Menchie's Frozen Yogurt (Cambie)

I've been hearing a lot of people talk about a new yogurt place that recently opened this year that's quite similar to Yogurtland. If you guys don't know Yogurtland, it's a frozen yogurt shop that's quite famous in the US because of their wide variety of unique flavors and their vast amounts of toppings that you can choose from. So when I heard that this place was similar to Yogurtland, I had to check it out especially since frozen yogurt is one of my favorite things to eat! Normally I would go get frozen yogurt at Qoola since it's way closer to where I live. Also, my schedule requires me to be in Richmond most of the time so I didn't really have much time to go to Menchie's up until last week! I invited my friends to come along  (since like me, they are frozen yogurt junkies too!).

Menchie's was quite hard to find at first since the place is located on 2315 Cambie street which is right before the Cambie bridge. I actually missed the first time so I ended up heading down to Yaletown and then making a U-turn all the way back up. Parking may be a hassle for this place because the only available spots for you to park is street parking and also the area where Menchie's is located is quite busy so it might be a pain in the butt to drive all the way there (unless of course you live near that area).

When we went in, it was like paradise for me because there were so many flavors to choose from! When me and my friends went their current flavors were: Vanilla, Chocolate, Original Tart, Cherry Tart, Cake Batter, Red Velvet Cake, Peanut Butter, Frozen Hot Chocolate, Pecan Praline, Creamsicle, Raspberry-Lemonade Sorbet and Mango Sorbet.With so many flavors to choose from, you'd want to try them all! And guess what? that's exactly what I did! And out of the 12 flavors that I tried, I would have to say that my personal favorite was the Peanut Butter! If you love Peanut Butter, I guarantee you your gonna love this! The mixture of the yogurt is just perfect! It's not too sweet yet not too heavy, and the flavor was just right! I would highly recommend trying this if you get the chance to go there. Next in line to the peanut butter is their Red Velvet and Chocolate yogurt. These two are pretty decent in their flavors, although a little sweeter than the peanut butter, they are still pretty good choices to go for as well.

I did find some of their yogurt a little too sweet for my liking especially their Pecan Praline (way overly sweet!).  Personally however, I still preferred Qoola better than Menchie's especially when it comes to their Original Tart flavor. Although I really liked how they have a wider variety of sweets for toppings, I would prefer it better if they also had a wider variety of fruits in their fruit section (but I have to say though I really liked their cinnamon apples). One thing that I do like about this place is that they are open late (Sunday-Thursday: 12pm-10pm and Friday-Saturday: 12pm-11pm) , so if your craving frozen yogurt after dinner, you can still head over to Menchie's for something cold and sweet for dessert.

Doughnut Adventure part 2: Lucky's Doughnuts

My sister and I had quite a doughnut adventure the other day or should I say a day devoted to over indulging ourselves with sweets? Because right after our visit to Cartems Donuterie in Gastown, my sister and I went to go visit another doughnut shop in Vancouver that specializes in classic style doughnuts. Located on 2902 Main street, inside the newly constructed second location of 49th Parallel Roasters Cafe, Lucky's Doughnuts opened their doughnut counter this month to share with the rest of Vancouver their awesome talents in making these sweet

fried treats.

You can say that the flavors that they make are more focused on old school or classic flavors such as old fashioned glazed and fruit flavored cream filled doughnuts. Non the less, their doughnuts are still awesome especially when it comes to (my personal favorites) their Apple Bacon Fritter and their Mango Square doughnut. This place is also a bit hard to spot because when we were looking for the place, the address led us to 49th Parallel instead. We didn't know that Lucky's Doughnuts is actually located inside the coffee shop so we kept wandering around the area looking for their sign, but it's a good thing though that we went back to 49th Parallel and took a peek inside, because we probably would have just left without knowing that we were already at the right place all along!

