Archive for the 'Other Cities' Category
Monday, March 31st, 2008
Since we were flying to China via Japan Airlines, we had a half day stop over in Japan near Narita Airport. Since we didn’t get to our hotel until late in the afternoon, we only had enough time to shop at a nearby Narita mall. I would have loved to zip into Tokyo but it just wasn’t practical. But I suppose that just means I will need to go back to Japan someday. 
We found out about Aeon Mall from my aunt, who brought us maps and mall directories from her last trip to Tokyo. Since we were hungry after our long flight, our first stop in the mall was to Beard Papa’s. I’m sure most people in Vancouver have been to the Beard Papa’s in Aberdeen Centre by now but how can you resist Beard Papa’s when you are in the country where it was invented? The selection was much larger (obviously!) and the line-ups were not as long.
The cream puff shells were piled high on the counter and looked so delicious. There was someone constantly pumping these with one of the several flavoured creams available.
The cream puff of the month was strawberry, so we decided to give that a try. There was also a new product on the market called the “Paris Brest”. It was a doughnut-shaped cream puff shell pumped with fresh vanilla cream.
Yum…just looking at these pictures makes me want to eat some more cream puffs! We gobbled these up in no time.
My favourite of the two was the strawberry cream puff. The outside was crispy and light and the strawberry cream was rich with strawberry goodness. I found these to taste better than the ones in Vancouver…perhaps because they are more fresh? To be fair, the Vancouver ones that I ate were a day old.
Grick and Jenkins liked the Brest more. I guess because the doughnut shape had more surface area than the regular cream puff, it was much crispier. If I was in Japan for more than just half a day, I would definitely try all the other flavours. :) Each brest or cream puff cost approximately $1.50Cdn.
Details:
24, Wing Tsuchiya, Narita, Chiba, Japan
Tel: +81-(0)476-23-8282
Summary:
Food: 
Service: n/a
Price: $
Posted in Narita, Other Cities, Dessert, Reviews | 2 Comments »
Monday, March 3rd, 2008
Edmonton is pretty neat in that in most major buildings downtown, there are food courts set up for people to quickly order lunch from. I suppose because it is so cold there in the winter, it is way easier to grab lunch downstairs as opposed to braving the elements. Mabel, Dallas, and some others had been telling me about Chicken For Lunch, a Chinese fast food eatery in the Scotiabank food court. This place seemed to be famous for its good food, a lady who remembered everyone’s orders and names, and a huge lineup that circles around the food court at lunch. Mabel and I got there just after 12pm and there was already a long line formed.
Both Mabel and I ordered the medium size lunch for $6.50. For this price, you get rice, noodles, veggies, two types of chicken, and a spring roll. The price was more than reasonable and the portion sizes are pretty huge.
I settled on the lemon chicken and the hot and dry. Hot and dry is a bit spicy but is also the one that came most recommended when I was trying to decide on what to order. The lemon chicken was pretty tasty and had a nice lemony flavour. There was also quite a bit of sauce so it went nicely with my rice. As for the hot and dry, it was pretty good but I’m not much of a fried chicken lover so I wasn’t completely sold on it. It was very crispy though and was spicy without being overwhelmingly so.
Chicken for Lunch was not bad although I have to say I am surprised that people are willing to lineup so long to eat it…sometimes every day! I suppose I am probably spoiled by the great food in Vancouver so it takes a bit more to really wow me. The food was a great deal though and there was a lot of variety in the types of items you could order.
Details:
10060 Jasper Ave, Edmonton, Alberta
Tel: 780-425-9614
Summary:
Food:
Service: n/a
Price: $
Posted in Other Cities, Edmonton, Fast Food, Asian, Chinese, Reviews | No Comments »
Saturday, March 1st, 2008
Both Mabel and I were in work for Edmonton for a few days. Luckily for me, Mabel is from Edmonton so she offered to take me somewhere for dinner on the night I arrived. We ended up at Cheesecake Cafe, which she noted was known for their excellent cheesecakes. This place is actually a smaller scale version of Cheesecake Factory, which is prevalent in most big US cities.
To start, Mabel and I shared the spinach and artichoke dip. The chips seemed to be freshly fried because we could still see some oil sitting on some chips. The dip itself was not bad although it was a bit watery towards the bottom and there was definitely more spinach than artichoke.
Since I was in Alberta, I decided to go with the honey garlic sirloin, which came with some veggies. I also had a choice of a baked potato or salad to go along with my dish and I chose the salad with a honey dressing. Even though I asked for medium rare, I found my steak to be a bit overcooked and kind of tough. I also couldn’t taste the honey or garlic, which theoretically should have kept the steak nice and moist. The vegetables appeared to have been boiled and were overcooked although the salad was pretty tasty.
