Toronto’s Latin American Neighbourhoods: Where to Go

Toronto does not have a single “Latin quarter”. Its Spanish-speaking community, the city’s fourth-largest non-official language group, is spread along a few corridors west of downtown: St. Clair Avenue West around Oakwood and Dufferin, Kensington Market, the Dufferin Grove blocks between Bloor and College, and the Jane and Finch area in the northwest. This guide tells you where to go, what you will find on each street, and the Spanish you need to order at a Latin bakery or chat with the owner of a corner grocer. It is written for English-speaking Torontonians who want to use their Spanish in the city without buying a plane ticket.

Along the way you will see how much a few phrases buy you. If you want to measure where you are before you start wandering, the free six-minute level test gives you a starting level.

Where is Toronto’s Latin American community concentrated?

Before you go wandering, find out what level you are starting from. The free level test takes about six minutes.

West of downtown, in a band that runs from Kensington Market up through Dufferin Grove to St. Clair West, and then north to Jane and Finch. That is the list a Spanish-language guide by TorontoHispano gives, naming The Junction, Dufferin Grove, Kensington Market, St. Clair West and Jane and Finch as the five neighbourhoods with the largest Latin presence. None is exclusively Latin; all have Spanish on the street, in shop windows and on café menus.

The census explains why no single quarter exists. According to the City of Toronto’s 2021 census backgrounder on language, 46,355 residents speak Spanish most often at home, making it the fourth most common non-official home language, and that number grew 11.6 percent between 2016 and 2021. A further 78,575 people report Spanish as their mother tongue. A community that size, growing through immigration from Colombia, Mexico, Venezuela and Central America, settles where rents and transit make sense rather than in one enclave.

The practical upshot: you can hear and use Spanish in several parts of the city, mostly on streetcar and subway lines, and the best way to find it is to walk a block of each corridor rather than hunt for a sign that says Latin Town.

What will you find on St. Clair West around Oakwood?

A long stretch of Latin bakeries, grocers and restaurants sharing the avenue with the Italian businesses that gave the strip its name. Wikipedia describes Corso Italia, on St. Clair West between Westmount Avenue just east of Dufferin and Lansdowne Avenue, as Toronto’s second Italian enclave with “a significant Latin American and Portuguese community in the area”. TorontoHispano singles out the same strip for its Latin American bakeries and shops.

Ride the 512 St. Clair streetcar and get off anywhere between Oakwood and Lansdowne. What you will see, generically, because this guide only names what the fetched sources name: panaderías selling pan dulce and empanadas, small supermercados with Colombian, Peruvian and Mexican staples, and lunch counters where the menu is handwritten in Spanish first. The street is also the setting of the summer salsa festival that has its own article on this blog, Salsa on St. Clair: a Spanish learner’s guide.

Spanish you will use here: “Me da una empanada de carne, por favor” (a beef empanada, please), “¿Cuánto cuesta?” (how much?), “¿Tiene cambio?” (do you have change?), and “Está muy rico” (it is delicious), which makes any shopkeeper smile. On this strip the staff are used to beginners and will slow down if you ask: “Más despacio, por favor”.

Is Kensington Market a Latin American neighbourhood?

Partly, and loudly. TorontoHispano describes Kensington as an eclectic neighbourhood that is home to a vibrant Latin community, known for shops, restaurants and cafés serving authentic Latin American food, with colourful murals along the streets. It is the easiest place in Toronto to go from a taco counter to an empanada stand to a Latin grocer in one block, and it sits a short walk from the Vamos office at 240 Richmond St W.

Kensington is where Toronto learners tend to have their first real exchange in Spanish, because many counters are staffed by Mexican, Salvadoran and Colombian speakers and the orders are short. A few scripts: “Para llevar” (to go) and “para comer aquí” (to eat here); “Sin cilantro, por favor”; “¿Qué me recomienda?” (what do you recommend?), which is the single most useful question in any Latin kitchen; and “La cuenta, por favor”.

Two cautions. The market changes quickly, so a stall that was there in spring may not be there in autumn; and it is a tourist street, so staff may answer in English out of habit. Keep going in Spanish and most will switch back. Our older post on Spanish tapas restaurants in Toronto covers the Spain side of the food map.

A native teacher can come to your home anywhere in the City of Toronto, any day from 9am to 9pm, and set you a shopping list to fill in Spanish on St. Clair or in Kensington.

What about Dufferin Grove, College Street and The Junction?

