Caribbean food in Scarborough: where to go for jerk, roti and patties

The Scarborough Caribbean kitchens worth the drive, what each one is known for, and how to order roti, jerk and doubles without getting it wrong. Every place with its own phone number.

Scarborough is where a lot of Toronto's best Caribbean cooking actually happens, and where the portions are largest for the money. It is also the part of the city where Guyanese and Trinidadian kitchens sit side by side rather than under one flag, so the same street can give you a Trini double and a Guyanese cook-up within two doors.

This is a guide to the ones worth the drive, written from a directory that keeps a working phone number for each. It is not the downtown list. The rooms out here are smaller, the counters busier, and the people behind them have usually been doing it a long time.

Know what you are ordering

Three things account for most of what gets sold in a Scarborough Caribbean kitchen, and knowing them makes the counter far less stressful.

• Roti is the bread, not the dish. Say "chicken roti" or "goat roti". If you want the bread torn and served next to the curry rather than wrapped around it, ask for a buss-up-shut. A shop that makes its own roti skin fresh is telling you it cares; a shop microwaving it from frozen is telling you the opposite.
• Jerk is a marinade and a method, not a sauce added at the end. Good jerk arrives with char on it and heat that builds. If the chicken is wet and orange and mild, someone took a shortcut.
• Patties are the test. They are cheap, made in volume, and a shop that cannot be bothered to get the pastry flaky is telling you how it treats everything else. Order one before you commit to a full plate.

The kitchens

These are the Scarborough Caribbean spots in the directory right now. Ratings and counts come from Google and change; the phone number is theirs, and it is worth a ring before a long drive.

A few notes from the map data worth knowing before you go. Scotty Bons on Warden Avenue has more than two thousand reviews on Google, which for a Caribbean grill in Scarborough is a lot of plates out the door. The Roti Hut on Pitfield Road does takeaway, catering and delivery, so it is the one to keep for a group order rather than a sit-down. Inner Circle on Kennedy Road is the small room with the high rating, the kind of place a neighbourhood keeps to itself.

If you are ordering for a crowd

Two of these do catering, and a Caribbean spread travels better than most. If you are feeding a hall for a christening or a nine-night, call ahead by a day, ask what holds and what does not, and order the rice and peas separate from anything wet so it arrives right.

Before you go

Ring first. Hours on Caribbean kitchens move with the day's cooking, not with a printed schedule, and a Sunday can sell out early. The numbers on these pages are the businesses' own, not a booking line, so you are talking to the people who will cook your food.

Written by See The Six · kept current from the directory, last checked 2026-08-24