Hee Rae Dung Korean Chinese Restaurant

If you're into Asian cuisine, it is a good bet that you've heard of Indian Chinese food.  2 more popular restaurants serving the cuisine are Green Lettuce and Chili Pepper House.  And what exactly is Indian Chinese food?  I would say it is a spicier version of Chinese cuisine that has similarities to Szechuan cooking.  Now what I asked if you've ever heard of Korean Chinese food?  Much like Indian Chinese food, where ethnic Chinese settled in Calcutta, Korean Chinese food has its roots in Incheon (where ethnic Chinese settled there). And I'm sure there are those out there that are well-versed in this type of cuisine as well.  But... It really doesn't get a lot of play because it is not really all that visible (albeit you can find some of the dishes at some Korean restaurants).  The lack of visibility can be partially be attributed to the absence of dedicated Korean Chinese food.  The last place I found a good selection of dishes was the now gone Da Rae Oak.

While I was breakfasting with JuJu at Jimmy's Place in Burquitlam, we had passed by Hee Rae Dung Korean Chinese Restaurant.  Seeing how JuJu is Korean, he was intrigued.  Well, I invited him to join Gordo, Viv, Rich Guy and myself for a meal there, but something about him working...  Normally, I generally have a plan of attack when ordering dishes.  Obviously we wanted to try the "must try" items as well as a good representation of the entire menu.  Well, due to my busy schedule, I didn't really do any research with the menu and just resorted to ordering 2 combos.  Problem being...  there were some duplicates!  Albeit slightly different.  So I apologize for the repetitive nature of the food!

Typically, a side of pickled daikon, black bean paste and onions are served as a side to a Chinese meal in Korea (as we had here).  Officially starting off our meal, we got a big plate of the Kan Poong Ki or Spicy Fried Sweet & Sour Chicken.  I've had this dish a few times before, but this has been the best hands down.  The large chunks of dark meat were fried up beautifully crisp on the outside while retaining a juiciness inside.  Bathed in a mildly spicy sweet and sour sauce (just barely clinging to each piece), we kept going back for more.  Next up was another classic Korean Chinese dish being the Ja Jang Myun (Noodles with Black Bean Sauce, onion and pork).  For those familiar with Northern Chinese cuisine, this is a version of the popular Ja Jeun Mein.  Although there was plenty of sauce, the flavours were mild with natural sweetness from the onions.  The noodles were soft while maintaining a certain chewiness.  Continuing with more noodles, we had the Jjam Bong or Spicy Noodle Soup with vegetables, shrimp, squid and scallops. Although the visuals didn't point towards a flavourful and spicy broth, it really was. There was a slow rumbling spiciness that hit in stages and lingered afterwards. The seafood was cooked nicely, noodles were al dente and veggies crisp. These 3 dishes belonged to Combo B which only set us back $27.90 (and these were large portions).

As part of Combo E (yes, I see the irony with ordering combos B&E...), we started with the Yang Jang Pi which was a large platter of seafood, seasoned beef, veggies and noodles with a spicy mustard sauce. This definitely looked better than it ate.  Not that it was bad necessarily, but there was a bit too many onions and not enough noodle.  Next was the Ra Jo Ki or Spicy Chicken with Vegetables.  Essentially a wetter version of the Kan Poong Ki, it was slightly less spicy and crispy.  Lastly, we had the Family Ja Jang which is a larger version with the addition of seafood.  The flavours were slightly different due to the seafood and a bit more moist due to it being stir-fried.  Nice.  What a pleasant meal and pretty decent value to boot.  I think Hee Rae Dung and I are going to be real good friends.  Now get me more of that spicy sweet & sour chicken!

The Good:
- Really large portions
- Awesome spicy sweet & sour chicken
- Something "different"

The Bad:
- Expensive, but okay considering the portion size
- The servers were nice enough, but we never saw them

Battle of the Breakfast Sandwiches

I literally grew up eating McD's. No joke! I remember eating it often and I even got the occasional lunchtime delivery at Elementary school. Yes, there were some envious classmates and even the teacher stole some of my fries. I'm not sure if this was the healthiest of diets, but hey, I loved it. One of my favs is the McMuffin. Something so simple, which could be replicated at home, I always seem to crave it. However, there are so many other fast food breakfast sammies out there and they never seem to measure up. So I decided one day to compare all of them to see which one reigns supreme!

