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- Written by: AfroToronto Team
- Parent Category: Lifestyle
- Category: Food and Drink
Chef Tolu Okojie is the founder of Greelz, a Nigerian Afro-fusion restaurant with two Toronto locations participating in ByBlacks Restaurant Week 2026 (May 11–17). From catering out of a home kitchen to running one of the city's most talked-about food brands, Okojie has built his business on suya, premium ingredients and a bold commitment to bringing Nigerian street food to the world, no shortcuts taken.
There are restaurants that serve food, and then there are restaurants that carry a mission. Greelz, the Nigerian Afro-fusion brand founded by Chef Tolu Okojie, fits squarely in the second category. Born from the streets of Lagos and refined in the heart of Toronto, Greelz has become one of the most distinctive food stories in a city already overflowing with culinary talent.
Every meal counts: How Frontlines Catering is feeding community and building youth futures in Weston
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- Written by: AfroToronto Team
- Parent Category: Lifestyle
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In Toronto's Weston neighbourhood, a quiet revolution is happening one meal at a time. Frontlines Catering, the social enterprise arm of Weston Frontlines Centre, uses food to fund youth programming, employment training and community food access. During ByBlacks Restaurant Week 2026, the organization brings its Caribbean-inspired menu to a national stage. We sat down with Culinary Lead Shannae Rowe to talk food, purpose and the futures being built in that kitchen.
There are catering companies, and then there are operations that carry the weight of a whole community on their shoulders. Frontlines Catering, the food services arm of Weston Frontlines Centre, falls squarely into the second category. Tucked into a neighbourhood that doesn't always make the city's highlight reel, Frontlines has quietly served Toronto's Weston community for nearly four decades, using meals to fund youth programs, employment training, mental health support and weekly grocery access for families who need it most.
A landmark exhibition tracing photography's role in the Black Arts Movement arrives at the Mississippi Museum of Art in Jackson from July 25 to November 8, 2026. Photography and the Black Arts Movement, 1955–1985 brings together over 150 works by more than 100 artists from across the African diaspora. For Black Canadian travellers, it's a rare invitation to combine cultural pilgrimage with the deep, soulful history of the American South.
There are exhibitions, and then there are events that feel more like a reckoning. Photography and the Black Arts Movement, 1955–1985, currently on a national tour organized by the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., is firmly in the second category. This summer, it lands at the Mississippi Museum of Art (MMA) in Jackson, on view from July 25 to November 8, 2026, marking its final stop after acclaimed runs at the National Gallery and the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles.
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- Written by: AfroToronto Team
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- Category: Mental Health
May is Mental Health Month, a meaningful reminder to check in on yourself and those you love. For many families in Ontario's Black and African diaspora communities, seeking mental health support comes with real cultural and systemic barriers. Regulated social workers and social service workers offer a trustworthy path forward. Understanding who regulates them, how accountability works, and how to verify credentials before reaching out can make all the difference.
May is Mental Health Month, which makes it a good time to do something many of us put off: check in honestly on how we're doing and think about whether the people around us are actually getting the support they need.
Chef Blessing Alasan of Blessinglicious brings the bold, soulful flavours of Nigerian street food to Scarborough, Ontario. From her mother's kitchen in Nigeria to selling 100 packs of suya chicken her first pandemic weekend, her journey is rooted in love, resilience, and radical inclusivity. Now participating in ByBlacks Restaurant Week 2026, Blessing is lovingly feeding her community on her own terms.
There is a particular kind of confidence that comes from feeding people well. Not the studied confidence of culinary school or the manufactured bravado of food television, but the quieter, deeper kind that grows when a dish you made from scratch leaves someone speechless. Chef Blessing Alasan has had that feeling since she was a teenager in Nigeria, cooking for friends just because she loved it, watching people come back for more, listening as the compliments slowly started to sound less like kindness and more like a sign.
