Toronto | Media Event At The Poke Box

The Poke Box!

So I noticed a trend in Toronto recently, it’s called Hawaiian Poke, but in a box. Almost every week, a new food joint featuring Hawaiian poke has popped up around the city. Being the clueless person that I am sometimes, I thought that these places were cafes where you can eat and play Pokémon Go! Hey, you can’t blame me, considering how these restaurants started popping up after the launch of Pokémon Go in Canada! Luckily I was able to experience first-hand what these poké shops are all about thanks to Patrick from Feedmyphone (YAY my first #feedmyphone event!). Patrick graciously invited me to The Poké Box’s media event, where I got to sample some of their delicious boxes.

Samples of meals to try at The Poké Box

So, what exactly is Hawaiian poke, you ask?

Good question, Google helped me to answer this one. Poke is a popular raw fish salad in Hawaiian cuisine. The word “poke” in Hawaiian means “to slice or cut.” While poke is generally made from yellowfin tuna, other raw fish ingredients are sometimes used in this fish salad.

Yay, preview party with other foodies from Toronto!

I was totally in my element taking photos with all the other food bloggers

It’s so incredible to be in a place where I’m not the only one who thinks that a chopstick makes a huge difference in the photo. Of course, everyone was snapping away to the point where our host, Patrick was like “OK guys, start eating! I’m going to eat without you!” (Sorry Patrick).

Poke samples for us foodies!

Can you believe I took over 50 photos from this event for this blog? I have no artistic talent when it comes to photography arrangement and was struggling to take some decent pictures. Luckily, Bao from Lucid Photography thought of the cute fish layout.

Patrick also partnered with the talented Jenny from CardsbyJD to create cute nametags:

My cute nametag, courtesy of CardsbyJD. Update: My Instagram handle is now ensquaredaired

I didn’t realize she also made the cute props until later in the night. I had a burning question and couldn’t understand why we had green poop as a prop but was too shy to ask since I knew no one at the event. Later on, as I became more comfortable with everyone, I blurted out my question, to which Jenny laughed and told me it’s wasabi! Oops… clueless sometimes, I tell you.

“Is that green poop?” No Nancy… No… That’s wasabi!

The Poké Box | $12.50

Tuna, salmon, mango chili, seaweed salad, crab salad, cucumber, edamame, red onion, roasted sesame, furikake, ginger

We had samples of the classic box on the menu, called the Poké Box. This salmon and tuna box is delicious, thanks to the ingredients in this box.

This dish is a special order; you have to eat the ingredients off the table… just kidding… your order will come in a box.

Up close and personal with samples of The Poké Box

Super Food | $11.50

Superfood box samples just waiting for us to devour them

Salmon, edamame, beetroot, kale, seaweed salad, avocado, ginger miso, coconut, tobiko, sesame

If you think about all the ingredients that went into this dish, it ain’t cheap! These are all high-quality ingredients, and that zucchini spaghetti is made with love (trust me, I use to make zucchini spaghetti with a spiralizer … it takes some time to make).

Create your own customized poke combo at the Poke Box

Personalized boxes. Clearly, based on the colorful boxes, everyone else did a better job ordering than I did

We were invited to create our own boxes to eat on the go. I also happen to lack creativity in combining ingredients and came up with a very, very sad box combo. Luckily, Jeremy and Kevin (the owners) came to the rescue and suggested some ingredients to help spice up my box. I would have been really sad as a paying customer to receive what I had gotten and I recommend first timers to order from the menu. Once you’re more familiar with poke boxes, then consider experimenting and creating a custom menu.

This post is not sponsored. However, the food was complimentary, courtesy of The Poké Box and Feedmyphone. Opinions expressed are my own.