The English Muffin with sausage at BK tries to emulate the classic from McD's but it fails miserably. First of all, the muffin is not toasted which meant it would spongy and cold. Secondly, the folded scrambled egg has only one texture (rubbery) and does not have that contrast between the white and yolk. The sausage is meatier than the one from McD's which meant a bit less fat. It is also saltier too. The Croissant version is better since the "bun" is soft and buttery.

The sandwich at A&W is probably my least favourite since they use a regular hamburger bun. Now that is not unusual since Triple O's does the same, but the fact there is no sauce, it makes the whole thing really dry. Furthermore, it stretches out the ingredients which makes the sandwich feel like it doesn't have much substance. I don't particularly like how they prepare the egg since it ends up looking more like a fritatta.

From Triple-O's, we have the classic Sunny Start. I remember downing 3 of these easy as a kid at White Spot. I'm sure my parents were horrified with needing to order 3 of them. This is obviously the most expensive of the fast food breakfast sandwiches. It consists of a fried egg, processed cheese, bacon (or sausage) and Triple-O sauce on a regular hamburger bun. The thing that makes this better than the A&W sandwich is the bun. It is much softer and less dense. Therefore, the other ingredients are actually discernible. Furthermore, they don't skimp on the bacon and as with any White Spot sandwich, there is an obscene amount of Triple-O sauce.

From probably one of the unhealthiest breakfast sammies to the healthiest, I got the 6-inch Breakfast Sub from Subway consisting of a microwaved egg omelet with choice of cheese, meat and veggies. I went for ham along with tomatoes, lettuce, cucumbers, pickles and olives with Southwest dressing. This was easily the largest of the sammies while also being the most bland (despite the dressing). It is also probably the healthiest despite the cheese and the dressing. Although it still might be close calorie-wise. Although it filled me up, there was less satisfaction eating it than the others.

Mona Pizza

Ever since he got his Honda Pilot 3 years ago, Costanza has been lamenting the fact that there was never an HID headlight option. For those who are unfamiliar with the term HID, think Xenon headlights or those-really-bright-annoying-lights-coming-towards-you-while-driving-at-night. Yah, those lights... Well, for awhile there, if your car did not come with them, the only option was to pay $1000.00 for a conversion kit. Now, for a low price of $58.00, you can install your own. So with my recent experience with installing them, he came over for some HID action (does that sound strange?). Of course with the boys in the garage, there was only one way we'd get dinner (you see, both of us do the cooking, the wives do not...), get takeout. Or in this case, order pizza from a nearby joint.

Seeing how we'd already tried Hot Oven and Stan's, we opted for another place nearby called Mona Pizza. I've always wondered why it was called "Mona". I assumed that was the owner's name. Nope. With a picture of the Mona Lisa on the wall and Mona herself eating a slice of pizza on the box, it was quite obvious where they got the name. Now the only question left was: would the pizza be a work of art or a fraud? Well, to get to the bottom of this, we ordered 3 pizzas starting with the Sausage, Mushroom and Ground Beef. It was quite obvious by looking at the pizza that it wasn't going to be very oily. In fact, we barely noticed any oil on top or at the bottom of the pizza. Take that Pizza Hut! In the end, the pizza was slightly dry because of it. As you can see, there was a generous amount of toppings and a decent use of cheese. Usually, with the liberal use of toppings, the pizza would be fairly salty. Not in this case though, it was bordering on slightly bland. The crust was slightly doughy while crisp on the bottom and all around the edges. It stood up well and there were no soggy parts.

Other than the pepperoni pizza we got for the kids, our second one consisted of Capicola and Green Peppers. Again, whenever there is capicola, one would expect some spice. Not really, it was quite muted. Decent pizza, yet hardly memorable either. If I had to do it all over again, I'd go back to Hot Oven. However, with all things considered (including price), Mona Pizza does the trick if someone wanted to get some pizza to watch the game or something.

The Good:
- Decent value
- Fair amount of ingredients and cheese
- Not greasy

The Bad:
- Middle of the road North American pizza

Wing Wah Bakery

While parking the car with intentions on grabbing some Chinese BBQ from Yu Kee, I noticed a bakery that was partially hidden. Man, what a crappy location in the strip mall. Located right behind a large post, Wing Wah Bakery was a convenient discovery since we needed some pastries anyways. We grabbed the kids let them decide what to get. Bad move as they were pointing at all of the non-Asian products. No offense, but buying animal-shaped cookies at a Chinese bakery is just wrong. We were able to get some of the more standard offerings though. Hey, we are the adults after all! Well... at least Viv is...

