Arepa Cafe

I've been curious to try the Arepa cafe on Queen since I've moved down to Queen West mainly because I had no idea what an Arepa was.  Being the food-thusiastic curious person I am, I needed to figure that out.  So on a Sunday morning, my friend Andrew and I met there to try some arepas for brunch.  Walking into the cafe, with exposed brick, we parked ourselves at a table and started our culninary journey there.  The thing about the cafe is you can order at the counter to take out your meal or wait to be served. 

Let's start with what an Arepa is: Arepas are small cornbread sandwiches mainly sold in Venezuela and stuffed with a variety of fillings.  There are over 10 kinds of Arepas at the cafe to choose from with fillings such as meat, pork, steak, chorizo, octopus, beans, plantains, avocado and cheese just to name a few.  There is also a fresh juice bar which I will have to try next time and some other entrees, salads and desserts.
Andrew picks the 'Reina Pepieda- the Curvy Queen' which is an arepa with chicken, avocado, red onion and coriander and I pick the 'Pabellon Vegie Arepa' which has avocado, cheese, beans and a fried plaintain stick in it.   They come to our tables and we are puzzled about how to eat them.  The fillings are pouring out of the arepas and so we use our forks to eat some of the stuffings before we ditch them and use our hands.  The arepas come with 3 sauces which they bring and they warn us that the yellow sauce is hot.  I think I can take heat so I put a fair share of the sauce on my arepa ... WHOA... hot, hot, hot.. I needed more water immediately and the problem is - the cafe got busy so it was hard to flag the server down for more water... so be warned, the yellow sauce has a MEAN punch...the other 2 sauces were milder and better accompaniments to the sandwhich.  Also the portions are not huge and also come with a forkful of coleslaw so it's good for a snack and I was concerned that we would be hungry after our meal.
I would have to come back to try another one but it wouldn't be a regular spot for me but am glad to have discovered another culninary experience.

*** stars
Arepa Café
490 Queen Street West
416-362.4111
http://arepacafe.blogspot.com/