Dim Sum Anyone?

As we walked to Crown Princess for best dim sum we were a bit worried that we might need a reservation, it was after all the dinner hour. As it turns out that dim sum is only available at lunch. And apparently no one (at least last Wednesday) was interested in Crown Princess’s dinner menu. There was one other couple there, but they left soon after we arrived. We were alone in what looked more like a banquet hall. The chairs were draped with heavy velvet, the table clothes were silky, and we were sitting at a table for four. The napkins even had napkin rings!

Having already sat down we decided to stay for dinner. The sea cucumber caught my eye, but they lost me at the price tag, somewhere over $100 for 4 pieces. Not my cup of tea. The complimentary jasmine green tea however, that indeed was my cup of tea. In the menu there was a picture of a roasted pigeon alas it was not on the menu itself. I settled for chicken in the “sze chaun” style as they put it. It came with a side of greens…. crispy fried greens. Still not enough to make me eat my veggies though. Brent had wanted beef tendon (because that is the part of a cow you want to eat, the tendons) and was told that they were all out, the waiter suggested something similiar instead. And *plunk* a giant (bigger than my head) bowl of soup was placed in front of him. Oh, how I laughed and laughed. You see, he does not like soup (weird right, soup is one of the best foods out there!).

We ate while the staff hovered nearby, clearing our table, refilling our tea. I could not help but feel like they were laughing at us behind closed doors. Especially when we tackled our appetizers with chopsticks. The shrimp ball was impossible to eat and I kept dropping crispy bits everywhere. The duck slid out of the pancake wrapped around it and fell onto my plate. All the while elevator music of such wonderful hits such as Sarah McLaughlin and Celine Dion played. And then played again. The CD had looped.

Overall it was ok, not the greatest. It was much too banquet hall-esque and the music really got to me.

 

 

County General- Take 2

The County General, where we had previously gone for brunch was recently voted best manhattan. Back we went for a second round. The dinner menu is not that extensive, it was fairly easy to make a pick. I went with the beef cheeks (it might sound like I ate cow bum, but in fact it was the cow’s facial cheeks). Brent had the bacon wrapped pork loin. I won, I totally made the better choice.

The pork loin was good, I did prefer the sides (potatoes and sweet potatoes). But the beef cheek was so tender and well-marinated. The meat just fell apart in a saucy mess of goodness. I did take a bite of my sides, both the regular carrot and the weird yellow one. Both tasted like dirt. So gross.

Turns out I am not a huge fan of manhattans, I foresaw this and instead had ordered a county drive-in, partly because it had Maker’s Mark bourbon (we had visited the distillery over the summer) but more-so because it was made with cream soda.

As per the dessert menu, if I said it was lacking that would be an understatement. All they had was apple pie and chocolate mousse! The croque madame is still hands-down  the best item served there.

 

Bar Volo

Now, I’m no beernoisseur, so when it was suggested that we go for dinner to Bar Volo (voted best beer selection) I shrugged and said sure, why not, they serve food there too. I am not one for beer, in fact there are very few beers* I am willing to ingest without making any number of faces.

What we did not account for was that they don’t start serving food until 5pm, we got there just past 4:30 so we had to sit around and wait a while. Given that there was only one thing on the entire beer menu that I would consider drinking (some really long-named cider), I opted to wait until we had food. I am not quite sure what I had expected when I saw that there was a food menu, given that the majority of places we went to that were known for their alcohol menu had a limited food menu. Here it was not the case of a limited food menu, rather it was small portions. But that just left room for candy, no complaints here. The caribou and fig pate was delicious, can’t really go wrong with pate. And the cider was delicious, and served in generous portions.

*Sleemans, Fruli, Belle-Vue Kriek and most ciders, except for Strongbow (’tis gross, unless mixed with regular beer for a Snake Bite, then it is oddly good)

 

The $150 Shot of Tequila

Resposado lives up to it’s name as a tequila bar, and for having the best margaritas in the city. How could they not? They have 3-4 pages of at least 30 different tequilas on offer, including the aforementioned $150 shot. They also have on offer 4 different varieties of margaritas! I’ll drink to that and I did. The mango margarita was better than the regular margarita, not saying the regular one was bad though. They also have a menu of various tapas foods such as chips and salsa, as well as empanadas. What I really like was how all the tapas we had was spicy, somehow it went well with the margarita.

This has easily become one of my favourite spots in the city. The music was great, the food was amazing, and of course the margaritas! Having only tried half the margarita menu and not making even a dent in their vast tequila selection, I can see this becoming a go-to hangout place.

 

AYCE

There is such a thing as too much sushi, regardless the sushi on offer at Aji Sai was delicious and it is a great way to try a variety of different types of sushi. Might I suggest bringing a lot of people? Because when there are just two of you… it gets to be too much.

 

Self-Evident

Best juice in the city was won by a little place on Church St. aptly called Juice Box. And it literally is just that. It is more of a shoe-closet than a storefront. And there are piles of fruits and veggies all over the place. It quite literally is like walking into a juice box. And the juice? What more can you expect? It was amazing. It was just fruit blended with more fruit! I actually enjoyed mango for once in my life.

 

Healthy Eating 101

A new doughnut shop recently opened on my walking route to Brent’s house. The poorly named Glory Hole Donuts was also just recently voted best doughnut in the city.  I was walking to his house.And it was Kyle’s birthday, so we had an excuse for eating so many doughnuts. It was meant to be.  We settled on a half dozen. I ordered two of each, that way we could try all the good flavours on offer (no one wants cinnamon sugar, gross). Maple had just run out, and there was no sign of lemon meringue or Elvis (marshmallow, peanut butter and banana chips), instead we had: black forest cake, chocolate pretzel and chocoalte pistachio. We started with the chocolate pretzel: it was amazing! The doughnut was soft and fresh (but sort of chewy). The pretzel bits in the chocolate icing were the best part, a nice contrast of sweet and salty, chewy and crunchy. The chocolate pistachio lacked that crunch that made the pretzel so good. The black forest cake was nothing spectacular really. First of all: where is the chocolate?! There was a just a tiny drizzle of chocolate in the pink (but just sugar-flavoured) icing. There was the option for whipped cream and cherries, but that was not enough to save the doughnut or bring any semblance of black forest cake to it.

Not surprisingly, a few pieces of various doughnuts is hardly a lunch. I insisted on going to Little Dog for a steamie. I was not in the mood for anything fancy. I just wanted a quick filling bite (we had other matters to attend to, namely building a fort in Kyle’s room). I had the Chicago dog, despite Brent’s protestations that it was awful. It was not awful. It was delicious. Rare is it that a hotdog is gross. Unless you get sauerkraut on it, as Brent did.
P.S.: the city really needs some chardogs.