Czehoski's Sausage is gone.

I drove out to its location at Islington/Queensway and saw, to my horror, a 'for sale' sign in front of the building.

Numbed, I walked to the front door. A small sign said the store is closed and the staff is will miss the paying customers. "We are not re-locating," the sign said ominously, but if it ever does re-open, ads will be posted.

To compound this nightmarish morning, I then went to Super Kolbasa on Roncesvalles and saw it was closed too! False alarm -- that was the wholesale location.

However, the Roncesvalles delis are all pale imitations of Czehoski. I've remarked on Czehoski's superior perogies in earlier posts, but the sausage is also the best I've found in Toronto. Now I'll have to look for the second-best.

The name lives on -- Czehoski restaurant on Queen West appropriated it when they occupied the space that housed the original location.

"The cooling display case that now houses our wines and beers, once displayed sausages and cold cuts," reads the website bumpf. They make that sound like the change was a good thing.

As a small matter of family history, my grandmother bought sausages and cold cuts from the original Czehoski back when Queen West was better known as Little Ukraine, rather than as a place where "trend leading professionals and artisans banter with the urban chic" (thanks, Czehoski copy-writers. I couldn't have come up with that line myself).

It's very unfortunate that this tradition has now reached the end of the line.