Life in the Lower Mainland (BC, Canada)

Yelp organized a take-out tasting for Lee's Donuts at the Granville Island Market, and I was lucky to be chosen. We got two donuts free, and I purchased two additional ones. At $2.50 you are basically going to Lee's Donuts for a treat or if you care about having a superior donut experience. If you're on a budget, that $2.50 is worth five or more large bagels from Superstore or Walmart. Plus a coffee and you're looking at a $5 "breakfast" which won't even be all that filling. From the four I got, there are two types of donuts that I'm gonna call Breadlike and Cakelike to help you remember the difference. The Breadlike ones are yeast donuts . Very delicate on the outside, and just being grabbed to put in a take out doggy bag will probably crush the exterior (which totally happened to mine). If you need a bunch of donuts that have to be halfway presentable, don't get these. They are very light and airy, and if you dip them in coffee they taste li...

Small bright space open for lunch and dinner with a bit of a break in between. Get ready before you go in: Menu is accessed from a QR code available at each table. If you don't have data, you can probably connect to the free Wifi provided by the City of Vancouver. Pay attention to the menu! It tells you about the complimentary tea (it smells a bit like coffee but it's made from beans) and the bowl (it's not as deep as it looks). Premium Bowl ($18.95 + $5 for cold tofu) Conger Eel, Shrimp, Kakiage (mixed seafood tempura), Soft Boiled Egg, Seaweed, Green Bean For $5 even though it's got fancy stuff on it I'd pass on the cold tofu next time. Nothing really special there. Tempura came hot but it's not going to stay hot. Neither will the rice, special bowl or not. Tempura wasn't particularly crispy probably because of not just the rice which was probably more than room temperature at some point, but also because they pre-drizzle their special sauce on the te...

Back to Red Robin! Again! This time for my friend's birthday. She's got a soft spot for Red Robin even though her last burger on my birthday burger outing wasn't that great. In fact she said her cheeseburger this time was strangely very salty but because it was a free birthday burger, she didn't say anything about it at all. This time since I wasn't choosing a birthday burger, I decided to order Fish and Chips. Yeah, who goes to Red Robin for fish and chips right?  But that's why I ordered it. For science! Arctic Cod Fish & Chips ($15.99) Premium hand-battered cod fillets, fried to crispy perfection, with our Bottomless Steak Fries. Served with Dill'd & Pickl'd tartar sauce. Terrible. Do not order this. Price for fish portion is atrocious plus it's pretty basic. A bit overcooked so it came out on the dry side, sadly. Came piping hot and definitely nicely crunchy-crispy on the outside. There was some issue with their usual tempura batte...

Fooling around with deep fried bread again. The result comes out lightly crunchy on the outside, puffy and airy on the inside, and much lighter than a donut. Best eaten fresh and fast. You're probably good to go with any basic bread dough but the recipe/process I used is very simple: 2 cups water 1 tablespoon yeast 1 tablespoon sugar Once the yeast has foamed a bit, mix it into: 5 cups all purpose flour 2 teaspoons salt -- this is a cautious amount and your dough will come out on the blander side 1/4 cup oil Mix it, knead it, let it rise. Once it's risen once and maybe doubled in volume at least, you're ready to prep it for frying. You can keep portions of it in the fridge/freezer for later as well. For my first batch, I tried just cutting a portion of the dough then, without kneading at all, just cut small chunks and put it into the oil for frying. This produced good puffy results, but not as many units (slides 1-2). The the second batch, I used about the same amount of d...

Normally I'm nowhere near Port Moody but I was hanging out with a friend today and we wandered there. Very spacious on the inside, especially now that Covid has forced restaurants to space people out. Very generous spacing between tables. There's the usual bewildering array of Chinese restaurant staples in their menu but also a "Chef's Special Recommendations". Any two items on the list plus rice, daily soup, and daily dessert, for $42.95. So this would work out to over $20 per person, but you're likely to end up with one or two meals worth of takeout so it's actually closer to $10 per person. So whatever you think of the food quality, price for portion is definitely not lacking. Daily Soup (included in price of Chef's Daily Recommendations) Honestly this looks like stray bits too small to use and just tossed into a pot to brew until the soup is flavourful. It's okay, although the chunks of corn are awkward to eat. It will NOT be doggy bagged. I...

My mom sometimes buys chips of flavours she hasn't tried before, and she's partial to the Pringles brand. Today she got Pringles Groovz and it was remarkably disappointing. Really weak spicing on each chip means I could basically not taste the "tangy southern BBQ flavour" at all. The chip itself didn't taste like potato or even a Pringles chip. I can't even believe I'm saying this but honestly the chips tasted literally like paper or cardboard. Slightly smaller, but thicker ribbed chip. This is okay and I suppose it helps with preventing the chips from shattering inside the tube. But I seem to remember once upon a time the chips fit the tube better so that there was less movement and therefore less likely they would shatter. Overall, extremely disappointed. But maybe more shocked than anything at the remarkable lack of quality here. What happened to this brand? View this post on Instagram Barely...

The newest free sample I received from SocialNature is Sahale Snacks -- this time very conveniently found at my nearby Superstore. They apparently carry three products, but last time I went, two were out of stock. Today, only one was out of stock, so I bought just the two types available: Pomegranate Vanilla Glazed Cashews (with pomegranate, apple, and vanilla bean) Maple Glazed Pecans (with walnuts, apples, cherries, and cinnamon) Not gonna lie, at $6.48 for a 113g pack, it's pretty pricey for my budget. But! Flavour is actually, really, amazing. The product inside of course isn't at perfect as the magnified picture on the outside, but it's reasonable. And of course the main part is the taste, and both types I got were winners. Obviously they would be gone in a hurry if you ate fistfuls of them like boring salted nuts, so DON'T DO THAT. Savour them literally one nut at a time. The strong, clear, flavours will come through even with just one nut so you...