Cheesecakes are definitely the specialty here so Mabel and I ordered a key lime cheesecake and an Oreo cheesecake. Some of the cheesecakes are seasonal and are available during certain times of the year. The key lime cheesecake was a nice shade of green and had the slightest hint of lime flavour. I liked the graham cracker crust although I wished it was thicker.
Of the two cheesecakes, I actually preferred the Oreo one more. It was not too sweet and also had chunks of Oreo cookies in it. Both the cheesecakes were very dense and we ended up eating only half of each flavour. Although the cheesecakes were good, I do like my cheesecakes to be creamier and the flavours here were too subtle for my liking.
I definitely preferred the cheesecakes here over my main dish and appetizer. If I were to come back again, I would probably just come for dessert and pick one cheesecake to share between two people…unless you are feeling really hungry.
Details:
17011 - 100 Ave, Edmonton, Alberta
Tel: 780-486-0440
Summary:
Food:
Service:
Price: $$
Posted in Canadian, Edmonton, Other Cities, Reviews | No Comments »
Monday, December 24th, 2007
It was my last evening in San Francisco and I met up with Thu for dinner. She took me to Straits Cafe over in Palo Alto, which is a Asian fusion restaurant. Thu told me that there are actually several Straits restaurants in the Bay area but the one we went to in Palo Alto was the original one.
We started off with an appetizer sampler. It had a good sampling of the more popular appetizers on the menu. Sorry for the dark and blurry pictures. I really need to learn how to take better pictures in dim lighting with my camera.
I can’t really remember what this was but I think it was a fish carpaccio on a potato wafer. What I do remember is that it was very tasty with the carpaccio contrasting with the crunchy potato.
The fresh oyster was dressed with a light Thai chilli sauce which added some spiciness. This was very good and I only wished that there was more than one per person.
The vegetable samosa was also great. The vegetable curry inside was very tasty and the crunchy outside was not greasy at all. I usually find samosas too heavy but this one was just right.
The chicken satay was very juicy and went well with the peanut satay sauce. As far as taste goes, there was nothing special about this but I still enjoyed it.
For our main course, we shared a couple of dishes. First was a pan-fried tilapia with an Indian yellow curry. This was my favourite dish of the evening. The tilapia was crispy on the outside but very moist and juicy inside. The curry was quite spicy and much of the taste was absorbed by the fish and veggies. This dish came with quite a bit of sauce and would have gone great with rice.
We also ordered some Hokkien Bee Hoon, which was vermicelli noodles with shrimp, fish cake, and chillis. This dish was pretty bland and did not have much taste. In a way though, this worked out ok for us because we spooned the gravy from the fish dish over the noodles.
Overall, I was pretty impressed with Straits Cafe. With the exception of the noodles, most of the items we tried were very tasty (especially the fish!). I am usually a bit skeptical when it comes to Asian fusion places but Straits Cafe did a good job with it. I wouldn’t mind coming back to try the other dishes the next time I am in town.
Well, this concludes my California trip. It was fun to try out some new and different restaurants from what I am used to in Vancouver. This will probably be my last post before the new year, so happy holidays and Merry Christmas to everyone!
Details:
3295 El Camino Real, Palo Alto, CA
Tel: 650-494-7168
Summary:
Food: 
Service:
Price: $$
Posted in Other Cities, San Francisco, Singaporean, Thai, Asian, Reviews | 2 Comments »
Monday, December 17th, 2007
We were back in San Francisco so NTR and UK took me to Hokkaido Seafood Buffet. Although most of the food here is seafood (obviously!), they also had some other non-seafood items as well. Most of the food offered here is Asian style.
After we settled in at our table, we started digging in at the various stations. I was pretty amazed by the selection of food and the sheer abundance of it all. I gravitated toward the mound of fresh Alaskan king crab, mussels, clams, and shrimp. It was all so tasty and you also had a selection of cocktail sauce, lemons, and ponzu sauce to add to your seafood.
I tried some clam soup, which was served in a small bowl. I didn’t like the taste of the broth very much, so I decided to try the clam meat instead. This didn’t taste much better though…and I later learned that it was the soup that everyone liked — not the clam meat itself. Oops.
The coconut shrimp was quite good although I had to scrape off some of the mayo. I also couldn’t really taste the coconut.
The shrimp were a fair size and were nice and crunchy.
I am a huge fan of fresh oysters and of course I had to load my plate with some of these. The ponzu sauce went really well with the oysters.
