Hue

Thanks for the pictures! They are making me terribly homesick these days. One of my fondest childhood memory is at Ding Tai Fung, where the family decided to beat the crowd in order to get a seat...I think we were too enthusiastic as we walked in and discovered that everyone single staff member was lying, literally, on those long benches or tables taking a nap. I forgot what time we actually went in and how on earth they'd let us in, but that image stayed with everyone of our family til this day. I am so glad you noticed the 7-11s! Even though they are ubiquitous in Taiwan, I still love being able to get all those things especially the variety of drinks. All kinds of flavoured teas you can imagine with cheap price too. I remember eating those fish roe as a kid, and not really appreciating them. I remember just eating them cut into little pieces (as they are on the salty side) and the adults eat them with raw green onion slivers. I think I'd love them now! Street food~ Man, I love them but my stomach/immune system needs to be toughened up a little bit in order to enjoy them... Did you see all those bubble tea shops that are literally just store fronts with no seats inside? Last time I was there they were everywhere!

I've had them as well, but not in Vancouver. I think it's an interesting twist, and if you life rice, you'd probably like them. The rice bun definitely resemble glutinous rice balls more so than rice cakes--it's chewy and sticky.

I don't know if this has been mentioned, but Harlo Burger on Cambie St. has been replaced by a Vietnamese restaurant called Green Pepper.

Ate at Dem Bonese about 2 years ago, and the ribs were forgettable, but what I do remember was finding a piece of blue plastic in our "fried potato stack"(in quotation because I don't remember what's it's actually called). Also remember how everyone was wearing bibs ...[

Thast IS a nice looking souffle......gotta put DINER on my to-try list now! Thanks!

Wow, those are great looking pictures! I have eaten at both places, but have not tried the soup buns.Thanks!

For the crispy rice dish, my friends and I prefer pouring our own sauce and eat it right away, or having them separate and then dip the crispy rice in sauce ourselves, otherwise you get these soggy/mushy rice mess. But some people like that. Definitely try it if you are adventurous!

Finally hit Shanghai Wind for the first time today with boss and co-workers. We must have been the oddest table in the restaurant, with 2 Chinese, 1 Caucasian, 1 Hindu, and 1 half Japanese half Caucasian. There were 2 printed menus, one with dim sum items, rice and noodles, and soup. This menu is with both Chinese and English. However, the other menu, which has the other dishes, was entirely in Chinese. Makes it a lot harder when one co-worker wanted to know the name of the dish so she doesn't have to order sweet and sour pork all the time! We ordered the juicy pork buns, and because we have a non-beef/pork eater, we also ordered vegetable buns. The pork buns were not as overly oily as I've tried at other places, which was nice. The vegetable buns were very interesting: the filling was sweet! It was as if they add sugar instead of salt by accident or something. We also had a chicken dish cooked with alcohol, hot and sour seafood soup, and sui choy with butter sauce. Finished the meal with cirspy pancake with red bean paste. Very nice! Oh yeah, for those of you interested in those pork buns, I found out that they sell them uncooked too! Same price as the steamed ones, 6 for $3.60 (I think).

From what I understand, each Chinese restaurants has a different system when it comes to tips, but most of the time the tip is divided evenly to all staff, so each server gets the same amount regardless of his/her service.

I hit the shop as well...tried the dulce de leche filled one, upon the lady's recommendation (she said it was milk jam(?)). Apparently they made it after you order it, since I had to wait a while, but it was hot and fresh.

Okay...I'm giving it more thought. If I am asking myself if I'd go back just for the same pie again, I'd say no.

Finally had time today to go to West Vancouver in search of pie...The Savary Island Pie!. The place was jammed with people at noon, and not a single empty seat in sight. But I had to have my pie...so I sat outside on the tiny patio, looking out at the pouring rain. Anyway, I had the lemon buttermilk pie with berries, but since I never really eat pie, so I can't compare it to others I've had and say whether it was good or not... A few steps down from Savary Island is a cafe called Amadeo. I had something called "Mocha Delight". Oh. My. God. It was so good! Mocha cream dipped in chocolate. I could really make the effort to go to North shore just for that!

So of course I had to try the Chocolate Danish....Yum Yum Yum! I was pleasantly surprised, since I don't really like any of the other Tim Horton's offerings. Really flaky pastry.

I went to Notte's Bon Ton to have my chocolate fix... Tried the Chocolate Progress, Chocolate Ganache, Spaghetti(weird name), and a Pineapple one(can't remember the name). All the chocolate ones are really good! The chocolate ganache filling is not as dense, but creamy nonetheless. Oh, another gem at Pane From Heaven is their fruit and nut scone. It's probably the best scone I've tasted ever!

Lunch at Fortune Restaurant with my mom. My mom has been doing a lot of dim sum with her Cantonese friends, whose idea for dim sum is precisely "less eating, more chatting". They usualy only order 3~4 dishes for a table of 3! Anyway, so my mom and I only ordered 3 savory dim sum and 1 dessert. We had the bake pork pastry, deep fried taro balls, bean curd wrapper with veggies, and crushed peanuts sesame dumplings--everything my mom likes. The taro dumplings had pork in it and too little taro, so I didn't really like it. The sweet sesame dumplings were very good; hot filing!