Sammy J's Grill & Bar

1075 Lougheed Highway
Coquitlam, BC

My dad received a gift card for Sammy J's a long time ago (back when "Pepper" was still a part of its name!). He thought it was lost but then accidentally found it again not so long ago! Since the gift card was, thankfully, still valid, we went out to the Coquitlam location for dinner.
For the appy, we shared the Jacked Up Skins (fried russet potato skins topped with aged white cheddar and havarti cheese, bacon, scallions and served with a ranchero yogurt dip). Unfortunately, I was too busy digging into these to take a photo. The potato skins were alright. It was a tad dry since the melted cheese did not fully cover the whole potato skin. I guess that's what the dip is for!

Honey Bourbon BBQ Ribs

Full pound of fall-off-the-bone slow roasted ribs basted in honey bourbon BBQ. Served with seasonal veggies and white cheddar mashed potato.

I ordered the ribs as my main. The meat definitely did fall off the bone. A slight prod with the knife and fork and the meat slipped off the bone. However, it seemed like the ratio of fat seemed more than the meat. As much as it makes food more tasty, I wasn't very keen on eating bites of pork fat... The BBQ sauce, as the name suggested, was on the sweeter side but I still enjoyed it. Loved the green beans as the veggie side though. They were lightly blanched and tossed with salt and pepper so they still retained a nice crunch. The mashed potatos were ok, nothing to shout out about.

Classic Cut 7oz Sirloin

Served with baked potato and seasonal veggies

The steak was my dad's choice. The sirloin was grilled to a rare doneness and came with a baked potato and green beans as well. I tried a bite of the steak and it was quite tender and juicy. Sometimes a sirloin can be chewy and tough to eat despite it being rare. Their cut of beef was not bad. My dad didn't like the baked potato though. He found the texture of the potato kind of weird.

The Lobster Grilled Cheese

Atlantic lobster, scallions, 4 cheese mornay sauce and havarti pressed between artisan Romano loaf.

My mom opted for a sandwich for her meal and decided on the lobster grilled cheese. Since I wanted to eat yam fries, she substituted her regular fries for yam fries, which came with a sweet chipotle dip. There were ample amounts of lobster meat in the sandwich but I thought it wasn't cheesy enough. Perhaps that's what the mornay sauce is for but somehow, dipping a sandwich into a rich, creamy sauce wasn't my thing. I like grilled cheese sandwiches to be ooey and cheesy in the inside. The bread was also crusty and a little hard (hard as in it would scratch the roof of your mouth when biting into it) so that also turned me off. As for the yam fries, they were ok. There are places that have better yam fries.

In terms of food, it wasn't too bad yet nothing really wowed me; though the service was adequate and the dining room was clean, bright and spacious. As a chain restaurant that seems like it's going for similar food and ambiance as other popular chain restaurants (Joey's, Cactus Club, Milestones) I'd have to say that Sammy J's would not be on the top of my list.

Guu Kobachi ~ Photolog

735 Denman Street
Vancouver, BC

W and I went to Guu Kobachi with 2 of our friends to post-celebrate W's birthday. Guu Kobachi is a new concept restaurant from the Guu Izakaya chain. This one specializes in a "no fixed menu" concept so their menu changes frequently to match whatever seasonal ingredients they have. Once again, I have forgotten to take photos of their menu so I have forgotten the names of some of these dishes...sorry.

Beef Tataki (?) 

It's definitely seared or broiled beef but I'm not sure if this was the beef tataki.

Miso Kushi

Breaded and deep fried pork and green onion on skewers with special Hacho miso sauce

Ebimayo's Sister

Shredded potato coated ebimayo

Grilled Gyu-tan

Sprinkled with black pepper and topped with shredded leeks

Korokke

Creamy mashed potato croquette with a whole prawn inside

Crunchy Chicken Gizzard

Deep fried chicken gizzard skin tossed with spice

Osaka Tako Tempura (?)

I believe this was the octopus tempura (Osaka style)

The food at Guu Kobachi was good, although, we all found their food to be on the saltier side (hey, it's good with beer!). This restaurant is smaller than all the other Guu's so seating is quite tight. I still need to visit Guu Otokomae in Gastown and I will have been to all of the Guu Izakaya's in Metro Vancouver!! Guu is guud!!

Au Petit Chavignol

843 East Hastings Street
Vancouver, BC

Ever since I had the fabulous Croque Madame at St. Honore's Boulangerie in Portland, I've been trying to find places in Vancouver that serves it too. One such place was Au Petit Chavignol on East Hastings Street. They are a cheese and wine specialty restaurant with a retail section next door.

We were the first to arrive on a sunny late Friday morning but the place was bustling right around 12pm. The dining area was small with a few tables and some bar seating.

Croque Madame

Mr. Crunch topped with a poached free run egg

It was a given that I'd order their Croque Madame! This was their version of the Croque Monsieur a.k.a Mr. Crunch (toasted ham and cheese sandwich) except with a poached egg on top. They usually serve this sandwich with a fried egg on top but I requested a poached egg instead so I could re-create the oozing egg yolk that I had at St. Honore.

