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 Chi
nese 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 w
aiting 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
Posts
I remember back in my University days, we'd go bowling every now and then to pass the time. Really, what else was there to do? Lemme see... Movie? Check. Clubbing? Check. Sports? Check. Castle Fun Park in Abbotsford? Check. Eating? Duh... So when all these options were exhausted, bowling it was. I can't say I'm necessarily that great at bowling; but I will always hang on to my high score of 204. You see, Chill is a pretty good athlete. He rules at softball, golf, bowling and hockey (non-ice that is). So when my top score of 204 is better than his career best of 201, he is seething deep-down inside. It is no surprise he 
decided to organize a random bowling night in the middle of the week to once again try to top my score. And to make it more interesting, the alley of choice happened to be the scene of the crime. Yes, the 204 I scored, which I continually remind him about... Well, there were no records broken tonight, in fact, after not playing for awhile, the best I could muster up was a 127. Pretty pathetic. Yah whatever, I wasn't there for the bowling anyways. It was the eats to follow!
at 49th. In the same mold as Tracadero's, the former Little Johnny's, Spargo's and Gigi's, the food here is a combination of Italian, Greek and American. Home-style cooking with home-style portions. Oh and they're friendly too. Another reason we picked this place had to do with the Canucks game. They have a large TV there and yes, they were showing the game. A nice 4-2 comeback against the lowly Av's. So Costanza and I started off with the Calamari, which was very good. Lightly battered and crisp, the squid was super tender. What really made this dish was the outstanding tzatziki. Costanza remarked there was a 
substantial bite as a result of the plethora of garlic. Add plenty of lemon juice and this tzatziki sang. For my main, there was not doubt in my mind - it had to be the Roast Lamb. A healthy portion of roast lamb shoulder surrounded by lots of Greek salad, rice and 2 lemon potato wedges was set down before me. I wondered how I could finish this big plate of food, especially since there was a side of pita bread as well. Most of the roast lamb was tender and moist. Some of the exterior portions were slightly dry; but that is to be expected. I definitely got good hits of rosemary and lemon from the lamb. It was further amped 
by the aforementioned tzatziki. I really liked the lemon potato - nicely roasted and full of lemon zing while exhibiting a pleasing soft texture. Normally, the rice is a letdown since it can be mushy and bland. Not here. It had plenty of texture and bite while being properly seasoned. The Greek salad was fresh and crisp. However, rather than using lemon juice, I believe they used red wine vinegar, which results in an unpleasing appearance.
l. Costanza had a nice chuckled about that. Bastard! Anyways, they were tender and cooked nicely medium-rare (well, more like somewhere between rare and medium-rare). The accompanying spaghetti with meat sauce was typical North American home-style and served its purpose. Of course the meal wouldn't be complete here without trying the pizza would it? I was so delighted when a Pepperoni Pizza was ordered. Made up for the 3 steaks! Much like Gigi's, the pizza crust was crisp on the outside while bread-like soft on the inside. A good amount of cheese and toppings made for a filling product. The last dish was the 
Mediterranean Beef which was tender and full of flavour, particularly lemon. This was also a very nice portion as well. It came with the same sides as my lamb, which meant great rice and potatoes. What a satisfying meal! Sure, it ain't "gourmet" food; but it is real food, home-style. Coupled with great service, reasonable prices and generous portions, I can see myself returning in the near future.
