Toronto's Chinese Food and Dim Sum Scene

Our ethnic enclaves guide and Chinese head tax page cover the broader history. This page is specifically about how Toronto's Chinese food geography moved — twice — over the past century.

From displaced Chinatown to Spadina

An earlier downtown Chinatown around Elizabeth Street, near what's now Nathan Phillips Square, was displaced when the area was cleared for construction of the new Toronto City Hall. The community re-centred on Spadina Avenue and Dundas Street West, which remains the most visible "Chinatown" today, with a second cluster developing along Gerrard Street East in Riverdale, known as East Chinatown.

The suburban shift

Starting in the 1980s, a large wave of new Chinese immigrants — bypassing the traditional downtown port of entry entirely — settled directly into the northeastern GTA suburbs: Agincourt in Scarborough, northeast North York, and Markham. This wave included substantial Hong Kong immigration in the years leading up to the 1997 handover to China, bringing capital and a large, food-literate Cantonese community into York Region. Markham is now described as hosting the largest concentration of regional Chinese cuisine in Canada.

Dim sum and beyond

Dim sum itself is rooted in Cantonese "yum cha" teahouse culture from Hong Kong and Guangzhou, and Scarborough and Markham became home to large banquet-style restaurants along corridors like Steeles Avenue and Highway 7, some still using traditional push-cart service. Toronto's Chinese food scene today extends well beyond Cantonese dim sum to include Sichuan, Hakka and hand-pulled-noodle traditions, reflecting a more recent diversification of Chinese immigration to the GTA.

Sources

• Destination Toronto — 20 Best Dim Sum Spots in Toronto
• BlogTO — The Best Dim Sum in Toronto