Pho Vietnam

The other day we had lunch over at Pho Vietnam which they say houses some of the best noodle soups in the city.  The restaurant is located in the heart of a commercial area in Scarborough where many furniture stores are located.  There are only a few parking spots located at the front of the restaurant. However don’t let the exterior fool you because the restaurant has pretty nice décor on the inside and is relatively clean.

Although my wife went for the traditional pho noodles, I went with the curry chicken and rice.  You may wonder why I would do that and that’s because I find that pho could potentially be all the same especially when it comes to noodles and raw meat.  Not much changes except for the soup base so I went with the more untraditional order and got the curry chicken instead.

When it arrived, the bowl carrying the curry was huge.  The rice on the plate was even bigger and contained almost 2 bowls of rice.  The curry was dark brown and it contained 3 pieces of chicken and 2 pieces of potatoes and a ton of curry sauce. 

A couple pieces of the chicken were quite chewy.  They were large pieces which led me to believe that these pieces were probably “older” chicken that were served.  The 2 pieces of potatoes were actually one that was split into two.  The sauce itself was not spicy at all.  Although one can certainly taste the curry, it was at best a bland curry.  The sauce was thick and reminded me of Japanese style curry except even in Japanese curry there was more spiciness than this. 

The meal itself was like seven dollars which was one dollar more than the pho.  It was filling but then again 2 bowls of rice will do that to you.  I will try the pho the next time as my wife and colleague all tried it and said it was decent.  The only complaint they had was that the medium size they ordered was like as a small at other restaurants.  As for the curry chicken, it was acceptable but not the greatest. I give it a 3 out of 5. 

1280 Kennedy Road  

Scarborough, ON M1P 2L5
(416) 755-0909

Matsuda Japanese Cuisine

On the eve of winter my cousins and I decided to go to Matsuda Japanese Cuisine Restaurant since we haven’t had Japanese for quite some time.  This restaurant offers an all you can eat buffet style of Japanese foods.  Although I am not a huge favorite of Japanese buffets, I decided to give this one a go since I have not been to this one before.

We got there late however there were reservations made.  The restaurant was about three-quarters full and the staff was courteous.  This all you can eat buffet is not the type on a conveyor belt or where you have to go up and get type buffets.  It’s the ones you tell the waitress what you want and they will bring it out for you. 

There was a lot of food ordered tonight so it is impossible to tell you everything we ate.  I think the best way to do it is to give you what I thought were some of the better dishes and which ones were less than desirable.

Tataki

Avocado Seafood Salad

Salmon Roses Sushi

My personal favorites of the night were the salmon skin, spicy salmon, tuna and eel hand rolls.  The fish was quite fresh and an added difference to other hand rolls from other places is that they add small pieces of tempura crumbs on top of the hand rolls.  Although the tempura crumbs are tasteless, it is that added different texture and crunchiness that makes this hand roll unique from all the others. 

I also personally enjoyed the herb salmon dish which is only served between Monday to Thursday.  The dish comes with about 20 pieces of other fish however it is the herb salmon that people want.  The salmon are seared on the outside and are then sprinkled with a slightly spicy herb.  It also comes with its own soya sauce although you can certainly use your own self made wasabi soya sauce.  I like this dish because the herbs give the salmon a totally different dimension in taste and not a bad one either. 

The other one I enjoyed was the tataki which is basically raw meat.  It too comes with its own special sauce however there were some at the table who felt that the sauce was a little too soury or minty.  I believe the meat was already briefly marinated in vinegar so there might have been a bit of overkill here.  However I just added the meat to my own self made wasabi soya sauce and it tasted wonderful. 

Beef

Steamed Mussels

Some of the stuff there that I would never try again included the Avocado Seafood Salad.  Even though on the menu they say that it took 25 minutes to make and this was one of their signature dishes, this dish surely was not worth the wait.  It has a very mushy taste to it and the combination of seafood and avocado made it somewhat bitter to taste.  It comes on a seashell but the appearance and color of it also made it less appealing.  

The steamed mussels were also less appealing.  There were chewy and had little to no taste to them.  It was definitely not one of the better dishes of the night.   Some of the makis we ordered were also suspect.  The Matsuda Maki, Philadelphia Maki and Mango Roses Maki were satisfactory although no one could explain to me why they were all so smoky tasting.  I am guessing that it could be part of their maki collection of dishes however I was hoping that not every piece of maki was so smoky tasting. 

Philadelphia Maki

Spicy Salmon Hand Roll

Herb Salmon

Overall it was a satisfactory night.  We ended up clearing the desert menu with a variety of ice creams, mousses and mango puddings.  As mentioned there are pros and cons when having many unique and specialty dishes.  I admit the majority would probably taste good but there will always be one or two that will leave you scratching your head.  The price on the weekdays was about $21.95 per person and a few dollars more on the weekend.  There was plenty of free parking outside and there was plenty of staff to take down your order.  I would give this a 3.5 out of 5. 

