Koon Bo Restaurant, Vancouver: Expensive cheap food

What do I mean by "expensive cheap food"? Well, their food is expensively priced with cheap quality. Um. Not happy. Came here because I saw an ad in the paper for it, but I do suppose if it's good, it shouldn't really need a huge ad in the paper =(

Restaurant: Koon Bo Restaurant 冠寶美食之家

Location: 5682 Fraser Street, Vancouver
Cuisine: Chinese
Price range: $10-15




Date of visit: July 19, 2013
Atmosphere: 3/5
Staff/service: 3/5
Food variety: 5/5
Food quality: 2/5
Buck worthy? 1/5

Alrighty, it was around 1 o'clock when we arrived and the place was pretty empty. On a Friday. Weird. Oh well. A lot of the tables weren't cleared off either, but I took that as a good sign, means it was SO busy they didn't have time, right?

Anyways, wanted to try a variety of items on the menu, so ordered their Duck with Thick Vermicelli in Soup ($7.95). There was quite a bit of duck, but it wasn't very well-made. The skin was so chewy and not fresh. The vermicelli was chewy and not bad, nothing special though. The soup was a turn-off because they used a wonton soup base instead of using the usual duck soup base. ICK.

Onwards to their Pan Fried Beef with Flat Noodles ($7.99) which was very oily. The beef was over-seasoned and super salty. Not to mention it wasn't fresh, tasted a bit spoiled already. Oh well. Didn't die from it yet. At least there was a lot of green onion and bean sprouts. That was the highlight. Pretty sad.

We were going to order a fish congee, which was advertised on their ad, but decided upon a Hong-Kong Style Sampan Congee ($5.25) instead. The congee base was good. The beef was the same almost-spoiled beef slices, which isn't how one traditionally finds beef in this congee.

It should be minced beef with fried glass vermicelli mixed in. Barely any ingredients, but they amassed enough of the crucial ingredients, such as pig stomach, jellyfish, squid, lettuce, and peanuts. 

Probably ordered too much, but we also got a Fish Belly with Tofu on Rice ($7.99). This was surprisingly good. The fish was cod I believe, and crunchy, fresh. A bit on the salty and oily side, but this is quite normal for Vancouver. The rice was exceptional. They know how to choose a good rice cooker! =) Happy with this dish overall. ONLY thing I was satisfied with. Not a good sign.

Won't see me back here though. So much good food in Vancouver I really don't need to suffer through this and pay so much. I ended up with a bill of $34.00 which could have got me better quality food and more. Just not my fancy.