vegetarian/vegan Archives - Page 2 of 8

Yah Yah Yah Ramen

August 22, 2020

Yah Yah Yah Ramen is a ramen joint I’ve heard good things about, but haven’t tried because fatty ramen broth wreaks havoc on my chronic digestive problems. The fiance and I used to love going for ramen, so I’ve been trying to find places that I am able to enjoy that offer a vegan based broth too!

I didn’t know that Yah Yah Yah Ramen was an authentic Japanese chain, with a few locations in Japan. We came for an early dinner on a weekend because I knew this place was popular, and we didn’t want to wait.

Pandemic wise, it felt clean here with half their tables closed. We noticed a clipboard for contact tracing but they weren’t actually using it…

They also do not use any MSG in their broth, and list out the exact measurements of the ingredients here.

Shio ramen: The fiance decided on a shio ramen, which is always the best choice in my opinion. The shio is the most simple so you can really determine if the broth is good or not.

The fiance absolutely loved his shio ramen and wouldn’t stop raving about it for the next few days. I think we’ve found our new to go ramen place! The ramen was delicious – rich, creamy, and very flavourful. It was the perfect bowl of comforting ramen that nurtured your soul.

Vegan ramen: (Sept 2021: See update to vegan ramen below) My vegan ramen was not bad as well! It came with corn, edamame beans, tofu, and wood ear mushrooms. Compared to other vegan ramen I have had, the toppings here were the most generous. I also added a ramen egg which was delicious and had a slightly gooey yolk.

The vegan ramen had a good richness to it and was flavourful. Spinach noodles are the normal accompaniment but I asked for the regular ramen noodles with a firm thickness. The noodles were cooked well and firm.

Chicken karage: We also got a small side order of the chicken karage. This was delicious! The chicken karage was served piping hot and very crunchy.

Our first visit to Yah Yah Yah Ramen was wonderful and I have no doubt we will be back when we are in Richmond. The food and service was great, I can see why it is so popular here.

Update (June 2021): Unfortunately, they changed the vegan ramen bowl! I was really disappointed because the new vegan bowl looks quite sad and measly. I wish they kept the tofu, corn, and edamame because they are filling. The broth and noodles are the same.

With that said, I’ll continue to come here because it’s the husband’s favourite spot, but lower my expectations for the vegan noodles.

Update (Sept 2021): Due to the disappointing vegan ramen, I thought it’d be a good time to try the salmon don. This is the combo add on, which is smaller than the usual size. The usual size comes with two pieces of salmon. The salmon don was simple, but not bad. The salmon was pan fried and had a slight crisp to it.

Mink Chocolate Cafe

August 8, 2020

I remember seeing Mink Cafe a lot during the hot chocolate festival. I believe they had some kind of special grasshopper drink that people were posting online! How interesting. I tried crickets once and it was interesting… they were dried so they were very crispy. Anyways, I’m going off topic.

While venturing out to South Surrey, Latte looked up a place where we could hang out after having lunch at Pho Sunrise and suggested Mink.

I haven’t been before but heard good things, and their chocolate seemed like great quality so why not give it a try?

This Mink location is located inside Morgan Crossing. It was pretty spacious inside, with half of their tables gone for social distancing. They had hand sanitizer by the door and I felt clean and comfortable in there.

I wish they would have asked for our contact information for tracing though.

Hot chocolate, 70% cacao dairy free: I was happy to see that they had a dairy free version with their dark hot chocolate. I chose oat milk as my dairy substitute.

The hot chocolate was delicious! It was creamy, rich, and decadent. The dark chocolate was very smooth and easy to drink. The sweetness level was perfect, not too sweet but not too bitter either.

They also gave me a free chocolate on the side (weird that Latte didn’t get one with hers though….) I gave it to the fiance when I got home and he enjoyed it.

White chocolate waffle: The waffle was not good. Although they had heated it up, the waffle was still hard and tasteless. I wouldn’t order it again.

All in all, Mink has really high quality chocolate as evident in their drinks. You can also buy a bunch of chocolate as gifts. In addition, they also have fondue which sounded delicious, but I was already feeling full from lunch.

I’m glad we came here and I would go back to Mink for a solid cup of high quality hot chocolate.

