Chong’s Restaurant

Chong’s is located on the south side of Kingsway and Slocan.  We went there for dim sum a few times during February and were able to compile a nice sample of different dishes that we tried during our separate visits.

Their dim sums are value priced. Most are about $3.50 each.  Some congees are included on their dim sum menu too.  You can also order fried rice or fried noodle dishes for $8 which was value priced as well for the size that you get.  The restaurant is not very large so dim sum service will be busy on weekends.

Menu:

Back of menu:

Prawn Dumplings were decent sized:

Steamed Pork Dumplings: My mom always orders this. I’m not a big fan as I feel most places make it with fatty pork right?

BBQ Pork Bun: Pork was lean and the steamed bun was nice and fluffy.

Beef Tendon: The flavor was good but the tendons were all too rough and chewy, meaning they did not steam it long enough to make it tender. 

Pan Fried Taro cake: This was so-so because it was not pan fried long enough.  Normally the outside should be golden brown.  Furthermore it did not have enough taro.

Stuffed Eggplant:  These were good as they were generous with the eggplant and they were cooked soft.

Dried Scallops and Egg White Fried Rice: Thumbs on on this as they did not overuse oil to fry the rice.  The rice was nice and tender (using overnight refrigerated rice) just as it should be.

Singapore Fried Rice Noodle:  The rice noodles were all broken to small pieces and it was not spicy enough.  Unfortunately the pork used was not flavored enough so it had a bit of an unpleasant ‘swine’ taste to it that was a bit overwhelming. Size wise it was big for $8.

Dried Fish and Peanut Congee: Their congees are quite superb. They do not use a lot of MSG and the congee itself had the right thickness to it.

Chinese Doughnut Wrapped in Rice Roll: It was about a half doughnut.  The rice roll was a bit too thick and chewy though.

Spareribs on rice:

Finally, Fried Mini Sesame Balls: These ones are hollow without any filling.  It was crispy but could have used a bit more sugar.

Overall the dim sum visits to Chong’s were pleasant.  Despite some of the dishes not up to par, you still get great value and get to try a variety of dim sum without breaking your wallet.  Don’t let the cheap price deter you because you get some pretty decent dim sum that is comparable to more expensive places.

SFDD gives 3.5 out of 5 Delights.

Fisherman’s Terrance - Richmond

We headed out Friday before the Lunar Year of the Rooster for dim sum with family at Fisherman’s Terrance.  Knowing that Aberdeen Mall and it’s parking lot gets quite hectic near noon, we headed out early for a 10am dim sum reservation. 

Most of the mall was not yet opened so it was quite pleasant to find a parking spot.  The restaurant was also slowly starting to fill up with other early patrons after we were seated.

We went through the menu quickly and ticked off our our orders.

Sparerib Congee:  This is a small bowl enough to be shared with 2 people.  It has been consistent each time we order this congee as it’s not too much MSG.

Shrimp Dumplings:  Medium sized and is not overly filled with non shrimp ingredients.

Pan fried rice roll:  This was not good at all because the rolls were very hard like it was taken out from the refrigerator.

Glutinous Rice: This has lots of Chinese sausages.  It appears it’s not 100% glutinous rice.  It may have been mixed with 30% regular rice.  The sausages make this dish quite oily and filling.

Pig Knuckles in dark  vinegar: You can usually eat this if you have a relative or close friend who just gave birth as it’s customary to give out.  This was quite a big bowl as you can see with many knuckles in there.

Chicken Feet in black bean sauce:  The feet were rather skinny today.  There were only 4 pieces.

Crab cakes: This is mixed in with chives.  It’s was pan fried quite nicely.

Lastly for dessert we had these sesame glutinous rice balls:

Normally they are either hollow or filled with red bean paste.  But to my surprise, this is filled with a very delicious black sesame paste.

The dessert must have been the best part of the dim sum as we’ve never had sesame balls quite like this before.

However thumbs down on their credit card terminal.  They now only allow you to choose a percentage as a tip.  You are not able to choose a dollar amount to tip. What’s up with that?  They should update their system the customer has a choice on how to tip.  I never believed in adding tip on tax!

Other than that, food service was like usual and came quickly.

SFDD gives 3.5 out of 5 Delights.

Phoenix Garden - East Vancouver

Phoenix Garden is a Chinese restaurant located at Broadway and Nanaimo serving dim sum during the day and seafood dinner in the evenings.  We came here after seeing the line up at our usual Van Dragon on Hastings.  We were surprised Phoenix Garden didn’t have too many people when we arrived so we did not have to wait even for a Sunday mid morning.

It seemed to be a more cozy and quiet restaurant compared to Van Dragon.  The prices are slightly higher but nothing to be jumping up and down about.  They do charge for the tea here.

Their dim order menu is nice as it includes colourful pictures.

We didn’t order a whole lot since it was only the 3 of us.  This is the spare ribs with phoenix claw rice.  It was rather small but the price made up for it.  The rice was nice and chewy while the spare ribs were not too fat.

The shrimp dumplings were large and plump.  However the skin was not done very well.   The skin was too soft and had a strange bland taste to it.  Usually the skin should have a more chewy, elastic like feel to it when you bite into it.

