Sushi

Instead of blogging play-by-play what I loved and hated about the sushi places, I thought that I would post once I was finished the entire category, but I've realized that that would be long and tedious. And it's taking a lot longer than I thought.

I'm not a roll person, so my assessment of sushi is probably skewed in comparison to the average sushi-lover's love of sushi. Don't get me wrong, I love sushi and eat everything but the rolls/maki. It's wierd because I like all of the separate ingredients of sushi; the cucumber, avocado and imitation crab in a calafornia roll seem really yummy in my books, but all rolled up in the rice and seaweed makes it all mushy and chewy. I think it might be the seaweed. It's not like I haven't tried! I have attempted to eat a piece of roll at almost every place on my list, the result is always the same and the other night was no different. I ordered one piece of real kani (crab) nigiri sushi, and it came like a really big maki piece with the seaweed on the outside. In retrospect I should have just picked the crab off the top and been happy at that, but no, I shoved the whole thing in my mouth and between choking spurts of laughter (thanks Naka) I managed to chew and chew and gag and chew and gag my way through it as the tears streamed down my face. Never again. That was my limit. I'm officially done in the roll department.

I'm still left with lots of other yummy sushi options, my favorites are: miso soup, edemame, all of the tempura varieties, beef/chicken terryaki, salmon sashimi (sometimes tuna), the eggy cones, and nigiri such as ebi, kani, inari, salmon, toro, and now tamago, the rice bowls, sometimes gyoza, the udon soups (except for the fishy ones), ramen noodles (which I've avoided until I get to the Japanese Noodle Category of my eat-a-thon), and the age dashi tofu.

My assessment thus far:

Kadoya
Local and staff favorite. Great, yummy, fast, close to work, very popular, I've never stayed to eat there and probably wouldn't unless it wasn't busy, just get take out. Great sashimi, avoid the sunomono. It's closed Monday's.

Yoshi

Gorgeous patio view, first experience of soba noodles, probably won't ever try them again. Went there for lunch. According to sushi experts I know, it's the best and a tad bit expensive, but the lunch menu is a good deal.

Downtown Sushi Bar
Sometimes I think that I go here because the service is so bubbly and consistently inconsistent, and it's the closest and most convenient. Don't eat the beef terryaki, I gave it two tries, it's gristly. They make very pretty rolls like the Davie Roll that I like to look at, or pick apart and eat the inner contents. Horrible decorations like year-round Christmas lights and mediocre sushi, but for some reason I keep going back.

Tanpopo and Kisha Poppo
Quality verses quantity in the all you can eat department. There is a science to mastering the all-you-can-eat sushi restaurant: Go there hungry, plan on spending a good couple hours eating, wear your stretchy pants, eat the rolls last so that they don't fill you up, avoid other ricey dishes for the same reason, at Tanpopo anyway don't order too much at once or they will forget half of the order, or you will get too much at once and be overwhelmed, eat too fast, and get full too fast. Take it slow, if you want to get the most bang for your buck, eat a lot of sashimi, it's generally the most pricey on the menu.

Tanpopo wins, even though it's more expensive and the service is not-so-smiley, there are more options, the view is nicer, and as a side-note they have a good happy-hour combo special if you don't feel in the mood for gluttony.

Azuma Sushi
I had salmon sashimi, inari nigiri, miso soup, and veggie tempura. Lovely orangey atmosphere, CASH ONLY IS BULLSHIT, lots of options, creative little twists on things. I'd go back.

Sakari Sushi
I had a beef terryaki bowl, miso soup, inari and real kani nigiri. We were the only people in the entire restaurant at 8pm on a friday night. Mind you it was blustery outside. Second floor, nice view, super-cute and polite server (she must be new and not-yet jaded), too many sesame seeds in the inari. perfect miso soup, lots of little tofuy bits.

