we decided could only be «iceberg lettuce salsa». (The only thing it was good for was a laugh.)
Light-​as –air, slightly burnt-​on-​the-​outside, not-​much-​on-​the-​inside grilled cheese sandwich… and a side salad that came with dressing that was apparently just olive oil. (And remained such, even after a request for vinegar to be added.)
A just passable pulled pork sandwich (described as «mostly tasteless») and fries.
And…something else that wasn’t memorable enough to mention.
I used to like this place… and to be fair, what it has going for it in this particular ‘hood is that it’s a bit seedier, and thus not as hipster-​prone as other places in the area. The back patio is reasonable (hey, we were out there in mid-​March this year!)…and the wait staff seems to take things in stride.
Just eat before or after…

It is not often I give one star. In the case of Ciro’s, I genuinely wish I could give less. Half a star is probably too generous. Zero for «Eep! Just close already!» is closer to the mark. We felt insulted and kind of violated, actually. Anyway…
… went to Ciro’s last night with a group of 8 around 10pm, place wasn’t busy, one guy working the ol’ dual purpose bar/​server role. We order the following, with parentheses providing a brief summary of the outcome:
* 3 bison burgers (Fine, 3 star burger maybe, homemade, BUT, came fully dressed with mustard, ketchup, relish… each of us had to scrape condiments off. Who does that? Let us dress our own freakin’ burger. we’ll call ‘em 2.5, then.)
* 3 pulled pork poutine (Nasty frozen fries, ice cold un-​squeeky curd, mediocre gravy, mediocre pork… BAD, so much so that two orders went mostly uneaten. 1.0)
* 1 nachos (Competitor for worst nachos ever that weren’t intending irony or insult; covered in crappy cheap black olive slices and scuz cheese, with very, very stale no-​name brand nachos. Sent back after a few people at the table sampled and rebuffed. The big zero.)
* 1 fried mozza sticks (Fine, probably from frozen; server tipped plate upon delivery and dumped two on the floor… they were replaced, but yeesh, talk about heaping bad upon terrible! 2.0)
* 2 cokes (Completely flat; notified server, who took his sweet time in replacing them with… 2 more completely flat cokes. Good job! Went unfinished. Another zero.)
* 3 Fin du Monde, 1 Mill St Coffee, 1 Cider, 1… Stella I want to say? (All were from bottles, none skunked, so that’s good, but the price was a bit on the high side… nothing outrageous, but 50 cents to $ 1 higher than I would expect at most bars. 3.0 ‘cuz they had Fin du Monde… we’ll be generous! Nothing interesting on draft.)
So, 3 burgers, mozza sticks, and 1 poutine were eaten (the latter grudgingly). 2 poutine, 2 cokes, and 1 nachos went unfinished (the latter so bad we sent it back).
The «cook» made angry faces at us and rolled his eyes from the kitchen (it’s open to view). To exacerbate his suckitude, at one point he was smoking in the alley that joins the main bar and the patio, just outside the door — the smoke was blowing into the bar, and we asked him if he could move away a bit. He nodded yes, but then didn’t move an inch. We asked him politely for something simple, and he was a prick about it. Swell.
To top it all off, as someone else mentioned: Ciro’s has the NASTIEST MEN’S ROOM IN THE CITY. It stinks so bad you have to hold your breath. It is filled with fruit flies and some kind of weird moth things. The urinal literally sprays water out at you when you flush. And the toilet… the toilet is covered in some kind of disgusting, slimy substance upon which the fruit flies and moths appear to be subsisting. When you’re scared to wash your hands after taking a piss, that says a hell of a lot.
Oh, as for that great beer list that supposedly recommends this place: it’s fine but nothing great, and the prices are higher than they should be considering they’re just readily available bottles. The Rhino has a much better, more thoughtful, more unusual list that’s just as large (maybe larger). So forget Ciro’s and just go somewhere else, please!
In closing, if Ciro’s were a body part, it’d be a badly infected rectum. Pure scunge, horrible through and through. None of us will ever return.

Only reason I went here was because another place down the road that we’d heard good things about was closed and we were starving.
I tried to warn my girlfriend against ordering the calamari but she got it anyway. Big mistake. Think it was straight out of a frozen bag.
She got the california wrap which she said was disgusting. I got the bison burger which was ok but nothing to write home about at all.
I can see this place being ok for beers but stay well clear of the food. Do yourself a favour and walk 5 minutes East to some good spots.

It’s all about the beer.
After creeping the neighbourhood on Unilocal and seeing that I’d be in the same boat as Sam G — i.e. post-​hockey, no shower and in need of beverage, I convinced my team to hit up Ciro’s for drinks.
This place is in no way scary like some of the long-​toothed reviews suggested. It has its own thing going for it, though it reminded me a little of a Souz Dal — Ten Feet Tall offspring. And, fortunately, the «Nightmare on Elm St» bathroom situation is fixed as well. Granted, I won’t be eating off the bathroom floor anytime (soon).
As everyone has pointed out, the beer selection is massive; I’d say somewhere in the neighbourhood of 50 – 75, the prices reasonable and quite a few of the selections I’d never seen before, so if that’s not a beer trifecta, I don’t know what is.
Though I didn’t order off the food menu, I did give it a once over and there’s nothing really mentionable here. The kitchen puts the orders out pretty quickly and the table next to us (our soul-​crushed hockey opponents) didn’t seem to complain, so it there might be some merit there.
Ciro’s is a dusty gem waiting for your raggy business to restore its lustre.

