Holly jolly Vancouver Christmas Market!

I really wanted to go to the Vancouver Christmas Market last year but unfortunately I wasn't able to make it due to busy final exam schedule and I had to leave on a trip to Whistler right after my exams and came back on 23rd and the market closed on the 24th. 

This year, I decided to take one day off from studying and went to the Christmas Market before all the exam madenss.

The gate

The entrance fee to the market is $5 for adults, $15 if you want the seasonal ticket.  Upon your entrance, you can get a bracelet if you would like to purchase alcoholic beverages inside.

Nutcrackers and various other things!

 Weisswurst!  (pronounced veissvurst).. it's made of veal.. and the price is  $7.50 I believe

German Pasta (What's the difference? Italian vs. German?)

hot spiced red wine and rum $7+ $4 for deposit.  You can return the mug when you finish it and get $4 back, or take the mug home for $4.

Surprisingly, I did see quite a few drunk people in the market...I guess they were indulging in these and some German beer.  When I took a sip of the drink, I knew why. 

 

 Melting block of cheese.

When I saw this before I went on the news, it looked SO GOOD.  At the market, I was appalled by the smell..(kind of smelled like feet).  It came with two pieces of bread for $8.50. 

 My boyfriend ordered this and I tried it.  It doesn't taste as bad as it smells but it was quite strong.. I thought it tasted like gorgonzola

 German waffles.  There were $7 each I believe. 

 (Everything in the market is overpriced :()

The waffles were good (nothing amazing) except the fact that the icing sugar was going everywhere when I was eating.  As I was eating, the powder landed on my peacoat and I was panicking

Pulled pork and baked potatoes $10 i think?

This was really gooooood.  It's expensive but I think it might be worth the money. 

Gigantic Christmas Tree

The Vancouver Christmas Market is a great place filled with holiday spirit.  There were some amazing musicians playing Christmas tunes on their fiddles in super cold weather.  I was amazed at how well they could play with their frozen fingers.  We ended up dancing for a bit because all the happy spirit that was around.. so..we just had to :)

The food is overpriced for sure with everything ranging from $7-10 but I think it is worth giving it a visit maybe once just to experience the food and the atmosphere.

I got to go and study for my exams now.

Good night!

21 days until Christmas!  Time sure flies..

Good luck with exams everyone (if you are writing one)

Guu Kobachi

It is quite sad to think that Toratatsu on Denman no longer exists. :(
  I loved their tuna+avocado bread spread, cheese tofu and some of their rolls. 


Fortunately, a new Guu opened on the same location and I was very very pleased with my first visit.

The place is super bright compared to what it was like at Toratatsu.  We went around 7 o'clock but not a lot of people

Afternoon tea at Urban Tea Merchant

I've been dying to go to an afternoon tea for a while but never got the chance until this week!  I was debating whether I should go to Urban Tea Merchant or Faubourg.  The last call for Urban Tea Merchant was at 5:30 and Faubourg at 5:00 so we decided to go to Urban Tea Merchant because we left the campus around 4:30 hoping to make it on time. 

When I first walked in, I saw two counters.  One selling desserts such as macarons and truffles and the other was for tea.  I was thinking... "where are we going to sit?"  .... hahah after a moment of confusion, the waitress took us to the back and there were seats for peple who are visiting for brunch, dessert (from Thomas haas), tea, and afternoon tea.

The waitress gave us 3 menus.  One was the harvest afternoon tea special which was $48 per person, one was for tea and the last was for food.  When I opened the tea menu, I was overwhelmed by all the choices. I ended up ordering the creme caramel rooibos tea

Sausages!! -Wurstküche, Los Angeles

Before I left to Los Angeles, I did some research on some of the unique restaurants that I might want to drop by.  Wurstküche was one of them and the other one was a macaron shop called "Lette" in Beverly Hills.  Unfortunately, I couldn't make it to Lette but I made it to Wurstküche.

"We're young; let's have fun with encased meat," says Joseph Pitruzzelli, the 27-year-old co-owner of Wurstkuche, downtown L.A.

Wurstküche is inspired by German sausages and it serves Belgian fries, 24 imported beers on tap and exotic grilled sausages.  It's located in downtown LA and they are opening one in Venice beach.

The entrance

I loved the red brick walls and it was like this inside as well...  The walls actually reminded me of restaurants in Crosstown! (i.e. Cafe Medina)

When I first walked in, the place seemed tiny with only 5 chairs.. a display of sausages, cashier counter and a couple of grills behind

Zuni Cafe -San Francisco

When we first arrived at San Francisco,  we were craving for Italian food so I searched up Italian places on Urbanspoon and Zuni's had one of the highest ratings.  We walked to Zuni's from our hotel which was in central part of downtown and we ended up in the sketchiest neighborhood in downtown San Francisco. It took us 15 minutes to get to Zuni Cafe.