London has one of the world's most dynamic African and Caribbean diaspora communities, and for Black travellers, the city rewards those willing to look beyond the postcards. From Brixton's cultural renaissance to the jerk-scented laneways of Peckham and Hackney's ever-evolving creative scene, this guide covers the restaurants, heritage sites, community hubs, and insider knowledge you need to experience London beyond the tourist trail.
London has always been a city that belongs, at least in part, to the African and Caribbean diaspora. The connections go back centuries, long before the Windrush generation arrived in 1948 and forever reshaped the capital's cultural DNA. Today, over 1.1 million Black people call London home, accounting for roughly 13% of the city's population, making it one of the most significant Black cultural centres in the world outside of the African continent.
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- Written by: Meres J. Weche
- Parent Category: Lifestyle
- Category: Food and Drink
Toronto's Afro-Caribbean and African dining scene has grown into one of the most vibrant and culturally rich corners of the city's restaurant landscape. From a Michelin-recognized Jamaican kitchen on Portland Street to an award-winning pan-Caribbean house on King West, a bold Nigerian kitchen in Parkdale, and a beloved Haitian dining room on Dundas, these seven restaurants represent the full breadth of what Black diaspora cuisine looks like at its finest.
Toronto holds a specific kind of culinary authority. Few cities on earth can claim the depth of Caribbean, West African, and East African diaspora communities that have shaped this city's food culture over decades. Jamaican families arrived in significant numbers from the 1960s onward, building vibrant neighbourhoods and food cultures in areas like Eglinton West and Scarborough. West Indian and Trinidadian communities followed, then Nigerian, Ghanaian, Ethiopian, Eritrean, and Somali communities, each bringing their culinary traditions with them and planting them firmly in the city. What these communities built, often quietly and without much mainstream recognition, was a food culture of extraordinary depth and variety.
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- Written by: AfroToronto Team
- Parent Category: Lifestyle
- Category: Food and Drink
Toronto's Black-owned café and bakery scene is thriving, shaped by founders who bring diverse African and Caribbean traditions to every cup and counter. From Marchelle McKenzie's viral brownie shop to Milkyas Tefera's Ethiopian coffee roastery, these establishments offer far more than great food. They represent cultural identity, community pride, and entrepreneurial excellence. Here's your guide to five Black-owned spots across the city worth exploring.
Toronto has one of the most diverse food cultures in the world, and its Black-owned café and bakery scene is a powerful expression of that richness. Rooted in Caribbean, African, and diasporic traditions, these businesses do more than serve good bites and drinks. They create gathering spaces, carry cultural memory, and give communities something to rally around. For anyone who believes that spending money is a form of voting, these five spots offer a delicious and meaningful way to put that conviction into practice.
Melvin D. Bakandika’s If I Could Lift This Hammer explores worthiness through myth, memory, and cultural symbolism. The book invites readers to reconnect with an intrinsic sense of self-worth that was never meant to be earned.
In a cultural moment shaped by comparison, performance, and constant validation, conversations about self-worth often feel transactional. We are encouraged to prove ourselves, to earn legitimacy, to measure our value through productivity, visibility, or approval. If I Could Lift This Hammer, the debut book by Melvin D. Bakandika, takes a different approach.
Rather than offering strategies for self-improvement, the book asks a more foundational question: What if worthiness was never something we had to earn in the first place?
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- Written by: AfroToronto Team
- Parent Category: Lifestyle
- Category: Food and Drink
Discover some of Toronto’s top jerk chicken restaurants serving authentic Caribbean spice, smoky perfection, and a taste of home across the city.
In Toronto, the city's rhythm has a distinct Caribbean beat. It’s a pulse you can feel in the summer parade crowds, hear in the sounds of soca and dancehall, and, most deliciously, taste in the smoky, spicy, and soul-warming embrace of jerk chicken. More than just a dish, jerk is a story of migration, community, and culinary tradition—a story written in pimento wood smoke and Scotch bonnet fire.
