Grand River: Improved dim sum!

Honestly, for a while I refused to come here for dim sum since the quality was so poor. All the food was too oily and overfried that it was almost disgusting to ingest. However, my mom convinced me otherwise, so here I am!

Restaurant: Grand River Seafood Restaurant (visit their website here)

Location: #112- 100 Schoolhouse Street, Coquitlam
Cuisine: Chinese, Dim Sum, Seafood
Price range: $10-15 per person



Date of visit: October 28, 2016
Atmosphere: 4/5
Staff/service: 4/5
Food variety: 5/5
Food quality: 4/5
Buck worthy? 4/5

One of the staples that I like to order is Steamed Pork Dumpling ($4.50). These were actually decent, not too much lard, nice size, and had some shrimp and mushroom in it. Good texture.

Steamed Bean Curd Wrap in Oyster Sauce ($4.50) is Sunflower's favorites, they pack lots of pork inside the beancurd, which is steamed to be soft and moist.

My granny's must-have: Steamed Chicken Feet with Black Bean Sauce ($4.95). They used to only have 4 per dish (sometimes they still only have 4 if they're big), but there were five today, which feels like a better deal. All the flavors of the sauce are soaked into the feet and the skin falls right off the bone.

Deep Fried Squid ($6.95) is not the same as Deep Fried Squid with Spicy Salt, so be careful! We enjoy the squid tentacles over the body of the squid, and these are so tasty! Crispy and fresh all the time, not overly salty either!

Steamed Spareribs on Rice ($2.99 if you order 3 dim sum) is something my uncle ALWAYS orders. Though I prefer plain steamed spareribs, how can you argue with a dish that's under $3? It's basically steamed rice with pork spareribs on top, with a side of sweet soy sauce. Hits the spot and the carb go-to.

Steamed Meat Dumpling ($4.50) is sometimes ordered at our table, I felt the skin was nicely made-- a bit thick but chewy, soft, and moist. There were SO MANY PEANUTS inside, I didn't like it that much, but Sunflower did! The meat rissoles inside were tasty and just the way I remember them as a child though!

Can't ever have a day without fish for OldBean, so a Halibut with Supreme Soy Sauce and Scallions ($7.95) was in order. The halibut was overcooked and a bit dry, flavors were good though.

Another fishy favorite is their (boneless) Yellow Croaker with Supreme Soy Sauce and Scallions ($8.95). There's only about 9 pieces of fish, but oh so melt-in-your-mouth good. Crispy on the outside the fish is moist and flakey inside.

Deep Fried Milk (special item, forgot the price) was a special monthly item, and quite disappointing. The outside was crispy but hard and the "milk" inside was solid and overcooked.

Fried Prawn Dumpling ($5.50) is packed with shrimp and garlic wrapped together in a golden layer of crispy wonton skin. Juicy inside and crunchy outside-- yum!

Steamed Tripe with Ginger and Green Onions ($4.95) is becoming rare in the dim sum scene nowadays because of the inflating price and complexity of preparation. However they do a good job here, no extra cornstarch coating on them, just plain steamed and delicious.

Mayo Pork Chops (special item, forgot the price) was definitely the wrong choice we made that day. The mayo was overwhelmingly sickening paired with the deep fried pork chop-- it was all too much. My piece had a lot of fat in it as well, which was disappointing.

Deep Fried Sweetened Glutinous Rice Ball ($4.50) took a good 35 minutes before it showed up at our table, since they make it fresh-- so remember to order it early! I'm glad they do this though, since it was super crispy, with the glutinous rice being soft and chewy. I didn't like the seasme paste filling though, it was not smooth and had lots of grit to it.

Finishing off with more dessert, Tapioca Cake with Red Bean Paste and Custard Paste ($4.50) was a beautiful presentation. Usually its harder to use small tapioca balls, but they did it!

It doesn't stick onto our hands and the tapioca balls are all cooked perfectly so that they are nice and chewy.

Service has much improved and their food has definitely turned for the better. I hope they keep it up and continue offering various different dishes each month!

Ruby Chinese: Bittersweet Farewells

Another restaurant closing gathering, all quite bittersweet. Basically, I grew up with Ruby and the staff there since everyone was like family there. This post is basically the farewell party on their last day!

They officially closed after lunch, I saw some people there for dim sum still, but she had portioned off three tables for guests to sit at. It was so warming as strangers shared a table and recalled all our good memories at the restaurant. They were familiar faces since we see each other so often during dim sum. First they served a Potato Salad! It was gigantic for 8 people! Crispy melon mixed with soft potato and loaded with shrimp, so amazing!

Food continued to appear on our table, there was soup with fish maw, super yummy!

