Kalvin's Restaurant

Alright, enough has been said about Kim's parting post, so I'm not about to debate about it any further. What needed to be said has been said. Despite the apparent division of opinions, the one thing that cannot be disputed is the commonality of food. For me, food is about bringing people together, not about tearing them apart. Hence, with all the negativity and anger from a few weeks ago, it is nice to see that something positive came of it. You see, it was suggested we have a chowdown of sorts. As a community of food bloggers, it has been a long time since a large group has come together. With the shear number of food blogs in Vancouver, it is practically impossible to organize an event with is inclusive. But for some of us, we felt the need to break bread and focus on our passion rather than our differences. Thus, Kevin was gracious enough to organize a dinner at Kalvin's Restaurant. On its front awning, it advertises itself to be Szechaun restaurant; however, it is more Taiwanese with elements of Szechuan. The people in attendance were Ben & Suanne, Ed, Angie, Karl, Jessica, Anita, Russell and Diana. I must admit. Despite our differences, we still were able to come together for a meal. Life's short. Let's enjoy, not hate.

For me, I was just happy to be there for the food. So we let Kevin do the ordering and we started with the Fondue Spicy Pork with Organ Stew. Alright, lemme get this out of the way... The menu names for these dishes have a lot to be desired. This dish was not a fondue. Rather, it was a heated hot pot of sorts with pig's blood and pig intestine. Due to these ingredients, the whole thing ended up to be quite gamy. For me, I grew up with offal and it ended up to be pretty good. I'm not sure everyone else had the same sentiment since it was one of the last dishes to be finished. Next up was the Pork & Ton Choy in BBQ Sauce. At first, I thought that there must've been some form of XO sauce used in the dish since it was a bit fishy and spicy. After checking with Kevin, it turned out to be satay sauce, which has some of the same ingredients as XO sauce, namely dried shrimp or sometimes, brill fish. For me, it was a truly different flavour with ton choy. I'm more familiar with the use of fermented tofu and garlic as a flavouring agent. As for the vegetable itself, it was cooked properly where it retained a nice crunch.

After this, we got a Shanghainese dish being the 5 Spice Beef in Onion Pancake. I thought that the beef itself was adequately seasoned where I could actually taste it. Usually, one complaint about this dish is that the beef gets lost. Not here. Furthermore, the amount of hoisin was just enough to add some sweetness. The onion pancake itself was also balanced in that the onions were not overwhelming. However, I would've liked to see it slightly thinner. I wasn't a big fan of the next dish which happened to be the Shredded Fish with Yellow Chives. I've had this before and I do realize it is intended to be mild. After all, flowering chives are not exactly a flavour explosion. Rather, it is all about the aromatics and texture. With that being said, I found the entire dish to be bland. Sure, I could taste the natural sweetness of the fish; yet little else. A dash more of salt would've done wonders.

Whenever we dabble in Taiwanese food, there is sure to be offal. Case in point, the first hot pot consisting of intestine and blood. For our next dish, it was the classic Spicy Pig's Ear. This is mostly a textural item. When prepared correctly, it should be chewy while not too chewy. Think jellyfish. And much like jellyfish, there is no real inherent flavour (after rinsing and cooking) so the marinade is very important. This one was moderately spicy with a nice balance of sugar and soy. The flowering chives added another layer of texture and flavour. Hands down, the Red Fermented Pork Chops was my favourite dish. Just to note, the picture represents 3 orders. This is normally an appetizer; but since we had so many people, we needed much more than one order. Essentially boneless pork chops marinated in "nam yew" or fermented red tofu, this was a distinctively flavourful dish. Normally, regular fermented tofu has a sharp saltiness which is enough to seasoned anything. The red version adds another layer of flavour which is typically sweeter and some spice. If you can imagine deep-frying this, it can only intensify the flavours even more. I really could literally keep eating this. It was that good.

