All Entries in the "Chinese" Category
S&W Pepper House on No 3 Road and Granville, Richmond
OK, you guys don’t laugh, OK? But …
Oh man!
I was so honored to have been invited to a dinner with some of the most revered foodies in Vancouver last week. When FMED asked if I would like to join in a dinner with such distinguished names in the foodie world, I was kind of uncertain. You see, these guys and gals are heads and shoulders above the likes of me — a wannabe foodie … a food blogger. These guys knows food and speak authoritatively. These guys are judges for restaurant awards. Their opinions are revered and trusted. They are what I want to be when (if?) I grow up. LOL!
Since I did not have their permissions to mention their names and pseudonyms, the diners will remain anonymous. Let’s just say there were a group of six boys and girl.
The dinner was at the S&W Pepper House in Richmond. S&W Pepper House is located on No 3 Road, right across from the Richmond City Hall. There is another S&W Pepper House in the Crystal Mall in Burnaby. Both are popular restaurants serving some of the best Sichuan cuisine in Metro Vancouver.
Oh boy, I was so embarrassed that I arrived late. Not good to have these people wait. They had almost finished the ordering by the time I arrived.
I had been to both S&W Pepper House in Richmond and Burnaby before. As a matter of fact, I remembered that the visit to the Burnaby’s S&W was one of our earliest post — like 2/3 weeks after chowtimes got started. Reading back that 4 year old post brings back memories to those days when blogging is a simple affair. I still remember that meal where we had the “Guo Qiao” (Crossing the Bridge) Rice Noodle in Special Soup which has a story behind the name of the dish.
First thing that came across my mind was so less classy this S&W Pepper House is today compared to when I first ate here almost 3 years ago.
Richmond's S&W Pepper House in 2007
This place used to look brighter, has better paintings on the wall and it does seem more busier. Maybe it was because this time we had the dinner in mid week. Oh well … not that it matters really but I just happen to notice the stark contrast.
The guys and gals are cooler.
They don’t take pictures of the food before they eat it. They don’t even have to write down their observations. All they needed was the chopsticks.
But they understood. LOL! They respectfully allowed me to shoot pictures before they dove into the food. I know it is not cool but I got a job to do.
FMED stole the picture above. I was not aware of it but I thought I share one of the rare shots of me here. I think this is the ONLY picture of me “at work”.
I was kind of surprised how many appetizers were ordered.
The above is called Fried Peanuts with Cilantro and Chili. This is just $5 and was marvelous. I had never ordered this before. Almost everyone just ate it straight. For me, I just had to have it with rice because the spiciness and flavour is too overpowering for me.
The above is called the House Special Chicken. While this is considered an appetizer, the large serving belies the categorization. There is half a bird here and costs $11.
The Chinese name, I think, is “How Swee Gai” which literary means salivating chicken. Fancy name, huh?
Again with this, I just had to have this with rice.
I see the dish above very often when I go for lunch at the Crystal Mall. I never knew what it was but it certainly was popular that a lot of people ordered it. I assumed that this is a very Sichuan dish.
Guess what it is made of.
This is called Shredded Potato with Dried Chili ($5). I was kind of intrigued because as far as I know potatoes are not native to China. Potatoes originated from South America and I was curious how this ended up as a traditional dish in China.
I thought I was cool right? I just had to mention this … and guess what the response was from the experts.
Well … More on following page. Click here to continue reading
The Jade Restaurant on Alexandra Road, Richmond
Please allow me to do a comparison in this post.
Yesterday, I blogged about the tapas we had in Mis Trucos.
Today I am going to blog about Chinese Dim Sum in The Jade Restaurant. I think this is going to be a bit fair comparison because The Jade restaurant is not a cheapo dim sum joint.
The Jade Restaurant is located on Alexandra Road.
This is the kind of restaurant that you will see a fair number of Mercedes and BMWs in the parking lot.
We don’t normally go to Chinese restaurants that have high ceilings and chandeliers. Those kind of places are reserved for special occasions.
There are not just one … but several chandeliers.
And that explains why we had never been here before. We were put off by the chandeliers.
And the captains wear suits too. The tables have double table cloth. The banquet hall is bright and large. This type of restaurants are designed for banquet dinners. The smallest table is meant for four people. For morning dim sums on a weekend, it is usually a family affair. So seeing multi-generation families are not uncommon.
