Guu

It's Thursday today; but it really felt like a Friday. Oh, it's the long weekend! Score! Well, not a total score, Viv was going to be late coming home tonight, so I didn't cook dinner and I was looking after one of the kids. I snacked a bit; yet I never actually got around to eating dinner. I thought it would be a great opportunity to get a late dinner when Viv got home (thanks to my parents taking care of the kiddies). I had a few ideas in mind; but ultimately I wanted to go get some izakaya. I've gone to Hapa Izakaya and Gyoza King recently, so I thought we should go to Guu. I haven't been to Guu in a long, long time; I think it's been over 6 years! However, there was one problem... The Canucks were playing and it was almost halfway through the 3rd period. Now you are wondering why this would matter. Well, I didn't want to fight through the traffic if the game ended and also, I didn't want to fight with the hungry after-game crowd.

So I briskly drove into downtown and luck would have it, I got a parking space right in front of Guu! Nice. Moreover, we were also lucky to get a table right away, although it was a sharing table. No matter, I'll just have strangers stare at me while I furiously snap pictures of my food (which they did). As always at an Izakaya, I am so indecisive since there are so many yummy items on the menu. Finally, after some discussion, Viv and I decided on the Salmon Yukke with Garlic Soy, Spicy Beef Yukke, Takoyaki, Deep Fried Pork Tenderloin with Sweet Miso, Baked Duck Breast with Sweet Miso and Fried Shrimp/Squid with Spicy Mayo.

The Salmon Yukke was accompanied by some shrimp chips and a quail's egg in a separate spoon. Once we mixed the egg with the salmon, pine nuts and scallions, it was smooth and buttery-like. The shrimp chips served as a vessel for the Salmon Yukke and I thought it was a nice texture contrast to the silky salmon. However, I thought the portion size was a bit small, especially the amount of salmon. The Spicy Beef Yukke arrived with a regular egg yolk on top and a generous helping of spicy sauce. This dish was quite tasty, although the spicy sauce was a bit too salty. From what I can gather, the spicy sauce seemed to be comprised of ginger, garlic, soy and chili oil. The takoyaki were very similar to the ones at Gyoza King, they were fried perfectly, crispy on the outside and fluffy on the inside. The pork tenderloin was fried in panko and was very crispy. It essentially was a variation of tonkatsu. I thought that the pork was fried a bit too crispy and there was a fair bit of oil glistening from a few of the pieces. The duck breast was pretty good, it was not as tender as I hoped it would be. By no means was it tough; but it did require a bit of chewing. The sweet miso sauce reminded me of Chinese hoisin sauce. That wasn't a bad thing though because hoisin sauce is excellent with duck. The various mushrooms that came with the duck were very pleasant to eat. Lastly, the fried shrimp and squid were forgettable. Both the shrimp and squid were overfried. The shrimp was dry and hard, while the squid did not retain any of its original texture.

All-in-all, Viv and I were satisfied with our meal; however, I personally like Gyoza King more. There is a larger selection of items and the food is more consistent at Gyoza King. Service was pretty good, especially if you take into account how the servers had to navigate the cramped restaurant. Now... I just hope it doesn't take us another 6 years to visit Guu again...

The Good:
- Good atmosphere
- Decent food
- Good service

The Bad:
- Cramped seating arrangements
- Small restaurant leads to lineups

Guu
838 Thurlow Street
Vancouver, B.C.
604-685-8817
www.guu-izakaya.com

Business Hours:
11:40am - 1:40pm, 5:30pm - 12:30am (Mon - Fri)
5:30pm- 12:30am (Sat & Sun)