O Mei Restaurant - Alaskan Crab Dnner

For the first time, I will be doing a double blog on a restaurant where I had been there before.  It was my father’s birthday so we went back to O Mei to have the crab seafood dinner.  Last time we were here we got the 9 lb lobster, this time we got the 10 lb Alaskan Crab.  Again it was made in 4 different ways.  It was steamed with green onions only, green onions with garlic, fried with batter similar to tempura and the rest of it was made into fried rice.

10 lb Alaskan Crab

Crab Legs with Green Onions

 

The first two ways were very similar.  They used the crab legs to make the steamed dishes.  The most outer legs were made with the green onions only.  The more proximal legs were used with garlic and green onions.  Both dishes also had vermicelli mixed with the dishes.  I have to admit the meat was very smooth and fresh.  It was delicious and the vermicelli captured all of the crab’s juice.  This was very tasty and it was not heavy at all.  Unlike the lobster, it was lighter and one “could eat more” of the crab when compared to the lobster. 

The “tempura” style of the crab meat was not as good as the lobster style.  The batter was slightly thicker which may it made it slightly more “soggier”.  The lobster dish was much more spicier and crunchier compared to the crab dish.  Still, it was quite good.  In some sense by not making it as spicy, one can taste the crab meat better. 

Crab Legs with Garlic and Green Onions

Fried Crab Meat

The crab rice was not as tasty as the lobster rice dish.  It was more bland and there were more egg and egg white in it. Since the lobster contains more membrane in it, the lobster rice would certainly have a stronger flavor and taste to it.  The crab I was told has less membrane therefore it is not as seafood tasting like.  Still the dish was very pure, sweet and delicious tasting. 

Crab Rice

Overall, it was a wonderful evening.  There was complimentary desert given to us as well including fresh mango covered in coconut, black sesame gluten balls mixed in honey and a couple of sweet desert soups.  If you have cholesterol problems or blood pressure issues, the crab would be the better way to go when compared to the lobster because it is somewhat less fattening and somewhat easier on the cholesterol.  Price wise however it is more expensive compared to the lobster.  It cost about $480.00 for the whole night.  Not for the faint of heart but for one night it was all very worth it.  Happy birthday to my dad!! Hope you enjoyed the meal.  For the night, I give it a 5 out of 5!

PF Chang's Restaurant

Yesterday we went over the border to Buffalo to do some shopping and check out a couple of places to eat.  We were over at the Cheesecake Factory at the Walden Galleria for which we were there many times before and of course the lineup was horrendous.  So instead we opted for PF Chang’s which is further down in the mall.  There, it was less crowded and we were seated within five minutes. 

The décor was quite nice and the staff was very courteous.  We were starving so we ended up sharing a few things for the day.  They provided a high chair for us and gave us a huge table knowing that we had a little one with us. 

We ended up ordering a Hot and Sour soup, Dan Dan Noodles, Sesame Chicken, Lobster Sauce Rice and Chang’s Chicken Lettuce Wrap.  The waitress forewarned us that the proportions would be satisfactory however if we were really hungry, this combination of food would not be enough for five people.  We were okay with it given the fact you can always order more afterwards.  She also demonstrated how to make a mustard, chili soya sauce for the chicken wrap. 

The hot and sour soup arrived first and it was dark.  It had all the ingredients of the hot and sour soup expect for the hotness.  There was zero spiciness to it but it was quite sour.  A little too much on the soya sauce and vinegar and not enough peppers.  Not the best soup in the world if you are a fan of hot and sour soup.

Chang’s Chicken Lettuce Wrap

Sesame Chicken

Next to arrive was the chicken wrap.  The lettuce was nicely washed and the chicken came in on a separate plate.  The self made wrap with a little of the waitress’ made chili soya sauce was excellent!! It was refreshing, not fattening at all and was delicious.  It hit all the right spots on the empty stomach. 

Next to arrive was the dan dan noodles.  This dish was yummy! It is actually quite different than the dan dan noodles in Toronto.  It was actually closer to the “cha cheung mien” in Hong Kong.  Very spicy though.  It’s mixture of cucumbers, egg noodles and bean sprouts was a perfect combination for this dish.  Honestly this dish will make your tongue go numb.  Very tasty but again very, very spicy.  On the spiciness scale this one hit a 8. 

Next to the arrive to the menu was a lobster sauce rice.  Interesting they call it a lobster sauce because the only lobster you taste is the sauce itself.  It had lots of egg and shrimp in it but no lobster meat.  Compared to the dan dan noodles, this was fairly bland but again if you are MSG conscious, this could be the dish for you. 

