Curiously Carmen

Chau Veggie Express

April 18, 2019

Chau Veggie Express is a vegan Vietnamese restaurant, which is quite popular with both vegan/non-vegan people. Avocado and I have been talking about visiting Chau Veggie Express for at least 2 years now.. and we finally went this month! Woo!

Chau Veggie Express is located on Victoria Drive, which you wouldn’t expect because it’s not really a hipster-fied area (yet). I ain’t complaining though, because parking is free and easy to find in this area.

The restaurant is tastefully decorated, with many communal tables and a patio outside.

After ordering at the counter, they gave us a wooden slate with a number on it and our food arrived shortly afterwards. It was time to dig in!

Taro chips: Avocado and I started with the taro chips, which we saw a lot of other tables order as well!

We both really enjoyed the dip, which was an organic tofu dip similar to the texture of hummus. There was a garlicky flavour along with some spice (due to the paprika).

Candlelit lantern pho soup: Due to my digestive problems, I decided on just sticking with the traditional pho. I’ve never tried vegetarian/vegan pho before, so I wasn’t really sure what to expect. If I’m being honest, my expectations were a bit lower.

But damn, was I impressed with this broth! It was very fragrant and in particular, there was a strong star anise flavour. While I was eating it, I kept thinking how did they manage to make vegan pho taste this good?

My only complaint would be that it was lacking toppings. For $11.75, I would have hoped to have more than a couple pieces than daikon, tofu, and 1 beancurd though…. I could have gotten a lot better value with regular pho, but you do pay a higher price because it’s vegan.

Golden temple soup: Avocado went with their curry soup and a bowl of quinoa! I had a spoonful of the curry and found it to be delicious as well. The curry was fragrant and sweet. It was on the lighter side as sometimes curries are thicker and creamier.

There was a generous amount of cooked kale on top, as well as some mushrooms, tofu, taro, and more things! A lot more toppings in this bowl compared to my pho.

Coconut pandan ice cream: I heard their vegan ice cream is amazing, so I obviously had to try it! This was my favourite dish of the evening. The vegan ice cream was rich and creamy, due to the coconut milk. It was very refreshing and well rounded.

The toasted coconut chips on top was the cherry on top! I would stop by and order this ice cream to go.

Strawberry lychee smoothie: Clearly, I wanted to try a lot of the menu that day! The smoothie was my least favourite and I wouldn’t order it again. There were so many ice chunks in it which made it not enjoyable to drink. It had a tart flavour and was too watery.

All in all, we enjoyed our meal at Chau Veggie Express and were glad we finally tried it! It’s not a place that I would come to regularly because prices are bit higher with not much substance and I like my meat dishes, but this place would be one of my top picks for vegan food in Vancouver.

Mongo Bongo Mongolian Grill

April 15, 2019

Mongo Bongo is a small, inconspicuous restaurant located in New Westminster. Macaroni and Cheese come here sometimes and enjoy it, so Cocoa, the boyfriend and I came along one night to try it out as well!

If you’ve never been to a Mongolian grill style restaurant, then allow me to explain! You pick out your raw ingredients (such as meat, tofu, vegetables), type of carbs, and sauces. Then, your food is cooked to order on a big, communal grill.

At Mongo Bongo, you can fill your bowl as high as you want. But if the ingredients go over 6 inches from the top of the bowl, you have to pay the all you can eat price. The AYCE price is about $4 more, but a good value if you’re super hungry.

The meat is thinly sliced, so you don’t have to worry about it not being cooked thoroughly on the grill. There’s the usual beef, chicken, pork or tofu as a vegetarian option.

Moving on, is the noodle section! If you don’t like noodles, you can ask the staff for a bowl of rice on the side. I found the noodles too oily (you can see the glisten on them) due to my digestive problems, so I only got a few strands.

Everyone else got them though, so if you don’t have a sensitive stomach I would recommend the noodles over the rice.

Up next, are the veggies!

The final step is the sauce part, which determines if your bowl is delicious or not. I had 1 scoop of teriyaki, and 1 scoop of their house special Mongo Bam. If your bowl is bland tasting, you only have yourself to blame!

After your creation, you put your name and table number on a sticky note and wait for your bowl to be cooked. There was a lineup of a few other bowls since it was a busy night, so I probably waited about 15ish minutes.

Here is my creation! I found that there was enough flavour, but the tofu was bland since it didn’t have time to fully soak up the sauce yet. I enjoyed it but I found myself thirsty and a bit sleepy after, which means they probably have msg in the sauce.

Here are the other creations. I don’t remember who’s dish was who’s, but we all enjoyed the meal.

Overall, Mongo Bongo was a good value and I liked how you could pick what you wanted.

I also liked how they didn’t use any oil on the grill, but the noodles were so oily that was probably why it wasn’t needed. But I found myself thirsty and sleepy afterwards.

I wouldn’t mind coming back if I was in the area, but it wouldn’t be a place that I drive across town for.

Ding Tea

April 12, 2019

Ding Tea is one of the new players to join the bubble tea competition in Vancouver, which has been surging recently! It is a Taiwanese chain that started in 2006, and they have some locations in the US as well. I’ve lost track of how many new bubble tea places opened in the past 6 months or so!

There aren’t many bubble tea areas in this part of East Van, so it is quite nice to finally have another addition in the area. They are located across from First Avenue Marketplace on Renfrew Street.