Coming from such a impactful dish, it was almost a letdown with the Shredded Beef with Green Onion. Nothing particularly wrong with it other than its normalcy. This is a typical combination found in Chinese cooking where the caramelized ingredients create a aromatic sweetness. The beef was so tender (from marinating) that I initially mistakened it for pork. This was well-executed, if not quite standard. Arriving in a big hot pot, the 3 Spice Chicken looked absolutely delicious. Sometimes known as 3 Cup Chicken, it named as such because there is usually 3 cups of main ingredients (such as rice wine, soy and sesame oil). A common menu item at Taiwanese restaurants, I usually find it oily and unsatisfying due to the lack of chicken meat. Not here though. The pieces of chicken were meaty, tender and freakin' tasty. All the flavours had melded together and penetrated each piece of meat. There was a good balance between tart, salty, sweet and aromatic. Furthermore, it was not as greasy as other versions I've come across. Very well done.

Normally, there are very few Chinese dishes that confuse me anymore since I've practically tried everything. However, when the Cold Bamboo Shoots with Japanese Mayo arrived, I didn't know what to think. I've never seen it prepared in this fashion. Now if you think of bamboo shoots, the first thing that comes to mind is funky vegetable gaminess. Relax, it was actually very bland. This dish was more about texture (think of really large white asparagus) than anything else since the mayo was very mild and sweet. Going from something that had some bite to a mostly mushy dish was the Eggplant with Shredded Pork. Another mildly flavoured offering, the eggplant was predictably soft. Yet, we could still discern individual pieces other than the middle of the plate. It was somewhat sweet with some savoury elements. Solid, if not unremarkable. Up until this point of the meal, we didn't really get a truly "Szechuan"-type dish. The Diced Chicken & Peanuts with Chili Peppers took care of that issue. Visually appealing and even more so taste-wise, this needed rice. The chicken was tender despite the small dice while the chili peppers added the necessary heat. Loved the peanuts, it added a nice crunch and nuttiness. Good wok heat as well since the flavours were intense and properly caramelized.

When the Prawns & Mayo with Pineapple arrived at the table, Karl gave me a look. He's not big fan of fried prawns and sweet mayo. Honestly, me neither. In actuality, I do enjoy it; but not beyond 2 pieces (I do like the one with walnuts more). After that, it gets heavy and kinda gross. In this case, the prawns were perfectly cold-water crunchy while the mayo was sweet to being with and became more sweet from the pineapples. As if we needed more food, it just kept coming with the String Beans with Minced Pork next. I found that the beans were slightly overfried which made them dry and slightly shriveled up. I did enjoy the plethora of garlic which added another flavour dimension to the slight spiciness. After this, we headed back towards another classic Taiwanese dish/snack in the Salty Peppery Chicken. These "chicken" nuggets are coated in salt and pepper then deep fried. I found them to be juicy on the inside while lightly crispy on the outside. In terms of flavour, it was more salty than peppery though. If they had added a bit more pepper, it would've been quite good.

We shifted gears once again towards Shanghainese food with the Xiao Long Bao. We went in with reasonable expectations on this one since this is not their specialty. As expected the dumpling skin was relatively thick, especially at the top where the dough twists. I found the meat inside to be tender in texture; yet slightly bland to the taste. More meat flavour and more seasoning was needed. There was a modest amount of soup inside and it could've benefited from more ginger. It was mostly one note in the flavour department. Again, it was decent for this type of restaurant. Despite what you think, this was not the end of the meal. Instead, there was a "soup" that was yet to arrive. Why were we getting a soup at the end of the meal? Well, the Chicken with Sesame Oil & Wine in Hot Pot apparently takes a while to prepare, so it ended up as our last item. If the pork chops was my favourite dish, then this was a close second. The broth was so intense and had so much depth, it would be hard to have more than one bowl. I could taste the natural sweetness of chicken, the aromatic essence of sesame oil and only a bit of the wine. Since the flavour was so intense, I can only speculate that there was MSG in this. No matter, I enjoyed it very much. To boot, the chicken was actually decently tender.

All throughout our meal, there was a large lineup outside waiting for tables in this tiny restaurant. I can see why. For the massive amount of dishes we did try, most were solid and some were fantastic. That is quite the feat when the restaurant was at capacity since the kitchen was probably nuts. Maintaining that level of quality and execution is challenging. I really enjoyed my meal and this has been one of the most Taiwanese/Szechuan meals I've had in a long time. It didn't hurt that I had good company too. I'm so glad I signed up for this dinner. It reaffirmed why I blog in the first place. Enjoying good food with like-minded individuals, despite any perceived differences. Life is too short to be petty.