With a counter set up at the front of the store and a wide variety of baked goods to choose from, we ended up deciding on their Apple Bacon Fritter, Mango Square doughnut, Old Fashioned Glazed doughnut and their Coffee Cake doughnut to try. All four of them looked and smelled really good but what stood out the most to me and my taste buds were the Apple Bacon Fritter and the Mango Square Doughnut. I was literally mind blown by the taste of their Apple Bacon Fritter! It had the right amount of apples and bacon bits that made the doughnut all the more irresistible to eat! It's the perfect mixture of sweet and savory in a doughnut and I just wanted to have more! Normally I don't eat this much sweets/fried food on a daily basis but I actually finished two of their doughnuts (Apple Bacon and Mango Square) in one sitting! Like the Apple Bacon Fritter, the Mango Square surprised me as well. When I ordered the Mango Square, I initially thought that the doughnut batter was just mango flavored but lo and behold, it also had mango filling inside it! I super love cream filled doughnuts so when I found out that the Mango Square is a bavarian-ish type of doughnut, I ended up finishing it in just a few minutes! This doughnut also reminded me of my favorite pie (Peach Mango pie) that I would always get in Jollibee. If you guys don't know what Jollibee is, it's a fast food chain that's very popular in the Philippines and having been born and raised there, Jollibee was like our favorite fast food joint to hang out/eat at after school besides Mcdonalds. Besides the Apple Bacon and Mango Square, the other two doughnuts were not bad as well but I found that their coffee cake doughnut and Old Fashioned Glazed wasn't anything special compared to the first two. Also, the Old Fashioned Glaze was a bit too sweet and heavy for my liking so I ended up only eating a small piece of it. But I guess it also depends on what kind of doughnut you like right? I mean people have different tastes so I can't really judge it for you unless you also give it a try yourself.

Comparing their doughnuts to Cartems' however, I would have to say that Lucky's doughnuts have a denser quality to their doughnuts and have sweeter glazes. Price wise, Lucky's is a couple of cents more expensive than Cartems and as I recall, they charge about $3.25 - $3.95 for a piece of doughnut depending on which flavor you get. Lucky's do make good quality doughnuts but if I have to pay more than $3 for a doughnut before taxes, I would rather just buy more of Cartems' doughnuts (it's way cheaper and they have more unique flavors to choose from). Overall however, I would have to say that Lucky's doughnuts is more of a hit or miss kind of place. They do make good quality doughnuts but the variety and taste of the flavors that they offer may just be so so for some. Personally for me, I still like Cartems' doughnuts better but because of their Apple Bacon Fritter and Mango Square doughnut, I am officially a fan of this place as well.

 Apple Bacon Fritter (Insanely good!)

 Left to right: Old Fashion Glazed, Apple Bacon Fritter, Mango Square, Coffee Cake

 Close up of the Apple Bacon Fritter

Doughnut Adventures part 1: Cartems Donuterie

I love love everything about doughnuts! The soft cakey texture that it has and the impact of sweet flavors that you get as it melts in your mouth.. it's just one of the best guilty pleasures that mankind has ever made! Writing this post is actually making me excited! Because I'm so thrilled to share with you guys our doughnut adventure last Saturday to two of my new favorite doughnut shops here in Vancouver.

Normally, I would prefer eating mini doughnuts rather than normal ones but these two doughnut shops converted me into a crazy doughnut loving girl! When I say crazy, I meant going on a doughnut frenzy with my sister and eating/trying out an equivalent of 4 1/2 doughnuts (calorie overload) all in one day! This doughnut adventure that we had started after we had lunch in Richmond on a Saturday. We didn't actually have anything planned after and we had nothing else to do so we just decided to head over to Gastown to do some window shopping since the weather was nice enough for us to go walk outside. I figured since we were already in the area, we might as well pay a visit to Cartems Donuterie to grab some of their awesome doughnuts to eat/try out and bring home. Our first stop on our doughnut adventure led us to 408 Carrell street, where Cartems' pop up shop is located. The store may be a little hard to find at first because the sign outside is quite small but unlike other doughnut shops in Vancouver, Cartems' doughnuts are very unique in their flavor and just insanely good! Their doughnuts were light and moist but at the same time were still full of flavor! The amount of toppings/glaze on each of their doughnuts were just right and the sweetness level is just perfect! It's not too sweet and it's not bland.. it was just perfect! Everything about their doughnuts is balanced out right down to it's core! Even in their ingredients, everything that they use come from local businesses and farms so not only does Cartems make great doughnuts, they are sustainable in their actions as well! (double thumbs up for Cartems!). 

