Manzo Izakaya


Debbie and I a little while ago happened to be in Richmond and wanted to try something a little different than our usual choices (ie: HK style Cafe's). So we decide to take a detour through Alexandria rd in Richmond.

This is a great area for the adventurous, literally a street of nothing but restaurants (mainly Hotpot restaurants, HK Cafe's, Taiwanese Bubble tea cafe's, Izakaya's, etc).

We were craving Japanese, and there are quite a few of these around and a lot of them look identical, after some discussion, we decided on Manzo Izakaya (simply because it was busier, which is always a good sign!).

This place specializes with Robata (grilled meat on skewers)

We started with a Beef Sukiyaki

A simple beef stew with cellophane noodles, fishcake & tofu. A great winter food item. This one was ok, I was hoping it would be raw dish and cooked table side. A good dish with rice, not bad for $10!

We ordered some Robata's consisting of Chicken, sweet potato cake, and wait for it..... Chicken skin!
(unfortunately I forgot to take a picture of the chicken skin or sweet potato).

Best dishes of the night! The skewers were juicy, flavourful with a great dipping sauce. Especially the crispy grilled chicken skin! Extremely guilty pleasure!

Miso grilled Sablefish 
 Another great grilled dish, except for two things. It is a tiny porton! And it costs $16!!! It was barely two ounces of meat! Great dish, but an absolute ripoff!

Our final dish was a Pork Cheek fried rice. 
Sadly this was bland, and flavourless. A real miss. I would avoid ordering this next time.

Overall the meal was hit & miss. We loved the robata, but everything else was kinda average and a bit pricey. We will be coming back to this restaurant, but next time it will only be for Robata!

The Flying Pig

*The photo's are a bit small today, click on them for their full sized glory!*

My cousin from out of town dropped by and I wanted to take her and my family out to a nice western meal, as we had been having nothing but Chinese food since she arrived! I've been looking forward to going to this restaurant for a while now, the menu has a nice fancy comfort food theme to it, and finally had a chance to go there.

Sometimes you don't get what you hope for...

It was Sunday brunch so we had a few breakfast themed dishes.

We ordered a Pulled Pork Poutine to share

My cousin had never heard of Poutine, so this was a nice intro. Fries were good, but pork was a little bland but overall who doesn't love Fries + Gravy + Cheese!?!??

Debbie ordered the Chicken Cutlet with mashed potatoes and vegetables

Pretty darn good, the chicken was well cooked and the mashed potatoes had some nice flavour to it, another hit!

My Cousin ordered the Croque Madam

Basically a ham & cheese sandwich with a fried egg on top, she enjoyed it and was very filling

My Sister ordered the Baked pulled Pork Gnocchi

Bland Pork, the Gnocchi was pasty, and sauce was non-existent. She only ate half and didn't bring it home. I think this says everything.

I ordered the Braised Shortrib Pasta with a creamy mushroom sauce

And it was not good...

It's strange that the dish was extremely salty, yet had no real flavour to it! The pasta was soggy and broken, and the sauce again had no flavour. The "shortrib" was just some cheap braised chuck steak and didn't have the texture or flavour of a true bone-in shortrib (but in their defense a lot of restaurants around town have "braised Shortrib" on the menu, when in fact it is just some cheap braised beef).

Overall I have to give this restaurant a pass, but maybe you'll have a better meal than me.

Le Tigre food truck

Where I am located now there are very few food trucks, so this is a rare treat for me. I was on my way to pickup something from a friend who happens to work on Granville St. Right in front of his office was the Le Tigre food truck, so I decided to give it a try!

It is run by Clement Chan, one of the contestants from Top Chef Canada.

One thing about food trucks... None are cheap, and this is no exception, so be prepared to pay a little more from them. The good news is that most have much better quality cuisine than your standard food court restaurant.

I decided to order two things, starting off with the Popcorn chicken

This was a fried spicy boneless chicken with a chili mayo dip, pretty darn good, though was a bit greasy (left a big pool of grease at the bottom of the container). Similar to Taiwanese fried chicken nuggets but with his original spices.

The "Kick Ass" rice with Pork belly and a poached egg.

I feel my arteries harden! This is definitely a luxurious dish with fatty braised pork belly, a perfectly poached egg & a topping of spicy mayo. A tasty dish but the pork belly was way too fatty.... I know your probably screaming at me saying that pork belly is supposed to be super fatty! But I seemed to get only the super "lardo" pieces with very little meat on them, but the meat that was there was pretty good, the egg was perfectly poached. Needed more rice though (I'm a bit of a rice addict).

Overall this meal cost me $14, a bit much for a quick lunchtime meal, but worth it if you go out for lunch as rarely as I do.

Shaolin Noodle House

Here's a quickie folks!

I love fresh noodles, who doesn't? My coworkers and I decided to have some handmade noodles for lunch, and we decided to make the trek out to the Shaolin Noodle House.

I ordered the Pan fried sticky rice cake with pickled cabbage and pork.

Be warned this is very filling! The Rice cake is freshly cut to order, and simply pan fried with a special soy sauce, cabbage & pork. It sounds simple, but is very tasty! This is comfort food for me. Kind like Meat loaf to some folk. Best to share with others!.... Must not be so greedy next time!