The Good:
- The meal as a whole was solid
- Good value
- Lots of choices

The Bad:
- Super small restaurant, it gets packed
- Service is friendly; but it is limited due to space and being really busy

Three Lions Cafe

*Restaurant is now closed*

Do you know how hard it is to find a place to eat after hockey that is not Chinese? Well, honestly, it's not really that difficult; but when the venue is dependent on location, then it gets dicey. This is especially true when Gadget Girl vetoes every idea that is outside of Vancouver proper. What's with people being afraid of the burbs anyways? Hence we ended up looking at somewhere central in Vancouver. We settled on Three Lions Cafe, which is somewhat hidden on Broadway in between the endless supply of late night Asian joints. Since our game ended at a reasonable hour, the Canucks game was still in progress. Hence, that meant the Three Lions, much like an other pub, was packed. While driving there, I was listening to the game hoping it would end before we arrived. It did and people starting leaving as a result. Perfect! After a short wait, we were seated at a table without enough chairs for everyone. Milhouse and Lionel Hutz had to resort to bar stools until other chairs were vacated. Not a big deal really; however, the lack of food options was. You see, it was just after St. Patty's day and all their curry dishes, fish 'n chips, pie and Caesar salad were all sold out. This didn't sit well with some of our group; but we decided to stay anyways.

When we did finally get down to ordering, I went for some pretty basic items starting with the Curry Wings (at least one curry item was still available). These were fried too long in my opinion. The meat was dry and stringy. I did like the curry flavouring though. It was very pungent, littering the whole table with aroma. For me, it wasn't too spicy and provided enough curry kick. For my next item, I got the Egg and Chips. As the name suggests, there was a pile of fresh cut fries topped with a fried egg. It included a sausage and a side of baked beans. Although the fries were starchy and only slightly crisp, I still liked them for some reason. Maybe because I was just hungry? The fried egg was a fried egg and the beans were your typical sweet molasses baked beans. The sausage was not bad, quite meaty and not too fatty. Sweet Tooth, as her nickname suggests loves desserts; but they only had a bread pudding available, so she ended up passing on that and settled on a Beet Salad. Now for $13.00 (!), she was expecting a decently-sized dish. How wrong she was. Consisting of orange scented beets with grilled asparagus and crumbled goats cheese, the salad was plated nicely. Too bad it looked more like a work of art than actual food. She gobbled this up in 3 bites. Despite being quite nice in texture and flavour, the meager amount left a bad taste in her mouth.

The small portions didn't end there. Boss Woman decided to try their Daily Pizza which was spinach and goat cheese. Unfortunately, it looked more like a flatbread appetizer. To be fair, it was not that expensive, compared to the beet salad. She thought the crust was not bad being crisp and thin. However the pizza itself was bland, needing something else to bring the mild ingredients to life. Gordo decided on the most expensive item on the menu hoping for something more substantial - the Organic Hanger Steak and Chips. As stated on the menu, it is marinated in herbed extra virgin olive oil, grilled to medium rare (clearly it wasn't) and served with house made chips. Again, it was smallish in size and the steak was not of a pleasing colour. It really need more charring. Despite the great sounding marinade, the steak was not all that flavourful, from the herbs or meat taste. Since there was a lack of choices, Emilicious, Gadget Girl and Lionel Hutz all had the Three Lions Burger. Yikes, three of the same thing! The horror! The consensus from everyone was that the burger patty ended up to be a little dry despite being quite thick. The dry, crumbly bun didn't help things either. With that being said, the meat was not oily (hence the dryness), and did have good flavour.

Finally, the very last dish happened to appear to be the best value of the bunch. Milhouse, having visited Three Lions before, ordered his favourite - Bangers and Mash. Consisting of Cumberland sausage served with buttermilk mash, onion gravy and Yorkshire pudding, this was a sight to behold. With Yorkshire pudding that looked more like a parachute, it was the only dish that wasn't completely finished by the end of the meal. The sausages were very meaty and went well with the rich flavourful gravy. That was probably the best dish of the meal because everything else was just "alright". Of course we didn't get to try some of their other items since they were out. However, we all generally felt that the portion size (bangers & mash withstanding) was too small for the price. I've heard great things about their brunch and maybe I have to do a revisit to get a more complete picture of the place.

