dinner Archives - Page 2 of 3

Mio Sushi, Seattle

November 9, 2014

A lazy Sunday calls for staying at home in cozy blankets, PJs, and watching Netflix while eating a disgusting amount of corn nuts. Oh, and catching up on blogging too of course. Apart from Toulouse, we also stopped by and tried Mio sushi on a whim. Our result to Mio was a result of indecisiveness, hunger, and convenience.

It was quite sad that after arriving in Seattle for a mere 28 hours, I was already missing and craving Asian noodles. In particular, I was craving udon soup as well so we set out on what would be a thirty minute indecisiveness, constant scrolling on Urbanspoon until we found Mio. There were other places as well, but we didn’t want to drive and we also didn’t want to spend a lot of money in the downtown core.

We were pleasantly surprised at how fast of a walk Mio was from our hotel! I was a bit iffy on walking there because the streets were pretty dark and we had to pass a big dark, unlit park which has probably seen better days… but I was assured that it would be safe to walk, turns out it was a pretty nice day for a brief stroll.

This location of Mio was located right outside of the downtown core, in the South Lake Union neighbourhood. The area looked pretty new, nice, and trendy. Kind of reminded us a bit of Yaletown but more commercial. We were the only customers when we came in around 8:30 pm.
As mentioned, I knew what I was going to order before stepping in. They had a seafood and nabeyaki udon. I got the nabeyaki udon ($9 usd) since it was cheaper than the seafood udon, and all I really wanted was just udon. It came in a cute stone bowl with a handle, and I was warned the bowl was very hot. I would have liked the tempura on the side because it got really soggy, but it was good nonetheless.

There were also some pan fried string beans, but it got pretty soggy and didn’t taste super fresh. Apart from those two very minor hiccups, this bowl of udon was exactly what I wanted, and was delicious. The broth was very flavourful, and a tad salty. It came with perfectly cooked and a decent amount of udon noodles, and imitation crab meat. I liked how there was a lot of seafood as well, it was a good addition as well as the fresh green onion garnishes.
The boyfriend ordered the Gyu ramen. The ramen was really disappointing. It lacked flavour, depth, and was very plain. Perhaps we were just used to amazing ramen in Vancouver, but this bowl was not appetizing. He also mentioned that the ramen noodles tasted like instant noodles… yikes.

To split, we ordered the salmon and yellowtail roll. Yellowtail roll is the same as negitoro roll, it confused us at first. Both rolls were very fresh and flavourful, pretty decent. The price was a bit steeper than we were used to for a casual Japanese joint at $4.75 USD per roll, but we did enjoy the freshness of it so we didn’t mind.

The rolls and udon were satisfying and delicious, but I wish we could say the same about the ramen. Service was pretty attentive, fast, and nice (well then again, we were the only customers in the restaurant!). Mio looked very clean, new, and had hints of pink accents throughout the restaurant. This looked like a place that would be really busy during lunch hours on the weekdays, but it was very quiet that night and they closed early after we finished eating. It was a good and convenient place to grab a quite bite since we were in the neighbourhood.

Cristos Greek Taverna

October 11, 2014

Last month, the boyfriend and I decided to go for a Greek date night. We had been craving Greek food for a month probably, but never got the chance to go.

That was a pretty good week, as we also had a really good night at Cactus Club Cafe and he actually ended up writing a guest post on my blog about the evening!
North Burnaby’s main street is dominated by restaurants. Restaurants side by side, across from each other- it is pretty much impossible to go hungry when you’re in this neighbourhood and if you have your wallet.

I often wonder how so many restaurants can stay in business and compete with each other, but I guess us Vancouverites really love our restaurants.

Cristos Taverna has been around for quite awhile now. I came here for a birthday dinner back in Grade 9, and even then, I thought it was quite old. For good reasons too, we had quite the lovely experience at Cristos Taverna and after coming here, it has landed a spot on one of my favourite Greek restaurants.
Our server that day was very friendly. Right when we walked in, we were greeted with a smile and friendly conversation, and he told us that he would give us the best seat in the house that day.

He also pulled our chairs back for us when we sat down, and shortly came back afterwards to light up our candles for “more romance.”

The way that we were treated felt like we were at a very high class, fancy fine dining restaurant reserved for the most highest classes of society instead of a neighbourhood Greek restaurant.

So far, the service and atmosphere was great. I ordered the chicken souvlaki plate, which came with rice, potatoes, greek salad, tzatziki sauce, and pita bread. Everything on my plate was absolutely delicious, and I found myself savouring every bite.

The pita bread was lightly toasted, and very soft inside. I dipped this into the tzatziki sauce, which was very refreshing and cool.

