Glenburn Soda Fountain and Confectionery

This past Sunday was a beautiful sunny day. The past few days before that wasn't so. Just downpour raining. We spent the afternoon having lunch at our favorite Chinese HK style cafe: Deer Garden and then we met up some friends to do some grocery shopping. Afterwards, we headed to the driving range to hit some balls. And decided to grab ice cream afterwards. Our friends recommended us to a old school looking ice cream shop. I love the vintage look and the decor around the small mum and pop shop. Me and bf shared the pineapple sundae which consists of vanilla ice cream, walnuts and pineapple chunks. This wasn't very sweet thank god because we ordered a large to share and we both were really really full. Overall, a great place for ice cream. And the price wasn't bad at all for a large it was about $7.25.

Glenburn Soda Fountain and Confectionery
Address: 4090 E Hastings St, Burnaby, BC V5C 2H9
Rating: ☆☆☆☆☆/5

Vesta Grill

A Korean pub/bar to go for late night chicken. Small place but when we went around 8pm it wasn't that busy. We shared seafood hot pot that consists of squid, mussel, crap and shrimp, Vesta Padak which consists of deep fried boneless chicken with green onion in a soy sauce dressing, Vesta Cheese Buldak which consists of cheese and rice cake with deep fried boneless chicken and a vesta garlic chicken fried with garlic. We were stuffed. The chicken was tender and moist and not dry at all. The soup was at a great spicy level. Not to spicy, just right for my liking. Overall we had a great time after a game of tennis.

Vesta Grill
Address: 3025 Anson Ave #104, Coquitlam, BC V3B 2H6
Rating: ☆☆☆☆/5

Cactus Club

I'm not usually the type to head to chain restaurants but here I am. At Cactus Club near Metrotown. We had a late dinner that night so we were there for happy hour. We shared most of the appys with friends and I ordered the four mushroom sirloin which consists of 7oz angus beef striploin with shiitake, portabello, button, crimini mushroom demi glaze, mashed potatoes, roasted asparagus. I also had 2 virgin ceasers with fresh mozzerella ball, olive and a pepper on top. Overall, the food is alright. Overpriced for what you get. I ordered my steak medium rare and it was overcooked and grainy inside. But, I must say the fish tacos my bf had was WAY better then the one at Craft Beer.

Cactus Club-Metrotown
Address: 4653 Kingsway, Burnaby, BC V5H 4L3
Rating: ☆☆☆/5

Craft Beer Market

I recently revisited this restaurant in Olympic village with my bf's family and friend. This place is know of there wide selection of beers. They usually carry about 100 different kinds of beers. I ordered the Baja fish tacos that consists of fish spice rubbed grilled and served with cabbage, pico de gallo and craft signature hot sauce. The fish was quite small and the amount of cabbage was overwhelming so this was extremely messing to eat. Cause all the ingredients were falling apart. There was no sauce inside the taco. I couldn't taste the pico de gallo inside. The hot sauce wasn't very good. Overall. The meal wasn't very good. The fries needed more seasoning as well. But it was crispy for my liking. Overall, I probably wouldn't come back for the food but for people who enjoy drinking might enjoy this place.

Craft Beer Market
Address: SALT BUILDING, 85 WEST 1ST AVE, Vancouver, BC V5Y 3K8
Rating: ☆1/2/5

Pho Tan

Finally, we had a celebration for my mom just yesterday. We pre ordered the special secret menu there which consisted of Beer Crab, Lamb chops, Oxtail and Shrimp. You have to call ahead for the special items. For the 7 of us we started off with the chicken salad. This was delicious. Not to overpowering with the fish sauce and it was light and a great start to our meal. Second was the lamb chops. These were amazing. One of the best lamb chops I had. The char on the meat was so tasty. Grilled to perfection not overly dry but super tender and moist. We had the beer crab. I'm not a fan of crab and it was alright. The soup was bitter from the beer and it was basically crab steamed in beer. Apparently you can also have the choice to put noodles into the soup after your done with the crab. But we weren't a fan of the bitter alcohol taste so we skipped out on it. We also had the BBQ skewered shrimp. These pieces of shrimp were nice and big and juicy. Great grill flavor. We had the raw beef carpaccio with fish sauce to dip in. The meat was still a little frozen but the flavors were there. We had to try their specialty of their satay pho which had Thai flavors in it. The noodles were a little on the soft side and the meat was rather tough but the broth was good. We had their bun bo hue as well which is the spicy noodle soup. The broth was clean but the noodles were also overcooked. We ordered the beef skewers that was overly try and tasteless. We also had a tong ho choy stir fried with shrimp paste. They gave us very little choy and the shrimp paste flavor was very muted. My mom makes it better. We had the oxtail with fresh french bread to dip the sauce with. The meat fell off the bone. The flavors weren't too overpowering and the bread was very good. Overall, my first traditional Vietnamese meal and I loved it. My thoughts is to always order what they are special or known for and you can't go wrong. Next time I need to try their sour fish soup.

