I normally don’t go for Mexican food- actually, scratch that, I never go for Mexican. I don’t remember the last time I had Mexican prior to this month. OH wait, I think it was Las Margaritas almost two years ago, for Dine Out Vancouver 2015.
I don’t really know why, I guess because there are so many restaurants to pick from in Vancouver that Mexican food goes off my radar! But lately this month, I have been trying more places. And by places, I mean Chipotle (Yes, I finally tried Chipotle and I can see why people rave about it) and this review, Sal Y Limon!
Sal Y Limon is located inside a small strip mall off Fraser. Parking is a tiny bit of a mess, so I recommend trying to find parking on the side streets. I don’t understand why the architects of this strip mall made it like a zig zag shape, ineffectively making the parking lot messy as well.
Once inside, it is pretty spacious although it can feel cramped during peak hours. Once you get in, you order your food at the till. The workers will bring you your food with the corresponding number stand.
Shrimp taco, $2.75: The shrimp taco is on the far left. I am a huge shrimp lover and devoured this! The shrimp was big and juicy, with a fresh and crunchy batter. It was topped off with crunchy and fresh veggies, and a spoonful of spicy mayo. So good! All the flavours went perfectly together!
Pollo pibil, $2.60: I ordered two different chicken tacos! This one was the slow roasted marinated chicken breast. It was soooo tender and packed with flavour. The pickled lettuce and cilantro also went really well with the tender chicken breast. Out of the two chicken tacos, I definitely recommend this one!
Pollo asado, $2.60: Same price as the chicken breast. This one is really simple, just chicken meat seasoned with salt and a bit of pepper. I found it a bit too plain, considering the explosion of flavours from the other two tacos. However, if you want something simple, this is the one to order.
Shrimp taco, $2.75: See comments above
Pollo pibil, $2.60: See comments above
Tinga vegetariana, $3.00: This was one of the vegetarian tacos. Although I didn’t try it, my cousin enjoyed it although she thought it was pretty spicy (she doesn’t do spicy food at all, so might not be that bad for spice lovers).
It came with mushrooms, zucchinis, onions, and napoles (Which I just learned from writing the post is that napoles are a vegetable made from cacti. Who know that you could eat part of a cacti?! See how blogging teaches you things? =P)
Pierna, $9.05: Instead of ordering tacos like my cousin and I, the boyfriend ordered a burrito! And boy, was it massive. It was bursting with rice, beans, cabbage, sour cream, and more.
The boyfriend ordered the pierna, which is pulled pork. He also added cheese for an extra cost. I didn’t try it but he said it was amazing, and wouldn’t stop talking about how good it was! I mean, I wouldn’t doubt him…it looks amazingly delicious!
Overall, Sal Y Limon is a great place to go for Mexican. I am not a Mexican food expert so I’m not sure if it’s authentic or not, but I can attest that they have delicious and fresh food! Also, the prices are so cheap!
Yay!
As expected on a Friday night, there was a bit of a wait. The restaurant is pretty small, and the kitchen is on the top floor. I always feel a bit bad for restaurants where the kitchen is on another level, because of the servers who have to walk up and down.
Pink Bike Cheeseburger, $12.50: I ordered their standard cheeseburger, but without the cheese due to my dairy restriction =(. It came on a toasted sesame bun, naturally raised local beef, veggies, and the pink bike sauce (a combination of mustard, ketchup, and relish).
BBQ Island Bison Burger, $15.50: The boyfriend also really enjoyed the bison burger. As with my beef burger, his bison burger was thick and juicy as well. It was topped with smoky cheddar and BBQ sauce.
Fat Mao Noodles is located inside Chinatown. It is easy to spot from the rest of the stores on the bloack due to it’s glass walls.
The restaurant is fairly small, but seating is still comfortable because customers do not have to squish beside each other. I was greeted instantly by the workers in the open concept kitchen. My friend and I came around 12 pm, and there was only one other table (pic taken before we left).
The menu is also worth including because it is so cute! We really enjoyed the cat themed decor in here, and I’m sure cat lovers would appreciate it as well.
Each table also has a side of sauces to go with the noodles. As you’ll soon read, these sauces played a really important part to my bowl of noodles!
Braised duck noodles, $11.99: With this dish, you could choose between either Shangnai chewy noodles or wide rice noodles. I love my doughy and chewy noodles so I went with the Shanghai noodles.
The noodles were perfect as well. They had a perfect bounce and were chewy. Since they weren’t completely flat, some of soup went in between the folds and made it more flavourful.
Boat noodles, $10.99: This was the special that day. It was a spicy pork broth with pork shoulder, beef balls, fried garlic bits and crunchy deep fried noodles. We also speculated on why it was called boat noodles.
Durian ice cream, $5.99: Although my friend was quite full, she really wanted to try the durian ice cream. She is a huge durian lover and wondered how durian ice cream tasted.
The restaurant is pretty small and located on the main level of an apartment building (or maybe it was an office building? don’t remember). The only downside to the restaurant is that it is really cramped.
Blue Dog burger, $16.50: After ensuring that the burger had no dairy in it, I was good to go! The Blue Dog burger consists of a custom blend brisket-chuck beef, fried egg, applewood bacon, veggies, and fries. I asked for the burger to be cooked well done, as I am a bit wary of eating raw ground beef.
Free range chicken burger, $15.50: The ground chicken burger was delicious as well! Even though it looks pretty simple, the patty was bursting with juicy flavour, much like the beef.