Calamari in Toronto

19 restaurants in Toronto list calamari on their menus. The cheapest is Mary Be Kitchen at $12.00, listed as Grilled Calamari. The typical price across town is $19.99, and the dearest we found is $25.00 at Bar Butcher, so the two ends of the list are $13.00 apart, which is 108% more for the same dish. Of the 19 kitchens listed, 8 charge more than a dollar under the typical price, 3 sit within a dollar of it and 8 charge more than a dollar over.

We track calamari in 16 other areas and compare them all on calamari across Canada. The typical price there runs $18.00 at the median, so Toronto is dearer than most of them, with a lower typical price than 4 of the 16. The lowest best price anywhere we cover is $9.00 at Joe Muer Seafood in Windsor, ON, and the highest best price is $16.95 in Grande Prairie, AB. The nearest area with it is Mississauga, about 17 km away, where the best price is $13.00.

Where is the cheapest calamari in Toronto? Mary Be Kitchen, at $12.00 on 21 St. Clair Avenue West. The same dish reaches $25.00 elsewhere in town, so where you order it changes the bill by $13.00.

What should calamari cost here? About $19.99 is the typical price across the 19 kitchens in Toronto that list it. Of the ones listed above, 8 are more than a dollar below that and 8 are more than a dollar above, so the typical price is a middle rather than a floor.

Is it cheaper nearby? The nearest area we track it in is Mississauga, about 17 km away, where the best price is $13.00. That is $1.00 more than the best price here.

Why do the prices differ so much? We compare what each menu calls the same dish, and menus are not identical: portion, cut, sides and the kind of room you are sitting in all ride on the price, and none of that shows up in a number. Part portions and half sizes are kept out of this comparison, and a chain charging the same at several addresses is counted once, so the spread above is between genuinely different kitchens rather than the same one repeated.