Once home, I dug into the BBQ Pork Bun first. It was light, airy and had just enough chewiness to prevent it from being too soft. The quality of the dough was obvious from the first bite. As for the filling, it was goopy and very sweet. They could've eased up on the corn starch thickened sauce. There was a good amount of filling which featured a few too many fatty pieces. Despite its shortcomings, the dough made up for it. The BBQ Pork Pastry was obviously filled with the same goopy BBQ Pork concoction. However, in this case, it worked because the pastry was thick. Although it was thick, it still had a nice buttery consistency to it.

Although I'm biased when it comes to the non-flaky type of tart shell, the one in the Egg Tart wasn't too bad. It was slightly dense, yet not sugary or hard. The egg custard had a nice silky texture and was nicely firm. However, it was bland and needed more sugar. The Apple Tart was an epic fail because one bite and ugh... uncooked dough. Suffice to say that ruined it right there. The filling was full of large pieces of undercooked tart apples. They still had a slight crunch and were coated with a thick syrupy sauce. Even the cooked portions were very buttery and greasy. We had to dump these out.

We also ended up with a few more buns including the Pineapple Bun (not pictured) and they were not bad due to the good airy dough. Yet, we couldn't get the image and taste of the apple tart out of our minds. In the end, the stuff was passable except there is definitely better. I guess Wing Wah can be considered an option for those in the neighbourhood because of convenience and reasonable prices. For me, I would probably stick with my favourite being Karmony out on Victoria Drive.

The Good:
- Inexpensive
- Nice owner
- Dough is good

The Bad:
- Lacking refinement
- A bit hit and miss

HK BBQ Master

After randomly visiting various Chinese BBQ joints in the GVRD in the last little while, it has further reinforced my belief that HK BBQ Master has the best stuff. I believe in their product so much so, I would drive all the way to Richmond just to get it. Yes, I'm that dedicated! Risk the health of my car as well as my own sanity for some roast pork belly - oh the sacrifices for food... Sometimes I often wonder why I don't live in Richmond altogether. Woah... What is this crazy talk? Okay, I wouldn't go that far. However, I did travel to Richmond to get some of the aforementioned BBQ treats from the lil' joint beneath Superstore.

For me, I believe that HK BBQ Master makes the best Roast Pork in the GVRD. They use pork belly exclusively, which ensures that each order is consistently fatty and moist. When a whole roast pig is offered, every section offers up a different type of meat, from fatty to really lean. I ended up with 2 pounds of it and it was as good as I remembered. The meat was super moist, well-seasoned and the fat melted in my mouth. As for the best part, the cracklings were crunchy yet not so much so that it was hard to eat. Put this in a sandwich and make your own porchetta. I also feel that they make the best BBQ Pork in town as well. It has a lot to do with the outstanding marinade and honey glaze. Not only does it help produce a tasty bark on the outside, it helps keep the pork moist. They also do a good job in the cooking process as there is a nice char which both looks appetizing and offers up some smokiness.

Unlike the last time (where I stuck with only the roast pork and BBQ pork), I also got a whole BBQ Duck. Yes, this was a huge meat order. By the picture alone, you can probably tell the duck was plump and meaty. It had a beautiful rich colour with lots of caramelization. One thing that I personally didn't like was the thick layer of fat underneath the skin. It probably had something to do with the type of duck they used. As for the meat, it was moist and only mildly seasoned. I actually prefer less saltiness as I find it destroys all the natural duck flavours. On the topic of salty, the side of Duck Livers that I was persuaded to buy were packed with sodium. The livers themselves were quite good though. The texture was stiff (as expected from a well-cooked liver), but there was a flavourful "bark" of sorts. In the end, they were too salty though. Whatever really... Let's ignore the livers shall we? The main event here are the BBQ meats and they do a fabulous job with them. For me, HK BBQ Master is hands down the best Chinese BBQ in town.

The Good:
- Well executed BBQ meats
- They only use the pork belly for the roast pork
- The glaze for the BBQ pork rocks

The Bad:
- Livers are too salty
- Pricey

Go Go Sushi

For such as small place, Ladner has an inordinate amount of Japanese restaurants.  Now the "Japanese" part of it can be up for debate as many, if not all of them are not Japanese-run.  Hey, that doesn't really matter to me if my expectations are in-line with the actual food.  Besides, does it really matter when most people don't give a rat's ass about it either.  So once again, I was in Ladner in search of a quick meal and it lead me to Go Go Sushi.  I guess the name subconciously spoke to me since I was on the go and didn't have a whole lot of time.  My only hope was that it didn't mean I had to "go go" afterwards!