I went here with a big group of friends for Brunch on Sunday. I’d eaten here before and remeber it not being terrible however this time was awful.
The waiter was super nice. That was about where the positive stuff ends.
All my friends ordered «the hangover» which is a basic breakfast… 2 eggs, toast, potatos, and then a choice of Bacon, Sausage or Avocado. 2 of my friends ordered the Avocado and two ordered bacon. One ordered one breakfast with no bread and I had french toast.
When it arrived all of my friends eggs were overcooked. Not only that but the one who ordered no toast got toast (no biggie) but when she brought it to the attention of the waiter he removed it from her plate with his hands while it sat in front of her. The people who ordered Avocado wished they didn’t as when it arrived it was FRIED and BROWN. Now I do a lot of cooking… and I have never once heard of anyone cooking avocado. We all assumed the avocado would have been raw. Sitting beside the two who had the avocado I felt like I was going to yack at the smell of the cooked rotten avocado. Trust me NEVER EVER EVER COOK AVOCADO unless you are like Gordon Ramsay or something.
When all the Hangover breakfasts arrived I assumed my french toast would be along shortly. Nope! Its like the chef made 4 hang overs and then when they were all done and served made my french toast because it arrived 10 min after everyone elses meal. but I think he prepped my french toast as he was making the hangover and forgot because when the meal arrived the french toast was soooo coated in egg on one side that it was like having scrambled eggs on french toast. I managed to eat one piece after scraping egg off one side.
our bill was $ 61 and ³⁄₅ of us were not able to eat our meal because it was so poorly cooked. I will never ever go here to eat again. They have a great beer selection but the chef needs training. AGAIN WHO COOKS BROWN AVOCADO? AVOCADO IS GREEN!!!

I love ciro’s for what it is: a gem of a dive bar that delivers with a comfortable atmosphere and food that’s better than you expect when you walk in.
The first time I went I was surprised by the funky interior on an otherwise sort of grungy street with little to recommend it. Ciro’s is dark and cozy but has interesting lights and colourful tiles to make it seem a little bit less seedy. The staff have always been super welcoming and happy to provide actual service rather than resentfully slinging a beer across the bar.
The bottled beer list is impressive. They carry a wide range of obscure Belgian beers that can otherwise be found at only a few LCBOs and premium beer places, and the prices are low for what they sell. Sadly, the draft list never lives up to my expectations — last time I was here they had a Chambly Noire tap on, which got me all excited… I was sadly disappointed to learn that it was just a teaser and my choices were actually limited to PBR and other bland blonde things.
The food is reasonably yummy, especially the noodle dishes, and the portion sizes are absolutely huge. The selection is eclectic pub fare — Asian noodle dishes, small twists on standard sandwiches, spanakopita, and burgers, and most of it is good for the price (not high). The chicken wings were breaded, over cooked, and under sauced, so I’ll stay away from those in the future.
The horrifying state of the washrooms has been discussed in other reviews, so I’ll leave it, except to agree that they are, in fact, pretty frightening.

Ciros has the absolute worst men’s room in the city. When given the choice between using these washrooms or being forced to go on dialysis, it’s pretty much a toss-​up. Arguably you’d be better off hitting the hospital, because at least those rooms are sterile and you might get a free cookie.
Sure, it’s off the beaten path. And by «beaten» we mean ‘physically swarmed by the teenage street gangs who seem to live in Landsdowne station’ and by «path» we mean ‘the spooky stripclub and social-​club alleys’ surrounding this notoriously sketchbag stretch of Bloor street.
But, aside from that… it’s truly a wonderful spot.
One of the best beer lists in the city… including items that you won’t find anywhere else. A knowledgeable and friendly staff. A selection of interesting patrons who are all there for a similar urban experience. Great post-​modern décor. Spectacular corn bread.
A great surprise on a Friday night.

When our group first arrived we turned a table so the six of us could fit. The waitress, a little abrupt, said we can only move it if we move it back when we leave. This fiestiness from the waitress actually turned out to be a good thing as we later found out.
Ciros’ has quite the selection of European beers so anyone should be able to find something to tickle their fancy. And apparently they’ll make french toast for you at midnight if you ask really, really nice.
The décor is an interesting mix of modern, 60’s, and something I can’t quite put my finger on. The bathrooms are also something to be seen but not in a good way. I don’t think they have been updated since the dungeon/​building was built. In the men’s room the toilet has more caulk than porcelain and the urinal is out of order, not to mention it is one of those that is floor standing. Not to worry though, the dungeon trolls are more afraid of you than you are of them.

4 stars go to my favourite plaided out ginger chef Bryan in the kitchen for busting out an off-​menu french toast with homefries at midnight on a Friday night at my special request. That seriously made my night, and made up for the near death experience caught in a bizarre and unsettling Ukrainian love triangle while on my way back from the restrooms of doom in the basement.