Toronto’s Best Burgers
Toronto takes its burgers seriously now. The city that runs on Detroit-style Telway sliders and a square patty older than most of its diners has spent the last few years in a full smash-burger renaissance: Sunday pop-ups have hardened into brick-and-mortar shops, fine-dining chefs have snuck burgers onto their counters, and old griddle men keep flipping like nothing ever changed. This is a list of where we actually send people when they want one, across every mood a burger craving can take.
There are cult smash spots born as roving pop-ups, thick tavern patties cooked to a rosy medium-rare, and charbroiled pub burgers with a cold pint alongside. There are restaurant burgers from Michelin-calibre kitchens, Detroit-style sliders steamed soft under a cloth, and flame-broiled throwbacks fried in beef fat. Prices run from a four-dollar Scarborough classic to an eighteen-dollar chef’s burger, and the neighbourhoods stretch from the Queensway out to Riverside, up Yonge and across the west end.
First, a tip of the hat to the old guard — the retro institutions we love for staying power more than reinvention. Burger Shack has been griddling its cash-only Banquet Burger near Yonge and Eglinton for about forty years. Apache Burgers has run its retro Etobicoke drive-in since 1969. Johnny’s Hamburgers has flipped cheap classics in Scarborough since 1967, beloved enough that a young Mike Myers turned it into the Stan Mikita’s of Wayne’s World. And Square Boy has served its namesake square patties on the Danforth since 1964. None of them are chasing trends, and that’s exactly the point.
Everything below, though, is where we’d send you today. Here’s where Toronto is eating burgers.
Burger Drops
What began as a Sunday pop-up passed between Leslieville, the Junction and a rotating cast of borrowed kitchens is now a permanent smash-burger shop in the old Smoke’s Poutinerie space near Liberty Village. Founder Greg Bourolias, once executive sous chef at Aloette, grinds a blend of AAA Canadian chuck and premium cuts fresh every day and smashes it to a lacy, craggy crust. Get a double, and don’t skip the shoestring fries buried under jalapeño cheese sauce and pickled-jalapeño relish. It’s tiny — a few tables and a patio — so come off-peak or plan to wait.
Toronto
Tap Works Pub
A proper St. Clair West neighbourhood pub, Tap Works pours local draught and cooks a burger better than it has any right to. The house version is a six-ounce charbroiled Canadian Angus patty stacked with double jack, shaved onion, pickles and special sauce; when you want more chaos, there’s an Oklahoma-style smash with a shatteringly thin, onion-fused crust. It’s Ontario beef, ground in-house, with truffle fries the regulars swear by. Grab a stool, order a pint, and settle in.
Toronto
Dotty's
From Jay Carter and Susan Beckett — the pair behind the much-missed Dandelion — Dotty’s is a Junction Triangle bar-diner named for Susan’s restaurateur mother. The burger is a deliberate throwback: a superior Ontario chuck grind, cheddar and American melted together, with onion, pickle and mayo on a squishy Wonder bun. Hand-cut russet fries and sharp cocktails from Bar Isabel alumni round it out. Walk-ins only, evenings Tuesday through Saturday, so time it right.
Toronto
JABS - St Clair West
Short for Just Another Burger Spot, JABS built a cult following as a pop-up before landing its first brick-and-mortar on St. Clair West. Everything is done in-house — beef ground on site, sauce mixed in the back, onions pickled by hand — and the smash burgers come gloriously messy, with add-ons like bacon, sweet onion jam and a spicy honey relish. There are kale and chopped-salad bowls too, if someone in your group insists. Check their hours before you go; they shift with the seasons.
Toronto
Elijah's Automatic Flame Broiled
Shant Mardirosian, the man who founded The Burger’s Priest, is back on the Queensway with Elijah’s, a moody flame-broiled burger joint set inside a converted former law office of exposed brick and stained glass. The AAA beef is ground on site and marbled with 45-day-aged prime rib fat, then flame-broiled for real char-grill smoke; the thin fries are cooked in beef tallow for a straight-up throwback flavour. It opens with donuts in the morning and runs late into the night. Expect a line — the name behind it guarantees one.