The only reason we were brave enough to step into here was because we read of the review from Wendy (Eat N About). It seems like the prices were not as bad as I feared.
You know what sucks here? The service. It was not that it was bad all round but a lot of the waiters/waitresses “tai yan” — that means that they have extra good service to the richer tai-tai’s (from the way they dressed and speak in Cantonese) while for us English speaking customers, we are left with the whatever they wished to dish to us.
That is the problem with such successful Chinese restaurants. They are so popular and have so many customers than they can handle, they can afford to select their customers. For some customers, we see that the waiters were always milling around waiting to fill the tea cups for them. For us, when we ask for anything, we were told to “mmm goi tang-tang” (please wait) and they don’t come back. When we ask them again, they give that annoyed look.
So when dining in such places, you got to deal with this or you are better off not going at all. IF … if you can look beyond this, dining in The Jade is good in every sense.
The Jade Restaurant opens at 9AM. So we were there early because their dim sum is really cheap in the first hour from 9AM – 11AM.
My tip to you is to go at 10′ish and order the first round of cheap dim sums and then follow-up with the better (more expensive) dim-sums at 11AM when the sifu (master chef) arrives in the kitchen.
When we arrived, the place was pretty empty. By 11AM, the whole place was buzzing with activity and there was already a number of people waiting for a table.
We ordered the ‘Bo Lei’ tea. It was a very dark tea … much darker than coffee but the flavour was not overly strong. This is one of the more unusual Chinese tea. You might want to try it if you had never before.
The menu does indicate the availability according to time. Click on the menu above to display it larger. If you don’t know what to order, just go for the ones that is marked with a red star. Those are their specialties.
But anyway, the prices of the dim sums between 9-11AM is $4 – $5 but have a limited selection.
After 11AM the prices ranges from $7 – $10 with more varieties like congee, noodles, and some special price items.
We thought it was not too expensive for a classy-looking place like this.
Arkensen and Nanzaro wanted cheong fun. Suanne and I decided to get one that you don’t normally find in other dim sum restaurants. This one has mushrooms and scallops. The boys protested saying that they don’t want this because it has vegetables (mushrooms!) in it. We tried to reason that this has scallops and they will like it. Well, rather than prolonging the debate, I just over-ruled their protest. Guess what … they love it. LOL! They just don’t want to listen to their mum and dad anymore.
They use fine inoki mushrooms. The scallop was most unique and has a very exquisite taste.
This is $5.28. For the non-Chinese, did you know why the price is so oddly ends with twenty eight cents? The number 8 is an auspicious number to the Chinese because the word sounded like “wealth”. The number 2 is a word that sounds like “easy”. So in combination, 28 is “easy wealth”. That is why you find that the Chinese will pay to get car license plate with the number “8″ in it.
In some Chinese cities, people pays hundreds of thousands of dollars for not just car license numbers but for things like phone numbers, the floor of an office building, etc. Even the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony kicked off on 08/08/08 at 8:08 PM.
If the number 8 is auspicious, the number 4 is to be avoided by the Chinese … because it meant “death”. LOL!
Chinese!
Despite protests across the table, we went ahead and ordered the Steamed Mushroom Dumpling ($4.98). The Jade restaurant makes their dumpling very well. The wrap is so thin and translucent that you could virtually see what is inside. This one has shitake mushroom and has a unique flavour.
It was so good that you don’t really need chili sauce or sweet soy sauce to dip. I think pure Cantonese dim sums does not provide the dipping sauces unless you ask for them specifically. Is that right?
Our waiter recommended this. The Steamed Eggplant with Black Bean Sauce ($4.48) was kind of oversteamed because the eggplant is too soft and mushy. We like the version we had at Royal Dinner and Dance better.
For some reason, they gave us this one above when we ordered the Supreme Dumpling in Soup. Their Supreme Dumpling in soup is their specialty.
We thought that it would be good to try dumpling with lamb meat for a change. The Pan Fried Lamb Dumpling is $4.48.
They serve this with sweet soy sauce mixed with chili, cilantro and garlic which was really good with the gamey tasting lamb dumpling.