Chicken Salad 

 Beef Carpaccio

 Lamb Chops

 Beer Crab

 Tong Choy

 Oxtail

 Grilled Shrimp

 Satay Pho

 Bo Bun Hue: Spicy Vietnamese Noodles

 Beer Skewers

*my apologies on the poor lighting and the poor photography skills...most of the time I ate before I took a picture...just too good*

Pho Tan
Address: 4598 Main St, Vancouver, BC V5V
Rating: ☆☆☆☆1/2/5

Sockeye City Grill

This past weekend me and bf decided to eat outside on the patio to enjoy the beautiful weather we were having. So we decided to revisit Sockeye City in Steveston. I ordered the mother's day weekend special of Halibut with mushroom cream sauce with gnocchi. Bf had the fish and chips with cod and fries and a seafood chowder. My halibut was under seasoned so I had to add extra salt to it to add more flavor. Bf's piece of fish was very well fried. The batter was light and fried just right. The seafood chowder was standard, not fishy at all. The fries were ok. Wish they were crispier. Overall, a ok meal but its pricey here because of the tourist location. Your looking about $60.00 for 2 ppl. Drinks not included.

Sockeye City Grill
Address: 108, 3800 Bayview St, Steveston, BC V7E 6K7
Rating: ☆☆☆1/2/5

Happy Mother's Day!

This year was quite busy for me and bf. We were scheduled for celebrating with his mom on Saturday and then Sunday with my grandma. But, before that it was Monday with my mom’s side of the family with all my cousins and relatives. We had a big dinner at Masa on Broadway. It was great to see the family again and the best thing my grandma ate she said was the vanilla ice cream. 

Saturday me and bf decided to make it Italian night so we cooked up a storm but not with lots of complications. First off, we had to go to certain places to get our ingredients such as superstore the night before, wholefoods for fish stock, anchovy, black and Kalamative olives, blueberries etc. And not only that. Whole foods had forgotten to give our second grocery bag so bf had to drive from Maple Ridge back to North Burnaby to grab the groceries. It was definitely a hectic day.

But overall we had a great outcome. We had made Cioppino, Italian seafood stew with clams, mussels, halibut, salmon. A Caprese salad that consisted of cherry tomatoes, romaine, fresh mozzarella, olives drizzled in red wine vinegar and olive oil. And for entrée we had garlic bread with Puttanesca which is an anchovy tomato based pasta. For dessert I had made a blueberry lemon cheesecake which we were too full to consume.

Afterwards we headed to Langley movie theaters to watch Civil War: Captain American at 10:40pm. I was exhausted and I didn’t enjoy it as much as I wanted too. I very late night for me.

On Sunday, we went to TNT to grab groceries to make my grandma a mother’s day dinner. We kept it traditional and stuck with Chinese ingredients that were simple and light flavored for my grandma. She couldn’t eat too much sodium at her age. I made steamed rock cod fish, sake clams, Hainanese chicken with Hainanese rice, stir fry broccoli, scallops and carrots and shrimp tempura. I couldn’t have done all these dishes without the help of my bf and little sister. So a big shout out to them for helping me out. THANK YOU! Overall, a great night. Grandma said it was the best chicken she has ever eaten. I also had another cheesecake a made the night before so I brought it over but we didn’t have time to eat it. This time I made raspberry lemon sauce. We stopped by dairy queen to grab my grandma a Kit Kat blizzard because she loves Kit Kat and vanilla ice cream but she didn’t enjoy it because she said it was too sweet so she just had vanilla ice cream from my little cousin’s cup. Overall, a less stressful day. But a wonderful day spent with family.

This coming Wednesday is my mom’s celebration at Pho Tan on Main. So more to come….