Tik Talk Cafe

Took my wife for a three course dinner. Everything was homemade and fresh. My only desire was a dinner roll to get every drop of the amazing sauces, as I couldn’t bring myself to lick the plate. Now I regret I didn’t. Will be returning often.

Very nice café, perfect for studying as it usually stays quiet outside of lunch hours.
There is free wifi and student discounts.
Management just changed and the new shop owners are still getting settled in, you’ll often find dishes that are off menu that regulars greatly appreciate.
Coffee is good, not very consistent but that would just be a matter of time.
definitely a recommendation for fellow students.

Visited this place for the first time today and was pleasantly surprised.
The shop itself is small, cozy, and quiet. An assortment of newspapers are available to read, and with free wifi, this place seems perfect for studying or relaxing.
I had the breakfast sandwich, a yummy combination of scrambled eggs, mushrooms, baby spinach, mayo, and butter between a toasted everything bagel, priced very reasonably at $ 3.99.

Was looking for a place to eat and I came across this café. It’s small, cute and quiet. The lady is really nice and the food is good (Green apple and brie panini).

We came here in a group of 6 after lunch for some coffee. The place is nice and cozy and the attention was good. We had a few espressos and some lattes with some cookies and muffins. The coffees were nothing special but the cookies were yummy.
The trouble came later: Shortly after leaving the place my stomach wasn’t feeling right. Turns out everyone in the group ended up experiencing stomach ache that afternoon. Not sure if it was the coffee the cookies or the water but something made everyone sick. I didn’t feel well until the next day.
I know, you may be thinking maybe it’s the restaurant they went to before the coffee that made them sick — but we didn’t all eat together so I’m pretty sure it was something at Tik Talk Café… I won’t be coming back.

I first came into this café last week, and have been back three times since because they have good tea and meal choices.
It’s a cute spot with exposed brick, a giant blackboard menu, and sunshine coming in the front window.
I did have one odd experience here: I had ordered the minestrone and I had to wait for them to heat it and package it for me to take out. I paid in the meantime, but when the woman handed me the soup, she apologized because it was ‘a little salty’ that day… then why did you sell it to me?!
If they weren’t one of the closest options for lunch I might not have returned, but they have redeemed themselves since with their tea and sandwiches — I’m a bit afraid to try the soup again though.

Came across this place exploring the Harbord Village offerings a few blocks from my new place (just moved to Toronto to start at U of T in September), and have already been back a handful of times… just to satisfy cravings for that green apple and brie panini I tried on my first visit. SO GOOD! Really though… that is one outstanding sandwich haha. I can’t really speak for the rest of the menu, as I haven’t actually tried anything else (food-​wise) yet. I can’t seem to justify going and not getting my trusted favorite. Coffee is good too, though I would definitely not consider myself a coffee snob by any standards, so I’m sure there are plenty of people who would adamantly oppose my position for whatever reason… whatever.
My thoughts on the place:
–really, really good food (from my very limited selection history haha)
–not too expensive (yeahhh broke college students!)
–good coffee (by normal, non-​pretentious coffee drinkers’ standards at least)
–cute, quaint, cozy (and yeah, that does also mean tiny) atmosphere
–no wifi, as others have mentioned, but this may actually be a good thing if you don’t specifically need it, you’re looking for a study/​reading spot, and you’re as easily distracted as I am from reading/​writing papers/​being productive in general by such time-​sucking things as facebook, twitter, youtube, online shopping, and I honestly don’t even know what else
–the ladies working behind the counter have always been super sweet to me, and I really appreciate that — I don’t typically go back to a place if the staff is a roster of the misguidedly self-​important types who seem to think they’re above working there… obviously they are not… since they are…
Conclusion:
Great study spot if you don’t require internet access or tons of space, great, relatively inexpensive food and coffee, and service that doesn’t leave a sour taste in your mouth. Just don’t plan to meet up here with 14 of your closest acquaintances to discuss why the coffee is inferior (to what, I don’t know), why a lack of free internet access while you sip your latte is such an overwhelming hardship, and why having read Beowulf somehow makes you all matter more in the world.

The mother and I were on our way to the science fiction bookstore a few doors down; from the outside Tik Talk didn’t look so inspiring but we didn’t feel like wandering around finding something else and the board outside advertising sandwiches on handmade bread sounded good.
We saw on the board that they were offering a roast beef option, which mom likes. She asked whether the roast beef was red or dark; they showed it to her, and it was kinda gray, so she skipped it. That didn’t bode well for us, though, nor that when we asked for water with our meals, we each got a glass of luke-​warm tap that was little more than half full (I could understand if the counter lady was trying to be environmentally friendly, but she’d turned the tap on full blast before reaching for the glasses and didn’t turn it off between filling the two, so she wasted substantially more water than went into the glasses).
But: The food was WONDERFUL. We each had a panini — my mother’s had pesto and stilton cheese, mine brie with green apple. Hers was three half-​sandwiches of a square loaf, mine two small sourdough sandwiches, both with a small salad. The sandwiches were awesome and MORE than ample — she left an entire third behind, I left half of one.
The food was so good, we both left in that kind of good mood only caused by a delightful meal. I’ll be returning next time I’m shopping for books just because I enjoyed it so much!

I like going to Tik Talk Café to meet up with friends or professors. It’s a quiet little café owned by a Korean family from Russia. It’s a comfortable and non-​pretentious café, which is a nice break from the fancier restaurants along Harbord. I find it to be a non-​intrusive space, which makes it good for meeting up with people to talk about more serious business.
They make all of their own soups, which I like to order sometimes. They always have the borscht and then two daily soups. I’ve had the chicken noodle and the hot ‘n sour, both of which tasted homemade and lovely.
The latte is decent. I think they pull shorter shots there and so the lattes taste more milky, which I like (though I know not all do).
Tik Talk gets 3 stars because of two things:
1. No WiFi (although if you sit at the tables in the front of the café, closest to Harbord Street, you can pick up the open «Harbord» signal).
2. Cash only.

Quaint, quiet little café with exposed brick. Soft classical music playing in the background. The Tik Talk café seems like the perfect place to study, since you won’t be going online as there’s no wifi. I’m not sure if this is by design or that the management is just cheap.
Either way, that’s a deal breaker for me, along with the fact that there’s no air conditioning.
I tried a banana-​strawberry smoothie for $ 3.51 with tax. Luckily she rounded down, saving me from throwing a chair. Seriously, shopkeepers, price your stuff so that it rounds to a 5! Pennies are useless!
My drink wasn’t bad, but on the small side at about 10oz.
To get wifi, you have to sit near the windows. The signal is faint however it works and the SSID is ‘harbord’.

Tik Talk and I go way back to when I worked at U of T at Harbord and Spadina. Since that time ownership has changed hands so you no longer get the chit chat but thankfully, the new owners bought the menu so I can get my Tik Talk sandwich fix. It’s turkey, roasted red peppers and a special herbed mayo that is just right on a ciabatta. My friends who are still at U of T always go for their favourite ‘crack tuna’ sandwich. The sandwiches are in the $ 7 range and are generously sized.
Usually lots of U of T admin types, profs and grad students there.