So many dumplings right? This one is called Steamed Chiu Chau Dumpling ($4.48).
The skin is so thin that we got to be careful picking it up. The crunchy texture of the fillings inside was great. It consists of turnip/jicama, chives, dried prawns, pork and peanuts. Loaded! It crumbles when you bite into it and so you want to eat it placed on a spoon.
The best part of the meal has got to be this simple dish. This item is only available after … More on following page. Click here to continue reading
Royal Dinner and Dance on Garden City and Blundell, Richmond
Shhh … don’t tell anyone about this place.
I am just kidding. I just wanted to catch your attention and read on.
It had been a while since we had dim sum as a family. The beauty of having a blog is that you can easily figure exactly when the last time it was. Everything is so well documented. For us, the last time was in October last year. We are not much of a dim sum people.
Last weekend, we decided to just go to a restaurant closest to home. Suanne reminded me that there is a place that serves dim sum with an odd name … the Royal Dinner and Dance. This is located on the strip mall on Garden City and Blundell in Richmond.
The moment we walked through the door, we had a good feeling that this is going to be good. All these years, we did not even realize this place would be like this.
The restaurant is located upstairs. You walk up a very wide staircase which has pictures of dancers. I think this place doubles as a dance club too because there is a stage and half of the restaurant is on the dance floor.
The restaurant is bigger than we imagine from the outside. What caught us by surprised is how many customers they have despite its size. The place was filled with customers. This is the kind of place where entire/extended families come for dim sum. A lot of the tables taken were parties of four and above.
The table already were prepared with the order form and a pencil. It took us a while, as usual, to make our selection. The prices are cheap too.
Service is hurried as one can expect from a place this this. They came by twice asking if we are ready with the order. They were cool when we said we needed more time. For people who are not used to this type of places, you would take it personally when they abruptly turn away and go to the next table. We don’t consider this rude but understand that some people not used to this will feel slighted.
We were glad to see the varieties they have on the menu. So, we try to pick one or two items from each section … and in the process over-rule some of Arkensen and Nanzaro’s choices. If we leave the choices to them, they will pick TWO orders each of siu mai, har gow and sticky rice. So unexciting. LOL!
I was surprised when both Arkensen and Nanzaro said that they wanted the Rice Rolls with Chinese Donut ($3.75). We never thought they will want such traditional and to us, bland dish.
The Chinese donut here was not crispy but a tad soft. A sign that it is not made fresh. The flavour comes mainly from the soya sauce. They also gave us hoisin sauce and sesame sauce too which we thought it was kind of weird. I actually asked our waitress if it is meant to go with the rice roll and she said “yes”. *shrug*
It was quite nice too dipping the rice roll on the two sauces.
The Pan fried stuffed eggplant with shrimp is kind of skinny. Other than that it is cooked just nice. It is not overcooked that it is all mushy and loses the whiteness inside and yet also not undercooked that it’s raw and fibrous. The flesh inside was still white. We thought they did this perfectly and like the sauciness of the dish too. The sauce was great with the rice roll. Only $2.50.
Well, Arkensen also ask for this … the Steamed Crystal Prawn Dumpling (also $2.50). The size is respectable and the texture was firmly springy.Very good.
We were looking for that tell tale sign of freezer burn and all to see if they are just simply steamed direct from big batches of pre-made ones. They looked good enough for us.
They also have several congee options. We got the Lai Wan Boat Congee ($3.95) because we do not know what it is. We still do not know why this is called Lai Wan or what the words Lai Wan means.
The congee bowl is quite big for a $4 portion and has in it squid, prawn, pork rind, peanut, and Chinese donut. The congee itself does not carry a lot of flavour but a dash of soy sauce and ground pepper does the trick.
Next up is called the Fried Sticky Rice with Preserved Meat ($3.95). It came in a glass bowl and is supposed take a form of the bowl when they cup it upside down on the plate. Well … it fell apart and the waitress had to scrap the rice into the plate, losing the form.
You see it was not sticky enough for that. And I was thinking that this is FRIED sticky rice and so it is not supposed to be that sticky.
Anyway, the sticky rice has lots of … More on following page. Click here to continue reading
Zen Fine Chinese Cuisine Opened — Want To Join Suanne and I for Dinner?
