sausage Archives - Curiously Carmen

Cora Breakfast and Lunch

September 9, 2014

After a turn of unexpected events, my friends and I found ourselves hungry in Coquitlam one sunny afternoon. We never go to Coquitlam, and were at a lost for ideas. Minutes passed as we uncomfortably sat in my friend’s leather seat car while our thighs burned from the sun, looking up place to place on our phone (LOL). I suddenly had a eureka! moment and remembered a joint by the name of Cora.
Cora is located in a plaza by Coquitlam Center. Honestly, at first glance, it reminded me of a daycare center or a preschool. It definitely looks like a kid’s paradise. Little did we know what was in store for us…

Walking in, my eyes were greeted with a dramatic and exuberant display of fresh fruits and bright colours. I looked around the restaurant in awe, as I took in all the bright colours and the measures they took to make this place kid-friendly.

Walls were painted with cute drawings of fruit in cute fonts. Cereal boxes which doubled as home-y decor. Friendly servers in brightly coloured uniforms. Cora is truly a fruit-lover’s heaven.
Cora does not skimp out at all with the fresh fruit. I have a feeling that parents must love taking their kids here, because it is such a fun atmosphere for kids to eat their fruits. This plate here was the eggs benedict with smoked salmon, served with roasted potatoes and fresh fruit. He fell in love with the eggs benedict at first bite. The Hollandaise sauce was delicious, and the English muffin tasted soft. Together, the eggs, Hollandaise sauce, smoked salmon, and English muffin went really well together. The fruit was extremely fresh as well. Yum!
Unfortunately, I forgot the name of what I ordered and I couldn’t find it on their website 🙁 I’m pretty sure it was just the standard breakfast plate. It came with bacon, sausage, roasted potatoes, eggs, and of course, fresh fruit. My meal was pretty average, just the standard breakfast plate that you would normally find. Nothing too special about it and was a bit bland, I wished that I had chose the eggs benedict instead because it tasted a lot better!
My friend got Cora’s special, which came with the standard breakfast sides, toast, and crepe. He enjoyed his plate, and we ended up all sharing the bread but we couldn’t finish it all.
My boyfriend ordered the mango banana yogurt smoothie. It was so good that I ended up ordering one for myself as well! It was very creamy and thick due to the yogurt, and was refreshing as well. You could definitely taste both the mango and banana in the smoothie. As a bonus, it came with a fresh strawberry and a slice of cantaloupe!

All in all, we enjoyed our visit to Cora. My plate wasn’t too special, but I really liked how much fruit they included. The one thing that sticks out about Cora for me is the abundance of fresh fruit and the friendly atmosphere they have. The standard breakfast plates are nothing special, but they go one step higher with the amount of fresh fruit that is served with each plate.

-Carmen

Bestie – German sausage restaurant

March 14, 2014

After hearing many great things and seeing mouth watering pictures on the internet, we decided to give Bestie a much anticipated visit one sunny afternoon.

Bestie is nestled in Chinatown, adding to the list of recently opened gentrified, hipster-type, local restaurants in this area. I thought that this place wasn’t as great as it was hyped up to be. I really liked the decor, service, and ambiance of this place, but the portions of food were smaller than I expected. I was also a bit disappointed with my currywurst, as I’ll explain below.
I liked the interior of Bestie. It gives off a very clean and cool vibe, with the type of wood panels then use and primary colours. It kind of reminded me of a children’s play space but maybe that’s just me? Of course, they can’t be in Chinatown without having the Chinese money cat statue!

Bestie also serves up alternative specialty drinks, as seen in the corner of the picture.
The boyfriend’s currywurst with venison and blueberry ($8). Blueberry?! Yep! It actually tasted pretty decent, the blueberries gave it a sweeter flavour to it.
Friend’s butter chicken currywurst ($9-10?). Can we all take a moment to acknowledge their cute, customized spoons? I thought they were so cute, but my friend found it harder to eat with it. Since he’s a much taller and bigger person than I am, his hands were too big for the fork. I thought that was pretty funny…
I ordered the currywurst as well, with classic pork thuringer. Again, I thought it tasted alright. It tasted as healthy as a sausage could be, you could definitely tell it was healthier than the normal sausages you’d buy at Costco or something.