Zuni's is a fancy restaurant and it reminded me of the restaurants in crosstown, Vancouver. 

Zuni Cafe is famous for their Chicken for two roasted in the brick oven ($48) but it takes approximately one hour to cook.

the menu at Zuni Cafe change every day inspired by seasonal ingredients incorporating Italian and French cuisine.

Chocolate Madness

I decided to go to the Vancouver Sutton Place Hotel's Chocolate Buffet with my friends this weekend.  I've always wanted to go to this place because I do have a sweet tooth and I love desserts even though I don't eat it often.

The first thing I saw when I walked into the buffet was the Chocolate fountain!  I was so exicted when I saw the fountain I forgot to take a picture of it... (Does that eve make sense?)

Chocolate peacan pie and croquembouche!! I've never seen a croquembouche in person!!! I've only seen them on Masterchef Australia... (yay for being a food tvshow nerd!) so I was pretty excited.

Unfortunately, I didn't get to try the chocolate peacan pie because I was so full after 3 plates but I did have two cream puffs and I LOVED LOVED it! 

The Dirty Apron cooking school & delicatessen

the menu-  photos were taken with my iphone

Dirty Apron is a cooking school and a deli co-owned by the owners of Chambar, Karri and Nico Schuermans and former Chambar Sous-Chef David Robertson.

I went to try their sandwiches and when I walked in, I fell in love with the place instantly because of the homey feeling of the store.  


Dirty Apron is Crosstown's gourmet grocer and they have fruits, drinks, candies, chocolate sauces from Medina and home made beef, chicken, fish stocks and organic fruits and veggies (Almost everything!).  It's not spacious but it has a lot of awesome stuff in stock. 

local meat cuts!

Anton's pasta bar

Anton's Pasta bar is located at 4260 East Hastings St., Burnaby. You can find the place while driving because the line up outside is usually really really long.  I went with my boyfriend and I think there were about 20 people ahead of us.  Fortunately, the people in the front were in big groups and a table for two opened up and we got in the restaurant after 5 minutes of waiting.  As we were exiting the restaurant after our meal we saw the people who were in front of us still waiting in line.. (Today's lesson: never come in big groups to Anton's :P)

We got bread while we were waiting for our pasta

BaoQi Eatery

I ended up going to this place randomly thinking that it's a Pho place.  It was located in between Granville and Seymour on Davie St but it was extremely hard for us to find the place.. It was literally hidden and the name of restaurant was no where to be seen on the street.  We had to walk back and forth a couple of times in order to locate it. 

when we looked at the menu and it had variety of Vietnamese food and not just pho. The reviews from Urbanspoon and Dinehere were positive and I was curious to see what their food was like.

clean and simple interior.

quite a small space though.

I ordered the classic meat sub (Bánh mì) $5.50
Bánh mì is a Vietnamese "sandwich" served on a baguette.  The classic meat sub comes with various cold cuts.

I've heard of a lot of good things about vietnamese sub but this was my first time trying it. 

Gyoza King

We went to get waffles at Michi waffles on Robson around 11:10 at night.. We try to make it before closing time but then traffic was huge on Main St. so we couldn't make it... (NOOOO :( ) After driving for about 30 minutes trying to figure out where we should go for dessert, we ended up going to Gyoza King on Robson..and realized that they don't have desserts but some of us felt hungry so we just settled down at GK.

Gyoza King is really small and there are around 10 seats where you have to take your shoes off and sit down on the floor. 

Kami Japanese Restaurant

Kami Japanese Restaurant is located in the South Surrey area and it's owned by a Korean family (?).  The restaurant looked quite big when I walked in because of the rooms on the side but when I looked around.. the rooms were tiny!!! Also the high ceiling really makes the restaurant look 5x bigger than it actually is.  I think it had a pretty fancy atmosphere despite the fact that it's a Japanese restaurant. 

I really liked their soy sauce bottle.  Very unique!

My brother ordered the spicy combo (?)

Mink Chocolates

 I went back home to White Rock this weekend and decided to drop by Mink Chocolates.  There are two locations, one in South Surrey and the other one is near Waterfront station.  If you are interested, check out their website http://www.minkchocolates.com/ !!

I wanted to go to Mink Chocolates because I was fascinated by their Smore Fondue set!  Even though you're not out in the woods camping, you can still enjoy smores at Mink Chocolates. (Dip melted marshmallows in the chocolate fondue and sandwich it between the graham crackers om nom nom)

I didn't order the Smore set yesterday just because the portion looked too big for myself and I do get sick of smores after eating about two of them.  I find them too sweet!

