Canada Trip.co.uk

Well, i was saving this little article for a little later in the month, but an honest comment on our Wendy’s article by Steve recommending Harvey’s made my mind up – and moved it a little earlier!

One of the many things i love about Canada is the food. Not only do you get an incredible choice of places to eat, you also get quality which unless you pay top money for, you don’t get in the UK.

On May’s trip out to Canada, i set out to hold true to my word that i would visit as many places to eat that people will commonly see – since you have such a great choice of places, its always good to make an informed one right? So, on this quest i found myself at the doors of Harvey’s.

Harvey’s is a fast food restaurant chain that operates in Canada, with locations concentrated in southern Ontario, southern Quebec, as well as the Maritimes, Manitoba, British Columbia, and Alberta. It serves hamburgers, hot dogs, french fries, onion rings, and other traditional fast food fare. Harvey’s is the second-largest Canadian-established restaurant chain behind Tim Hortons, and is the fourth-largest burger chain in Canada. So when you’re eating here, you’re truly eating Canadian Food!

With so many different restaurants to eat, you’ll find each one has its own unique characteristic. Harvey’s i have to say was my favourite of all the restaurants in Canada as far as their special characteristic goes.. This is because they specialise in giving you the freshest burger they can.. Freshly grilling it and then taking it over to a counter. From here the member of staff will ask you what you want on the burger – so rather than being restricted, asking for a burger without blah blah blah, or with extra pickles – you can get your burger made up exactly how you want it.. SO if you want everything on – just ask for everything!
Some of the options you get when having your burger made up are Lettuce, chopped onion, gerkins (pickles), pickled hot peppers, green relish, tomato sauce, mayo, and mustard.

We had the double original burgers since we were pretty hungry, and they are BIG burgers! Harvey’s take freshness seriously and i have to say, the burger was the freshest burger i had at any of the restaurants in Canada. The burger its self was hot, juicy and tasted fantastic, almost flame grilled, though officially it isn’t. The only small criticism i would have with the burger would be that it doesn’t quite have the same texture as a wendy’s or even a&w burger has, though this is pretty insignificant when you look at the sandwich as a whole. It is simply pure satisfaction.

When you go for a combo, obviously you’ll want to know what the fries are like. I think the fries at the Harvey’s we went to were actually the best fries we had anywhere. They are your usual Canadian Fast Food Fries — that being nicely seasoned skins-on fries, something i really wish would catch on in the UK. Something you may also want to try while at Harvey’s is their Poutine. Poutine for those of you who haven’t heard of it before is a purely Canadian dish. It is made of French fries, covered in fresh cheese curd and then covered in brown gravy. Poutine actually originates from Quebec but has found its way through the rest of Canada, proving to be very popular! So don’t forget to try some when you’re out there!

Unlike a&w, Harvey’s don’t push a particular drink at you, so just like McDonald’s, Wendy’s or Burger King etc – you have the usual choice of drinks, though Harvey’s do sell Pepsi, not coke – and Iced Tea. It’s a shame as I’m a Coke Cola fan, but i love my iced tea… another trend i wish the UK would get its act together on!

If you’re not feeling so adventurous they do have a drive through.. though as we didn’t go through it our selves I’m not entirely sure how the burger ordering works as they would still have to make the burgers up fresh and to order (If anyone wants to leave comments about going through Harvey’s Drive Through – please do!).

So to sum it up, if you want to eat a true Canadian burger, not having to worry about quality, what will be on it, or how fresh the burger will actually be – Harvey’s is the place to go! I would recommend you make this your first choice before going to any other restaurants!

Harvey’s Restaurants can be found in any of the provinces and areas i mentioned above, though if you’re in Newmarket you can visit the very one we did. It’s just off the main road (Highway 31 – Davis Drive) on the right as you drive in from the east.

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This entry was posted on Monday, June 14th, 2010 at 9:10 am and is filed under Places to Eat. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.