Favorite is their Singaporean fried rice noodles, just as I remember them =)

They called this "Owner fried rice special" because it was personally made by the owner herself! Loaded with ingredients, this tasted delicious.

One of our all time favorites must be their pan fried string beans, mildly spicy with meat bits and the beans crunchy and flavorful-- I'm definitely going to miss this!

Then poured in many many dim sum plates freshly steamed! Various buns stacked atop each other, some sweet, some savory.

There was also har gow (shrimp dumpling), which is kinda crazy because in all my years here we've never actually ordered it! First--and last =(

Pork hock was one of my grandma's favorites, since they're so tender and the flavors are all soaked up into the pork hocks.

I've always admired them for having clean oil to fry their foods (they change it weekly and sometimes more frequently if the "color" of the oil changes), as compared to most Chinese places that just use their oil until unfryable. These tomato sauce shrimp were lightly fried and had just enough sauce to coat the outsides. These were quite large as well, and crunchy in my mouth!

We all held the plate of deep fried squid since we were running out of room on our table! So heavenly.

Look at how much food we still had! This was about the time when three people from our table had to leave-- leaving six of us staring at all the food.

There was bonus beef omasum-- Elephant's favorite! (Too bad he wasn't here for it)

Here's the owner still working hard, going around to make sure everyone was comfortable and well fed.

There was so much food left over and we couldn't bear to waste it, so packing it for later!

Lastly, a picture with the owner (and famjam)! Thank you for the many years of great memories, food, and chatter! We will definitely miss you, and hope you see each other around town ^-^

Fresh Prep: Delicious convenience in a box!

I apologize in advance, since I totally forgot to publish this post a year ago, but here it is nonetheless! I was contacted by a member of Fresh Prep to try out their meals and provide some feedback! My first time doing something like this, so please bear with me!

The website has evolved over time, so it's a little different than when I first ordered from them-- it's much cleaner and prettier. They have the option for you to look at their weekly menu, pricing, and explains how it works. You create an account and the current deal is getting two free meals with your first order. I ordered for a one-time delivery meal for two.

It comes in a convenient little box, delivered right to your door (if you're within their delivery range, they can also deliver to work if you want to pick up there, which is what we did). I ordered the Lemon Rosemary Salmon with Arugula and Ancient Grain Risotto ($14.00/portion).

Inside are the ingredients, nicely packaged with a cooking instructions sheet. The ingredients are labeled, so you won't need a lot of effort trying to figure out what each ingredient is, if you're unfamiliar with them! In the box, we got Wild Sockeye Salmon Filet, Ancient Grains, Lemon, Vegetable Stock, Rosemary Sprigs, Ground Rosemary, Arugula, Carrot, Himalayan Salt, Parmesan Cheese, and Garlic.

The herbs and seasoning ingredients, along with the salmon, all neatly packaged.

Fresh ingredients in each bag!

We followed the instructions on how to cook them, first was the salmon! Beautiful color and cut of salmon!

Next we put the risotto into a pot with water and the bouillon cube to boil.

Stir stir stir!

Now add the carrots!

The lemon was half cut into slices, for the convenience of placing half on the salmon and the other half for extra lemon juices if needed. They also provide dried and fresh rosemary for seasoning and plating!

Done baking in the oven now!

Onto plating, now this is where it gets personal on how you want to plate the dish, but the kitchen smelled amazing!

The salmon was nicely cooked according to their instructions, and we didn't end up using the Himalayan rock salt, since it was flavorful enough on its own.

Overall I quite enjoyed making this meal, it was straight-forward and easy to follow. Only extra we needed was water and basic kitchen utensils/tools (like a stove, oven, pot, tray, plates, etc). We were quite satisfied with the portion size, taste, and quality of ingredients-- we even had leftovers of the risotto! This was made on our anniversary night, and let's say thanks to Fresh Prep, we had a most memorable evening =) Continue being amazing!

Dragon Group: Amazing tea, sub-par dim sum

Family was in Richmond visiting the temple, so we thought to have lunch in the area before leaving! Saw this new place have their "Grand Opening" sign up, so we decided to give it a try, it used to be the location of South Ocean.

Restaurant: Dragon Group Seafood Restaurant

Location: 150-4751 Garden City Road, Richmond
Cuisine: Chinese, Seafood, Dim Sum
Price range: $15-$25/person



Date of visit: October 10, 2016
Atmosphere: 4/5
Staff/service: 4.5/5
Food variety: 5/5
Food quality: 2/5
Buck worthy? 1/5

There wasn't a long wait in line for tables although it looked crowded, we were seated after about 15 minutes of waiting. The inside is quite nicely furnished now, but still the same small space. There is a $1/person charge, and the tea quality justifies this surcharge, it was very nice tea-- fragrant and light.