The Good:
- Interesting items on the menu (too bad most were sold out)
- Lively atmosphere at night

The Bad:
- Portion-to-price ratio was not particularly good
- Very tight arrangements inside

New Szechuan Restaurant

Dives and Rich Guy. They go together like a Charlie Sheen and good taste. You see, Rich Guy doesn't prefer restaurants that are "unclassy". He'd rather drive around in the Crystal Mall parking lot for hours rather than eating at a place like Burger Burger. That is indeed a real commitment to avoid places that Guy Fieri deems as "money". Call it what you want, but I'm sure he's #winning, much like Charlie Sheen (well, that's a bad example, scratch that...). So imagine my utter amazement and confusion when he recommended a place that is not only a dive, it's totally hidden from plain view as well. So let's get this straight. Rich Guy wants me to try this restaurant that has no ambiance whatsoever which employs disposable plastic table coverings as it's only decor. I never thought I would see the day. What's next? A trip down to Prime Time Chicken???

So where is this place? Well, it used to be called Spring Chilli Szechuan; but it was bought out and now goes by the name of New Szechuan Restaurant. Yah, not very creative; however, it is Szechuan and "new". For a "secret" restaurant as Rich Guy put it, the place was packed when we arrived. I guess there are no secrets when it comes to food! I also made it no secret to my son that the food could be quite spicy - something that would ultimately bite my in the arse... So we started with the Hot & Sour Soup (which was really cheap for $6.95). In terms of depth, we thought it was a little weak; but there was sufficient tartness and spice. There was also plenty of ingredients which included a decent amount of shrimp. For me at least, I like my hot & sour soup with meat. It gives the soup more body. Overall, a decent hot & sour soup for the price.

According to Rich Guy, this restaurant does one dish really well which keeps him coming back over and over. Now, for him to make this claim, it really has to be good. The dish in question is the Chili Garlic Pork. Consisting of thinly sliced pork belly smothered by minced garlic, ginger and doused with chili oil, this was a veritable flavour explosion. Combined with the naturally melt-in-your-mouth pork, I absolutely agree that this is good. In fact, we could've ordered 4 of these; however, we had many more dishes coming. It's really too bad the next dish was a complete let-down. The Chili Green Beans were completely overcooked. Let me rephrase that, they were completely over-fried. Deep-frying the beans prior to stir-frying is a typical restaurant preparation for this dish. These were fried to the point that they lost all their colour and texture. They were dry and limp at the same time. The one saving-grace was the spicy savouriness of the flavouring agents.

Interestingly, the next dish to arrive was something we did not recognize. It turned out to be the Sliced Beef Shank and Tripe. Although we did not order this dish, I secretly wanted to since it is quite obvious I have this affinity for offal. Buried beneath the obscene amount of cilantro was thinly-sliced braised beef shank and honey comb tripe. Everything was tossed in a dressing of chili oil, vinegar, sugar and soy. Although it can be seen as a simple item, the flavours and textures worked. I enjoyed this dish very much (since nobody else really touched it). Another dish I enjoyed flavour-wise didn't really come through in overall execution. The Dry Szechuan Chicken had a nice chili oil kick (much like everything else); but was cut up into pieces which were far too small. Once fried, most of the pieces were too dry to actually eat. Combined with the bones, it became somewhat hazardous if you were not careful.

Since we didn't have a beef dish, we decided to try the Mongolian Beef. Again, this dish had a pool of chili oil at the bottom which naturally gave the meat a nice kick, albeit greasy. The strips of beef were bordering on being chewy while still easy enough to eat. This went well with plain rice. Remember when I mentioned to my son that the food would be spicy? Well, we ordered the Shanghai Fried Noodles for the kiddies specifically because it is not spicy. Well, call it psychological because he kept insisting that the noodles were spicy. I could only wish there were true since the noodles were kinda bland. Not a good attempt at this dish. I forgive them though, they are a Szechuan restaurant, not a Shanghainese one. After this, we had a relatively long wait for the Braised Pork Hock. When it arrived, we quickly realized why it took so long. It was freakin' huge! Must've taken that long to reheat the darn thing! The best thing about the hock was the skin. It was buttery soft with a nice rind which melted in our mouths. Very sinful indeed. However, most of the meat was slightly dry and not as tender as we expected. Furthermore, the dark, rich colour of the sauce did not translate into anything particularly flavourful. It was sightly sweet and not much else. This pretty much summed up the food here. It's quite decent; yet at the same time nothing to write home about. With that being said, I would return just to have 10 orders of that Chili Garlic Pork. I'm sure Rich Guy would gladly join me, despite the lack of ambiance...

