Updated: 12th Oct 2010: this restaurant is closed according to Urbanspoon.

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 … soft and mushy like those you find in “jung” (rice dumplings). On the side is a chili garlic sauce dip and a sweet chili sauce dip. The rice was pretty bland actually — not a lot of flavour.

There are a lot of dim sum / appetizers that we ordered, isn’t it? It is just that they have so many items that appeals to us in this area.

The Smoked Pork Hock is $4.80. This cold dish came in thicker pieces with skin and hence it was more chewy than we are used to for this dish. Since the boys like this a lot, we left most of this to them.

The Smoked Fish Noodle in Soup is $7.86. That is about the most expensive dish they have on the menu.

Most of the food came at the same time. I thought it was amusing that the elderly lady helped us sort out the dishes but arranging it for us. It is mainly because the noodle on the left of the picture above goes with that fish on the right. I thought she was helping us arrange it so that I can photograph correctly.

The noodles has spinach and cabbage accompanying it. The vegetable broth is bland but when eaten with the more flavorful fish, it does provide a pleasant balance to the taste. This reminds me of the ying-yang principles of Chinese Cuisine I had been reading in my 8GTCC research.

What fish do you call this? Anyway, the fish is soft. It is not as crispy as we expected it to be. Maybe they prepare this before hand because I see that they have this in combination with rice too. An extra dash of soya sauce does wonder to the taste.

We also ordered the Sesame Oil Chicken Noodle in Soup $7.50. We got this because it is not commonly found … at least not to us.

When it was served, we could pick up the nice aroma of rice wine in it. As such the soup here has a much stronger flavour than the earlier noodle soup.

The noodle are a tad too soft. It is just an observation … not that it is a problem or anything to me.

The elderly lady told us that they serve free range chicken with this noodles. I like the chicken, especially with the skin on.

It is cheap eating here. Nothing is more than $8. There are enough uniqueness on the menu to make you want to come back again to try their other dishes. They did the dishes very well for the kind of price you pay. The elderly lady who runs the floor is very friendly and motherly. So there is very little not to like about Tai Yau Yik.

Tai Yau Yik is close to the Richmond O-Zone. It is perhaps about 1/2 a block away. Maybe it is a good idea to check this place out for yourself if you happen to go to the O-Zone during the Olympics. I think you will like it.