The greek salad was very fresh, with crunchy veggies sprinkled with feta cheese and tossed in olive oil. The roasted potato was bursting with flavour and didn’t have that really starchy, dry texture to it.

The chicken was bursting with flavour, and grilled really well. Overall, everything was just cooked perfectly and my Greek craving was definitely satisfied.
The boyfriend ordered the calamari entree, and loved every bite of it was well. Normally, I would try a bit of his food but I was too busy eating and loving mine that I didn’t feel like trying it.

He loved how the calamari was seasoned, and said that it was crispy and light on the outside.

At the end of our meal, our server came back and talked to us for awhile. He told us that we should come back in the Fall (we went early September) since they were bringing back live music. He promised us that he would reserve the same table again for us if we called.

As if this wasn’t enough, he ended up giving us a business card and wrote his name down, along with the information for the live music nights. From the way that he connected with us, I thought he was the owner trying to make a good impression for his restaurant. Turns out, he was just one of the staff members and did not own the restaurant.

I hope that the rest of the servers are as welcoming and nice as he was!

-Carmen

PS. Two weeks afterwards, we decided to try another Greek restaurant four blocks down, Sfinaki. Disappointingly, it really did not compare to our experience here at all, food and service wise. Keep your eyes posted for what we liked and didn’t like about that place!

The Cheesecake Factory, Downtown Seattle

October 6, 2014

Since these two weeks haven’t been exactly the best, I always find myself thinking about my weekend getaway as that was the highlight of my month. So, let us flashback to my weekend in Seattle 🙂

After spending a long day walking around downtown, we were pretty hungry and tired by the time dinner rolled around. Walking around burned all the energy from our lunch at PF Changs. We also witnessed a ridiculous man who was going absolutely crazy, swearing and yelling at workers because their computer broke and had to close the store early. I’ve never seen someone so upset over gelato before!

After that incident, we were walking to the Cheesecake Factory and out of nowhere, this minivan starts honking for two minutes straight, because the car in front of her was dropping off an older man at the sidewalk when the traffic light was red and there wasn’t anything saying they couldn’t stop. WTF?! This is not including the creepy man on drugs who yelled at me at See’s Chocolate hours before but I don’t want to get sidetracked anymore LOL. People are scary sometimes. Anyways, we got to the main Cheesecake Factory location in downtown and waited about twenty minutes in line which was expected for a gorgeous, warm Saturday night.

Maki and Nigiri ordered the seared tuna tataki to start ($17.95 USD). Since it was $18 for a thinly sliced portion, I felt bad having some so I don’t have an opinion on this dish 🙂 But any dish with avocado and seared tuna is good in my books.

For the entree, Maki and Nigiri shared a pasta dish, which I can not remember the name of. Sorry 🙁 The portion was huge though, you can’t really tell from the picture but it is definitely an entree meant for more than one person!
The boyfriend ordered the classic burger ($11.95 USD) which came with a big piece of grilled onion, lettuce, tomato, and a side of fries. I was quite surprised he ordered a plain hamburger, but he didn’t want to over indulge since we were planning on getting cheesecake! To his surprise, he really enjoyed the hamburger and said it was delicious even without the cheese. To this day, he still brings up this burger and wants to have it again, haha!
I ordered the fried shrimp platter ($16.95 USD). I love my seafood, especially shrimp, and this one was no different. The shrimp were absolutely massive, I’ve never had shrimp that big before!

They were very crispy and flavourful. The fries underneath were pretty standard, and I didn’t try the cole slaw because I’m not a big fan of it. None of us enjoyed the special shrimp dipping sauce (the red one in the back), it had a very off putting flavour and was a bit watery and light. I ended up only eating half my entree because I was getting pretty full from the huge shrimp pieces, and plus I wanted to save room for cheesecake (duh).
Finally, the best and most famous part came! Maki and Nigiri decided to split the mango key lime cheesecake (all their cheesecakes have a set price, from $6.95-$7.95 USD). Yummmm!!
The reason why the boyfriend decided to skip out on the cheese for his burger earlier was for this slice of rich, heavenly indulgence, the Godiva cheesecake. One bite was more than satisfying for me, we all found this cheesecake to be very, very heavy and filling even though he asked for no whip creme.