More oysters…yum!
There was also a selection of various sushi and sashimi. One that I liked was a tempura sushi, which was lightly fried with tempura batter. Although the sashimi was definitely not as good as what we ate at Taiko, it was quite good for a buffet. The tuna was also a pinker colour than what I was used to in Vancouver.
They also had Chinese-style crabs which was steamed and then stir-fried in a clear broth. The pieces of crab were quite big and tasty.
The baked scallop with cheese was a bit rich for my taste but it was interesting to see that it was baked right in the shell.
The shark fin soup was made with imitation shark fin, but you couldn’t even tell the difference. The soup had a lighter taste compared to what I was used to in most restaurants. NTR enjoyed this quite a bit.
When you are seated at your table, each person is given a ticket for one half a lobster baked in a cheese sauce. To claim it, you just head over to the lobster station and the server there will put one on your plate. The lobster itself was quite good although I wasn’t too crazy about the cheese sauce.
You could also construct some Peking duck using the mini buns provided and the generous pieces of duck. I didn’t have any of this but both NTR and UK enjoyed it. I was starting to get quite full by this point.
There were also hand cones that were made fresh so the seaweed was still crunchy.
The black bean clams had a nice flavour and quite tasty. There were also frog legs, which I didn’t try. NTR noted that it was a bit too lean for her taste.
The black bean oysters were very tasty. I could tell they were quite fresh and were just cooked and had a nice consistency. There was also some dim sum (bottom of the picture below) but the selection was small and most of the items were oversteamed.
Now onto the fruits and veggies. I needed to eat some veggies after all this seafood so I scooped some edamame onto my plate. I also had some watermelon, but the strawberries were definitely the better tasting of the two. They were sweet and ripe…I even went back for seconds!
Now it was dessert time. Most of the desserts were pretty standard but there was a good selection of both Western and Asian desserts.
I found that the Asian desserts looked better than they tasted. I think they had been sitting on the plates for a while so they may have tasted better when they were fresh.
I had quite a good time here. I would say that the seafood items are definitely the specialty. If I were to come back, I would load up on the seafood, especially the cold items, and pass on the desserts. We went on a weekend for lunch so it worked out to about $22/person. Weekday lunches are a great deal at about $12/person.
Details:
2200 Bridgepointe Pkwy, San Mateo, CA
Tel: 650-212-2688
Summary:
Food:
Service:
Price: $$
Posted in Other Cities, San Francisco, Japanese, Asian, Chinese, Reviews | 2 Comments »
Sunday, December 16th, 2007
It was our last day in LA and although we initially planned to make a repeat visit to Taiko, we decided on Chinese food instead. NTR, UK, and I headed over to S.W. Seafood & BBQ in Irvine for a late lunch. Incidentally, it happens to be located in the plaza across the street from Taiko.
We ordered a sampling of five dishes but first, we had some soup, which came with our orders. It was a pretty basic soup with tofu, egg, veggies, and mushrooms.
NTR ordered all of our items and asked for less MSG and oil. I was constantly thirsty during my trip so the call for less MSG worked out well for me. First came one of NTR’s favourite, the egg foo yung with scallops instead of shrimp. This was probably my favourite item here. The scallops were cooked just right and the eggs were creamy and had just enough salt. It went great with rice.
We were a bit lacking on the veggie content this weekend, so ordered some peas and broccoli with shrimp. The vegetables were nice and crunchy…as were the shrimp. It was a light dish but everything was quite fresh.
We also had some stir-fried white fish with mushrooms, carrots, and Chinese vegetables. There wasn’t anything too special with this but it was still quite tasty. The pieces of fish were quite large as you can see by the picture below.
The pan-fried noodles with chicken and veggies were also quite good. The noodles were crispy but not oily at all and the chicken with veggie mix made the noodles just soft enough.
Lastly came our indulgence for the afternoon. The deep fried squid with jalapenos and garlic was so yummy. I especially liked this because there was not too much batter and it was actually pretty light. The hint of spiciness from the squid was just enough and the squid went great with rice.
The dishes here were not overly large but was a great deal at $6.95 each. Believe it or not but even though we ordered so much, we polished off almost all the food we ordered! Even though we had asked for less MSG, I could still taste it in some of the dishes though and I was still quite thirsty even though I drank several cups of tea. Overall though, I was quite impressed with this place and enjoyed the food quite a bit.
Details:
5406-A Walnut Ave, Irvine, CA
Tel: 949-262-0128
Summary:
Food:
Service:
Price: $
Posted in Los Angeles, Other Cities, Asian, Chinese, Reviews | No Comments »
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