We decided to share a dish of Spicy Cumin lamb

A great sharing dish, lots of lamb for everyone and not too spicy! Just the right amount of grease!

One dish not pictured was my coworker's plate of Special shrimp fried rice. It was truly special!
It was a multi-grain fried rice with the perfect amount of egg, spice and grease! I will order this dish the next time we hit this restaurant! In fact I would strongly recommend eating family style at this restaurant instead of everyone ordering their own dishes. Lots to share and more to eat!

A Restaurant on the Beach...


In Mexico that is!

Sorry for the long delay folks, I've been on vacation in Mexico. So why not focus today's post on a restaurant in Bucerias Mexico.

After spending a day walking through the little town of Bucerias, we were getting hungry. Unfortunately a lot of the places we wanted to dine at were closed. Luckily a coworker of mine recommended a place that we just happen to stumble upon!

The Fat Boy Seafood

And yes, that is the name of the place.

It is located in Bucerias right by the town square, a little place by the beach with a great ocean view.

After sitting down we started with a Pina Colada...a big one!

Then came a complimentary fish ceviche & chips, the fish had some great flavour though the texture was a bit like hamburger.

Debbie ordered the grilled Mahi with garlic, it's served with garlic bread, rice pilaf, and some really great roasted potatoes!

The fish is very fresh and the accompaniments were great, plus the portion size was huge!

I ordered the Scallops served two ways, One was sauteed in garlic & butter, and the other wrapped in bacon and grilled.

This was an awesome dish, I love scallops and I haven't seen ones this big very often. Great dish and would order again!

At the end of the meal we received a complimentary dessert of Kahlua and cream, a great way to end a meal.

This is a great little restaurant on the beach and I'd strongly recommend stopping by if you happen to be in the area. One small warning though, there are a lot of beach vendors in the area, and literally stop by every five minutes to try to sell you something, it can get annoying at times, but each vendor will leave you alone after you say no.

Indian & Chinese Together!


The Chili Pepper House, is an Indian/Chinese fusion restaurant. The story behind this cuisine is fascinating, where Chinese citizens who wanted to escape the Cultural revolution ended up migrating to India, where their cuisine is a mixture of Chinese cooking techniques with Indian ingredients.

On with the show!

We first started out with the Chicken dumplings covered in a Chili soy gravy

The dumplings were handmade and pretty good (and one of the only non-fried items on the menu!), and the sauce was great! I ended up keeping the sauce after we finished the dumplings since it was so good!

Next was the Hakka Chow mein.

Greasy, boring, nothing special. Next!

Fried prawns with sweet & sour sauce.

Now I know what your thinking, it's a dish of fried prawns. But wait! They were fresh and nicely fried, the batter was light and the sauce was not too sweet. I would get it again!

Fried Okra & Eggplant, with a sweet chili sauce

Debbie and our friends really enjoyed this dish! It's very greasy but the flavours were nice and the Okra not slimy at all.

Sweet & Sour Fish

Best dish of the night, the fish was nicely fried (though a very cheap fish I'm sure, like Basa, Tilapia, etc) and the sauce was nice and light and not too sweet. Very tasty!

Chili Chicken

This is the house specialty, fried chicken with a not too spicy chili soy gravy similar to the one served with the dumplings. The chicken was good, but at this point we had already had our fill of fried foods.

This restaurant can get very busy, so either book ahead or come early, just be prepared for an entire meal of fried food! I need some fruit now...

Roma

What a great surprise!

It's that PNE time of the year! It's always fun to stop by the PNE once a year. Mini donuts, Corndogs and.... The Superdogs(the show, not the food!). The PNE is a great place for a fun snack but not a great place for a full meal. So on the hunt we went!

Heading out westward we initially planned to stop by the Red Wagon Cafe as I've heard so much about the place, but as we park the car, Debbie notices another restaurant that looks more interesting.
Roma (right next to the Busy Bee dry cleaners). This is the sister restaurant of Campagnolo and what a lovely surprise it is!

We start off with a Pizza for an appetizer. We order a Funghi Pizza with Mushrooms, fresh Mozzarella, Mizuna, & herb butter.

Now when it comes to pizza, in my opinion the best I've ever had is at Serious Pie in Seattle. Bar None. Ever since then, almost every pizza I've had has been average at best. This pizza though is pretty damned good. It has a great crisp crust with fresh cheese and mushrooms. Easily one of the best pizza's I've had in Vancouver. It's not Serious Pie, but its really close!

Debbie orders the Rigatoni with smoked albacore Tuna, fennel, olives, capers, and tomatoes.

Debbie really enjoys the pasta, with nice and tasty tuna. Not the largest serving size but this is quality over quantity! If you want huge plates, head to Anton's Pasta or the Olive Garden and stop reading my blog!

Still there? Cool, continue reading

I order the Tagliatelle with pork ragu 'in bianco', a white pork bolognese.

Really creamy and yummy! The pasta is nicely 'al dente', the white bolognese is both rich yet and nicely meaty, it's not simply an alfredo with meat, it's much more than that.

Overall I can see why this place is busy all the time, passing by it I always thought it was just a coffee shop, but is in fact a proper Italian restaurant, drop by and enjoy!