The Good:
- Awesome Chili Garlic Pork
- Homey place with homey service
- Lots of parking! Yay!

The Bad:
- Food is alright, could be better
- Not expensive; but it can add up

Sushi Mori

Having returned from our trip to Portland, we needed to get our keys back from Rich Guy. Naturally, that meant meeting up to eat as a result. Once again, we were searching for a place somewhere in the between. Much like last time, we were thinking of Osamu Sushi. Argh! it's not only closed on Sundays; but Mondays as well! As an alternative, we settled on Sushi Mori. Now when I mean settled, I really mean it. There are other "better" choices out there for sushi in the Tri-Cities area; but due to the circumstances, we ended up here. At the very least, parking was an easy task. On a side note, people might think I'm obsessed with parking when it comes to restaurants. Well, I am. Generally, when you have 2 kids in tow, the last thing you want to do is to spend time finding parking or walking 5 blocks in the rain with 2 kids either. Hence, parking is a very real consideration when it comes to eating out. At least for me that is. I truly digress...

Rich Guy had arrived first and already waiting us at the table was a complimentary appetizer of sorts. On one side, there was pickled radish and the other there was what we thought was watercress with a peanut dressing. Between that and ordering, there was a significant delay since there was only one server working the floor. When we finally did get our order in, the food took a little while to arrive. We started with the Spicy Salmon Sashimi. It looked alright; but we found it underwhelming. I actually think the one at Sushi Town is better. And that is quite the statement since Sushi Town is not exactly the pinnacle of Japanese cuisine. The salmon was acceptable while the dressing was a little on the bland side.

We were pleasantly surprised at the size of our Assorted Tempura. From the large ebi to the big pieces of veggies, this was a mound of food. However, the tempura batter was quite aggressively employed; thus it got a bit chewy in the end. Now you've probably heard of hit and miss dishes; but how about hit and miss in the same dish? That would be the case with the Chicken Yakisoba. The noodles had a nice chewy texture while being sauced with the right amount of flavour. The chicken was plentiful and cooked properly. Yet, the whole thing was greasier than a oil disposal unit at the back of a Chinese restaurant. The oil collecting on the cast iron plate would make a pan-pizza at Pizza Hut jealous. What were they doing back there? I heard of stir-fried noodles; but this was like oil-soaked noodles.

We ended up getting a few rolls consisting of the Scallop & Tobiko and Unagi. The rice was a tad gummy and lacking flavour; but was acceptable. I found the scallop to be quite good with large pieces and being sweet. Not a bad roll. Now as for the Unagi, that was another story. As Rich Guy remarked: "there was not enough unagi". Yes, there was a unbalanced unagi-to-rice ratio. Hence, the roll didn't really taste like anything. Lastly, we decided to try out one of their specialty rolls. We found them to be rather expensive, with nothing under $10.00. We ended up with the Caterpillar Roll which is pretty standard in the "specialty" roll category. This particular version consisted of unagi, cucumber, imitation crab meat and asparagus tempura on the inside with avocado on the outside. The entire thing was decorated with a two-tone sauce. Aesthetically-speaking, the presentation was nice as well as the construction of the roll itself. Texturally, the dense rice made each piece substantial to eat. Not necessarily a bad thing if one was hungry I suppose. A pretty solid roll; but not particularly a good value considering the price. In fact, the prices as a whole are on the higher side. They are not out-of-line considering the nearby competition such as Nagano and Sango. Furthermore, there is Sushi Turnhouse nearby which is substantially less expensive, albeit poorer quality. With everything taken into consideration, I wouldn't necessarily choose Sushi Mori over them.

