Insadong Korean Restaurant

Clean...haha, that's about the most memorable thing about this place.  I was here a while back with some friends and family and ended up getting a room in the upper floor.  Finding parking was aggrivating to say the least.  When I arrived, there was a cloud of smoke hovering around the entrance from some of the patrons who still thought that smoking is good for the health. 

       

Upon entering the restaurant, I felt like I was.........in Asia. 

I know it's bad, but I love eating raw garlic and the miso chili paste with the meat.  I smell rancid for days, but that's the price you pay to enjoy good food.

Everything was clean, and neat.  There weren't sauces and meat-juice spilled all over the table, and the servers were careful enough to maintain this all during service.  I was pretty impressed....well, I get impressed when our server doesn't have their thumb in the food when placing the dish on the table.

Some kind of cold, seafood noodle salad....Lol, sorry, I am probably the last person you want to be asking for a review on Korean food. 

It's hard to tell in this picture, but most of the portions were generous.The japchae (no idea how to spell it) was done perfectly from what I can remember. Loads of meat, very little oil.  Some places, you see the noodles swimming in a pool of oil....not here.

The meat was of excellent quality, very fresh, and no sign of anything being frozen or recently defrosted.  My favourite for the nite had to have been the kalbi, but no images here...ate it too quick.

Overall, the food was good, the prices were okay and the service....well, the service could have been better, but it's not like the staff wasn't trying.  I think it was just a matter of the place being understaffed.  The restaurant is quite large and capable of seating a lot of people.  But it was also the spacing I guuess.  We were in a room on the upper floor so we were spread out and far from the rest of the dining area so maybe the staff had to do a little extra leg work to get to us. 

Would I go back?  I probably wouldn't go back unless someone else was driving.  Insadong isn't exactly close to where I live so I doubt I'd make the effort to go out that far.

Pho Viet - #3 Road - Richmond

This Saturday, I was at my other job and it was a full day so a boxed lunch was included.  Not to sound disloyal or anything, but some of us decided to save our lunches and go out for some hot chow.  Since time was limited, we needed something quick, but not quite fast food.  The funny thing was, we probably spend more time in the car, fighting through traffic in the area than actually in the restaurant.  The traffic around Empire Centre is an absolute nightmare.

Some of the crew wanted pho, and it was suggest we go to Pho Viet.

                   
This particular location is new to me as it used to be another pho place called West Lake?  It was kind of a mix of HK cafe/pho because they had combos that included a drink, starter, pho, and dessert. 

Our bean sprouts came blanched, but I never use this stuff anyway - filler.  Recently though, I discovered using the green stuff and a squirt of lime really enhances the flavour of the soup.

Salad Spring Roll.  I tried this once at the location on Ackroyd and found the noodles inside were really dry...not sure if it's supposed to be like that, but it wasn't my cup of tea.

I like my spring rolls deep fried.  Warning, they are tasty, but when they come, they're usually pretty damn hot and you should let them cool a bit before you bite into one.

Me, I usually get #1...I like rare beef, tripe, brisket.  The rare beef cooks way too quick, so you gotta fish it out right away if you want it rare.  Lately, I noticed the brisket is leaner than it used to be.  That's a huge minus for me.  Brisket is supposed to be fat...lean - no good.  But the shop can't be blamed, people want to eat healthier nowadays and all these tree-hugging hippies out here on the West Coast are ruining everything.

A lot of people use the bottled chili sauce and that other brown stuff in their pho, not me.  I just have it plain nowadays, or maybe with those green leafy things and a squirt of lime, but that's about it.  I used to go to Pho Viet on Ackroyd alot, and I loved the chili sauce they had on the side (not the bottled stuff, the stuff that looked like XO Sauce and came in a jar).  In fact, that was the sole reason I used to go to Pho Viet.  I used to go through an entire container of the stuff and sometimes reach over the next table for another jar, but in the last few years, they changed the recipe, and it just doesn't taste the same anymore.  It's less XO Sauce-like. 

The food at this location is pretty much exactly the way I remembered when there was a location at Ackroyd.  I still like the broth from Pho Cao Van bettter, but that's just me and I really have no idea what good pho is supposed to taste like.  This new Pho Viet location is way cleaner than the place on Ackroyd, and larger as well.  The price is always good, and the service was friendly enough.  That being said, I'm not sure I'd go back often, seeing as how it's in one of the most traffic congested areas in Richmond.

The Keg - Granville Island

The Keg.  What better place to start a pub crawl than the Keg?  Last week a couple of old coworkers organized a pub crawl and I show up only knowing one person....how ackward.  Some of my other pals did show up later on, but when I got there, I was debating to pig out in front of a bunch of strangers......hunger got the better of me and so I pigged out.

My night started off right - Chivas Regal 12 yrs, no other drink should be paired with the hunk of dead cow I was about to eat.

The Keg delivers - Keg Size Prime Rib, prepared fat and bloody, just the way I like.  I'm curious what kind of heathen would have it any other way?

My pals that came later.  This is the crew I worked with during the 2010 Olympics, arguably the best work experience I have ever had.  From left to right: Irfan, me, David and Harpreet.

Harpreet, the smooth operator, with our server.  I didn't catch her name, but she was awesome.  She was on top of our drinks, our orders, and the food.  Very professional.  The Keg at Granville Island definitely lives up to it's name with great food, great service and reasonable prices.  I'd go back in a heartbeat, but that goes without saying.

V's Malay and Thai Food

Seems like it's food court food month!  Another cheap eats place is V's Malay and Thai Food in the Richmond Public Market.   I'm no expert on what authentic Malay or Thai food tastes like, so all I can say is for food court food, it ain't bad.