However, there was a lot of curied ketchup on top to the point where I couldn’t really enjoy the taste of the currywurst. I’d try to describe the taste to you but the ketchup was overpowering. My fries ended up getting soggy because of all the ketchup that was soaked in it, I ended up eating only 1/2 of it. Next time, I would definitely order the ketchup on the side if I knew!

In conclusion, we enjoyed our visit to Bestie even though my currywurst was a bit disappointing for me with the overpowering ketchup that stole the taste of the actual sausage. Their portions were smaller than I expected for the price paid. I enjoyed the decor and ambiance more than the food.

Trilussa Pizza & Pane

March 1, 2014

While browsing on Urbanspoon, I came across Trilussa Pizza & Pane. I knew I had to visit this place due to it’s 97% rating and 271 (and counting!) votes! And boy, am I glad I discovered this place!

Their pizza dough is made fresh everyday with quality ingredients. Luckily enough, I made a reservation just in case it would be busy. To our shock, when we arrived, they were completelyout of pizza dough and actually saved us the last two pieces of dough! I’m pretty sure they only stayed open to serve us, or they could have just used their dough and close early, but nope, they actually waited for us!

Talk about great service. Although it was our first time here, the workers made us feel right at home and made conversation with us while we enjoyed their fresh, and authentic Roman pizza. I felt as if we were regulars here and had a really great experience.

The exterior of the restaurant doesn’t really stand out from the rest of the numerous restaurants along Main Street. Half my childhood was spent around the Little Riley/Main Street area and I was really shocked I’ve never noticed this place until I came in. Right away, we noticed a cute little handwritten sign that apologized to customers that there was no more dough. When we walked in, they knew my name right away and said, “Carmennnn! Hey!” like I was a old pal.

The interior of Trilussa is very cozy and warm. On one end they have the pizza bar, espresso machine, and till, and the other side consists of the booths. There were little coat hangers on each booth which was a nice and convenient detail to this place. Trilussa is pretty small, but very comfortable.
You can see the oven in the back that is used to cook each order individually, which adds to the freshness. Normally, the area with the glass pane would be lined up with pizza waiting to be cooked (if they had dough left!).

We patiently sat, with our tummies rumbling while the oven brought the anticipated pizza to life. Overall, it took about 8 minutes for our pizzas to be done cooking. They only have two ovens, so I wonder how they manage when it gets busy! I would imagine that there are really long wait times during peak.
Behold! Our pizza! It came on a pretty long wooden paddle, I wonder how many unfortunate people have had their pizzas knocked off the table by other customers. We ordered the Milano (prosciutto cotto & mozzarella) and Garbatella (sausage & mozzarella).

I fell in love at first bite. The crust was thin and very crunchy on the outside, but soft and chewy inside. The mozzarella was very stringy and rich. The pizza had a bit of oil on it which didn’t really bother me, because I knew from their sign (scroll up) that it was extra virgin olive oil. This was enough for two people and we left extremely full and happy.
Here is the closeup of the Milano. You could have more toppings but we opted for mushrooms only. I wished that there was a bit more proscuitto, but the freshness and quality of their ingredients make up for it (quality over quantity!). I preferred this dish over the Garbetella because it had more meat on it.
Here is the Garbetella. Again, I wished that this had more sausage pieces on it. However, you can see the generous portion of stringy, melted cheese.

After doing some background research, I found out that the owner of Trilussa was born and raised in Rome, Italy which explains why the pizza tastes as lovely and authentic as it does. Normally, I would that really bloated and gross feeling after eating pizza, but due to the freshness of their ingredients, I felt great! I would love to come back to Trilussa, so glad I discovered this little gem.

-Carmen