Ah yes, the backup plan. I had none. Yes, epic fail once again as I suggested we head to Kishimoto on Commercial for some eats after our league game on Friday. A few problems though - we had a table of 8 and it was around 8:00pm. If you are familiar with Kishimoto, the chances of us getting a table were as good as Christy Clark winning her riding. Wait. She didn't win her riding... Okay, that meant we didn't get a table. Hence we walked across the street to Tangent Cafe because there was no lineup.
One look at the menu and I was utterly confused. Vancouver Smoked Meat Sandwich and Mee Goreng??? Okay, I wasn't expecting that. Oh well, we were hungry and really didn't care. So Gordo and I decided to share a few thing beginning with the Roti Canai with curry chicken dip. The roti was surprisingly good with a crisp exterior giving way to a chewy and light interior. It was not greasy or heavy either. Although the curry chicken dip had some creaminess to it, the flavours were too mild in our opinion. Next up were the Sambal Green Beans with tofu. We found the beans to be cooked all-the-way-through, yet still retaining a crunch. The flavours were not typical, yet was impactful with a nice kick. We disliked the wild rice though as it was too dry and rubbery.
Continuing with Malay cuisine, we had the Mee Goreng with chicken. Again, the flavours were not familiar to us as we've had this dish before in a Malay restaurant. It was more soy than sweet, but it did have a nice heat level. The noodles were a bit too soggy for our tastes while the chicken leaned towards overcooked. Onto a North American dish, we had the Tangent Burger consisting of a chargrilled patty with diced bacon cooked into the patty, sautéed mushrooms, lettuce & cheddar. We found the burger patty to be fairly moist and not greasy. The soft bun had a slight chewiness that held up nicely to the wet ingredients. We substituted Truffle Fries for $2.00 more and they were really crispy with a good amount of truffle oil and Parmesan.
Polka King and Polka Dot graced us with their company (it's been a loooooong time) and tried the featured item being the Wild Sockeye Salmon with mango salsa, roasted veggies and rice. As evidenced in the picture, the salmon was pretty much overcooked and dry atop more dryness being the rice. The veggies were good though as well as the tasty mango salsa. Polka Dot remarked if they had put more of the salsa on top, it would've helped with the dry salmon. Ginseng went for the Beef Rendang and again, it was not similar to any other version we've had before. It was more like a coconut curry than a rendang. Normally, there would be a wealth of spices including ginger, galangal, lemongrass and star anise. We didn't get any of that. The beef was tender, but was slightly dry.
Gadget Girl foolishly ordered the Beet Salad, not because it wasn't any good, but what she really wanted was a burger. Alas, she wanted to play it healthy and longingly eyed our food. In the end, she did like her salad as it was large, fresh and full of ingredients. She particularly liked the fresh Mandarin orange slices. Milhouse went for the Caprese Panini and as you can see, they didn't skimp on the ingredients (tomato, bocconcini, basil, salami and balsamic reduction). He liked it as there was no absence of flavour, but it could've been toasted a bit more. In the end, everyone was just happy to hang out and grab a bite to eat. In terms of the strange mix of cuisines, there were some hits and some definite misses. We didn't expect complete authenticity, hence we let some things go. With reasonable pricing, we didn't go away displeased either.
The Good:
- The service we got was friendly and as good as it could be on a busy Friday
- Okay pricing will all things considered
The Bad:
- Don't expect authentic Malay
- Proteins (except for the burger) could've been prepared better
Tangent Cafe
Posted by
Sherman Chan
on Friday, June 14, 2013
Labels:
American,
Bar,
Late Night,
Malaysian,
Vancouver
1 comments:
Tangent eh? Sounds exactly as advertised!
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