This is the steamed ginger chicken bun.  The meat inside was rather small.  The bun portion was fluffy though.

They also had a special menu for fried noodles or congee.  We got this fried mixed seafood rice noodle dish with curry.  It was only $7 and was a large portion.

The rice noodles were quite fresh.  It could have used a bit more of the curry flavour though.  It did have lots of small shrimp.  I’ve never had this type of fried noodle dish but flavorwise, it is comparable to what a Singapore fried vermicelli would taste like.

When it came time to paying, the waitress was quite impatient and just grabbed the  credit card machine out of my hands after I pressed in my PIN. I thought that was rather rude as I was not expecting that.

There is plenty of street parking in the neighbourhood.  They may have a parking lot in the back but it is one of those really tiny ones where you can get door dings.  If you go during the weekday, we saw some posters advertising 30% off dim sum if you order before a certain time.  There is no discount during holidays or weekends though.  They don’t show it in the outside window poster, but have it as small print in the inside poster!

We certainly like to return next time to try their other fried noodle dishes as well as their congee specials.

SFDD Gives 3.75 out of 5 Delights

Fortune City Seafood Restaurant

Fortune  City is on the shopping complex at Renfrew and 1st Avenue.  We haven’t been here since it changed from No 1 few years back.  We still recognized some of the wait staff as they seem to shift from one restaurant to another if it closes down.

We were here with a party of 4 on a Friday morning.  It was quite packed at 11am, must have been the first round of dim sum patrons.  After we got our table, it slowly quieted down with no body waiting for tables after we sat for 15 minutes.

We didn’t order a lot since there were only 4 of us. 

This is the dried shrimp with green onion rice roll.  The rice roll was very fresh like it just came off the rice roll maker.  It had a generous amount of green onion on it and came with the usual peanut/sesame and sweet bean sauce.

This is the thousand layer cake.  It is kind of like a Malay cake with some layers of creamy sweet paste in between.  It was quite fluffy as it came straight out from the steamer.

The stuff eggplant came with 3 big pieces.  The stuffing was a fried shrimp stuffing.  The eggplant was cooked soft and melts in your mouth which was good.  A bit too much sauce for our liking though.

Spareribs on rice came in a larger clay pot.  This seemed larger than other places.  The spareribs were not too fat and were quite tender.  It had some cubes of squash mixed in to give it a tad of sweetness.

This is the BBQ pork rice roll.  Again, the rice wrap was very fresh and soft, just like the green onion rice roll from before.  It was certainly made to order and the BBQ pork inside had the right mix of fat and lean meat.

This time we went for the baked BBQ pork bun instead of the steamed.  This one usually tastes a bit sweeter as has a shiny layer of sugar glazed at the top.  These tasted good and the BBQ pork was not too fatty.

Finally we had the shrimp dumplings.  They were large and plump.  The skin was not too thick and did not stick awkwardly to the bottom of the basket.

Prices are reasonable here and like other places in Vancouver, if you come before a certain time you will get a small discount like 10% off, or free tea.  Try to find street parking because the parking stalls inside this mall are very narrow and inconvenient to manoeuvre around.

SFDD gives 3 out of 4 Delights.

Parklane Chinese Restaurant - Richmond

Parklane is one of 2 Chinese restaurants located in the London Drugs plaza on No 3 /Westminster highway intersection. 

We came here with family on a Sunday afternoon for dim sum so it was very busy even though we got reservations. 

The parking lot is OK as long as you don’t mind driving up to the rooftop where it is less busy.  Gladly, it is not as painful as the Aberdeen parking lot.  The restaurant is on the 2nd level so if you are lucky, you can get a table by the window and have view overlooking the street.

We had a party of 6 and ordered quite a bit to showcase here.

Taro Root Dumpling:  This has a loose coating of crispy batter and the inside is filled with a taro pork mixture.

Braised Duck:

Egg Yolk Buns:  These have a creamy yellow sweet filling that runs out.  It is meant to imitate an egg when you open it up.

Vegetable Dumpling and Chive Dumpling:  The skin was a well made chewy texture.

Sticky Rice Roll:  It’s not as oily as the version wrapped inside the leaf.

Phoenix Claws (Chicken Feet):  This one was a tiny bit more spicier than we’d like.

Fried Chicken Rice Noodles:  It was fresh off the wok as it was still steaming.  Small but that’s the typical size for a dim sum time.

Fried Chicken Chow-Mein: The noodles were nice and crunchy.  The sauce was a bit gooey though but had lots of chicken.

Minced Pork Dumpling:  These are pan fried and can be filling if you eat one whole.  Best to eat half or a quarter of it if you an cut it.

Another Chicken Feet Dish with Peanuts:  This is a change from the normal chicken feet dish.  It’s meant to be cold.

Pork Rice Soup: We’ve never tried this before.  It has rice and minced pork inside the broth.  Strange to have for dim sum.

Parklane charges a mandatory $1.20/head for tea which seems high. Pricing is near the high side  that seems typical these days for dim sum in Richmond.  Service from the wait staff was generally good considering that it was a full house.  Best to make reservations ahead of time.

SFDD gives 3 out of 4 Delights.