Life in the Lower Mainland (BC, Canada)

For Dine Out Vancouver 2018 my friend's pick was Bufala for a late Sunday afternoon lunch. We got in late-ish almost at 2pm I believe and seating was pretty easy, no reservations required. They were however out of two of three desserts on their Dine Out menu! So you might want to take that into consideration. The Dine Out menu is basically their whole menu minus some smaller appetizers. The $20 appy and pizza deal is almost half price and a goodly amount of food! Their pizzas are very thin Neapolitan/Napolitana style  with a pretty generous amount of edge crust. To help you eat that crust there are three flavoured oils (that you can slather over your pizza ingredients too if you like): Chili, Herb, and Parmesan. Flavours of the oils are on the subtle side but unless you drown your pizza you (or at least I) won't feel the same heavy feeling from food being too oily. Kale Caesar Salad (normally $13) green & purple kale, grana padano, anchovy, bacon, salt-cured eg...

Thanks to Yelp I got tickets for this year's Gluten Free Expo (last year it was called the Specialty Food Expo ). There were no shortage of one-per-person-please bags of Spokes puffed potato chips for the taking right when you entered the convention centre. Maybe the tamer flavours were all gone because these were no-punches-pulled spicy-hot Mango Habanero flavoured. For once, a chip that is actually spicy-hot when it has a picture of a chili in the ad copy. Unfortunately, the rather wildly inconsistent seasoning means you could get a really hot chip, or a sweeter one, but generally there's some buzz and flavour to each chip. These are light chips and if not for the spicy heat could go very quickly. I found they were very good to get my appetite whetted and mouth salivating.

Thanks to Yelp I got tickets for this year's Gluten Free Expo (last year it was called the Specialty Food Expo ). Enjoy Life was handing out samples pretty much right when you entered the convention floor. These soft baked mini chocolate chip cookies by Enjoy Life are quite okay. Life a lot of gluten free baking, it feels grainy and in this case also seems to have a very slight gummy feel. However for tiny bites, they are pretty packed with chocolate chips so a little bit -- like one tiny cookie -- can go a long way if you take time to savor each cookie.

Thanks to Yelp I got tickets for this year's Gluten Free Expo (last year it was called the Specialty Food Expo ). You're probably already familiar with Quesava Kitchen and their veggie poppers  (among their various products). This year at the expo I noticed Forno de Minas, which had a plainer Brazilian cheese roll, not heavily flavoured like Quesava (which is not to say the strong flavours in the Quesava Kitchen ones were a bad thing -- they were actually quite delicious). What struck me about Forno de Minas cheese rolls was how the inside seemed much lighter. Maybe they were fresher out of the oven and would harden up later into a similar consistency. Not sure. I was curious enough to buy a couple packs to try at home however (convention price was $7 for 1 pack, $12 for 2 packs, $15 for 3 packs). I'd made Brazilian cheese rolls (with this watery recipe so easy even I could do it) before and they do harden up once they get cold. It'll be curious to see how the...

Very crispy chicken! But also not your typical crispy fried chicken, so if you're used to KFC, be careful about assuming you'll like The Fried Chicken Works . I figured I'd want to eat it piping hot so I opted for their handy boneless option. If you've ever held a drumstick that had only minutes before come out of the fryer, hoping to eat the chicken while it's still hot and juicy, you'll know what a literal pain it is to hold onto the heat-retaining bone. Price for portion is a bit scary at around $1.50 per chunk of chicken but you get a drink with that, a not insignificant amount of really decently done fries, and there's more filling meat here than a gourmet burger for the same price. Apparently fried to order, and I got to eat it hot and juicy. The crispiness appears to mainly come from the skin-on chicken. The chicken skin/fat is fried to literally a crisp and there's nothing fatty or chewy left about it. It is, however, definitely crispy ...

Caught up with an old friend today at Green Basil Thai Restaurant this afternoon (her choice -- she likes Thai apparently) and checked out the lunch special. Rather rare to find a decently filling lunch for under $10 these days and for sure it exists at Green Basil Thai. There's a lunch rush around Noon but dies right down shortly after 1 pm. Lunch is served till 3pm. G9L. Chicken with cashew nuts in Thai Chili sauce ($8.75) Rated 3-chilies but not spicy hot at all. My suspicion is they go easy on the spiciness to accommodate more palates. You'll probably have to double check how spicy something is if you really want spicy-hot food. Overall okay taste. Dish portion is good, and what helps make this a filling lunch is the bowl of coconut rice, bowl of soup, and vegetarian spring roll that comes with the specials (some specials that are noodle dishes do not come with rice). Spring roll was oily. Sauce was weak. Tom yum soup was weak. Drink it while it's hot. ...