Kokoro Tokyo Mazesoba

August 5, 2020

After discovering Ramen Danbo‘s delicious vegan ramen (their regular ramen was great too!), I went on a vegan ramen hunt. For those uninterested in vegan reviews, keep reading because we also had a regular meat dish too.

I was really happy to see that Kokoro Tokyo Mazesoba had added some vegan additions to their menu! I knew the fiance would love this sort of noodle, and now there was finally something on the menu that I could eat as well that wouldn’t upset my stomach.

I remember when Kokoro Tokyo Mazesoba first opened in 2018, Vancouver went absolutely nuts for it!

I wanted to try as well but due to the rich and fatty nature of the noodle sauce, I knew my chronic stomach problems wouldn’t be able to handle it. Also, no I am not vegan. My stomach can’t handle rich, animal fat based ramen broths so I can only have vegan broths which are better for my stomach.

We weren’t sure how busy the restaurant would be these days, but we went early around 5pm just incase. Fortunately, it wasn’t busy at all and we were seated right away.

Kokoro was one of the few restaurants I’ve been to that have asked for contact tracing so I was impressed with that.

Niku mazesoba: The fiance went with the pork belly mazesoba. He found it delicious – very rich, creamy, and fatty. I had the smallest nibble (quite sad, really) and I found that small bite to be really good.

The noodles were wrapped with the seaweed and green onion once mixed, which elevated the rich and fatty flavour of the pork belly even more. The pork belly was also very flavourful and tender. The fiance’s only complaint would be that this was pretty salty, which I also did see mentioned on other reviews.

I read other reviews and their menu advertised that you could get some rice after to soak up the sauce, once you’re done with the noodles. However, there was no sauce left once the fiance finished his noodles so it made us wonder if they gave us less sauce this time?

Vegan ramen: The vegan ramen was made with some kind of creamy soybean broth. Overall, I found it alright. There was a nice creaminess to it with a slight richness. It looks like it would be spicy, but it actually wasn’t.

The redness came from what I am guessing is tomato, since the broth was pretty tomato-ey.

In addition, the vegan ramen came with two pieces of firm, sliced, tofu which was slightly grilled. There was a generous amount of onions, corn, and wood ear mushroom. It was not bad for a vegan dish but I prefer Ramen Danbo‘s more. However, I wouldn’t mind having it again if someone suggested coming here.

Overall, our visit to Kokoro Tokyo Mazesoba was pleasant. The mazesoba was delicious and the vegan option was alright too. We wouldn’t mind coming back again for it. They also opened a new location by Lougheed Mall earlier this year.

Ramen Danbo

July 4, 2020

Ramen Danbo has been on my list for awhile now, because they offer both regular ramen and vegan ramen! I loooove ramen but unfortunately, had to stop eating it due to my chronic stomach problems. However, I wanted to see if vegan ramen would be any good, and I’ve heard really great things about Ramen Danbo.

The last time I had ramen was 2 years ago at Marutama, how delicious that was before my stomach problems went even more downhill (I did go to a couple of places like Jinya and Ramen Gaoh but didn’t order a ramen dish)!

Ramen Danbo is an authentic ramen shop with locations in both Kitsilano and downtown. The Kitsilano location was their first location outside of Japan!

One of the worst things about having ramen is the line up. Most authentic ramen joints are always lined up! Because we hate waiting in line, we went to the Kitsilano location about 10 minutes before they opened and were seated immediately.

The restaurant was pretty small as most ramen places are, and they removed half of their tables due to COVID. As with most restaurants, they have a QR code that you scan to see the menu.

Ramen Danbo has a lot of customization options: noodle thickness, noodle firmness, thickness of broth, amount of lard (if non-vegan), and amount of karadare (spicy sauce).

Vegan shio ramen: I chose thin noodle, firm, standard thickness, and a little bit of karadare.

I’m pretty sure I confused the poor waiter by asking for a slice of pork and egg with my vegan soup. Oops! Anyways, I found the vegan ramen to be absolutely delicious. The broth was very flavourful and creamy, with so much umami flavour.

I couldn’t get enough of it. It wasn’t as fatty as the fiance’s regular ramen, but it still satisfied my ramen craving and I’d come back. In addition, the pork slice was tender and soaked up the broth well. The soft boiled egg was a nice touch too, ramen eggs are delicious.