I can’t believe I’m saying this but we felt that there was almost too much of a chocolate taste (I know, impossible right?!). We didn’t really taste the actual cheesecake flavour, just lots and lots of chocolate. I think this would be a good dessert to split among four people, but definitely way too much for one person. Needless to say, he ended up packing half of it back to our hotel because it was impossible to finish.
For myself, I ordered the white chocolate raspberry truffle cheesecake (Oh man, I felt myself gaining a few pounds just typing that out LOL). I had asked for no whip, but they forgot about it so I ended up scooping it off. At first, we were wondering why my cheesecake crust was dark, and thought that maybe it got burnt since the other two looked fine? T

Turns out, my cheesecake came with a chocolate crust. I prefer the original crust cause I didn’t taste the chocolate at all, and it tasted a burnt to me. As for the cheesecake, it was pretty good and rich, but I was hoping that there would be more raspberry to it. Nonetheless, I did enjoy my slice and ended up bringing half of it back to the hotel as well. Of course, we didn’t end up eating both of them and had to throw them out since they melted in the car after outlet shopping. =.=”

All in all, I had a lovely experience as usual at the Cheesecake Factory and am already looking forward to the next visit! There was also some sort of homecoming prom thing for high schoolers that day, and it was very cute to see nervous preteens all dressed up and going on dates with each other 🙂

Andddd, here is a bonus picture of a gorgeous view in Seattle 🙂 Thanks for the great visit, see you next time Seattle ♥

-Carmen

Kishimoto Japanese Restaurant

September 19, 2014

I have heard amazing things about Kishimoto, both from my friends and also online. I’ve always wanted to try it, but know that it’s a sushi hotspot and I do not really want to wait ages in line.. 🙁

Finally, one day, timing worked out and my boyfriend took me there to try it! I was very eager, and had extremely high expectations before even walking in the front door.
As always, finding parking along Commercial Drive was a hassle but we did find free street parking that day! Yay! Kishimoto is a relatively small restaurant, and adding to the popularity= long, expected wait times. We went around 5:30pm right after I got off work, because I knew if we went around 6-7pm we would have to wait.

Walking in, you will see signs everywhere instructing guests to wait until they’re seated, no sitting down until all the guests have arrived, etc etc. Just shows how busy it gets! We waited around 5 minutes for the server to clear the table for us. Smooth sailing so far!
My boyfriend has been here before, and said that their tuna tataki ($11.95) is a must order. So, of course, being the curious food blogger I am, I had to give it a try. When the server put down the plate, I thought that she had mistaken our order cause all I saw were onions. The tuna tataki was actually under all the onions and roasted garlic. I was in love at first bite.

The tuna was incredibly soft, and melted in your mouth. It had a slightly grilled taste to it. Adding the onions, roasted dry garlic, and ponzu sauce, it was absolute perfection. My favourite dish of the night.
I knew that Kishimoto specialized in intricate plating techniques, so I was quite eager to see how our dishes would be plated! Here is the negitoro roll, chopped scallop roll ($4.95), and wild salmon nigiri ($3.00). I thought that the chopped scallop roll tasted pretty average. I really liked the negitoro roll since the tuna tasted very fresh, and had a lot of flavour.

The wild salmon nigiri also had a great, fresh, and juicy flavour to it as well. I ordered one piece of salmon nigiri, turns out that one order is actually equal to three pieces! I really enjoyed the sushi rice, it was cooked perfectly and had that distinct delicious sushi rice taste to it. Definitely worth the $3 since you get three pieces of nigiri! The “flower” art at the bottom was composed of daikon (type of carrot) sheets, edamame beans, and ginger. The candle seen at the top picture was a real candle, wrapped around a daikon sheet. Pretty interesting concept! I wonder if anyone has accidentally lit their daikon on fire…. Knowing how clumsy I am, I’m surprised I didn’t knock it over…
Up next, was our salmon oshisushi ($12.95). Oshisushi is a type of sushi made by placing all the ingredients into a box and pressing it together, hence the rectangular shape. The salmon oshisushi came with creamy sauce, crushed black peper, jalapenos, and salmon sashimi. After it is pressed, it then gets lightly torched. I enjoyed the salmon oshisushi as well, but found that after a few pieces, it was a bit too heavy for me due to the creamy sauce. I ended up requesting for a lemon slice, where I then lightly squeezed the juice onto the remaining pieces. I found that cut a bit of the cream heaviness out. Oshisushi = oishi 😉 If you know some Japanese haha…
The second oshisushi we ordered was the ebi ($12.95). This one came with cooked prawn, basil, pesto, creamy sauce, and crushed black pepper. Just like the salmon oshisushi, I found that it was a bit heavy to eat though I did enjoy the pesto sauce. There was a slightly grilled taste to these as well. I ended up drizzling a bit of lemon juice to this one as well. For those who have tried Kishimoto’s oshisushi, did you find that it was a bit on the heavy side due to the cream?

I noticed that all their desserts were made in-restaurant, so I wanted to give it a try. We ordered the house-made strawberry sorbet, which came with condensed milk topping and served with a cute wooden spoon! Our waitress informed us that it was still frozen, and to wait a few minutes before digging in. There was a very strong strawberry flavour to the sorbet! Adding the condensed milk on top, the dessert was sooo gooood. There were also bits of strawberry seeds in the dessert as well!