I forgot to request a soft poached egg so they gave me a standard medium egg, hence, I did not get much egg yolk ooze... The sandwich was true to its name. The bread stayed crunchy until the last bite, even with all that bechamel sauce on top! However, the sauce stiffened up halfway through so the sandwich didn't have that ooey-gooey cheesiness to it anymore (the lack of oozing egg yolk didn't help either). The first few bites were excellent though. The ham was a little on the dry side but that's just me being nit picky.

Feature sandwich of the day

Egg Salad Sandwich with side salad

W ordered their sandwich of the day. It was a simple egg salad sandwich with tomatos and lettuce on whole grain bread. The sandwich came with a side salad which consisted of arugula and some sliced red onions tossed in a vinaigrette. The sandwich was pretty plain (something I could make at home) but it was fresh and a good size for lunch. I thought the salad paired better with my Croque Madame because it helped cut the cheesy richness.

As we were finishing up, a table near us ordered a bottle of rosé champagne for lunch! Wow, some people sure know how to enjoy a sunny Friday afternoon... 

Campagnolo Restaurant

1020 Main Street

Vancouver, BC

 

I was reminiscing about the fantastic agnolotti pasta I had at Araxi last year so I searched for places in Vancouver that had agnolotti on their menu. I came upon Campagnolo's menu and saw that they served their own version of agnolotti (same type of pasta but different filling) so I convinced W to go try it with me.

The decor inside was simple but clean and warm with the wooden wainscotting and tables. We were served iced water while we perused the menu.

After we made our order, our server came and placed this plate on our table! She said it was to sprinkle on our dishes. On the left was parmesan reggiano, the centre was some sort of dried herb (sorry, I do not recall the name), and on the right were some dried chili flakes.

Agnolotti

Salted cod, preserved lemon

Ahh, now this was what I was looking forward to! Such a simple looking pasta but such diverse and complex flavours! Inside was a filling of pureed salted cod meat with mashed potatoes and herbs and the sauce was a light dressing infused with preserved lemon. There were also little bits of preserved lemon peel in the sauce which cut the saltiness of the cod filling very nicely.

Salsiccia

Fennel sausage, arugula, parmigiano reggiano, chilies

W and I also shared a pizza to go with our pasta. I loved the base of the pizza. The crust was thick and chewy (but not bland and difficult to eat) while the middle was also chewy but thin so that you could fold it and eat it without have the topping spill out. The chilies provided a slight kick to the pizza, the arugula gave a little crunch while the sausage balanced out the acidity of the tomato sauce. I would have liked to see more sausage though; otherwise, this was a very tasty pizza.

Terrina di Cioccolato
Coffee, nutella 

We comtemplated for a very long time whether to have dessert or not. There were only 3 choices on the menu and none of them really inticed us. However, we wanted to end the meal on a sweet note so we chose the chocolatey-coffee-hazelnutty cake (the others were a strawberry rhubarb tart and a cheese platter).

The cake was moist and soft. It would have been better if the coffee flavour was more pronounced. It seemed quite sweet with the chocolate and nutella throughout the cake. Overall, I liked the savoury items more than the dessert in the meal. The menu at Campagnolo changes often so be sure to check their menu online for their latest offerings.

Tojo's Restaurant

1133 West Broadway

Vancouver, BC

 

It was W's birthday not so long ago and I wanted to take him to a nice place for dinner where we haven't been before. Since (a) he liked Japanese food, and (b) he mentioned before that he wanted to try the place where the California roll originated from, I made reservations for Tojo's!

I did not order their omakase menu because I was afraid they would put ingredients that W did not like to eat in their dishes. So, we just ordered a la carte off their menu.

Goma-ae

Blanched spinach with creamy sesame sauce

We started off with the goma-ae. It was a small portion of crisp, cool spinach just lightly tossed with the sesame sauce. There were some thin, black, crunchy things on top that we were unable to identify. I thought they were fried fishes shaved into strips. They were a little crispy and a little chewy as we munched on them. 

Tojo's Tuna (small)

Chef's signature dish - Tuna sashimi with special sesame and wasabi sauce

We also had the small-sized order of Tojo's tuna as an appetizer. The tuna was fresh, albeit a little on the mushy side. The sauce was a mix of savoury and sweet with a little kick from the wasabi. I found the sauce overwhelmed the tuna a bit too much. It detracted from the natural flavour of the tuna since the sauce was quite strong. If it was just lightly tossed with no residual liquid at the bottom, it would have been better. Well, we did make good use of it since we dipped our rolls in the remaining sauce.

Tojo Roll (left & right) and Golden Roll (centre) 

Tojo Roll - West Coast dungeness crab, avocado, spinach and egg rolled inside-out with sesame seeds on top

Golden Roll - Crab, scallop, wild Pacific salmon, and sweet shrimp rolled in an egg crepe with fish roe on top

Onto some more substantial items, we decided to try two different rolls.We could not find a roll on the menu that indicated "California roll" (we were there to try the original California roll but it was not to be seen!) so we settled on the Tojo Roll which we thought most closely resembled the California roll.