The Good:
- Pretty nice decor
- Lots of choice
- Food is alright

The Bad:
- Expensive for what you get
- Service is non-existent, not enough staff

The Salt Cellar

Lost in this recent "gourmet" sandwich craze are the what we call "original sandwich joints". No, I'm not talking about Subway, Skyway or The Sandwich Tree. Yes, those can be quite acceptable places to grab lunch; but Ben Stein has more character than them combined. What I'm talking about are those mom 'n pop places that have been serving up solid sammies in homey and friendly lil' places long before "hip" sandwich shops hit the scene. Okay, there are too many to count and it'll take awhile to hit all of them; but we have to start somewhere. That somewhere may not be the most obvious either. This place is the Salt Cellar in White Rock. It fits the homey, neighbourhood deli/sandwich joint to a T. Nothing fancy here. For those who are have issues with gluten, many of the items are available gluten-free.

For lunch, I decided to go for the soup and sandwich. I went for the home-made Vegetable Soup to start. Now, for some people, a vegetable soup might elicit as much as excitement as a bingo game at a senior's centre. However, this vegetable soup was very good. Gimme a "B-9"! Sorry, I actually do like bingo, especially on cruise ships. Anyways, there was a plethora of chunky veggies in a naturally flavourful broth. It was very evident that this soup was made with fresh ingredients and with care. For my sandwich, I selected the Smoked Meat on whole wheat. As you can see, it is not fancy. No artisan bread, the meat is not piled ridiculously high nor are there any fancy sauces. It is a regular sandwich with fresh ingredients. No, it didn't blow my mind; but it was satisfying nonetheless. Now faced with a deli full of products, you know I wasn't going to leave merely trying one sandwich and a bowl of soup! Therefore, I went crazy and got a few things to go. They have a wide selection of dinner ideas which are ready to be packed up or they can warm it up for you to eat in as well. I picked up a portion of their Beef Bourguignon which was very meaty. In fact, it was mostly meat with some carrots and onion. There was a rich red wine flavour combined with the beef juices. As a result the whole thing was flavouful and all-around tasty.

Not satisfied with only one savoury item to go, I also got a slice of their Meatloaf. I didn't actually get to try any of this since Viv had it for lunch one day. From what I remember, she said it had a pronounced onion flavour while the meat itself was slightly dry. At the very least it wasn't too fatty. Due to the way it is meant to be packed up and sold, there was not enough of the ketchup-based sauce to go around for the slice of meatloaf. As I was picking out the savoury stuff, the desserts caught my attention. Well, not really, I'm not much of a dessert guy; but I figured to get some for research purposes. The first dessert was the Carrot Cake. It looked pretty good and in fact, it was good. I found the cake to be quite moist and nicely spiced. Lots of carrot and raisins hidden inside while the cream cheese frosting was modest, which meant that the cake was not too sweet either. Viv had the other half and basically echoed the same opinion. She is much more into cakes and really enjoyed it.

Now for my favourite item purchased at the Salt Cellar - the Lemon Square. Well, it is really a lemon bar; but it came as a square. It looked pretty and since I love lemon desserts, I had to get it. One bite and it was obvious there was a high-lemon content. It had a zing that hit me right away. There was just enough sugar to temper the tartness. Yet, other than the lemon, the most pronounced flavour was of butter. That, to me was slightly too much. Don't get me wrong, I love butter, especially on bread and in pound cake. I just don't like so much it begins to conflict with the other flavours. The last dessert item was a classic Chocolate Cake. We found the cake itself to be pleasing to look at it. We do eat with our eyes, so it is pretty important. The rich dark coloured cake was actually quite moist. I personally wasn't a huge fan of the chocolate icing; but then again, I'm not much of a sweets person. Whatever the case, the stuff here at the Salt Cellar is just plain solid. Sure, it doesn't have the glitz of modern touches of a Dirty Apron; yet it doesn't have to. Now I wouldn't suggest anyone actually make a special trip out to White Rock; but if you're in the area, go in and say hi. The warm welcome from the proprietors, reasonable prices and food that is made with care and quality ingredients are enough to keep the locals coming back.

The Good:
- It's nice to be at a place where you really are welcomed
- It's not fancy; but solid nonetheless
- The food is honest

The Bad:
- Kinda far for everybody except the locals
- Nothing mind-blowing here