There used to be a time where anyone wanting to take me on a cheap date could just walk me around the corner to the pet store where I would spend an hour in front of the chameleon tank. Now it seems that I can get in dinner and a show. At Sha Lin Noodle House they make all their noodles fresh on site and a window into the kitchen lets you keep an eye on the process while you’re waiting for dinner. A plexiglass partition does double duty keeping things sanitary and keeping the kids away from the vats of boiling water too.
Notice that I was the only one up there with the children, but I find it very interesting to see how food is made, especially something as mundane as noodles. These guys were on to something way before Fuel’s open kitchen hit the streets.
Here’s a video I found that showcases the noodle-making technique a bit better:
Now for the food.
We ordered a green onion pancake to start, followed closely by handmade cutting noodles with beef and broccoli. At that point, I was starting to get pretty full. The green onion pancake was flaky and savoury, made with just a small amount of oil, and the freshly made noodles were both delicious and interesting in that they were not uniformly shaped. A pan fried dumpling, dipped in vinegar (only available at dinner) followed after I had already eaten too much food and so the majority of it had to be saved for lunch the next day.
Entertainment plus way too much food plus 2 beers for $30.00 equals a definite success.
The service was quick too. Food and beer were brought to the table almost immediately and while the pan fried dumplings did come last, after a bit of time, it was still much quicker than the potential 20 minute wait the waitress warned us about. We seemed to have just beat the rush because as we were tucking in to dinner a long line up started forming of hungry diners and people eager to pick up their take-out orders. It’s definitely a neighbourhood favorite and be prepared to wait a bit if you go at dinnertime.
It took me a while to get to the Richmond Summer Night Market this year. They almost didn’t secure the space for the market, then the food section started off a bit stunted due to water problems and then well, then my weekends just seemed suddenly full. But I finally made it there this weekend for one of my favorite kinds of moveable feasts; the kind where you are the one wandering through the crowds and stands, searching out new delicacies and old favorites until you’re quite full.
We started off with the basics, Har gow and Siu Mai ($3) with a Quail Egg wrapped in bacon for good measure. Then some Sticky Rice wraps with Chicken ($3):
Mixed up the palate a little with some Nutella, Custard and Red Bean Car wheel cakes, apparently from Taiwan ($1 each):
Personally I thought the red bean paste was by far the best (the others were too sweet), but predictably, they were the ones that no one seemed to want. Nutella was in high demand:
Then some deliciously juicy Beef and Spicy Lamb skewers (6 for $10):
The BBQ Squid (below) is defiinitely a favorite of mine, but this time we tried the flattened whole squid instead. It was tasty, but rather on the chewy side, almost like squid jerky.
Then finished it off with some Dragon’s Beard Candy and bubble tea before rolling ourselves back to the car.
The dragon’s beard candy is pulled sugar dusted with glutinous flour and wrapped around chopped peanuts. The texture is not unlike cotton candy. They had quite the assembly line going here, with the old man pulling sugar, the middle woman wrapping the nuts and the last woman boxing it all up, but it was very popular and we ended up waiting quite a while. By the time we got the candy I was done my (disgusting) bubble tea and were definitely ready to leave.
I didn’t have room for takoyaki (the non-octo variety), the fish-shaped waffles filled with red bean paste (top), spicy curry fish balls or custard. And I need to go back to the better bubble tea place that was out of pearls this time around.
Good thing that I can probably make it happen since it doesn’t shut down until October 5th. Yay!
In high school my friends and I used to drive into town from Langley and sit for hours in Wazubees. Except we called it Cafe Cafe Cafe because that’s all they had on their sign and we never thought to ask past that. There are so many establishments in this city that fall into the category of decent, possibly unmemorable food that are described as “that pho shop up on Hastings” or “the dim sum with the blue awning”. They don’t need to have a sign or even a name (although I guess they must need to have one somewhere to register as a business) because there will always be people around in the community who need to eat. This post is a tribute to all of those places.
Last week I ate at the Ginseng Seafood Noodle House. I only know the name because I made a point of taking a photo of the sign:
We went because it was late and we wanted something cheap and not too unhealthy. We were greeted warmly and after not too much deliberation, decided to order the Special Dinner for Two. Soup of the Day, a thin vegetable soup that was nourishing but otherwise uninteresting; Deep Fried Quail, a succulent, tender little bird that also came with the head; Prawns and Scallops with Gai lan, delicious, fresh steamed Chinese broccoli topped with seafood ;Bean Curd & White Nut with Vegetables, an interesting but tasty concoction involving something called White Nut (actually yellow and I’m pretty sure from the bean family) and tofu skin in soup; accompanied with Steamed White Rice and followed by fortune cookies.
