Sherman's Food Adventures: Sun Yee

Sun Yee

*Restaurant is now closed*

Sometimes, there is no other way to describe things but to be rather blunt.  And no, I'm not going to rant and rave about Richmond...  Although it is rather fun...  Instead, there are restaurants that are not very sexy.  Sun Yee would fit that description with its "easily ignored" yellow awning, drab interior and 70's washrooms.  Yet, sometimes we have to look at substance instead of glitz.  Hence, this is where we met up with Costanza, Elaine and all the kiddies for dinner one night.

In actuality, Gordo and I had visited the place once after hockey, but due to the limited amount of dishes we had, I never blogged about it. Well, we didn't have this problem this time around as we ended up with the "choose your dishes" Dinner for 6 which included soup, bonus tilapia, rice and dessert.  To begin, we were presented with the Daily Soup which was Herbal Chicken Feet.  Yes, it looked more like a crime scene from Chicken Run, but I did like silkiness of the soup despite being bland.  Our first dish was the Honey Peach Prawns which were drenched in a sweet mayo glaze.  The prawns had a nice snap and were still crisp on the outside.  Not sure about the peach as I'm not a huge fan of cooked fruit.

Next, we had the Peking Pork Chops which were thick and juicy.  They were properly tenderized being soft while maintaining a bite.  However, the batter was too thick and became gummy when contacted with the sauce.  The sauce itself was too sweet and the barely cooked onions didn't benefit the dish.  Instead of getting an extra hit of sweetness and aromatics, all we got was raw onion taste.  Bubbling and sizzling, the Satay Beef & Vermicelli Hot Pot was flavourful with only a hint of spice.  Due to the amount of liquid, the vermicelli ultimately became quite soft.  As for the beef (where there was lots of it), it was also soft where it was over-tenderized.

Moving along, we got the Broccoli and Beef.  Much like the aforementioned hot pot, the beef was also pretty soft.  However, it was probably cooked a touch less which meant there was some chew left.  The broccoli was vibrant and still crunchy.  Although the dish wasn't exactly lacking in flavour, it could've benefited from some garlic.  As part of the meal, we were presented with a complimentary Steamed Tilapia.  As much as I'm not a fan of that particular fish, they did a relatively good job preparing it.  Normally, tilapia has the texture of overcooked mushy fish, but in this case, it was somewhat flaky while the belly portion was fatty and just cooked.

Although the Steamed Pork Patty with Salted Fish is often considered a home-style dish, I generally do not hesitate to order it in a restaurant.  The effort it takes to hand-mince the meat is a real turn-off, so I let someone else do the work!  I liked this version as the pork was moist, loose and not overly fatty.  There was just enough salted fish for flavour while it wasn't stingingly saltly.  Surrounded by shrimp chips, the Crispy Chicken featured a nicely coloured crispy skin.  The meat was a little on the drier side, yet was not completely chewy either.  There was a general lack of seasoning which meant the side of wok salt was necessary.  Suffice to say, we didn't even finish half of the food we ordered, partially due to our silliness, yet mostly because of the portion size.   As unsexy as it is, Sun Yee serves up okay food for a good price.

The Good:
- Inexpensive
- Large portions
- Acceptable

The Bad:
- Acceptable, but not great
- Decor and washrooms have seen better days (but that's not what you are paying for)

Sun Yee Chinese 新意美食 on Urbanspoon

2 comments:

LotusRapper said...

That chicken foot in soup pic is precious: "Heeeeeeeeelp !" LOL !

Etienne said...

"crime scene from Chicken Run"

Yesssss lol

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