Sort-of Secret: Smoked and Smashed, a 500-square-foot barbecue spot in Vaughan

The sort-of secret: Smoked and Smashed, a smoked meat and smash burger counter in the middle of a Vaughan industrial park You may have heard of it if: You work at a nearby manufacturing company But you probably haven’t tried it because: It’s open only from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. most weekdays

The city’s voracious poutine hunters are usually found wandering Queen West after midnight, but true aficionados would be wise to make a daytime trip to an unlikely mecca: a strip mall in Vaughan, just off the 407. That’s where chef and owner Jason Cherun runs Smoked and Smashed, the 500-square-foot space where he serves up 30-day dry-aged smash burgers and house-smoked meats atop perfectly blanched fries. The window of opportunity is tight (it’s open only from 12 p.m. to 2 p.m. on Mondays, 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. other weekdays and 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Thursday nights), but visitors get to enjoy barbecue tailgate style: on a picnic table in a parking lot.

Cherun studied culinary management at George Brown, but he ended up dropping all of his courses that weren’t cooking oriented—which meant he didn’t graduate (he didn’t tell his parents). Instead, he took a few different gigs, including an apprenticeship at Terra, the kitchen at Magna Golf Club, and a job overseas at Bondi Beach in Australia. After more than 15 years in professional kitchens, he left the industry in 2007 when he realized that he wanted to be a husband and a father one day—restaurant hours were challenging enough without having to balance a family too. So he put cooking on the back burner and joined his mother’s printing business, which he eventually took over.

Related: What’s on the menu at Shake Shack’s first Canadian outpost

But the printing world slowed down during the early pandemic, which gave Cherun some time to step back and think about next steps. “I knew I couldn’t work in printing for the rest of my life,” he says. “It just wasn’t making me happy.” Meanwhile, he’d picked up a pandemic hobby: smoking and barbecuing meats. “I trained in classical Italian and French cooking, but I wanted to make the food that I really enjoyed eating,” he says. “I became obsessed.”

Luckily for Cherun, there were more ways than ever to get food into the hands of hungry customers. “Back in the day, you were either a chef, a cook at a restaurant or a caterer,” he says. “That was it. There weren’t pop-up shops, Ubers or supper clubs like there are now.” In 2022, he came across the Cookin app, a food-delivery marketplace that allows home cooks and chefs to sell ready-to-eat meals directly to customers. He set up an online shop selling smash burgers and specialty smoked meat sandwiches out of his house under the name Smoked and Smashed. It immediately took off. A few pop-up events later, he went all-in and signed a lease for his shop in Vaughan, which soft-opened in November 2023 before opening full-force in January.

At first, Cherun made everything himself, aging and grinding burger patties, smoking his own meats, and concocting barbecue ribs and brines. “I may be naïve, but I don’t know anyone else who’s making 30-day dry-aged smash burgers in this city,” he says. He’s since been able to hire a small crew, which saves him from cutting onions until four in the morning. Everything is still made by hand except the buns and the St. Albert cheese curds. “I’d love to have someone come in to make fresh buns in the morning. Maybe one day.”

The dry-aged beef chuck smash burger comes with cheddar, smash sauce (Cherun’s version of Big Mac sauce), pickles, caramelized onions and shredded lettuce on a potato bun. The crowd favourite, the McRib sandwich, is a half rack of deboned baby back pork ribs topped with shaved Vidalia onions, pickles and house-made barbecue sauce, all nestled into a fresh Italian bun. The never-frozen fries can be zhuzhed up with house-made beef gravy and brisket, smoked Montreal meat or Cherun’s rotating weekly feature.

Related: Toronto’s top 10 burgers, according to a chef who ate 250 different patties on a North American burger tour

Then there are the decadent sandwich specials, like one featuring smoked steak that’s roasted and marinated with white balsamic and truffle oil, then finished with arugula pesto and confit garlic aioli on a Tre Mari Bakery bun that’s toasted with roasted bone marrow butter.

The small indoor space has a refrigerator full of aging meat, a tightly packed shelf of spices and rubs, and a counter lined with homemade sauerkraut, sauces and dips. Every order comes with a few Double Bubble chewing gum packets—a nod to Cherun’s father-in-law, who worked for the bubblegum empire.

Cherun knows his operating hours aren’t ideal for folks who aren’t close enough to swing by for lunch. But he now has the family he’d hoped for all those years ago, and they come first. “I have to play daddy in the mornings,” he says. “Then I have to get them home by 4 o’clock and off to their soccer games or dance classes.” Still, he plans to eventually extend the hours at Smoked and Smashed and open up a more central location. Until then, it’s well worth a weekday commute—just don’t tell your boss.