western Archives - Curiously Carmen

Pizza Ludica – Revisit

July 10, 2021

It’s been many years since I went to Pizza Ludica! Pizza Ludica is a pizza and board game restaurant, with two locations by Chinatown and New West. I’ve been to the Chinatown location a few time over the years, and always had a great time. You can read my review on my first visit here.

Pepperoni and I were discussing board games, and had plans to go to a park to play. But the weather wasn’t on our side that day, and I suggested Pizza Ludica so we can still play games somewhere.

The Chinatown location is located on the border of Chinatown and downtown, a few steps away from Stadium station. There is meter parking around but beware of angry nesting crows. I was attacked by two when I was paying for my parking meter!

Due to the pandemic, Pizza Ludica has temporarily stopped taking reservations. There used to be many tables prior to COVID, but they have removed a lot and spaced them out. It looks like they spaced the tables more than they needed to but I’m not complaining about that. If you’re coming on a weekend, I would recommend coming early since they don’t have many tables and no reservations currently.

I had some concerns about touching the board games and eating, but they had it all planned out. Board games are quarantined for 3 days after being played. This could also be a downside because if you see a game on the quarantine table, you can’t play it. But they have such a large collection of games that we didn’t feel disappointed.

Also, they recommend that customers eat their pizza with a fork and knife so that it’s more sanitary than touching game pieces and your pizza.

Hawaiian pizza: The pizza here is similar to Neopolitan pizza, in that it is baked fresh in an oven and also thin crust. They don’t advertise it as Neopolitan pizza though.

I was happy to see that they offered Daiya vegan cheese here, at no additional cost. I’m not a fan of Daiya cheese except when it’s melted and on pizza.

The pizza here was delicious although the bottom was slightly burnt. There was a lot of ham and pineapple topping, and the dough was thin and chewy.

Montreal pizza: Pepperoni ordered the Montreal pizza which came with pepperoni, mushrooms, and green peppers. There was a generous amount of toppings on her pizza as well, and she had no complaints.

The Pandemic board game is probably really popular right now. We actually bought the mini version a few months ago to play at home. Pizza Ludica’s Pandemic board game was on the quarantine table, but Pepperoni and I saw the Iberia version available so we played a couple rounds of this.

Board games are also categorized by difficulty level and have stickers on the box to show you. You can choose if you want a quick game, a longer strategy game, or something in between.

Overall, we had a good time playing board games and eating pizza at Pizza Ludica. It’s a great place to hang out with friends if you like to play board games.

Nightingale

June 3, 2021

This review is a long time coming! I have been wanting to try Nightingale for maybe about 1.5 years or more now. We wanted to go last year for a couple special occasions, but COVID said no! Fast forward to now, we decided to settle with patio dining because who knows when restaurants will open again?

This is the entrance to the restaurant during normal times. The restaurant is located in downtown on West Hastings. Nightingale is the sister restaurant to Hawksworth, Nightingale is considered the “casual” equivalent but there is nothing casual about it to me (maybe the addition of the pizzas?? Or I’m just not fancy enough and think this would be considered fancy dining lol).

There was a storm that day so it was a pretty bad day to go, but we were determined to try it. Prior to going, I saw that the patio was open rain or shine, and had rain protection and heat lamps so we thought it would be fine. Rain will not stop us for a special occasion and since we’ve been wanting to come here for so long!

We didn’t realize that the patio to Nightingale wasn’t actually connected to the restaurant. Next to the restaurant, there is an office building, and then a courtyard. The patio was set up on the courtyard so servers had to walk past the office building to get there. We felt pretty bad for these servers going back and forth in the pouring rain and left a nice, big tip!

Ceviche: It’s been awhile since I had ceviche, and it’s not something we normally order but the fiance wanted to try it. At first glance, the ceviche looked different from what we were used to so I was a bit worried we wouldn’t enjoy it. Turns out, it was absolutely delicious.

The ceviche came with halibut, jicama, avocado, and a side of crispy plantain chips. The ceviche tasted extremely fresh and had a lot of fresh halibut inside. There was a strong fresh lime flavour, which was refreshing. The crispy plantain chips were great too, and reminded me of those Chinese shrimp chips you get with duck except the plantain chips were thinner.

