An iconic Montreal diner just opened a location in North York
And if you can polish off one of their meat lovers pizzas, it’s free
Toronto likes to think we have everything, but where can you get pizza, smoked meat and Greek deli classics, all at the same spot and with a dash of Montreal flair? Enter Spano’s Diner.
Now open on Hafis Road (just around the corner from Bellwoods Brewery’s North York location), Spanos isn’t just a restaurant—it’s a full-on time machine with checkered floors, red-and-white booths and massive portions that scream at you to clean your plate or Yiayia is going to be mad.
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Owner Chris Dessilas isn’t playing around with the legacy, either. He’s been in the Spanos game since 1986, when he started working as a delivery driver at Pizza Spano in Montreal, and he’s carrying a torch lit by his father in the 1960s. “It’s my dad’s sauce and my dad’s dough,” Dessilas says. “Mr. Spano started off with a smoked meat joint at a farmers’ market, but he didn’t know much about pizza. The Greek community, we all talk, so he said, ‘I’m looking for a pizza guy!’ My dad showed up and worked for him as a cook, and they became best friends.”
Dessilas bought the Montreal diner in 1996, and one of his own former delivery drivers, Steve Ramanan, had been after him to open up a Toronto location ever since. Now, Ramanan is one of Dessilas’s two business partners here.
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When it comes to pizza, Dessilas is strictly old school, favouring stone ovens. And the entire menu, right down to the tzatziki, is made from scratch on site. In addition to pizza, hungry people can tuck into juicy souvlaki, poutine, chicken wings, heaping bowls of pasta and, of course, smoked meat sandwiches.
If you’re feeling particularly brave—or like you haven’t eaten since the mid-’90s—there’s the Meat Lovers Pizza Challenge. If you can knock back the 18-inch, eight-pound pie loaded with Montreal smoked meat, pepperoni, bacon, sausage and ground beef, all smothered in a thick layer of cheese, in 45 minutes, it’s free. Many have tried. Few have succeeded.
Leah Rumack has worked as the deputy editor of Today’s Parent and the features director of Fashion and has contributed as a writer to a long list of Canadian brands including Toronto Life, the Globe and Mail, the Toronto Star, Chatelaine, Elle Canada, Zoomer, the National Post, EnRoute and Re:porter. Her work focuses on travel, food, pop culture, beauty and fashion.