It's All About The Process

I have taken this challenge to eat at all of the eateries on Davie and Denman very seriously. But geez how many sushi places can there be on two streets? Ten to be exact. Thank goodness I'm not taking-on all of downtown Vancouver! I formulated a plan to eat at all of the restaurants in an orderly manner by dividing them up into ethnic categories (ie: Greek, Japanese, Indian, Mediteranian (kindof a catch-all in the Falafal department), Italian, European, Chinese, French, etc) and Western sub-catagories (ie: Pizza Joint, Burger Joint, Breakfast Joint, Sandwhich Joint, Smoothy Joint, etc) and completing one catagory at a time. It seems easy right? But once I think about it there are multiple potential problems, such as: what do I do about the places that I have already eaten at? When it comes time for that specific category do I have to eat there again to freshen my memory? Naw, screw it, if it is unmemorable then it probably isn't worth a second time around. Or does it deserve a second chance? How many items off the menu do I have to eat? What if the categories overlap, like Italian restaurant that serves pizza? Or a "Greek Taverna" that serves Indian food? Deep Breath....I guess it's just all about the Process....Har Har.

To begin I divided the Japanese restaurants into three categories: Sushi, Izakaya, and Noodle, and started down the list of sushi establishments. Buuuuuuut I'm easily distracted. I've only eaten at half of them, but five out of ten is still relatively good progress right? A person can only handle so much miso soup! In this blustery-weather time of year I'm more inclined to be homeward bound and make up a recipie as I go along and throw a bunch of stuff into a crock-pot and cuddle up with a good book. Although this being my first winter in Vancouver I'm willing to forgive the rain because I'm still amazed at how mild it is here. I digress, in any case I still need to get through five more sushi restaurants. Any takers?

A 140-degree Soy Chai Latte With Half a Shot of Vanilla and Extra Foam.

It's really fun to say that when I get to the till. My prescription is once daily as needed.

Okay so I cheated. I went to Granville Island in search of tasty things to bring to Kelowna and I found a new favorite Coffee Shop. It's called Agro Cafe Coffee and Roasting House on Railspur Alley, hidden around the corner. The service took forever (I think that that's the theme on Granville Island) but it was worth it in the end. It has a beautiful and relaxed atmosphere, not too crowded like some of the good coffee shops, maybe even slightly undiscovered. And the Chai was a perfect balance of sweet and spice to warm me up on a chilly day! While googling to see if there was an Agro Cafe closer to home, I found one at the bottom of Davie on Hamilton, so I guess technically I didn't really cheat after all.

ps. DON'T eat the cabbage rolls from the Pierogi place in the Market.

Cafe Luxy

Okay so I may have had a wee bit of a stressful night-shift last night but three things cheered me up this morning on my walk home after work (if you can't already tell I'm a list-kinda person):

1. The fact that I don't have to go back to work till Monday.
2. The mild-ish-ness of my first winter in Vancouver.
3. The impending first lunch meeting of the Ex-girlfriends Club!

What I love most about Italian food, is that by the end of the meal, between the pasta and the garlic bread, I'm in a carb-coma. Downright sit back and sigh serotonin satisfaction. Today's lunch at Cafe Luxy on Davie was no exception. I havn't eaten at all of the Italian restaurants on Davie and Denman, and being a naturally impatient person I am picking a favorite before I've tried them all. I've been to Cafe Luxy now twice for lunch and once for dinner and it is definitely making my top-ten list. The dinner portions will last you several meals, the pasta list is endless, and all the options for lunch are only $7.98 with salad and garlic bread. I might not be able to hold myself back if someone dared me to try all of the pasta dishes on the menu. Today I had the Penne alla Luxy, which was penne with sundried tomatoes and assorted peppers in a rose sauce. After picking out all of the green peppers (they give me heartburn), I can't wait to wake up tomorrow morning and have my leftovers for breakfast.

Fat Guy in a Little Coat

You CAN eat your heart out, but don't be that guy. Don't knife and fork your way into a hospital. I don't want to have to suck the fat from your atherosclerosed coronaries while you whine to me about the low-fat low-salt diet (see tips about hospital food). It's called portion control people. And the gym.

