Oishinoya Broadway

Boy, this location along the Broadway corridor at Cambie has changed hands a few times!  First, it was Ramen One, where it emulated Ichiran's lonesome dining within your own cubby with minimal human interaction.  Then we found 404 Coffee Lab taking over the entire space (they were only a small window attached to Ramen One at first) offering up beverages with some food options.  Now the place is an outpost of the Oishinoya chain dishing up various version of Gyudon as well as some other rice bowls.  They didn't do much in altering the layout of the restaurant, so introverts rejoice!

So after ordering from the kiosks in front, we merely took our receipt, picked a cubby and sat down.  We placed our receipt by the service window and after a short wait, presto!  We got our rice bowl sets.  Before I get to those, the cubby itself is more than just 3 walls.  Rather, you have your personal water station (so you don't need to ask for water) as well as chopsticks, spoons and napkins.  If you needed condiments, they have it all including shoyu, garlic ra-yu, togarashi, furikake and fried garlic.  Believe me, that garlic ra-yu or chili crunch, is fantastic.  You can put that on anything and it will taste better!

Since the basic bowl wasn't interesting enough for a picture, we went for the Ontama Gyudon featuring an onsen egg.  This was placed atop a good amount of thinly sliced fatty beef.  We found green onion, onion and pickled ginger rounding out the ingredients in the bowl.  With the silkiness of the runny egg, the chewy rice took on a different texture being more moist but still having a bite.  The beef was buttery and tender while conservatively sauced.  This was intentional because we could customize the flavours with the aforementioned condiments.   We got this in a set which added 3 small side dishes including edamame, kimchi and wakame as well as a Miso Soup.

My favourite of the bunch was the Cheese Gyudon as they did not skimp on the torched cheese on top.  I could really taste the cheesiness, but it wasn't overwhelming.  There was a bit of smokiness and nuttiness.  Again, the fatty beef was tender and the stringy cheese on top added another layer of texture.  I've already gone over how the garlic ra-yu could enhance even shoe leather, but it really went well with this bowl since it was relatively neutral-tasting.  Just a bit of spice (the chili crunch itself was more nutty than spicy) and some crunch really enhanced the rice bowl.  Moreover, to give it even more boost, we sprinkled in some togarashi.  For this set, I opted for the Chicken Karaage and a Miso Soup.  The karaage featured a crispy thin batter while the chicken itself could've been juicier.

Our last version of the beef rice bowl was the Kimchi Gyudon.  This was essentially the basic gyudon with a bunch of kimchi on top.  If you were expecting some briny and spicy version of Korean kimchi here, that is not what we got.  Rather, it was plenty tangy with some sweetness and mild spiciness.  By itself, it needed a bit more for it to be tasty kimchi.  However, when combined with the fatty beef and chewy rice, it was not bad.  The tanginess and crunch brought some life into the bowl and even the slightest of spice did help provide more impact.  Instead of the chili crunch, adding some shoyu and fried garlic did the trick.

Onto a couple of non-beef rice bowls, we went for the Unagi Don.  This was a pretty standard version where we found 3 big fillets of buttery unagi.  It was lightly glazed so it wasn't too sweet.  It sat on a bed of chewy rice which accepted the sweetness of the unagi well.  Since this was also a set, we were able to try the Ebi Tempura as well.  I found the batter to be a bit thick, yet it was still uniformly crunchy.  The ebi inside was still moist and buttery.

The last thing we tried was the Bara Chirashi consisting of salmon and tuna mixed with cucumber and green onion.  Seeing that this was not a sushi joint, the sashimi was decently fresh and vibrant.  With a bit of shoyu and mixed together with the rice, this was rather pleasant and light.  Overall, the rice bowls at Oishinoya were well-portioned and did the trick.  Nothing particularly fancy here, but the pricing is fair and you can get full, even with the small size.  Great for people on the go or ones who'd rather not converse much with anyone.

*All food and beverages were complimentary except for the cost of one of the sets*

The Good:

- Decent eats

- Well-portioned, even for the small size

- Great for those who want to be left alone

The Bad:

- Obviously, not great for groups

- Currently with the Skytrain construction, it can affect you, depending how you get there