They had quite a variety of flavors to choose from that day but out of all that they had, we decided on getting the Naomi, Bee Sting, Carrot Cake, Blueberry Ginger, Cinnamon Sugar, and Citrus Dust. I've actually been reading a lot about Cartems' Earl Grey and Maker's Bourbon Bacon on other food blogs as well and I was really really curious to try it! but unfortunately they didn't have any of the two that day! (Bummer!) but I guess this just gives me another reason to go back to Cartems another time. Out of the six that we got,  my personal favorite is the Bee Sting, I just couldn't get enough of it! They use their special house honey and infused it with Cassia flowers for the glaze and then finished it off with Parmesan and a crack of fresh pepper. The combination of the flavors was just perfect that I was really sad when I finished eating it because we only bought one! (At least now, I know which one I should buy more of on my next visit!) Another thing about Cartems too is that their doughnuts aren't cheap, it costs about $3 for one, $15 for 6 and $27 for 12. It's a bit pricey for a doughnut but If you think about it your mostly paying for the taste and quality of their doughnuts. I guarantee you though that paying $3 won't seem so bad anymore after you've tried it because they do make great tasting doughnuts!

Overall, I would have to say that Cartems Donuterie is one of the best places to go to for doughnuts. Even though the price may be a bit more than other places, I think it's worth paying every penny for the uniqueness of the flavors and the quality that you get. This is also one of the reason why Cartems is one of my favorite go to spots when it comes to doughnuts because they are just really good at what they're doing and it clearly shows in the products that they make.

Left column (Top to bottom): Carrot Cake, Cinnamon Sugar and Blueberry Ginger

Right column (Top to bottom): Naomi, Bee Sting and Citrus Dust 

After excitedly buying a box full of doughnuts at Cartems, our doughnut adventure didn't exactly end here and to think we already have enough doughnuts for 6 people! We actually ended up going to another shop up on Main street that has one of the best tasting Apple Bacon Fritters in town! (for me at least). So stay tuned for part 2 of our doughnut adventure on my next post! :)

Izumi-Tei

Izumi-Tei is a new Japanese buffet restaurant inside the Japanese supermarket called Izumiya located on alderbridge way across from Delicious Cuisine. You can say that buffets are one of my favorite places to go to especially since growing up in Asia, I was so used to the usual buffets that they would have. Comparing Asia's to here in Vancouver's, there is for sure a huge difference in variety, quality and service. Unless of course, it's Sunday brunch at a hotel in downtown, then that's a whole different story. Since I live here in Vancouver now, I'm still on the constant look out for new buffet restaurants that would at least satisfy my taste buds and tummy as well as something that could be similar to how it is back home. So when my friend told me about this new Japanese buffet place that recently opened, I was really curious to check it out.

Going to Izumiya in general is easy and the parking is not as bad as it might be compared to parking for Delicious Cuisine because you can also park around the area of E-spot. When we got there, the place is actually quite small compared to most buffet style restaurants. You can say that this place is like the Japanese version of King Buffet, instead of serving Chinese food, they serve you Japanese food. And for $11.99 a person, I thought that maybe it's just similar to those all you can eat places like Ninkazu or Richmond Sushi.

Upon entering the restaurant, there's a cashier by the door for you to pay first. When we went, there wasn't a long line up so we were able to get a table after we paid. The only catch here is, your only given an hour to eat! they will actually put a note on your table saying when your hour is up, so make every minute count! 1 hour might not be enough time for you to eat or relax even because you kind of feel like they are rushing you to leave. I don't know about you guys, but when I'm eating I don't really like being rushed especially when it comes to eating buffet! At first though, we were a bit pressured with the one hour time limit, but after looking at the food choices and after taking our first bite, our appetites just started to disappear so that one hour limit didn't seem so bad after that.