My dad in the foreground there, showing me some of the places him and my mom frequent after their daily walks.

They've got a wide assortment of food, and it looks like most of it has a heavy curry influence.

So my parents were kind enough to let me sample some of the offerings from V's and there was a lot to sample.  The portions are pretty large, and if I wasn't eating a bowl of wontons from Daily Noodles, I probably would have had more of V's.  One of the curry beef dishes was pretty good.  It was spicy (and I paid for this later), with a hint of sweetness to it.  That monster in the upper right-hand corner is a meatball.  It was massive and surprisingly full of flavour.

Would I go back?  Yeah, for sure.  It's cheap and tasty enough, and it's not that far from my work place.  I probably wouldn't go out of my way to eat here, but definitely on days I don't pack lunch, I would probably pop in here.

Noodles Daily (Richmond Public Market)

My parents come here all the time and last week, I gave them a call at the start of my lunch and they happened to be at this place.  Since I didn't pack a lunch, I walked over to the Richmond Public Market and met up with them for a bite to eat.

My dad in front of Noodles Daily.

Cheap and light, wontons in soup.  For $4, you get a huge bowl of wontons in soup.  The wontons have a little meat in them, lots of veg, and lots of wonton skin.  Overall, it's not nearly as good as say Tsim Chai noodles, but hey, you're in the food court of Richmond Public Market, and you're shelling out $4.

Continental Seafood Restaurant - Richmond

I've only been to Continental Seafood Restaurant once before, but didn't bring a camera the last time.  I don't have any outstanding memories of my first visit, nor do I remember anything that tasted spectacular.  This time, I had my crappy phone camera, and though I apolize for the low-quality pictures, I have to say the quality of the pictures reflect the quality of my experience. 

I was there this weekend with my parents and the first thing I noticed was it wasn't open until 10am, unlike some other places that have dim sum (which are open as early as 8am). The second thing I noticed was there were no cars parked outside, and absolutely nobody waiting for the place to open (as with some other dim sum places). Yes, alarm bells were ringing, but I still tried to keep an open mind.

I don't think the shrimp in the xia jiao/hagow/ebisiumai/shrimp dumplings were very fresh.  When I ate one, it tasted like the ocean.  Yes, I realize that shrimp is seafood and comes from the ocean, but these dumplings tasted like that mouthfull of seawater you swallowed by accident when playing in the surf at English Bay.

The siumai tasted pretty good actually, no complaints here.  Decent size, juicy and flavourful.  The good thing about hitting a dim sum place as soon as it opens is you know everything is freshly steamed. 

You know, some people can't stomach the chicken feet, but I'm okay with it.  And these ones were really tasty, just don't think about what it is.

The steamed pork spareribs were seriously lacking, and I was really disappointed with this one.  A little too lean, and the bone/cartilidge to meat ratio was way off...not enough meat.  On top of that, they had deepfriend tofu as a filler.  WTF?  I've seen butternut squash in there sometimes, but most places will servce just meat.  Tofu?  Are they just trying to piss me off?  Anyway, not happy with this one.

The steamed rice noodles were good.  Nothing spectacular, but not overly soggy or watery.

My mom's favourite dish at dim sum is the sesame balls.  If the place can nail the sesame balls, my mom will go back there forever.  This place got it done right, or maybe because they were fresh out of the deep frier.  Either way, my mom now swears by this place because they made good sesame balls.

I didn't like the sticky rice wraps.....no flavour whatsoever, and they must have undercooked the rice, or used extremely low-grade rice.  This one is a definite fail.

Well, now, if it's good enough for our commander in chief......

Now for the things I did like about Continental Seafood Resaurant.  The push cart service is awesome, as dim sum should be (or even more old school, carried on trays).  The new "order sheet" system that some places use doesn't sit well with me - too AYCE style, too boring, and though probably more efficient, just doesn't feel like dim sum anymore.  Another good thing about Continental is there's little or no wait time to be seated.  The places is pretty big....haha, but maybe it was so spacious because the place hardly had any customers?  The service was actually good - quick, but then again, it could have been attributed to the fact that there were so few customers.  Loads of parking, no issues there either. 

Price-wise.....there are cheaper better places out there I'd rather go, but I don't suppose I'd object to going to Continental Seafood Restaurant if the rest of the group was going.

Pita Express - More Food Court Regrets

You know you're in trouble when you go to a Pita place and see several bottles of Tuong Ot Sriracha Chili sauce lining the condiment section.  I was downtown for training a couple of weeks ago, and options are limited for a quick and decent bite to eat there.  Yes, I know of a couple of places that are good, but duty calls when it comes my readers and I have to try new places once in a while.  Pita Express is one of those places I wish I could untry. 

                

I ordered the lamb pita which came with what was supposed to be Greek Salad.....just how sour is it supposed to be?  I don't remember ever having Greek Salad quite this sour, and it wasn't a vinigar sour, it was more like a nasty, food-gone-bad sour.  To be fair though, the name of the shop never professed to be of Greek origin, so who knows what kind of salad that was supposed to be.  Now onto the Pita/wrap thing.  The lamb was bland and flavourless, with no hint of lamb taste whatsoever......maybe it was made with reconstituted protein powder?  Anyway, arguably the worst pita wrap I have ever eaten.....and the Thai chili sauce didn't help either.

Yeah, I know, it's the food court, so I should know better, but just because it's food court food, I can't assume that everyone knows it's crap.  The price was average, the food was awful, but on the lighterside, the staff were quite friendly and the proprietor did a really good job of reeling me in.  For those of you reading this, don't get caught like I did, hook, line and sinker.