Deer Garden

Deer Garden is one of Richmond's beloved franchises. What makes them so special?  Not only do they offer a normal set menu for regular Hong Kong style food, Deer Garden is also known for their noodles in soup, their specialty. A partial noodle bar you could say. Deer Garden has two locations in Richmond but we chose to go to #1178-3779 Sexsmith Rd.  Michael and I found out about this place was from one of his friends. He usually knows the greatest places to eat in Richmond, but prepare yourself because there's always going to be a wait when you get there.

The food at Deer Garden is amazing, their noodles taste fantastic and since I am recovering from a minor dental surgery, my diet is limited to what I am able to eat. There is a separate menu for their noodles, where you can select what you want as a soup base, type of noodles, and what two choice of toppings you'd like to go with the noodles. I chose from their noodle menu of course, something soft and easy to chew for me. The menu allows you to add or take away whatever you like. I took away all the veggies such as cabbage, onions and parsley.

Rice noodles on fish soup with ham and pork sausage

I got rice noodles, classic plain fish soup, with ham and a pork sausage. Lemon water to drink. The noodles were soft and silky, the fish soup was so creamy and went so well with the noodles, fantastic. The aroma of the soup made me just even more hungry and just the thought of that bowl is making me hungry. The fish aroma doesn't overpower the taste of the noodles either, there is enough of that fishy taste in the soup that it blends well with the creaminess of the soup. The ham was just plain regular ham, since I didn't want anything fancy. As for the sausage, it was boiled to way I loved and tasted like Hong Kong.

Fried pork with maggie sauce

I also got a mini side dish - pork with Maggie sauce. For those who is not familiar with it,  you could say its the soy sauce's sultry cousin. You may think it tastes like regular soy sauce, but theres a sweet tangy taste that gets you. Lots of Chinese people like to eat in with eggs, dip with poultry or with veggies. You could even see it as the Western version of an HP sauce or ketchup.

Michael's dish

Michael also went with the noodle menu. Except his bowl looked a lot more full then mine. He had the works. Michael chose rice noodles with the classic plain fish soup as well, he got the all veggies piled up on top of his noodles. For his two choices of sides was beef brisket and enoki mushroom.  His favourite part was the soup. Michael always liked the beef briskets there, they give a good amount and its well cooked beef brisket, what more can a guy ask for?  His only problem was not that his iced lemon tea came in a bubble tea cup and wasn't properly sweetened.

Fried chicken with Teriyaki sauce

For Michael's side dish he got pan fried chicken with Teriyaki sauce. Its fried chicken, you can't go wrong with fried chicken.

Our drinks .. inside bubble tea cups

For the huge portion that we got for dinner the combo only costed $7.95 each with an additional $1.75 each for the mini side dishes and $2 for our drinks.  Michael and I could agree that the service could have been better, but since the restaurant was packed we don't blame them. All is forgiven.


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Santouka Ramen

Santouka Ramen on Robson Street

There are so many Japanese ramen noodles restaurants in Vancouver, yet we haven't been to a single one yet. We decided to try Santouka Ramen today, located at 1690 Robson Street on the edge of Vancouver shopping district.

The restaurant is very small, as in Michael and I can hear literally hear the conversation at our next table. There is also tables set up facing the kitchen to make it feel like a "noodle bar" type of a vibe. Since the restaurant is so small it does make me feel like I am in Japan, which is fantastic because it really gives it an authentic feel knowing that everyone who works there is from Japan. Michael found out that Santouka Ramen  is actually a franchise from Japan, it doesn't get more authentic then that.

Kara Miso Ramen (a little bit spicy)

I was hungry and I was ready to eat my little face off. Michael and I both got a ramen and rice combo. I chose the Grilled Salmon Bowl combo ($14.50), while Michael chose the Ikura Salmon Roe combo ($15.90). All the noodles were served with barbeque pork cheek, bamboo sapling, fish cakes, seaweed and their signature broth. We got to chose what goes with our broth and I got the Kara Miso which was a little spicy but not so hot that I am chugging water with every bite I take. It still had a hint of Miso taste to it which was nice.