Last to arrive was the sesame chicken rice dish.  This dish was loaded with broccoli and chicken and it was okay.  One thing you will notice is the different taste and texture of the chicken.  On the outside the chicken is tasty with it’s sesame barbeque sauce.  On the inside it is a more tender and had a total different taste that was not easy to describe.  Still tasty but interesting to say the least. 

Lobster Sauce Rice

Dan Dan Noodles

Overall it was a good experience and a good alternative.  We also ate at the Cheesecake Factory when we came down and although we did buy a cheesecake from them afterwards, it was almost 20 times into our meal before they paged us back saying our table was ready.  PF Chang’s is definitely a good alternative.  Watch out for the dan dan noodles!!  I give this a 3.75 out of 5.  

PF Chang's Restaurant

Walden Galleria
1 Galleria Dr. TH131
Buffalo, NY 14225
716-706-0791

Very Fair Seafood Cuisine

This past weekend we had a chance to dine at Very Fair Seafood Cuisine.  For those who are not totally familiar with this restaurant, yes that is the name of the restaurant.  This place had gone through multiple owner changes however this present owner has been there for at least the past 5 years.  We were there this past week to celebrate a birthday and in doing so we decided to get a 10 course meal from them. 

First up, just want to apologize for some of the photography.  For some of the dishes the waitress was either separating them on a cart or from another table. 

We sat down to eat on this busy evening.  There was also a wedding going on that evening inside the restaurant but we were still given a couple of tables outside the wedding reception area. 

Roasted Suckling Pig with Jelly Fish

Deep Fried Crab Claws

The first thing to arrive was the roasted suckling pig.  It came with jelly fish which were cold but it mixed well with the pork.  The skin was pretty crunchy and it was quite tasty.  It also came with oyster sauce which also adds extra flavor to the dish.  The meat was salty tasting and was pretty good. 

The fried crab claws arrived next and this is a very typical main course dish.  What they do is that they take a claw and its meat and dip it into fried batter therefore making a nice fried claw ball.  People eat this dish with red vinegar.   The crab meat was tasty and they did not make the batter and this dish too oily. 

The shark fin soup arrived next.  Unfortunately for this restaurant this would be one of the last times they would serve this dish due to the city’s ban on shark fin.  It was however well done and each bowl contained at least some shark fin in it. 

Shark Fin Soup

Baby Bok Choy with Mushrooms

The baby bok choy and mushrooms arrived next.  It was not overdone and the mushroom sauce provided good flavor to the overall dish.  It is always good to have a dish like this because it is refreshing and usually allows one to “break away” from all the fatty dishes before and after this.

The baked lobster was next to arrive and it was serve with green onion and garlic sauce.  The lobster was nice cooked and was quite fresh.  The meat was juicy and they did not overdo the garlic sauce which brought out the best of the lobster.

The chicken came out next.  This was pretty good chicken.  Usually they serve this dish with fried shrimp crackers.  However this time they serve this with nuts over the chicken.  I believe the nuts were chestnut however others might dispute this.  Either way, I do like the variety and by doing it this way, the chicken was more softer and juicier and not as dry like typical roasted crispy chicken dishes. 

Baked Lobster

Crispy Chicken

The last couple of dishes to arrive were the noodles and rice.  It is a tradition for them to serve this at the end to make sure that if you were not full by now, then you will be full after this.  They also served some red bean soup as well afterwards for desert which was not bad at all either. 

Normally this is a typical ten course meal.  Others may add a couple more where there is abalone and/or fish.   We decided to bypass that as there were a lot of food on the table already and everybody was stuffed.  A table of ten to serve all of this will cost you $188 per table.  Cash preferred of course.  Overall we were quite full after the meal and it was decent.  The only drawback was that there was no one dish that was spectacular.  It was fair just like its name.  For tonight I give this place a 3.75 out of 5.  

Very Fair Seafood Cuisine

17 Milliken Boulevard  Toronto, ON

(416) 299-6368

Crown Princess Fine Dining Restaurant

We were happily invited to have lunch with some of our out of town friends to Crown Princess Restaurant for some dim sum.  Now I have always resisted from blogging on dim sum places because sometimes it can be difficult to really blog everything that comes through.  But after today I think a restaurant is a restaurant so here goes. 

We got there just before noon hour and it was three-quarters full.  By noon hour, this place was lined up all the way outside.  I was told that this restaurant is one of the more pricier restaurants for dim sum and that it is a more of an upper class type dim sum restaurant.  This place goes by the mark on the sheet what you want system.  The teapots and plates are of a slightly fancier type. We ordered a variety of dim sum but I will just highlight the main ones.

Snow Peas Shoot In Garlic Sauce

Abalone Tarts

We ordered snow pea shoots to add an extra food group in our meal since everything was mostly seafood or meat.  The snow pea shoot was off the simple type where it was cooked into garlic sauce.  Keeping things simple, the vegetables were quite nice. 

