南翔上海料理 - Yu Garden (soft opening)

On a lazy Sunday afternoon, Mr. "E" and I decided to try the new Yu garden recommended by a friend in Richmond hill. When we got here, we found out that it is a branch from a famous shanghainese dumpling place that operated since 1559 in Shanghai.

The menu is famous for the 灌湯包, pretty much consume steamed inside a huge dumpling which you drink through a straw. Obviously we had to try both the sharks fin and crab roe soup dumpling.

As you can see from the menu, they have some pretty gourmate xiao long bao for tasting purposes. 

To start we ordered 馬蘭頭 a classic minced vegetable (Indian aster) with tofu cold dish. It was quite tasty and refreshing for a hot summer day.

Then came the soup dumplings. Maybe because of their soft opening, the crab roe soup dumpling was flavourless. 

As for the shark fin soup dumpling, it was a tad better with the chicken stock which was as expected. I had to season with ample amount of vinegar and salt. But I have to say it was quite bland, and lacking the umami flavour we were hoping for to find. 

We can not go to a shanghainese restaurant and not get the classic 小龍包, xiao long bao. Much better than the massive soup dumplings as it is more flavourful. 

Mr. E got one of his favourite 東波肉, braised pork belly. The flavour is solid, but the sauce needs further reduction and the pork needs to soak in the sauce more to absorb the essense of the sweetness and saltiness. It was quite good with the rice. 

As for the last dish, we finished with was a classic shanghainese scallion noodles with dried shrimp. Once again, we were hoping for more but the flavours were bland. You can say they were subtle. The noodles wasn't bad though. 

We had really high hopes for the restaurant after reading the restaurants biography, and how it introduced that both Bill Clinton and the Queen ate at the Shanghai branch. Overall, the food needs work. The kitchen needs time to settle in as their signature soup dumpling really needs major improvements. 

Service: 3/5

Quality: 3/5

Price: $$ 

Taiwanese food in toronto?!?!? Really!?!?

As a big fan for all things taiwanese and japanese, I always wondered when I could find a decent taiwanese place in toronto. Upon recommendations from a close friend Ms. J, we came across Koo Koo chicken in Mississauga. Yes and this place is in the middle of no where in a non distinct strip mall. But man was it good! Much like food court, you order, get a number and sit. They will bring you the food. 

Since there were 4 of us, we pretty much ordered the whole menu. First off is the sesame oil braised chicken (麻油雞) with thin noodles. The fragrance of the rice wine is amazing. Only lacking is the texture of the noodles, too soft for my liking. 

Next is the braised pork rice with pickled vegatables. My much hated pork, but man I love braised taiwanese pork (滷肉飯). The texture of the pork is succulent and not oily at all. 

How do I usually decide whether a taiwanese restaurant is legit. I must get their osyter pancake (蚵仔煎). The homemade sauce is very authentic, better than ones from vancouver and closes to that of taiwan night market stands. It is interesting how they use watercress instead of Napa cabbage. My favourite!!!! 

We cannot come all the way and not get fried chicken nuggets and cutlets. They have different powders to go with it like curry, seaweed, plum and lots more. Only complaint is I would've wanted to taste more of the basil that they use to fry the chicken with. 

Chicken cutlet is a lot of tender and juicy than the nuggets. I would say better done technically and I would get this and not the nuggets. 

Overall, highly highly recommend for people who love and crave taiwanese food. God was I glad for Ms. J's recommendation. It would have been ashame not to know of this place.

Service: 3.5/5 

Quality: 5/5

Price: $ (super affordable) 

When you crave tuna!!!

I have been craving albacore tuna! So Mr. E says why not we buy a slab of albacore and make a homemade japanese izakaya style dinner. As such we brought a $30 slab from J-town and began our cooking adventures. 

For starters, let's have some shisoto peppers! Out of the 40 little peppers I ended up with all the hot ones! (Apparently you get 1 hot one out of 12) 

We decided to prepare the tuna two ways. First is the tuna tataki, lightly seared tuna served with a ponzu soya sauce. Yummy!!!

Next is the famous hapa izakaya style negitoro. More or less it's one part soya, one part sesame oil and one part peanut sauce. We served this over baguette. Delish!!! 

Lastly as our main how can we not have yaki-udon. We made it with pork collar instead of beef as Mr. E loves his pork!!