Classic Miso Broth Ramen

Michael go the classic Miso broth, which was rich in flavour with a hint of creaminess. Michael and I really liked the noodles served with our broth. Everything went so well together, the little bamboo gave the noodles some texture. The noodles were prepared  really fresh and soft, it was an obvious that the noodles didn't come from a package. Everything went really well even though it was simple it worked. Just one delightful slurp. By the end, Michael wished he had more noodles.

Grilled Salmon with Rice

Although the noodles were delicious, my favourite part was the rice sidedish. I had grilled salmon with rice, served with seaweed, and Michael got salmon roe which were salmon eggs, under a bed of scrambled chicken eggs, served on rice.

Ikura Salmon Roe on Rice

I don't know what they did to the rice but it tasted it  fantastic. It had a seaweed taste to it with  some sesame hint to it. Michael said his chicken eggs had the tomago sweetened flavour, paired with the moisture from the salmon roe, it really went well with the rice. As for myself, the salmon was nice and flaky it wasn't dry at all. I could just gobble up my bowl again if I could.

Overall the experience was really good I wouldn't mind coming back here with Michael  to eat our combo again. Maybe we'll make new friends with the table next to us next time as well.


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Richmond Night Market

Summer's nearly there and whats there to do in Richmond? We head to the Richmond Night Market at 8351 River Road. I personally don't like going to the night market because of the crowds of people and the cheap, often fake items being sold. It's a big market laid out with different tents selling clothes, electronics, to various different kinds of food and drinks. Michael loves going to the night market to walk around and  "shop," not really for me. But I have to admit the food at the night market is really good. This was my first time actually putting time and thinking about what I wanted to get. Michael and I really stuffed our faces today.

First stop. Michael and I shared the Takoyaki for $5 which are six fried octopus balls served with  mayonnaise and terriyaki sauce. It was super hot but we still stuffed our faces with it.  Michael and I thought it was nearly as good as restaurant quality, with decent chunks of octopus in there, so its good to know we didn't get ripped off.

Second stop was more for me. I have always wanted to try Rotato and have seen all my friends on Facebook rave about it, so I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. I finally got to try it for $4 and chose the cheddar cheese flavour. It tasted fantastic! Potato goodness spiraling down a stick, crispy, thin, cheesy, just awesomeness. Michael tried some but I didn't ask him to try some more. It was just too good to share, I just wanted all that yumminess to myself.

To wash all potato goodness down I got a regular sized lime flavored lemonade for $4. It was so refreshing to wash all that salty food off my taste palette, what a thirst quencher.

After Michael and I went for skewers. We got bacon wrapped sausage, garlic chicken, and rib eye for $6.75. I had the bacon wrapped sausage with all the  fatty goodness. What could possible go wrong when something is paired with bacon? Life is good. Michael had the rib eye and chicken, he thought the chicken wasn't as good, it didn't taste like the Japanese barbeque style and the meat tasted a little tough. But the rib eye was just juicy with every bite. Nomnomnom!

Michael was then attracted to a seafood stall called Seafood Kingdom, who were doing promotion for their seafood products. Abalone is considered a Chinese delicacy and can cost a lot, even hundreds of dollars for the larger of the shellfish. But these guys, they served a good size for only $6, where if we got it in a restaurant with the trimmings, it might have cost $20. Michael thought the taste was rich in the oyster sauce that came with it. The shellfish tasted very fresh, they even showed us the shell where they took the abalone out of.

Michael also got the half lobster for $5.95 that was also being promoted by these guys. It didn't taste as good as the abalone. But it was a full half lobster motoyaki, shell and everything with decent chunks of meat. Definitely a bargain.

After it was my turn for some goodies. I got a cheese sausage for $3. Cheese inside a sausage. What more can I say? There wasn't enough cheese though, but other then that the sausage was very juicy.

For dessert we got Michael and I shared deep fried vanilla ice cream for $4.75. It tasted interesting, the batter outside the ice cream, the whole concept was just unreal to me when I saw the people putting the ice cream in the fryer. Unreal. It tasted not bad in the end though, the vanilla went really well with the batter.

Second dessert, was a churro for $4, I have never had a churro in my life but I have heard many good things about it. Since I saw it today I thought I'd give it a try. Call me crazy, maybe it's just me and that I didn't get a churro at a good place, but I thought the taste was very bland and heavy. Not a good feeling. There wasn't too much taste to it. I am open to trying other churros though, my thoughts of it has not been tainted. So bring it!


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