Gamamaru Shokudo

Normally, late night spots dishing up eats that go well with beers and the sort are reserved for Downtown Vancouver or small enclaves of restaurants on Main and Fraser Streets as well as Central Richmond.  So when we found out that Gamamaru Shokudo is doing that very exact thing, but in Fleetwood, it piqued our interest.   In addition to soju and beers, they have a menu that is a mix of Japanese and Korean late night favourites.  We ended up trying a bunch of dishes to go with our soju.

On the topic of Soju, we had a bit of a sampler consisting of peach, grape and mango.  Really dangerous as these went down easy.  I liked the mango the most as it was lightly sweet and tropical.  This went well with the Kushikatsu including baby crab, cuttlefish nugget, snow crab, pork belly, garlic beef, scallop, cheese menchi and teriyaki menchi.  These were really good with the 2 menchi skewers being the most flavourful.  The meat was tender and hey that slice of processed cheese!  Made it taste like a cheeseburger.  Crabs were crispy and briny while the snow crab was delicate.  Scallops were buttery soft despite being fried.

We had 3 different Oshizushi including Saba, Salmon and Unagi.  The one thing that they all had in common was the generous amount of the main component.  They were sliced a bit thicker than usual which resulted in more impact and texture.  The rice itself was a little on the denser side, but it wasn't a deal-breaker.  Nice torching on the top and for me, the salmon was my favourite with smokiness and sweetness.

On the menu, they have a section of share plates that included the LA Galbi.  This was a decent portion of meaty shortribs.  I really liked how they had marinated these so they were tender but still retained a considerable amount of chewiness (in a good way).  Too often, these are over-tenderized and hence, are too soft.  In terms of seasoning, they were a good combination of savoury and sweet with good caramelization from the grilling.

One of my favourite items was the the Clam Nabe.  The broth was so clean and pure tasting with the natural sweetness and brininess of clams.  The clams themselves were plump and buttery.  They were just barely cooked through.  All of them were open and the broth was not sandy.  We also had the Tako Bomb which was colourful with its combination of green onions, octopus, salmon, garlic chips, diced tsukemono and quail's egg yolk.  As expected, there was varied texture and flavours when mixed together.  We ate this with strips of nori.

We got a bunch of carbs to round out the meal including the Mentaiko Yaki Udon.  This was a good version due to the perfect texture of the noodles.  They were prepared properly where each strand was chewy with a nice rebound.  Beyond the great mouth-feel of the noodles, the creaminess of the dish was also on point.  It was creamy without being too heavy.  Of course the cod roe was at its fishy briny best completely flavouring the dish.

So I'm sure you've heard of Omurice before, but how about Omusoba?  Same concept but with noodles instead of rice!  The yakisoba was covered with a soft omelette while aggressively drizzled with yakisoba sauce and kewpie mayo.  As much as it looked like to much sauce, it was actually not that noticeable after mixing everything together.  The soba, much like the udon, was perfectly cooked with a springy chewiness.

We got the Sukiyaki Nabe for good measure and being a nabe, it was not as salty and sweet as the regular version.  Hence, the soup was drinkable and lightly flavoured.  The beef was marbled and hence was tender while the veggies added some relief from the heaviness of the other items.  Last dish was an Unagi Don and yah, they loaded up with so much buttery unagi, that we couldn't see the appealingly chewy rice underneath.  The unagi was evenly seared and drizzled with just enough sauce.  Simple, but well-executed.  As you can see, the food is pretty solid here at Gamamaru.  The prices are also quite reasonable, so you can order lots to share without breaking the bank.  Nice addition to the Fleetwood neighbourhood of Surrey.

*All food and beverages were complimentary for this blog post*

The Good:

- Well-prepared eats

- Reasonable-pricing

- Open late and lots of parking

The Bad:

- Sushi rice could've been less compacted in the pressed sushi