You can get smash burgers and fried chicken three nights a week at this Annex café

Nafe Mustafa and Omar Ibrahim, co-owners and chefs of Those Guys—a tiny fried chicken and smash burger joint running out of an Annex coffee shop—were both born and raised in Bangladesh. Mustafa moved to BC in 2016 for business school, and Ibrahim came to Toronto in 2015 to study economics and political science. After graduating, Mustafa relocated to Toronto, where he met Ibrahim through mutual friends.

“We were both at turning points in our lives when we met in 2022, and we connected right away,” says Ibrahim. “Our dads were from the same tiny town in Bangladesh, we’d both worked as line cooks through university and—most importantly—we shared a passion for food.”

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Neither is classically trained, though. “When I moved to British Columbia, there was nowhere I could go for the food I was used to, so my dad, who is an excellent cook, started teaching me the basics of Bangladeshi cooking over Zoom,” says Mustafa. “My interest grew from there.” Ibrahim’s culinary spark was also ignited by family. “We lived in a multigenerational household in Dhaka,” he says. “Both my uncle and grandmother were incredible cooks, and I learned from them.”

They got their start on the WeCook app. “We’d tested recipes at dinner parties, and after trying our burgers and fried chicken, friends insisted we needed to sell them,” says Ibrahim. The app, however, didn’t feel like the right fit, so they looked for a space that matched their hours of availability. The Annex was their first choice. “We felt the neighbourhood was lacking in quality comfort food at affordable prices,” says Ibrahim. “In early June, I asked the owner of Crossroad Kafe, who I knew from around the neighbourhood, if he’d rent us the space after hours. Two weeks later, we were up and running.”

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The small kitchen keeps things streamlined: single- and double-patty smash burgers, two- or three-piece fried chicken meals, and a fried chicken sandwich. Everything is halal, and there’s also a Bangladeshi-inspired poutine that swaps gravy for a roux-thickened curry of ginger, garlic paste, caramelized onions, cardamom, clove, turmeric, cumin and coriander. The lone dessert is a creamy house-made tiramisu.

For now, Those Guys is a weekends-only operation as neither chef is ready to quit their day job just yet. Ibrahim works full time at Mallo Coffee and Bar, and Mustafa is in sales. “We have aspirations, but we’re also realistic,” says Mustafa. “We wanted a side hustle. We love cooking together, and we have similar food philosophies. On Mondays and Tuesdays, I’m selling accounting software, and I can’t wait for Friday to come. I love the adrenalin rush when we’re serving 10 or 15 tickets at once.”

As for the name? “When people eat our food, we want them to recognize the care and love we put into it and think, It’s gotta be those guys who made it.”

Those Guys, 262 Christie St. (inside Crossroad Kafe), @thoseguysbnc