Toronto
Danny's Pizza Tavern
In a Little Italy room where Seinfeld plays on a loop, Danny’s Pizza Tavern makes the case for the thick patty in a city gone smash-crazy. This one’s a hefty chuck-and-brisket blend, seared to a pink medium-rare and dressed simply with American cheese, shredded lettuce and tomato. It shares a menu with square tavern-style pizza and red-sauce Americana, so come hungry and order both. Reserve, or slip into its walk-in sibling, Danny’s Next Door.
Toronto
The Comrade
This candlelit Riverside cocktail bar has been an east-end fixture for more than two decades, and its double-decker burger has a following all its own. Built on charred prime rib brisket with cheese and pickles, it’s the number-one order by a mile — so beloved that when new owners took over, keeping it was non-negotiable. The rest of the menu is cocktail-forward and changes weekly, but the burger never moves. Come for a late one under the red lanterns and stay past midnight.
Toronto
The Wren
A scratch kitchen inside a Danforth craft-beer bar, The Wren treats the burger as a moving target. Its rotating specials — Mondays are the day to watch — run from a French onion burger crowned with red-wine-braised onions and Grana Padano aioli to smashed, sambal-spiked riffs with a fried egg and shrimp chips. Whatever’s on, it’s cooked with more imagination than a bar burger usually gets. Check the board, or their Instagram, for the week’s build.
Toronto
Aloette Restaurant
On the ground floor below Patrick Kriss’s two-Michelin-star Alo, Aloette was conceived as the perfect diner, and its burger is one of the great restaurant burgers in the city. A half-brisket, half-chuck patty arrives under a slice of fried Beaufort cheese with pickled onion, shredded lettuce and a swipe of cheese mayo, for around eighteen dollars. Can’t get to Spadina? The takeout spin-off, Aloette Go, puts a quarter-pounder with crispy cheddar and Go sauce in a box across a handful of locations. Either way, you win.
Toronto
The Frederick
Cory Vitiello’s Harbord Room burger was the stuff of Toronto legend, and after more than a decade away he’s revived it at The Frederick, on the ground floor of the historic Dineen Building downtown. The patty is a fresh-ground, dry-aged chuck-and-brisket blend, piled with Guinness-braised onions and white cheddar on a brioche bun. It’s a genuine beast, and it lives on the all-day menu of a proper bar and grill. Order it with a martini and pretend you’re on an expense account.
Toronto
Rosie's Burgers
Named for the owners’ grandmother, Rosie’s does simple, nostalgic smash burgers across a growing set of counter-service shops, the original on Queen West. Thin, crispy-edged patties, French fries, onion rings and strawberry shakes — comfort food that needs no reinvention. Everything’s made fresh, so budget fifteen or twenty minutes. And whatever you do, save room for the banana pudding.
Toronto
Harry’s Charbroiled
Don’t let the name fool you: Harry’s smashes and griddles its patties rather than charbroiling them, and the crispy-edged results have earned a devoted following across its several locations, from Coxwell to the Waterworks food hall. The menu keys on the Jane — Classic, Double or Big — plus a crackling crispy-chicken sandwich and thick shakes. The tagline says it all: always flippin, never slippin. Simple, fast and reliably good.
Toronto
Gold Standard
Gold Standard is where Toronto goes for a proper Telway — the Detroit-style slider that’s basically the Midwest’s answer to In-N-Out. A thin patty is griddled in mustard under a heap of shaved onions, capped with cheese on a Martin’s potato roll, then the whole thing is steamed soft under a cloth. Run out of a takeout window on Roncesvalles and a Parkdale storefront, it’s a daytime operation — roughly nine to three — so make it a lunch. Order a few; they’re small and dangerously easy.
Toronto
Richmond Station
Top Chef Canada winner Carl Heinrich has been quietly serving one of the city’s benchmark restaurant burgers at Richmond Station since 2012. The Stn. Burger stacks a pasture-raised patty with aged cheddar, pickled onions, a house beet chutney and garlic aioli on a soft bun, with rosemary fries alongside. It’s a fixture of the menu at this bustling downtown institution, which pours only Ontario wine and runs a chef’s tasting upstairs. Book a table, or grab a seat at the counter and order it at lunch.
Toronto
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