In December last year, we came across a shop lot in Steveston that with sign saying that Zen will be re-opening. Well, Sam Lau’s Zen Fine Chinese Cuisine restaurant had re-opened last week.
Suanne and I had just booked for dinner on Friday, February 26th. We were wondering if an chowtimes readers would like to join us in checking out Sam Lau’s re-incarnation of his famed “Greatest Chinese Restaurant in the World”.
Zen became famous overnight in 2008 when Jennifer8 Lee of the New York Times wrote a book called The Fortune Cookie Chronicles in which she traveled around the world checking out Chinese restaurants. In her book, she heralded Sam Lau’s Zen Fine Chinese Cuisine as “the world’s greatest Chinese restaurant outside China”.
Whether Zen is really the world’s greatest Chinese restaurant outside of China is open to debate, I know. There is a question too as to why Sam had to close Zen even after getting a second wind from Jennifer 8’s review in her book.
Anyway, we wrote about the publicity Zen had from Jennifer8 Lee’s review and our tasting at Zen shortly after. Recently, we wrote to Hakkasan about Zen and we had a very in-depth response from Hakkasan which we will share on a later blog post.
Suanne and I was thinking that perhaps if we could get like 2 to 4 couples to join us, it would be great. We have a reservation for 5:30PM. For hockey fan, please note that the 2nd Semi-final of the Men’s Hockey game is on at 6:30PM.
Please send me an email at ben@chowtimes.com if you are interested in joining Suanne and I.
The menu are as follows … we are looking at trying the Menu B.
Menu A – $33
Salad ~ Micro Mix, Mango Ravioli, Salted Plum Oil Crumble, Seasonal Fruit, Rice Vinegar Foam
Baked Whelk ~ Stuff Diced Seafood, Chicken, Vegetables With Coconut Curry
Double Boiled Soup
Tofu Duo ~ Crispy Egg Tofu, Steamed Silky Tofu with Mushroom
Pork Belly ~ Braised In Chinese Spice, Serve With Glutinous Risotto
Dessert Of The Day
Menu B – $55
Terrine ~ House Smoked Salmon Wrapped With Souffle
Baked Whelk ~ Stuff Diced Seafood, Chicken, Vegetables With Coconut Curry
Foamy Seafood Cappuccino ~ Layered With Egg Tofu
Lobster ~ Stir Fried With Black Bean Sauce/Steamed Garlic Sauce
Deep Fried Crispy Chicken ~ Serve With Five Spice Infused Salt
Lotus Leaf Rice ~ Stuff with Dried Scallop, Mushroom, bbq Duck,Diced Chicken, Crab Meat, Bamboo
Dessert Of The Day
Menu C – $120
Seafood Duo ~ Curry Stuffed Whelk, Sliced Geoduck Fondue
Chinese Seafood Soup ~ With Fresh Crab Meat and Fish Maw
Braised Abalone ~ Slow Braised In Oyster Sauce (3 Heads)
Steamed Lobster ~ Steamed With Mince Garlic
Rice ~ Lobster Claw Stir Egg White, Fried Rice
Dessert Of The Day
Here are some of the pictures of Sam Lau’s previous creations (credit to Zen’s website … http://zencuisine.ca)
There are more …
Hot Luck on Kingsway Near Willingdon, Burnaby
Some of my friends at work told me that if I wanted to try spicy hot food, I should go and try the new restaurant on Kingsway just next door to Saffron. And they warned me that their food is super-duper hot. This had been on my radar for a few weeks already and I knew it was just a matter of time before I go with Suanne and the boys.
Last week, I had one of those heavy days at work. The first meeting started at 7AM and it is one after another with a large group of team members. And I had to run the meetings. It would have been easier if I am just an attendee. So by late morning, I was totally spent and decided to just drop everything and went outside to clear my head.
It was a good thing I had the camera with me that day. So I went to have lunch on my own at Hot Luck.
Outside the restaurant, there is a sandwich board that says that the Lunch Special is just $5.95. I thought it was awfully cheap. I can’t think of any restaurant like this that has lunch specials that cheap. Are you aware of any?
The interior is clean, bright and neat. Some of the bigger tables even has white linen too. I was impressed particularly because they serve such cheap lunch specials here.