Walking in, the interior is spacious and thoughtfully decorated with a white theme. We came 2 weeks after opening, on a Saturday afternoon and there was a line up out the door.

Mango smoothie with crystal boba: After checking that the smoothie was not made with milk (safe!), I decided to get this. Sadly, they were out of the regular pearls, but the owner suggested the crystal boba which he described as a crunchy pearl. I was intrigued!

Turns out, the crystal pearl has a harder texture than boba, akin to lychee jelly. Taste wise, there wasn’t much taste to it. Think of lychee jelly texture in the shape of a ball, without the lychee taste. I wouldn’t get the crystal boba again, I prefer my pearls!

The mango smoothie itself had too much ice chunks, which made it not as enjoyable. It could have been blended longer for more consistency.

(I’m double jointed in my thumb which is why it looks weird…)

Hokkaido milk tea: These were one of the top 10 specials being advertised, so the boyfriend gave it a try! He was really impressed with the taste. The tea was strong and fragrant. It was a tad bit sweet, so it might be better to order it half sweet.

On a second visit, the boyfriend ordered the Hokkaido milk tea again. Since my mango slush had a lot of ice chunks, I decided to give the slushes another try but have strawberry instead. The slush was not good this time as well. There were ice chunks and the strawberry flavour was very artificial.

Lychee aloe juice: A non-caffeinated juice which was very tasty. There was a very generous portion of aloe chunks inside. We also added some coconut jelly which added more textures to the drink.

Monster boba latte: The monster is Ding Tea’s version of the brown sugar pearl latte, available after 1pm until quantities last. I was VERY happy to find out they had almond milk available, so I was able to order it! =D

I found that there was not much roasted brown sugar taste compared to other places I have tried. But it still satisfied my brown sugar latte craving and I am glad there is a place within walking distance if I’m ever craving it.

I would recommend coming here for the non slushes/smoothie drinks. The slushes/smoothies aren’t good, I also wish they had a fresh fruit option because it tasted very artificial.

Overall, I wouldn’t make the drive purposely for Ding Tea. But, it’s nice that there is finally another bubble tea place in this area. I’d come back because this area is convenient.

Rocky Point Ice Cream

April 10, 2019

Rocky Point is such an underrated park, but I love it here! This park has many good memories for me, from family BBQ gatherings, to picnics with friends, or Ribfest. One of the most popular places in the park is Rocky Point Ice Cream!

On the way home from Coquitlam, the boyfriend and I stopped here because it’s been awhile. I was also craving some dessert.

It was not that busy on the night that we came by, but in the summer it can get really busy here. Rocky Point Ice Cream has that classic, ice cream shop scent… you know, the very sweet/rich dairy scent. Or is that just me who smells it?

Berry sorbet: I had my eye on the vegan chocolate, but that only vegan chocolate flavour was a chocolate blueberry fig and it was not good. So, I settled on the berry sorbet even though I didn’t really want sorbet because there wasn’t anything else.

I found the sorbet to be disappointing, but that’s because I was craving something richer with a coconut milk base. But that is in no fault of Rocky Point, just my personal preference that day.

Brown butter pecan: The boyfriend enjoyed his flavour unlike moi. It was their spin on the pralines and cream flavour.

I would recommend Rocky Point Ice Cream for their dairy desserts, but not their vegan/dairy free/sorbet things. Their prices are also a bit cheaper than the popular ice cream shops in Vancouver which is great!

Deer Garden Signatures – Burnaby

April 5, 2019

Deer Garden is a restaurant the boyfriend and I go to sometimes, when we are craving soup noodles. We usually go to the Fraser Street location and actually didn’t even know there was a Deer Garden in this area until we were walking by on the way to Myst one day!

A few months later, we were doing some errands around Metrotown so it was a convenient time to finally try this location.

There is a small parking lot on the side, but it was all full. There’s also free street parking in the area, but you may have to walk 2-3 blocks.

The size of the Burnaby Deer Garden is a bit smaller than the Vancouver one, but the layout is the same.

Unfortunately, we got the worst table in the restaurant that day. It seems like it used to be part of the waiting area, but they decided to add a random table (the other tables were all booth seats). Throughout the meal, waiting customers were standing very close to us and it was a bit hard to get service.

Pork cutlet: The boyfriend felt like adding a pork cutlet to his lunch! I didn’t try any, but he really enjoyed it. The pork cutlet was served piping hot, and with a loud, audible crunch so you know that the batter was fresh.

DIY noodles: I ordered the century egg and fish soup, Korean crystal noodle with fish and sausage. The soup broth taste was consistent with their other location.

I love Deer Garden’s grilled sausage, it has been so long since I ordered it due to my digestive issues. My system wasn’t in a flare-up that day so I was able to spoil myself… it did not disappoint *heart eyes*.

Some of the crystal noodles were not completely cooked, and hard when I bit into… so I soaked them in the hot soup while eating the fish and sausage first. There was a good amount of boiled plain fish and century egg.

DIY noodles: The boyfriend ordered laksa soup, egg noodles with fish balls and sausage. There were only 3 measly fish balls, which was a bit of a disappointment! Otherwise, he enjoyed his noodles and was quite full after, especially with the pork cutlet addition.

The Vancouver location is a bit more convenient, but we wouldn’t mind coming back here if we were in the area!