Mink Chocolates specialize in ganache filled chocolate bars, which are a more portable form of bonbon.

De Dutch

I got a call Sunday morning asking if my boyfriend and I wanted to go grab brunch.  I got ready in 30 minutes (woke up pretty quickly considering it's Sunday morning) and went for brunch.

  I alsolutely love brunch and the smell of bacon and eggs that permeate the restaurant in the mornings.  I also love pancakes and waffles with syrup and fruit toppings/ whip cream and I can go on and on about how much I love brunch but I will stop here and talk more about De Dutch.

I've seen this place many times passing by (West 2nd Ave and Cambie).. but I didn't know that it serves breakfast/ brunch!  I reminded me of Danny's and surprisingly, there are 22 locations in BC!

 This is weird.. but the water tasted good... ><

It was extremely difficult to order because there were so many choices and I thought it was quite expensive compared to I hop and Danny's

Long weekend-Togo Sushi, Kimchi hotpot

Happy belated Canada day!! 

After a 3 day weekend, going back to work was definitely hard.. When I went in the office this morning, it was half empty.  I guess everyone is using up their vacation time wisely and making their weekend a 4 day weekend! It was gorgeous today and it would've been nice if there was no work today as well:(

Anyways! This weekend, I went to Richmond Centre Togo sushi to visit my brother.  Togo sushi is  a Japanese food franchise and there are 5 locations in Vancouver.  My brother works in the one in Richmond Centre as a sushi chef.  (I was just looking at the website and apparently there is one in UBC? I've never seen it before!!)

My brother was kind enough to buy/make sushi for my boyfriend and I.

Negitori roll, spicy chop scallop roll, and House roll (house roll has prawn tempura, spicy tuna, smoked salmon, cucumber, and crab meat.. my brother also put in salmon just for us :) )

The sushi is inexpensive and it's pretty good for its price.

AND... 3 spicy tuna rolls.

we couldn't eat all of them so friends had to help out

Simple Banana bread

I love baking banana breads because they are simple and quick to bake.  I always use this recipe from allrecipes.com

Ingredients

2 cupts of all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup butter

3/4 brown sugar

2 eggs, beaten

2 1/3 cups mashed overriped bananas

I used 1 cup of white sugar instead of brown because I didn't have any brown sugar.

look at how black my banana is..

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease a loaf pan. 

this is the pan that I used

In a large bowl, combine flour, baking soda and salt.

In a separate bowl, cream together butter and sugar. 

 I am always shocked when I bake at how much butter goes into these...(or any other breads, cookies)

if you eat the whole banana bread, you are eating that chunk of butter as well..yikes!

Wings, Benkei, Home made dinner...

I am back!   I haven't been eating out much or cooking at home (what have I been eating??) and when I do eat out, I always leave my camera at home so I haven't been updating often :(..  This post is just going to be a lot of things together.. and not much of a review..

So, Benkei first!

I took pictures of different ramen flavours this time

 Chashu

 Miso

Made with rich chicken and pork soup

Mmmm Brunch

I went for brunch at Hub Restaurant and Lounge(right beside Yaletown Roundhouse station) on Sunday morning with a friend.  Brunch is only served on weekends and holidays until 2pm. I personally love brunch but it's SO hard to motivate myself to wake up early on weekends.. but I made it!!

The weather was nice so we sat out on the patio. 

I ordered

shrimp and crab benny - poached eggs, toasted crumpet, hollandaise, roasted potatoes  $13

I loved the tiny glass of orange juice. I wish I could get this kind of meal delivered to my bed every morning...XD

A couple of things that could've been better were the overly soggy crumpet and the slightly overcooked egg.

Pigging out on a Saturday night

On Saturday, I decided to make a simple brunch after volunteering.

 Just bacon, scambled eggs and strawberries

On Saturday night, I had dinner with my friends from International Business Language group 2009-2010 at Joey on Burrad and Broadway.  I haven't seen them for awhile so it was good to see how they were doing and what their plans for the future.

I've been to Joey before and I liked all the food that I've ordered but there is nothing too special about the restaurant. (It reminds me of Cactus club and Milestone)

Panang Shrimp Curry bowl

stir-fried with vegetables in a red coconut curry cream with thai basil and peanuts. $17.49

Seriously... the lettuce on top of the rice tower looks like kimchi..XD

 This dish was decent but personally it wasn't worth the money..

BC Halibut & Prawn Spaghetti 

with tomato, Kalamata olive and fresh basil $19.99