Hot Luck is a Sichuan cuisine restaurant. They had been opened for 3 months already and words had spread that their food is super hot.
You know it is super hot when all the pictures on the menu are red in colour.
I was so enticed by their House Special and Combo Special items above. Unfortunately they are meant for a minimum of two people and up. I guess I got to come back another day to try them.
If you look at the rest of the menu above, you will find that it is not as cheap as the sandwich board outside makes it out to be. Most of the Lunch Specials are $8. The main dishes are above $10.
Their food are not expensive but just that it is not as cheap as you might be led to think.
As usual, I asked for their recommendation for a starter. The waitress said that their Spiced Beef with 5 Spices ($5) is one of their favourite and pointed to the table next to me. It seems like that table was not the only one that had this starter.
This is a cold dish. Even the dish it was served on was cold. The beef slices were not as hot as it looked.
I did not want to get the Lunch Special because lunch specials being what it is are not true representation of what the restaurant serves well. After asking me if I can take hot food, the waitress said I should try their … More on following page. Click here to continue reading
Kam Ho Restaurant on Alexandra Road at No 3 Road, Richmond
*** The Kam Ho Restaurant is the reincarnation of the original Ho Yuen Restaurant in Richmond! ***
About a month ago, we went to the Ho Yuen restaurant for dinner. It was supposed to be one of the ho-hum posts because we did not find it particularly interesting. We did not even plan to dine there.
What surprised us was that the Ho Yuen post generated 34 comments! The reason was because of the new owner behind Ho Yuen … a self-bestowed “Dr” Jaime Chan. If you don’t know who “Dr” Jaime Chan is, read the comments and you will know why he attracts such ire from people who know who he is.
Some readers lamented that they missed the old Ho Yuen. We learned that when “Dr” Jaime Chan took over Ho Yuen, it was not the same anymore.
Despair not … it is because the Ho Yuen is back!
The original Ho Yuen had reincarnated as Kam Ho!
Huey wrote an email to us last week alerting us to this news (thanks Huey!) that Kam Ho is opening on last Saturday. So we changed our dinner plans and made our way to Kam Ho for dinner.
The new Kam Ho is located in Alexandra Road but it is not on the section of Alexandra road that you would automatically think of. Instead it is located on the No 3 Road section of Alexandra. You should get to Kam Ho via No 3 Road. Kam Ho is on the same strip mall as Celsius and Kelong.
It had been a while since we saw a new Cantonese style restaurant opening. Almost all new restaurants in Richmond these days are mainland Chinese or Taiwanese restaurants, not so much Cantonese. So we are glad to see a new one opening here.
It was opening night. The waitresses are all eager and helpful. I guess not many people know of Kam Ho’s opening because there were not many customers. Half of the customers that night seems to be someone they know.
No pretty young waitress here. All of them are middle aged ladies. In Chinese we call them “ah sows” or aunties. Not that it’s a problem. I am just saying. When I mentioned this observation, both Arkensen and Nanzaro reacted saying that what I said is not nice.
Kam Ho is about half the size of Ho Yuen and seats about 50 people. They have a wide open kitchen that you could see all the going ons in it.
Kam Ho is not a HK Style Cafe. It is more like a HK Style Diner. The have a big menu with sections of noodles, congee and such.
We decided to get a Dinner Combo. We opted for the $33.95 3-item combo from the menu above (click to read in bigger font). We thought it should be enough for the four of us as it usually is.
Besides the selection of dishes, the combo also includes soup, rice and sweet dessert.
The Daily soup is some of the best we had ever had. In it was pork, chicken feet, snow fungus and Chinese herbs. I like the Cantonese word for this type of soup. “Lo For Tong” is translated as “old fire” soup and means soup that had been boiled for a long period of time.
The soup itself was really flavourful. It was a good start.
At first we ordered a house hot pot but the lady insisted that we try their Hainanese Chicken. It did not take much convincing for us.
It looked very good. They don’t even pour any soya sauce on the chicken. It was just plain Hainanese chicken with parsley and fried peanuts.
The chicken is boney and the first thing we observed is that the chicken is cold. This apparently is a style of Hainanese chicken where it is dipped in ice after cooking. This produces a gelatinous layer underneath the skin. The skin is springy and on all accounts very good.