My Ultimate Meal

In the contest of home-cooked verses dining-out, home-cooked always wins because it's made with love. Growing up, birthdays were always big family gatherings and the best part was being able to pick your birthday meal and cake. My mom would made the meal and Memere made the cake (But now Marielle usually brings home a "faulty" DQ icecream cake:).

In my nostalgia, my ultimate home-cooked meal has remained relatively unchanged:

• Spaetzle (homemade German noodles)
• Roast chicken with gravy
• Corn on the cob
• Garden carrots and peas and/or fried garlic zuccini
• Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Blizzard cake

My dream dining-out meal (other than an everything-imaginable all-you-can-eat buffet in Vegas) is an Italian restaurant:

• Escargot in mushroom caps
• Linguini in an alfredo sauce with sun-dried tomatoes and wild mushrooms
• Creme brule

Taters II

Yesterday in my rush to blog while at work I totally forgot a key anecdote. When I was in highschool and couldn't stomach the thought of another cheese whiz sandwhich, I would bring a tupperware container full of steamed garden potatoes for lunch and eat them cold, covered in ketchup and ranch. Delicious and Nutritious!

Potatoes

Potatoes are undoubtedly my favorite food. Purely delicious carbyness. I could seriously eat potatoes served in any form. You name it, I'll eat it. I've tried raw potatoes and I don't recommend it, the starch sticks to the roof of your mouth. I love 'em fried, baked, steamed, double-baked, hash browns, mash browns, tater tots, potatoes Au gratin, scalped potatoes, mashed potatoes, whipped potatoes, re-fried potatoes, deep-fried potatoes (not fries specifically, just poutine), sweet potatoes, potato chowder, potato soup, potato salad, potato skins, potato pancakes, baby potatoes, and in a casserole. If I had to pick only one option to eat for the rest of my life, my choice would be to unearth baby potatoes directly from the garden in Creston (shovel and dirty fingernails included), hose 'em off, steam 'em, and serve with a generous dollop of butter and salt. Hmmmmm heaven.

Potatoes can cheer me up no matter what mood I'm in. For example last night I made a lame'old, uninspired stir-fry and I couldn't even finish it because I was so mad at how badly it turned out. So what did I do? I made potatoes, the perfect bedtime pick-me-up snack (that and a handful of mini Twix bars!)

Hospital Food Tricks

Okay, so I have decided to try my best to live within my means and not go out to eat in November, which doesn't exactly coincide with my quest to eat at all of the restaurants on Davie and Denman. And I don't have any romantic dinner dates on the horizon, so I'm pretty much screwed. After some thought I decided to share my infinite wisdom about hospital food. Every hospital is a little different, but the general delivery of food is the same. They make a meal tray at one location, send it to another location, put it in a re-heating cart and radiate the crap out of it, and then pass it out. So if you've ever been to a hospital you know, the food is soggy and over-cooked at best. The only people who ever say that the food is good are men who have been eating spaghetti out of a can since their wives passed away. On my ward especially, people are put on special diets. Aka: low-sodium, low-fat, low-sugar, low-calorie, etc. Basically bland and blander, but of course with their health in mind. Also with specific portion controls, people get blown away by how small accurate serving sizes actually are.

Just a couple tips:
1. Say that you can't eat fish, that you don't like it, that you'll go anaphylactic, whatever is necessary to avoid the rubber chuncks that they drown in sauce.
2. Ask for cold cereal. If you ask for hot cereal they will send you goop. Literal gelatinous goop that could either be either oatmeal or cream of wheat or indecipherable. Unless of course you like goop.
3. The mashed potatoes are probably their best accomplishment, doused in a generous helping of low-sodium gravy.
4. Eat your meal as soon as possible, there's nothing worse than room-temperature milk!
5. If you're desperate and can't even attempt to eat what they've sent you, ask for a sandwich from the kitchen on the ward. How badly could they screw up a sandwich? Just specify no fish because the salmon sandwich is beyond revolting and I've only ever smelt it.
6. And if you're REALLY desperate, get someone to sneak you in some home-cooked food, or fast food if you really need a fix.