The ingredients were fresh and there was just the right amount of rice wrapped around the seaweed but, honestly, I thought the roll was quite bland (hence why we wanted to dip our rolls in the Tojo's tuna sauce).

The Golden Roll was unique and it definitely showcased the freshness and sweetness of the ingredients. The golden yellow tobiko provided a nice crunch to the roll. In lieu of seaweed, the thin egg crepe held the roll together. The flavour of this roll was also subtle but I liked it more than Tojo's Roll.

Canadian Sablefish

Baked sablefish with Tojo's secret marinade

Next, we shared the sablefish. The flavour of the fish was predominantly sweet so I thought the taste was kind of one dimensional. The fish was cooked perfectly where the meat flaked off easily but still retained its softness. Underneath the sablefish was a mound of veggies: julienned carrots, celery, snap peas, yellow peppers, and maitake(?) mushrooms. Unfortunately, this dish did not wow me at all.

After finishing the sablefish, we were still a little hungry so we ordered a few pieces of nigiri sushi to finish off the meal. We had the Tobiko (flying fish roe), Sake (wild Pacific salmon), and Hotate (scallop). Sorry, I forgot to take photos of the sushi so you'll have to take my comments as is. I thought the salmon was cut kind of haphazardly. There was still a bit of skin left on the salmon and it wasn't very pleasing to the eye. I expected more in terms of execution and plating at a fine dining restaurant like Tojo's. The scallop was good but just a little heavy-handed on the wasabi.

Overall, we sort of had high expections at Tojo's. Unfortunately, we left rather disappointed and I felt that my wallet suffered an unnecessary beating due to their inflated prices. It's a good experience but for us, once is enough at Tojo's.

Mother's Bistro & Bar [Portland, OR]

212 Southwest Stark Street
Portland, OR

This is what happens when you've taken photos of food and you forget what they are when you finally have time to post them! I apologize in advance; there are 2 dishes below that my family has ordered but I've forgotten what they are now! Well, I can make out what they are but I've forgotten their actual names. I knew I should have taken a photo of the special's menu!

Anyway, continuing on with our trip in Portland... For our last night, we headed to Mother's Bistro for dinner. Urbanspoon had pretty good ratings and I've read a food blog that mentioned this place as well so we decided to give this restaurant a try.

There was a short wait when we arrived, then we were led to our table situated in a quiet corner. It was quite dark inside, the room only lit by the chandeliers and candles on the table. The restaurant had large picture windows though so I think it will be much brighter inside during the day.

I had a hard time deciding what to eat! There were a couple of entrees that I wanted to have so W, being the wonderful boyfriend he is, ordered my #2 choice (meatloaf) so I could sample some of it while I ordered my #1 choice.

Mom's Meatloaf & Gravy

Ground beef and sauteed aromatic vegetables, served with gravy, smashed red potatoes and seasonal vegetables

Being a restaurant that is dedicated to serving homestyle comfort food, I wanted to try the meatloaf. From the bites that I had, the meatloaf was moist and flavourful. The side of zucchini was really good. It was well seasoned and the middle was soft while the edges were still crisp.

Chicken & Dumplings

Slow-stewed chicken with herbed dumplings

The only dumplings I've ever had in my life were of the Chinese or Japanese variety so this was something completely new to me. This was a very hearty and homey dish. It reminded me of Chinese congee (rice porridge)because of the thick consistency. The chicken came in large chunks but they were stewed until they were soft so it pulled apart with ease. This was a very filling dish due to the ample amount of chicken and the doughy dumplings. Unfortunately, I did not really like the dumplings because they were kind of bland and quite heavy/doughy. In the end, I had to doggy-bag half of it to go. It made good leftovers though!

Grilled Flank Steak

With roasted red potatoes and seasonal vegetables

My dad had the one of the specials of the night which was the grilled flank steak. This was also one of the dishes I've forgotten the name of. I tried a piece of the steak and it was tender and not dry at all.

Roasted Free-range Chicken

Half a natural chicken served with pan juices, smashed red potatoes and seasonal vegetables

My mom tried the roast chicken meal. The meat was still quite juicy and I could tell my mom liked it because she was spending a lot of time picking the meat off the bones.

Smoked Salmon Linguine

My sister had one of the entrees on the special's menu as well. This was a creamy fettucini pasta with smoked salmon as the protein.

Jambalay Risotto 

Slow cooked arborio rice with andouille sausage, prawns, onions, roasted red peppers and cilantro

My brother-in-law went the exotic route and tried the Jambalay risotto. He commented that it was quite spicy but he still polished off the whole plate!

Complimentary cookies

Chocolate chip, raisin, walnut

We were all too full at the end to order any desserts but we still received a complimentary plate of cookies to end the meal.

Our server was very patient and nice but when he came to take away our paid bill, he kind of stood there looking at us like he was expecting more tips.... That made me feel a bit uncomfortable. Our server was good but we paid the amount that we felt was adequate for the service we received in this environment. Aside from that awkwardness, the evening at Mother's Bistro was enjoyable.