There are a few things that I don't like about this place: 1) Some of the food items were really oily and it made me feel like I was drinking a bowl of oil (which is pretty disgusting if you ask me). 2) The servers are not efficient in clearing out the plates of the tables so by the time we were on our third round, there were a lot of plates that were piling up on our table. The service in all you can eat places are much better compared to this place. 3) Some of the food items look a bit disgusting to eat especially their tofu. I know they change their menu occasionally but the tofu just looked really disgusting. When I tried getting tofu, I couldn't get it out because it was sticking on the sides of the metal pan and it was really slimy too so it just reminded me of thick looking saliva (my appetite was gone after that).  I think out of all the items, the only ones that were okay-ish for me were the ebi fry, sauteed eggplant, chicken wings and their gomae. The chicken teriyaki was a bit salty for me and some of the chicken were really hard to bite into. Their takoyaki was a bit soggy and their vegetable tempura was drenched in oil (really not appetizing).

Personally, I wouldn't recommend anyone coming to this place. I think going to Ninkazu or Richmond Sushi might have been a better choice for us that day. What bums me out too is that this place charges for around the same price (or even less) as going to Ninkazu ($9.95) or Richmond Sushi ($12.95) for lunch! But I guarantee you though that you could get much more out of your $11.99 somewhere else than going to Izumi-Tei. At least now, I know where not to go for all you can eat.

Haroo

Haroo is a small Korean restaurant located on Alexandra Road in the same mall as Michigan, Cattle Cafe and Deer Garden. I've always passed by this place but never got a chance to try it out until a few days ago when my mom suddenly had a craving for Korean food. The decision to go to Haroo that day was perfect because we were going out for lunch on a weekday at around 12:30pm, which meant more chances of finding parking on Alexandra Rd and a 50/50 chance of not having to wait so long for a table. And Surprise surprise! we were right! Parking wasn't full and when we walked in the restaurant we immediately got a table! so credits to my mom for craving Korean food that day! When you enter the restaurant, the place is decorated with a very homey vibe. It's like your going into cooking mama's real world version of her kitchen/dining room. The guy that was serving us ( I think he's the owner) was very polite and friendly but I think when we went he was the only one serving customers and doing all the work at the front. I hope there's more servers at night because if he's by himself and it gets busy then service will be slow. Although we had to wait a bit for the food, after taking my first bite, I think it was worth the wait especially their Seafood Pancake! It was lighter and thinner than Jang Mo Jib's and it has more kinds of seafood in it which makes it taste even better (for me). The atmosphere also helped in the waiting part because it made us feel like we were in someone's home especially since there's also Korean shows playing in the background (or maybe I'm just so used to hearing my mom's Korean shows playing at home).

If you haven't had a chance to visit yet and your thinking of going but don't know what to order. I would highly recommend trying out their Bibimbap, Seafood pancake, and their Bulgogi rice or just get their lunch specials for only $9.95! You can choose from a couple of different combos like the ones that we ordered such as Bibimbap or Bulgogi Rice and it usually comes with a couple of side dishes and either tofu soup, rice cake, bulgogi soup or something else (depending on which set you order of course).

Since we went during lunch, the parking and waiting part wasn't much of an issue but if your planning to go to Haroo for dinner, I would suggest going early because this place fills up pretty fast at night especially on weekends!

Tofu Soup + Bulgogi Rice lunch set

 Pajeon (Korean Style Pancake)

 Tofu Soup + Bibimbap lunch set

 Tofu Soup

 Bibimbap

Qoola (Oakridge)

If you were to let me choose whether I would have ice cream or frozen yogurt for dessert or maybe even as a replacement meal for either breakfast, lunch or dinner.. I would definitely 100% tell you I would choose.. frozen yogurt! When Qoola closed in Aberdeen Center, I was devastated (no joke) because I always go get frozen yogurt almost every week, no matter how cold or bad the weather is outside. Besides Timothy's, Qoola is one of my favorite places to go to for frozen yogurt. One of the reasons why is because they have the self serve option for their customers. I just love the idea of being able to put in and control how much I want to eat, how much toppings to put in and how many flavors of yogurt I want to mix in. And compared to other places I've been to, I also just preferred Qoola's original flavor better than the original flavors of other places. So when I found out that Qoola recently opened in Oakridge Mall, I just had to go there immediately and get my weekly cravings of frozen yogurt! Since there's no more branch in Richmond, the closest Qoola that I can get to now is Oakridge. Although it's quite far (around 15-20 min drive), this location is still closer than going all the way to Metrotown mall. This post also goes to shows how far I would go just to get frozen yogurt (even if it means driving all the way to Oakridge or Metrotown mall).