Location: 478 Dundas Street West, Toronto
Website: None
No, technically Harmony Restaurant doesn’t serve Turkmen cuisine (it specializes in northern Chinese fare), but they do serve an interesting bowl of lamb soup. Turkmenistan consumes the second most lamb per capita in the world. Close enough, I guess?
(Hey, you try doing this blog. Good luck finding a Turkmen restaurant in Toronto.)
Harmony Restaurant’s specialty is a bowl of lamb soup with bread, which features chunks of tender lamb and chewy cubes of bread in a very lamby broth.
The presence of bread is odd at first, but it basically plays the same role as noodles in a noodle soup. It’s not mushy at all; it’s chewy and starchy, and soaks up the flavour from the soup. It’s surprisingly tasty.
The chunks of lamb are great. They’re super tender, a little bit fatty, and packed with a deep, meaty flavour.
The broth, too, is absolutely crammed with that unmistakable lamb flavour. If you don’t like lamb, this isn’t the dish for you. It’s not subtle.
It also has a nice zippiness and a mild kick that ensures it never feels one-note rich. It’s a tasty bowl of soup, especially once you add a few spoonfuls of the smoky chili oil.
I also tried a pork bun, which wasn’t quite as good as the soup. The pork was well-seasoned and tender, but the bun itself was dense and dry. It was basically like a big saltine. It wasn’t great.
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