I was looking through the menu while we waited, so we could place the order right as we sat down (hungry peeps). First to arrive was the Halibut with Scallions and Ginger in Premium Soy Sauce ($8.25). The halibut was cooked perfectly, juicy and flakey inside with a crispy exterior that was evenly coated with the soy sauce. Not overly seasoned, I quite enjoyed the piping hot fish. Wish there were more pieces considering the price we paid.

My mom really loves Rice Roll Wrapped with Donut ($5.25), but this was an utter disappointment. The rice roll itself was mediocre, chewy but not quite "smooth". The Chinese donut was hard as a rock and over-fried. Normally it should be crispy on the outside with a bread-like interior. At least they put the soy sauce on the side.

When I first went for dim sum in Hong Kong, one thing I really enjoyed were their "combo" dishes-- basically dishes with more than one item in it, so you could have dim sum alone AND still have variety. I saw the Beef Ball, Spare rib, Chicken Feet combo ($4.75) and was sold immediately. Sadly, this wasn't quite up to standard. The chicken foot was nice, and the beef ball was a good size and average texture/taste. The spareribs were actually seasoned nicely but more than half of it was tiny bits of meat with chunks of fat. There was ONE piece with bone in it (I like the ones with bone). So basically this was one super oily dish.

Annnnd for my Elephant, Deep Fried Sesame Ball with Seasame paste ($4.75). This wasn't freshly made to order, but was still relatively warm. Crispy outside but the dough inside wasn't chewy enough. The sesame paste was too gritty and sweet that it didn't flow nicely.

Being a lover of anything Tom Yum, I ordered Beef Omasum in Tom Yum Sauce ($5.50). It was like any other omasum dish, but I like their concept of putting in Tom Yum. I'd say it's a rather personal taste, since I enjoyed this dish, but my mom said it was weird.

Didn't settle for regular shrimp dumplings, so we got Meat Rissoles with Crab ($5.75). Fancy sounding enough (it has this even fancier sounding name in Chinese). Probably the most disappointing dish of the whole meal, possibly my whole dim sum eating life. The wrapping was soft and soggy, fell apart when touched, not chewy at all. The filling did indeed contain real crab, but it also did not hold and so... the dish just all fell apart before it reached any bowl. Similar to any good sushi, your dumpling is not meant to break apart before it reaches your bowl, the wrapping should be strong enough to hold it, yet still be soft, smooth, and chewy.

Another combo dish, Steamed Tri-Buns ($4.75) should contain a custard bun, a BBQ pork bun, and a chicken bun. I say "should" because I got double of the BBQ pork bun *sadface* I asked a waiter to confirm I wasn't being stupid and not able to differentiate the two remaining buns (custard is round and easily distinguishable from the other two). These were good, the custard bun had flowy filling, as advertised and tasted pretty legit. The buns themselves were good texture and taste. I just wish I had a taste of that chicken bun now.

Something with a fusion twist to it, since I don't think truffle is commonly in Chinese dishes, the Pork Shiu-Mai with Truffle ($5.50) arrived. These looked normal, with some truffle sauce on top. I did not like the taste of the truffle, it was slimey and tasted like concentrated Chinese mushrooms. The shiu mai itself was made with ground pork and had good bite to it. Average size.

Lamb isn't commonly in dim sum, and I'm a sucker for lamb so...Pan Fried Lamb Pastry with Leeks ($6.25) was ordered. These buns were not worthy of the price we paid. Pan fried to a golden exterior with the bun being soft and moist, and the filling being all lamb, I liked the flavors. However, there were only three small buns. THREE.

Still hungry, we ordered a Wonton Noodle Soup ($7.80/bowl) expecting the usual wontons, but were surprised when they showed up more like pork and chive dumplings with no shrimp. The meat wasn't very fresh inside the dumplings, the wrapping was chewy and smooth though. Noodles weren't anything special, but I like the added touch of greens.

I saw the Pan Fried Tofu with Shrimp Paste ($5.25) come out of the kitchen a few times and they were huge! Must order. The tofu was a big chunk with shrimp paste on top. Nicely fried, it was crispy and I like how they placed the sauce on the side. Shrimp paste met the average standards.

Normally we don't eat a lot, but boy was I surprised when I saw our bill was $124.74!! Then I looked to see that they had charged us 55 people's worth of tea-- no wonder! Luckily I caught it, and they changed it.

But still, paying more than $10/person for dim sum is a rarity for my family, so this was a surprise, but hey, being adventurous means you have to suffer the consequences too! =P Overall, good service, high quality tea, hit or mostly miss dim sum.