It’s been a year since anyone has eaten a juicy rib-eye or a bowl of impossibly fragrant Thai curry or anything, for that matter inside a packed Toronto restaurant, an experience once as central to life in this food-obsessed town as piling onto the streetcar at rush hour. (That, we don’t miss.) Since then, more than 10,000 restaurants have reportedly closed across Canada hundreds in Toronto taking countless jobs along with them. The rest continue to scrape by on a mix of takeout, delivery and outdoor dining, along with Covid relief funds and, if they’re lucky, flexible landlords.
How three out-of-work Toronto cooks launched thriving online businesses
How three out-of-work Toronto cooks launched thriving online businesses
After losing jobs during the first wave, these food workers became entrepreneurs from home By Kelsey Adams
Kennedy Sherwood’s bake shop Knead It baked took off in January.
Every week a new online food business pops up in Toronto.
Back in March 2020, out-of-work restaurant chefs and home cooks experimenting in the kitchen during their newfound, lockdown-induced free time started selling meals of all kinds via online businesses.
Some are industrious people whose hours were cut when restaurants pivoted to takeout and delivery. Some are falling back on passions to make a living, and some are just having fun and seeing where things go.
Toronto s secret new pasta joints are hidden inside homes
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While some have delved into baking during lockdown, or even starting small businesses out of their homes delivering products, others have done the same with the art of pasta creation.
Back To The Pasta and Pasta Forever are just two of many handmade pasta delivery services operating out of homes in Toronto, with other businesses like Rockwell Pasta doing the same thing. Like with baking, some are hobbyists, but others are professionals using their talents and sudden surplus of time to find a new way to feed people.