Mongolian Grill-a-licious!

I am seriously dedicating a whole entry entirely to The Mongolian Grill. There are so many things that I love about this place, it's cheap, I can walk there on my lunch break, the service is cute, it's entertaining to watch, it's fast, and it can be relatively healthy if you make the right choices. I always have the Big Bowl Lunch Special for $6.95 because the small bowl is too small and even though it's only a dollar more, who needs the all-you-can-eat option? (Tiny side-note here, I have seen people go back for seconds and thirds, and it's not pretty) You have to get there before 4:30 or else they change it to "dinner" prices, and I've never been there for dinner, but I've heard that the only addition to the smorgasbord is pineapple.

So for those of you who have never been it's simple, you get your bowl, pick your meat (lamb, chicken, pork, or beef) I'm personally a beef fan, pick your noodle (white or off-white (I don't really know what the difference is!)), then your veggies, then your sauce, then the man at the grill fries it all up for you with his long tongs. This is all self-serve, and while you wait the server brings to your table a little bowl of rice and a little bowl of soup.

So my tips are:
1. Obviously go for the Big Bowl Lunch Special, it's the best bang for your buck.
2. If you're a meat lover scoop the frozen meat slices into your bowl, then use your fist to squish it to the bottom, your body heat melts the slices slightly and makes more room for more meat. If needed repeat!!
3. Don't pick tomatoes, they get fried up all weird and end up soggy and stringy.
4. Put your noodles on last because they can heap up nicely, whereas the veggies slide off when your bowl gets too full. So order should go meat, veggies, noodle, sauce.
5. Don't follow the sauce recipe guidelines, they don't really work and it's usually way more than necessary. As long as you have one scoop of an oil option and about two scoops of a sauce option you're good to go.
6. DON'T GO TO THE MONGOLIAN GRILL ON DENMAN! I had my first Mongolian grill experience there and it almost ruined me. The little bowl of soup had the flavor and consistency of mucus. Stick with the one on Davie.

Treats

When I'm walking down Davie at seven in the morning after a night-shift the only things that are open are coffee shops and bakeries. So when my weaknesses include sweets and treats and pastries, it's hard not to stop and indulge at one of the eighteen-million bakeries on my route. Well technically there are only four: Cobbs, the Transylvanian one, and then the two Chinese ones. My personal favorites include the Tiramisu from Transylvanian Traditions - Bakery and Sweet Shop, the Lemon Tart from Maple Leaf Bakery, the Cream Puff or Eclair from Beard Papa's on Denman, and the Crousant and million-grain bread at Cobbs. When it comes down to strictly doughnuts, I don't think that I could say no to a box of Krispy Kreme's!

In the past couple years I have re-trained myself to eat only healthy, multigrain bread, therefore haven't eaten white bread in ages and I miss it's nutrient-void fluffyness. It's like a sinful, guilty pleasure. I remember as a kid my mom would either make 16-inch loaves of white bread (which we could then cut into one-inch slices and lather in butter) or buy white bread from the bakery in a five loaf "family pack". And on the drive home the four of us kids would have, slice by slice, devoured a whole loaf. And we wondered why it wasn't filling? But I guess people still buy white bread because when I walk by the bakeries there are cooling racks stacked with doughy white loaves, fresh from the oven, steaming in the windows.

The Coffee Shop

I don't drink coffee, but non-coffee drinkers still want to go to coffee shops to socialize. It's like the new Legion for young people, minus the beer and bingo. So because I drink tea and I don't know of any tea-shops in my neighborhood, my drink of choice is a chai latte. I then judge a coffee shop by it's chai latte. They are my favorite at Delany's and Blenz, not so good at Starbucks and Melriches (the whole tea-bag, super-milky thing just isn't for me). And as much as I hate Starbucks, the ginger-molasses cookie and lemon loaf are both de-licious!