All in all, I did enjoy my visit to Kishimoto and left satisfied. Service was a bit slow at some points, since they had a full house. I noticed that it got busy around 6pm so I’m glad we had an early dinner. I highly recommend trying the tuna tataki here! What were your favourites?

-Carmen

PS. Stay tuned for some delicious Seattle eats next week! 😉

GUEST POST: Cactus Club Cafe (North Burnaby)

August 31, 2014

Intro: My boyfriend and I were at dinner last night, when I suddenly had the idea for him to do a guest post on my blog! We brought up the idea from time to time but never actually went with it. I thought it would be fun to give him the chance to write about our food adventures this time. That’s it from me (Carmen) now, here is the review of Cactus Club in the eyes and tastebuds of the boyfriend!
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Hi everybody! It’s pretty exciting to finally be writing the long talked-about guest post. I’m not a writer like Carmen is so my apologies ahead of time. It’s been a busy week for Carmen because of her new internship position, and that along with a bunch of other events happening during the week means that we haven’t had the chance to spend a night just to ourselves. So on a Saturday where neither of us had to work, we finally spent a day together. After a long day spent downtown, including a trip to the Aritzia warehouse sale (post on the haul coming soon!), I decided on going to the Cactus Club Cafe for dinner. Out of all the other similar restaurants (ie. Milestones, JOEY, etc.), Cactus Club Cafe was one of the ones that I still had yet to try. This location is nestled in a busy stretch along Lougheed Highway that also includes a White Spot, Boston Pizza, JOEY Burnaby, and a Browns Social House.

Walking inside, the first thing you notice is it looks really fancy. Carmen mentioned, “it looks way fancier than the exterior would suggest.” The interior consists of wood and glass for decor, which gives it a modern feel. They have a few big screen TVs for those looking to enjoy a game while they drink and dine. We were seated right away by the hostess and told the drink specials that night; $5 Cactus Blonde Ale or $1 off Signature Sangria. Carmen ended up ordering the Signature Sangria. It was made with fresh strawberries and raspberries, zinfandel wine, apricot brandy, sprite, and a splash of bellini. Carmen thought it was really good. The fresh strawberries and raspberries add a lot of fruity flavour that compliments the zinfandel well, and the bellini layered on top added a nice sweetness that went well with the apricot brandy.

We ordered the ceviche as our starter. It consisted of raw steelhead trout, prawns, minced red onions, mint, cilantro, thai basil, lime, and nuoc cham sauce served with tortilla chips. The last time we had ceviche was at Tap and Barrel, and I overdid the lime juice in the ceviche. This time, I was warned not to add too much. The sauce mixes well with the herbs, and the fish and shrimp, cut to the perfect size for dipping, created a dish that was fresh and very flavourful. It is definitely worth trying.

For our entrees, Carmen went with what she had the last time she went to the Cactus Club Cafe: the grilled tuna club. It consists of rare-seared albacore tuna, tarragon tartar sauce, bacon, cilantro, and pickled ginger on a ciabatta bun, served with a side of fries. While she found it good the last time she had it, she thought this time there was too much pickled ginger and tartar sauce that overpowered the taste of the tuna. The fries are your standard fries, but I liked how none of them were soggy. I tried a few bites and loved the grilled taste of the tuna, but I agree that the tartar sauce was a little too much. (See review of Cactus Club Coal Harbour here)

For my entree, I settled on the short rib sandwich. It consisted of beef short rib, caramelized onions, and emmental cheese on toasted sourdough bread with au jus dipping sauce, served with a side of yam fries. The short rib was cooked very tender, and the emmental cheese went well with the beef because of it’s milder flavour. The au jus sauce adds a lot of flavour to the sandwich and some extra moisture to the already tender short rib. The yam fries here were delicious, and crispy as well. No mushy ones to be found. I would definitely order the short rib sandwich again if I was back and looking for something familiar to order.

We were both stuffed by the end of our meal, so we have no dessert thoughts to share. Throughout the night we were looked after very well by our server, and both of us agreed that the service here is excellent. In terms of comparing it to the other similar type restaurants, I thought that the Cactus Club Cafe was definitely on par with the rest. I really enjoyed the atmosphere at the Cactus Club though as there was lots of booth seating, and the dim lighting made the quiet night to ourselves all the more private.

So that’s all to this post. I hope you all enjoyed reading my thoughts on the Cactus Club Cafe in Burnaby. As I mentioned above, stay tuned for Carmen’s post on her haul at the Aritzia warehouse sale!

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Hope everyone enjoyed the guest post! Perhaps he should write more guest posts in the future? 🙂