Personally, I prefer my ramen broth as simple as possible to enjoy the full umami flavour of the soup which is why I usually get the shio ramen. Because of that, I wouldn’t order the karadare again because the spiciness distracted the broth.

Don’t get me wrong, I love spice and hot sauce but I prefer my ramen simple.

Classic chashu men: The fiance went with the thin noodle, firm, strong thickness, rich lard, and no karadare. The broth was very flavourful and rich.

It was the perfect bowl of comforting noodles to warm your soul. However, he loves his ramen as rich and fat as possible (to the point where you’re drinking straight up lard LOL), so he would go up a level to the maximum amount of richness, aka the extra rich level.

The chashu ramen came with a whooping 6 pieces of pork as well.

We enjoyed our visit so much that we decided to try delivery. However, the delivery experience wasn’t as good.

The portion was smaller and although they only had firm noodles as an option, the noodles were pretty soft. I wouldn’t get delivery again and would recommend going to the restaurant.

We will definitely be back!

Do Chay

March 21, 2020

Disclaimer: In light of COVID-19, I just wanted to say that I am doing my part and social distancing. Luckily, I have some drafts saved up before this whole craziness began so please don’t attack me for posting restaurant visits before this began.

I know that you may want to go out and have fun, but it is crucial that we distance ourselves to slow the spread of the virus and flatten the curve before it gets worse. Yes, you may feel fine but you could be passing on the virus to someone who is immunocompromised or elderly that may not survive this virus.

Do Chay is a vegetarian Vietnamese restaurant that has been on my radar ever since it opened last summer. While looking for a place to have dinner with Avocado before this whole COVID-19 fiasco, I suggested this place because she is my buddy for trying vegetarian/vegan restaurants with!

Do Chay is the sister restaurant of House Special in Yaletown. I remember reading that the owners of Do Chay had another Vietnamese restaurant in Vancouver, but didn’t realize it was House Special. Tbh, if I knew it was House Special, I would have been less inclined to visit because House Special was disappointing.

Anyways, Avocado and I totally underestimated the atmosphere in here. We both thought, for some reason, that it would be a low-key, casual family-owned style restaurant. When we walked in, it was quite bougie and hipster. But after I found out that they were the same owners as House Special, it made more sense.

Ginger lemonade soda: I wasn’t going to order this, but it looked really good when I saw the bartender make it for another table. The selling point to me was how I saw her freshly squeezing lemons into the drink. The drink was really good if you like ginger-y things like I do!

Black truffle tofu: I was sold when I saw this on the menu as I am a huge fan of truffle! However, we both found this dish pretty disappointing and our least favourite of the evening.

We were under the impression that it would contain truffle oil to give it that wonderful truffle aroma, but it didn’t. The tofu was just your ordinary deep fried tofu with soya sauce, and not worth $8.

I would skip this because the other dishes were a lot better, as you’ll find out.

Coconut rice cakes: The coconut rice cakes were unlike anything I’ve had before. They were made with coconut milk and lightly pan fried. Usually rice cakes are chewy and dense, however the coconut rice cakes were slightly crispy on the inside, and creamy in the middle with a fragrant coconut taste.

To elevate the dish even more, the coconut rice cakes came with an ‘ish sauce’ which is a vegan fish sauce. The ‘ish sauce went perfectly with the coconut rice cakes and I found myself savouring every bite of this.

These are a must try because I’m not sure where else you could get these!

Satay noodles: The noodles came with a spicy peanut and sesame satay broth. Since the dish is called ‘satay noodles’, it could be interpreted as a stir fry but that was not the case.

It was very saucy, warming, and filling. The noodles soaked up the delicious broth.

Curry bowl: The rice curry bowl was warming and delicious as well. There was a very mild spice to it and was quite creamy. I loved the addition of the deep fried curly yam strings on the top! It gave the curry more excitement and some fun texture.

Overall, we left very satisfied with Do Chay with the exception of one dish. The food here is made with quality and care, and you can really taste it. Compare to Chau Veggie Express which is another vegan/vegetarian Vietnamese place nearby, Avocado and I both liked Do Chay more as we found the dishes more innovative and had richer, deeper flavour.

Do Chay is on the pricier side so I don’t see myself coming regularly, but it’s a great spot for something different and/or if you’re a vegetarian or vegan. Definitely don’t miss out on the coconut rice cakes!