Pizza: The pizzas don’t have a name, but we ordered the one with roasted mushroom, fontina, confit garlic, arugula pesto. They have a decent pizza selection for a restaurant that doesn’t specialize in pizza.

The pizza dough and crust was delicious. Slightly chewy and lightly charred, it was my favourite part of the pizza. I wish the toppings were spread out more evenly instead of being dollops on the pizza, so that we could have all the toppings on each bite. There was a bit too much garlic for my liking but overall, the pizza was still really delicious.

Spaghetti: When I saw this on the menu before we went, I knew I had to try this! There wasn’t a name for the spaghetti as well, but this was the one with manila clam, jalapeno, scallion, and white wine. The clams was what sold me, I love a good seafood pasta.

The spaghetti did not disappoint! It came with a simple garlic with some cheese (probably also some kind of dairy sauce in there too). Due to the clams, the sauce had a nice seafood flavour too. The fiance noted how generous they were with the clams, and he was right. The plate came with so many clams, and they were big, juicy and flavourful.

Despite the storm, we really enjoyed the food at Nightingale and it did not disappoint. Unfortunately, we couldn’t sit in the dining room where the ambiance was better, but we wouldn’t mind coming back here again.

Ricky’s Country Restaurant

May 9, 2021

Ricky’s Country Restaurant has been around forever. Honestly, I am surprised that they haven’t shut down yet and are still running. We came here many years ago and it was meh. There are definitely better brunch restaurants out there!

However, let’s stop with my negativity. The fiance and I were looking for a brunch delivery one weekend. We were really hungry and we saw that Ricky’s had the fastest delivery time and also free delivery, which were the 2 reasons we picked Ricky’s and not elsewhere. We were pretty meh about it. You’re probably wondering why we even chose this place then?! Haha!! Good question….

Ricky’s Country Restaurant is located inside the motel by Boundary and Lougheed. There is also a newer Ricky’s Cafe that opened a few minutes drive away in Brentwood’s SOLO district where I went pre-COVID and it was pretty meh.

Traditional benny: The fiance was craving an eggs benny, so he decided to try the traditional one. The most important part of an eggs benny is the hollandaise sauce, it’s what makes or break the eggs benny.

The hollandaise sauce was very buttery and creamy and the fiance enjoyed it. I had a bite and it was too rich for me, I could probably have only a couple of bites before it would be too much.

Unfortunately, the egg yolk was a bit overdone as you can see in the photo so that was disappointing. The hash browns were not bad and still a bit crispy despite being delivery.

Chicken strips: I love my chicken strips, and haven’t had them here before so I decided to try it. Ricky’s makes their chicken strip batter differently, and I didn’t like it this way. The batter was flaky, like tempura. The menu described it as “Southern style” chicken strips.

Nonetheless, the chicken strips were juicy and seasoned well. I would have preferred the batter to be made the usual way.

Our brunch from Ricky’s was alright. It was okay in a pinch, but it wouldn’t be a place to crave or go to often when there are so many other good brunch spots. The food this time was better than I remembered it to be when we came here many years ago at least.

White Spot – Gilmore Location (Two Revisits)

April 6, 2021

White Spot has been advertising their chicken pot pie for awhile, and the fiance really wanted to try it. Advertising works! We went to the Gilmore Location (before restaurants closed for dine in again) so the fiance could have his chicken pot pie craving satisfied. On a side note, pot pies now remind me of Modern Family and Cam’s obsession with them.

I have been to the White Spot on Gilmore and Lougheed many times throughout the years. This location has been here for a long time and I hope it doesn’t get torn down for condos (although it wouldn’t be surprising since it’s so close to the Skytrain). I just never wrote a post on this location over the years so I thought I finally would.

We ended up coming back a couple of weeks later for their happy hour, so I included that in this post too. Again, these two visits were before restaurants closed for dine in again to prevent the spread of COVID!

Chicken pot pie: The chicken pot pie was satisfying and just what the fiance wanted. It was delicious, with lots of white meat inside. The pie crust was very flaky and crispy! To the fiance’s disappointment, this was a limited time offer so I am not sure if they still have it on the menu anymore.