We also ordered the abalone tarts.  This is not a dessert.  Shaped like an abalone, the insides consisted mostly of ground pork and mushrooms.  We are not too sure if there were any abalone on the inside.  We could taste any but that does not mean it was there.  It was slightly on the salty side and a little oily but was edible otherwise. It is a "special dish" on the paper card.

Dumpling, Siu Mei and Tripe

Mango Pudding

We also a variety of dumplings and tripe.  The famous "siu mei" had a small mushroom on the top.  The meat was nicely done.  The taste was interesting in that it wasn't heavy on the meat side.  It was a good siu mei and slightly different from other restaurants.  The tripe had some carrots on top mostly for decoration.  The tripe was very tender and "crunchy".  It was quite fresh and again one thing I noticed was that it was not that heavy on the MSG.  It was quite light yet still tasty..  We also ordered a mango puddingwhich came in the shape of a fish.  With some condensed milk, this dessert was quite good.  There were no mango chunks but definitely a strong mango taste to it.

Vegetarian Roll

Shark Fin Seafood Dumpling in Soup

 

 

 

 

A couple of other interesting dishes that arrived were the sweet potato, taro and mushroom rolls.  Basked in a nice soup sauce, this is a great dish to have for any vegetarian lover.  The flavor of the soup was such that it was not so heavy that it took away the taste of the individual ingredients. 

Finally the last one was the "shark fin" seafood soup.  Recently the city banned shark fin so the fins were substituted with vermicelli like strands.  The big dumpling inside the soup plus the "shark fin" is suppose to make this dish one of the most special dishes in the menu.  When it arrived it came with special bowl and dish.  We split it up into 5 bowls.  Inside the dumpling also contained some ground pork.  It was quite tasty and did not disappoint. 

Overall it was a great experience.  We also ordered meat and shrimp steamed noodle rolls or also known as Cheung Fun.  We also had a seafood congree which contained some scallops and clams which help filled the void of an empty stomach and a pumpkin soup that sure looked and tasted a lot like a butternut squash soup. 

The restaurant is somewhat divided where if one wants a more private area, they could sit on the other side of the room for more privacy.  There was plenty of public parking all around the restaurant.  This place is located in the heart of downtown Toronto and would make a great lunch and dinner place. This place however is a little pricey and if one is concerned with that, then an alternative dim sum restaurant might be in order.  Otherwise the food is pretty good and not heavy on the MSG. For this place, I give this a 4 out of 5.

Crown Princess Fine Dining Restaurant
1033 Bay Street  Toronto, ON

(416) 923-8784

Remezzo Italian Restaurant

The other night we had a chance to go to Remezzo Italian Restaurant.  This restaurant is located in the heart of Scarborough in the southwest corner of Warden Avenue and Sheppard Ave East.  They serve primarily Italian foods ranging from pastas, steaks and fish.  We made reservations just in case but the place was about three-quarters full.  We brought our little one with us and they were able to accommodate us with a corner seat.

New England Crab Cakes

The lighting was mostly from the candles around us.  We forgot our camera that night so we had to use an old I-Phone.  We ordered appetizers first which were the New England Crab Cakes.   The cakes were slightly on the crunchy side and slightly flaky.  The meat was not melded properly and the crab cake was lukewarm.  It was slightly salty and certainly had crab taste to it but we have tasted better crab cakes before.

Linguini Di Mare

 The entrees arrived next and my wife order the Linguini Di Mars which consisted mostly of scallops, shrimp and pasta in cream sauce. The pasta was nicely done where the cream and sauce was not too thick and creamy.  The scallops were perfectly done and the shrimps were fresh.  A good dish to have for this evening.

Steamed Mussels

We also ordered some steamed mussels..The steamed mussels were steamed in tomato sauce and were actually quite tasty.  They were all of the medium size and each shell had at least one mussel in them. The sauce was slightly spicy which gave the mussels a bit of zing to it.

Spare Ribs

The ribs were my dish and they were not bad at all.  There were 2 full racks equalling eight bones each.  It came with fries and I was given ketchup and BBQ sauce for the fries.  The ribs meat was soft and literally fell of the bone.  The BBQ meat was nice done with no major burnt or seared proportions.  I was hungry prior to dinner, but quite full after this entree.

Overall it was a respectable night.  It's a good place for simple yet good Italian food.  Plenty of free parking out front and the staff was very courteous.  They also have a bar where people can also just sit and have a beer or two if they don't wish to sit at the table.  It was fairly good food minus the crab cakes.  For this I give this a 3.75 out of 5.

Remezzo Italian Restaurant
3335 Sheppard Ave. East 
Scarborough, ON M1T 3K2

(416) 498-8848