I’m not sure that “special” is the right word for it, but the variety of flavours and colours complimented nicely and for $32 we ate very well.
I even ate a bit of the quail head, dipped in fortified salt. Little strange, but it was actually pretty good.
So while I wouldn’t necessarily recommend the Ginseng Seafood Noodle House, I’m sure I’ll be back, and I’ll enjoy it.
This month’s EAT Magazine is out now, with a short piece I did called Five Great Restaurants We’d Never Heard Of on five of my favorite local (ethnic) haunts. Dai Tung Chinese Restaurant for dim sum is one of them and because I was just there again this past Monday, I thought I would post some photos. You can read the article online (the entire magazine is now online, which is fabulous), or pick up a copy around town.
Specialty of the House: Braised Eggplant with Shrimp Paste
No dim sum is complete without Har Gow.
Or Siu Mai.
Delectable Fried Tofu with Prawns in Black Bean Sauce.
Fried Spicy Squid. Kind of like yam fries, but squidier.
The first time I had tofu was when I was 12 and deciding that I was going to become a vegetarian. In an effort to help, my mother served a green salad with a raw, slimy slab of medium-firm right on top. I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that it was disgusting. But I stuck with it and even though I am no longer a vegetarian (the next photo will be the proof) I do love the stuff and also happen to know where to find the best dish in town. It’s the deep-fried heavenly Spicy Salt Tofu ($7.25) from Yopo Cafe , a tiny little shop in Yaletown.
Fried tofu is on most Chinese restaurant menus, but usually they have the spices down but not the salt. Or the texture is good but the dish lacks flavour. I don’t know what the secret is at Yopo, but the tofu is fried to a perfect crisp - hard and golden with a sheen of oil on the outside and soft white on the inside - and then covered over with chilies, scallions, onions and salt. It usually arrives piping hot and has to sit on the table for a few minutes while we balefully contemplate burning our tongues instead of waiting.
On the last visit, I also had the B.B.Q Pork Won Ton Soup ($5.50), and it was quite tasty, although another favorite is easily the Tofu Seafood Soup ($5.50 for a small bowl and $7.25 for a large). There are a hundred plus dishes on the menu, ranging from noodles to hot pot and while I tend to favour the soups, I’ve never been disappointed.
Yopo only has 20 seats and enough people know about it to ensure that they are always full (with the take-out line sometimes going out the door), but although I’ve been there many times, I’ve only been on a weekday lunch, so you might have better luck on evenings and weekends. Or just go early like my coworker and I do and check out the menu online before you go.
I’m not sure when I noticed the giant neon lobster in a Robson Street window, but I only passed it a couple of times before I noticed that what used to be a sushi place beside Chapters was now Oji Chinese Cuisine & Dim Sum. And of course it didn’t take long after that to get in there to check it out.
It basically looks exactly the same as it used to, with the high-backed lacquered benches and booths, but now there are Chinese paintings of cherry blossoms and misty mountains instead of whatever was there before. The service is likewise forgettable - random, different, servers dropping off water and menus and then picking them up again without taking our orders, communication that was mostly gutteral, etc, but when the food finally came it was delicious.
Deciding what to eat was a little bit of an equation. After a lot of mulling over the photos on the Dim Sum menu, adding (and then sorrowfully subtracting) various dishes and comparing the final product with the regular lunch menu, we decided on a bowl of noodles each and Har Gow, Sui Mai, and beef balls. Regrettably I don’t have any photos of the food because we ate it all before it occurred to me to pull my camera out.
I had noodles topped with BBQ duck, the beautiful deep red of the meat contrasting beautifully with the off-white rice noodles (in much the same way that the fat of it contrasted with the carbs). The beef balls were full of flavour and dripping oil without being too oil. Instead they just tasted deliciously of spices and onion. Har Gow, a staple, was juicy and succulent and no complaints about the Sui Mai either.
For dessert we somehow made room for egg tarts and then I seriously debated rolling over on one of the benches and having an afternoon nap. The problem with this place will prove to be the proximity to my work. I won’t be able to keep walking by it without stopping in…
UPDATED: I passed by here the other day and noticed they now have a website:
