Is Rap's Still Open? Restaurant Takeover Update (Toronto, ON)

Rap's, a Jamaican and Caribbean restaurant on Eglinton Avenue West in Toronto's Little Jamaica, was the ninth episode of Restaurant Takeover (Food Network Canada), airing on 2012-10-25. TVmaze's synopsis describes a restaurant facing more competition as other Caribbean spots opened nearby, with food that did not hold up against them and decor in disarray. The show sent chef Derek Minkensky and designer Paula Velez. TV Guide's season listing says the episode gave the restaurant business advice and a renovation so that it could compete with similar places.

No page I read names the show alongside an address. The match to Rap's at 1541 Eglinton Avenue West rests on the name and the neighborhood, and no other Caribbean restaurant of that name came up in the research for this entry.

A blogTO piece dated June 2012 by its web address, A Night Out at Eglinton West and Oakwood, described Rap's as known for jerk chicken sold from an outdoor barbecue east of Oakwood. Customers bought a ticket inside, about $8 for a medium order, and collected the chicken outside. According to blogTO, it stayed open until around 5 or 6 a.m. and sat near other Caribbean spots at 1545, 1569 and 1602 Eglinton Avenue West. The article does not mention the show.

CTV News published a story by Hannah Alberga on 2021-10-29 about late-night food in Little Jamaica, and a photo caption in it describes Rap's as serving authentic Jamaican food on Eglinton Avenue West. A Streets of Toronto listing, with a page-modified date of 2026-07-25 and a note that its details were current through 2024, lists jerk chicken, oxtail, curry goat and ackee and saltfish, and says the restaurant has been open for more than 30 years. The website listed for the business on its Google Maps profile, read on 2026-10-19, showed a 2026 copyright notice, the Eglinton Avenue West address, the phone number 416-784-0008 and a menu with prices, and it describes the restaurant as having operated for over four decades.

The pages I read do not itemize the changes made during the episode, so this entry does not describe them.