We upgraded the steamed rice to Hainanese Chicken Rice for 50 cents a bowl. The oily rice is mildly flavoured. We had tasted bolder tasting ones but this is just alright. However, their rice bowl is bigger than most other places. We like that.
With Hainanese Chicken Rice, you normally would get the dip. We like the ginger and green onion more than the chili. The chili is kind of strange that it is quite “chunky”. We prefer garlic’d chili instead.
The other item they recommended us is the Deep Fried Prawn with Pepper Salt. OMG, it was good.
It is topped with … More on following page. Click here to continue reading
Tai Yau Yick Shanghai Restaurant on Anderson Road, Richmond
Here is one more post written based on the recommendation of a chowtimes reader …
Last month Deborah wrote an email to us saying:
Hi Ben, I noticed you tried a lot of places in Richmond. If I may, I would suggest you try a place on Anderson Rd called Tai Yau Yick Restaurant. Its a hole in the ground but the food is very delicious. I would suggest you get the pork chop on rice, tofu, deep fried chicken wings, and beef pancake. Do not order the xiao long bao’s here, you can get better ones at other shanghai restaurants. The old lady that runs the place doesn’t speak english, but she is very sweet
We had actually been to Tai Yau Yick before. It was quite a long time ago. I distinctly remember that it was one of those rare moments that we forgot to bring along the camera. So we did not blog about it.
These days, we never forget to bring the camera. It is second nature to us now. I might forget to bring the wallet or the house keys when I go out, but I never forget the camera. Is this a sad thing? LOL!
Tai Yau Yick is located on Anderson Road and near the Richmond City Hall. It is also located just next door to Diary Queen.
Parking here is not a problem. It is a small strip mall and we always have parking spots available all the time.
Tai Yau Yick is a small place. There are about five tables only. They can barely fit in 20 people. The place does look much neater than we remembered some years ago. The tables looked newer and they have wallpapered and painted the walls.
There is very little you will not like about Tai Yau Yick. It is waited by an elderly lady who speaks perfect Cantonese despite that they call this a Shanghainese restaurant. I asked the lady if the chef is Shanghainese. She said that they are all Cantonese but they specialize in Shanghainese and Taiwanese Cuisine.
Their menu acts like an order form. This is like what you see in some hot pot and dim sum places where you check and specify the quantity you want. What do you think with this method? I think it’s good idea in making sure they don’t misunderstand your order. It is also more efficient for the restaurant too if you already are familiar with their menu.
They place the order form with a pencil on the table but the order form is in Chinese. You have to ask them for the English version.
We decided to try their soybean milk. You can opt for either sweet ($1.75) or salty ($2.50).
We tried the salty version. Because we did not know that the soybean milk comes with a few Chinese doughnuts in it, we ordered a side order of the Chinese doughnut ($2).
The warm soybean milk is more savory than it is salty. In the soybean milk are green onions, dried shrimp and preserved vegetable (jar choy).
It is actually a good thing we ordered a side of Chinese Doughnut. They are very good … as it is still crispy when we dunk into soybean milk, unlike those that sit in the soymilk that became soggy. The crunch explodes in your mouth.
But it is also oily though. Suanne said that this must be the Taiwanese style doughnut.
Suanne was surprised that I ordered this Soybean Bitter Melon ($2.90). She knows I have never liked bitter melon. Also our boys refused to touch it.
I wanted to try it because it is unique. Moreover, I know that if I don’t like it, Suanne will finish it.
It was bitter alright although the soybean sauce that it was steamed in took away a lot of the bitterness. It is an acquired taste kind of thing.
Suanne insisted I to eat half of my share but I just picked the smaller piece. I love Suanne.
The name Red Hot Dumpling ($4.80) sounded so good that we also ordered that. They do every dish very well. Not only is the dumpling well made, we like the sweet and spicy sauce it is served in. The spiciness is light at first but gradually intensify in the mouth. Nice.
For the boys, we got a sticky rice for them. They like sticky rice. So we had the Taiwanese Style Sticky Rice Roll ($5.50).
We thought it was going to be like one of those glutinous rice roll with filling inside (you know, the ones that you can buy freshly made in T&T?). Instead, the rice is … More on following page. Click here to continue reading