These are the residential pockets where Latin families live rather than the commercial strips where they shop. Dufferin Grove is bordered by Bloor Street West to the north, Ossington Avenue to the east, College Street to the south and Dufferin Street to the west, according to Wikipedia, which also notes a large Portuguese population spilling in from Little Portugal to the southwest. TorontoHispano lists it among the five most Latin neighbourhoods for its accessibility and nightlife.

College Street between Ossington and Dufferin and Bloor between Dufferin and Lansdowne are the streets to walk: bakeries, small independent shops and the bars and restaurants that Wikipedia describes as the neighbourhood’s active nightlife. Spanish shows up in the grocers and in the parents’ groups at the two public elementary schools, Dewson Street and Ossington/Old Orchard. The Junction, further northwest, is the newcomer-friendly, gentrifying area TorontoHispano describes as a meeting point of immigrant communities including Latin Americans.

Jane and Finch, the fifth neighbourhood on the TorontoHispano list, is described there as a multicultural area with a notable Latin community, more affordable rents and community services, shops and restaurants that serve it. The Centre for Spanish Speaking Peoples, the city’s long-standing Spanish-language settlement agency, is based on Jane Street in North York. If you work or volunteer in the northwest, this is where your Spanish will be used most seriously, with newcomers rather than with menus; see our guide to Latin American newcomers in Toronto.

How do you order and chat in Spanish at a Latin bakery?

Greet, point, ask, thank. “Buenos días” or “Buenas tardes” first, always. Then “Me da…” or “Quisiera…” plus the item, “¿Cuánto es?” for the total, and “Gracias, hasta luego” on the way out. That is the whole transaction. The conversation starts when you add one question: “¿De dónde es usted?” (where are you from?), which in a Toronto Latin bakery opens a story about Bogotá, Lima or Guadalajara.

A short list for the counter:

• Me da un café con leche, por favor. A coffee with milk, please.
• ¿Qué es esto? What is this? (pointing at the pastry case)
• Uno de estos y dos de esos. One of these and two of those.
• ¿Lo tiene caliente? Do you have it warm?
• ¿Aceptan tarjeta? Do you take cards?
• Está buenísimo. This is really good.
• ¿Cómo se dice esto en español? How do you say this in Spanish?

Use usted with the owner and anyone older; tú is fine with staff your age who use it first. If you blank, “Perdón, estoy aprendiendo español” (sorry, I am learning Spanish) gets patience everywhere in this city. Vocabulary varies by country, so the same pastry may be a “pan” in one shop and a “bollo” in another; asking “¿cómo se llama?” is part of the fun.

Key facts

• 46,355 Toronto residents speak Spanish most often at home, the fourth most common non-official home language, up 11.6 percent from 2016 (City of Toronto, 2021 Census backgrounder on language).
• 78,575 Toronto residents have Spanish as a mother tongue, 2.8 percent of the city (same source).
• Five neighbourhoods with the largest Latin presence, per TorontoHispano: The Junction, Dufferin Grove, Kensington Market, St. Clair West, Jane and Finch.
• Corso Italia runs along St. Clair West between Westmount Avenue and Lansdowne Avenue and has a significant Latin American and Portuguese community (Wikipedia).
• Dufferin Grove is bounded by Bloor West, Ossington, College and Dufferin (Wikipedia).

For free ways to keep practising once you have walked these streets, see where to practise Spanish for free in Toronto, and for the community’s organisations and events, our earlier guide to the Spanish-speaking community in Toronto.

Which neighbourhoods does at-home teaching cover?

All of them, and the rest of the city. A Vamos teacher comes to your home anywhere in the City of Toronto, which the at-home page lists as Downtown, Midtown, North York, Scarborough, Etobicoke and the rest of the city, any day from 9am to 9pm. If you live near one of the corridors above, a good first assignment from your teacher is a shopping list to fill in Spanish on St. Clair or in Kensington before the next lesson.

At-home packs start at 10 hours for CA$700, with kids from age 4 at the same prices, and every teacher is a native speaker with a university degree in teaching Spanish as a foreign language or in linguistics. Details are on the Spanish lessons at your home in Toronto page. If you would rather practise in a room full of other learners, Tertulia Toronto, our free weekly conversation course, is coming, with dates and venues to be announced on the conversation events page; the Vamos Academy Toronto home page has the full list of programmes.

Tertulia Toronto, our free weekly Spanish conversation course, is coming. Dates and venues will be announced on the events page.