The only minor complaint was that it was the only side dish was the salad and the fiance wanted fries. But we ended up swapping our side dishes so it wasn’t a big deal. Thinking back, we probably could have just asked them for fries as well.

Regardless of location, White Spot always has a delicious salad and this did not disappoint. The lettuce is always very fresh and crunchy.

Grilled chicken wrap: This is what I usually get at White Spot! You can pick between the crispy or grilled chicken. White Spot has delicious grilled chicken, their chicken burger is good as well. I find the wrap has too much sauce for my liking so I ask for no sauce or on the side. I’m a weirdo!

However, I found the chicken wrap disappointing here compared to other locations. The chicken was cut into very small chunky pieces instead of slices. It was also wrapped pretty loosely. Taste wise, it was not bad but I’ve had better chicken wraps at other White Spot locations.

Poutine: After noticing the happy hour deals, the fiance and I came for a late night meal (although I didn’t end up ordering happy hour because I saw chicken strips hahaha). The fiance enjoyed his poutine and said it was delicious and satisfying. There was the perfect amount of gravy and cheese curds.

Onion rings: I’m not a big fan of onion rings but the fiance enjoyed these a lot as well. The onion rings were served hot and crispy. There was a good amount for the happy hour price.

Chicken strips: For myself, I decided to try White Spot’s chicken strips! It is no secret that I love my chicken strips. The chicken strips here were delicious. Piping hot, crispy, and well seasoned. I ended up packing half of it for leftovers the next day and they were just as good after heating them up in the air fryer.

Overall, White Spot is a BC staple and you can’t go wrong with it. The one thing is that service can be slow sometimes, which would be my only complaint but otherwise, I enjoy getting my White Spot fix every once in awhile.

Railtown Cafe

November 11, 2020

For the past month, I have been publishing mostly Indian and Korean reviews! I had yet another Indian review lined up but decided that I rather spread the posts out.

I didn’t have any other restaurants to write about and haven’t tried anything new recently (except for Indian restaurants), so I decided to look around UberEats to see what I could write about.

Railtown Cafe was offering a discount on UberEats so I decided to give it a try. Rarely do I order breakfast or brunch food, but the breakfast menu looked pretty good!

There are currently four Railway Cafe locations in Vancouver. The original location is in Gastown, and there are also two in downtown by Waterfront and on Howe Street, and lastly, one on Main Street by Olympic Village. My delivery order was placed from the Gastown location.

Sausage breakfast sandwich: Admittedly, I haven’t had a gourmet sausage breakfast sandwich…. until now, that is! When I do have sausage breakfast sandwiches, they’re usually ordered in a haste from Timmy’s or McDonalds (not that there’s anything wrong with that, I do love my fast food breakfast sandwiches). This was the first time I’ve had a fancier sausage breakfast sandwich.

What a treat this was. Everything about this was delicious and I found myself savouring every bite. The bread was fresh, thick, soft and buttery – it reminded me of fluffy Japanese bread. The sausage patty was thicker than I imagined and the quality was great, there were also some herbs inside. In addition, there was a perfectly fried and gooey yolk egg, melted cheese, and some fresh, crunchy greens.

It was the best sausage breakfast sandwich I had so far and I would gladly order it again.

Bacon breakfast sandwich: For the fiance, I ordered the bacon breakfast sandwich but we ended up splitting both sandwiches in half so we could both try.

The bacon sandwich was delicious too, but the sausage sandwich was definitely better. The bacon was great quality and thickly cut. It also came with a fried egg but the yolk wasn’t as runny, melted cheese, and fresh veggies too.

Hashbrowns: I also ordered a side of hashbrowns. The hashbrowns were crunchy and delicious, and more on the thick side. I noticed that they cracked some extra salt on top, which wasn’t really needed as the hashbrowns were flavourful enough on their own.

All in all, Railtown Cafe’s breakfast sandwiches were delicious and really great quality. I would gladly order from them again or stop by any of the cafes. My only complaint was that it was quite salty, but that’s to be expected. It’s definitely something you shouldn’t eat daily because it’s high in sodium (you know you’re getting old when you start to watch your sodium levels for blood pressure), but would be a nice treat once in awhile.