Since I was by my lonesome, I decided to go for the biggest and baddest (an expression of course) Bento Box they had. For once, the Bento Box was eerily similar to the picture on the wall.  I mean it was EXACTLY the same including the angle of the California Roll.  The roll was actually not half-bad where there was much more filling than rice.  The rice itself was rather gummy, but did have a nice hint of rice wine vinegar.  It could've benefited from more sugar though. I sampled the Tempura next and it was quite greasy while being really crunchy.  So much so, the yam ate like a potato chip.  I liked the ebi though as it was sweet and had a nice bite.  I really wish there was more tempura dip as it was merely a puddle in the middle of the box.  

The Gyozas were not bad with a seared bottom and moist filling.  Not sure about the sauce though, it was more like sweet & sour than anything else. It really made the whole thing taste non-Japanese.  And yes, the place is not Japanese-run.  By listening to the staff, it is Chinese-run. The Chicken Teriyaki was massive for a boxed portion.  There was plenty of chewy rice on the bottom and super moist chicken on top.  It was fried nicely where the exterior was crisp while the meat was just barely cooked.  The generic sweet teriyaki sauce was kept in check so it didn't overwhelm everything. This alone could be enough for someone with a small appetite. 

As for the Nigiri, they were massive in terms of fish and rice.  Actually, I didn't prefer the gargantuan piece of rice, yet it did match with the large slice of fish.  As for the quality, the fish was pretty standard.  It was neither super tasty nor was it poor either.  I ended up leaving some of the rice in the box unfinished.  There was just too much food.  Yah really, too much food, even for me!  Despite not being very authentic, I didn't really mind as I got full value for what I paid.  The portion-size was massive while the food quality was acceptable given reasonable expections.

The Good:
- Large portions
- Reasonably-priced
- Decent eats when not looking at the authenticity of it

The Bad:
- Well, it ain't authentic (if you care)
- Best for take-out as it is a small place

Moderne Burger

For the longest time, I've been wanting to do a revisit of Moderne Burger because it has been nearly 4 years I last ate there. Since then, there have been a rash of new "gourmet" burger joints and existing restaurants offering their version of a "deluxe" burger. Sometimes, there are so many toppings on these burgers, it almost becomes unrecognizable. Hence, I really felt that I had to go back to the basics. And Moderne Burger was the place to experience this. You see, their burgers are pretty simple - unseasoned ground beef and only a handful of optional toppings. That's it. Sometimes, simple may be better.

Much like last time, I headed over to Moderne after getting my haircut (this time around, I brought my son). We were welcomed by the same personable owner who chatted me up last time (he chats it up with everyone, which is nice). Unlike last time, I started with a Creamsicle Shake. In addition to the serving found in the glass, I was supplied with the usual tin of "excess shake". Well, this excess was practically half of the tin. That was a lot of shake especially since my son didn't want any of it. He likes chocolate, not orange... I enjoyed the flavour as it did really taste like a creamsicle. Furthermore, it was not crazy sweet. However, it was slightly icy. Same as last time, I went for the Cheeseburger, which came with fresh leaf lettuce, tomatoes and red onion on a firm bun (surprise, it wasn't brioche like everywhere else these days...). Okay, let's get one thing clear here: the burger ain't fancy. In fact, it is darn basic. However, for me at least, I still continue to enjoy it. It's just a good burger. The meat wasn't exactly juicy, but it wasn't dry. The good quality ingredients shone and the bun held up all the way. As much as I love brioche, it was nice to see none of that here because the sweet egg bun would've been overkill with the unseasoned beef.

Predictably, my son had the Grilled Cheese, even though he does enjoy the occasional burger. Essentially a pressed hamburger bun with 2 slices of cheddar, this was a grilled cheese that my son liked very much. He remarked that by using real cheddar it wasn't as salty. Nice to see he is developing discerning tastes... We ended up splitting the Fresh-Cut Fries because we wouldn't have finished 2 orders. These were very similar to White Spot fries except they were crispier. We liked the fries and my son actually was beginning to stash away a portion for himself since he thought I was eating too much of it. And that pretty much sums it up. Although the food is pretty basic, it does what it does without relying on fancy ingredients or gimmicks.

The Good:
- Simple, good burger
- Personable service
- Nice diner ambiance

The Bad:
- Menu is pretty focused, don't expect anything crazy here
- Tight booths, especially for 4 people