Bahay Kubo - North Delta

It is curious to me that since literally fifty percent of the Yes We're Eating Again team was born in the Philippines (although we are 100% of Canadian citizenry) that we do not review more Filipino restaurants. Well, yes, there was the Jollibee review but that was more fast food and is not truly representative of the food of the Philippines. I may be personally responsible for this imbalance. You see, when I met Marie a few years ago, she and her friends ate almost exclusively at Filipino restaurants which was fine with me as it was mostly new and interesting. One day I said, I almost never eat out at a place that serves what I can cook at home. That is not completely true but for the most part I am looking for food adventures! There are too many good things from other places being served in Vancouver for me to eat at White Spot ( nothing wrong with White Spot! I have happy childhood memories of Pirate Packs)! Soon my partner had that same bug and now, I have to talk her into a Filipino restaurant!
So I was successful in that this time, and we ended up at Bahay Kubo at the corner of Scott Road and 88th. This is a second location for this home cooking restaurant and looks straight across at La Meza Grill, another local favourite Filipino restaurant. A bahay kubo by the way, is roughly a Filipino stilt house with a thatched roof and iconic of rural life in the Philippines. It is also a children's song...Cool.
You can order off the menu here or you can select a combo of prepared dishes. We got 2 combos (rice and 2) at lunch time for $10.50 each which is a smoking deal, as far as I am concerned!
My combo included Kare Kare and Binagoogan. I love Kare Kare which is oxtail, tripe and peanut sauce. This was an excellent version with meaty chunks of oxtail and the peanut sauce was rich and delicious. Binagoongan is pork and shrimp paste. Sometimes, although shrimp paste is meant to be a subtle flavour in Filipino food just like fish sauce in Thai food (or fish sauce in Filipino food, for that matter), the shrimp paste can be overpowering. This was not the case here. The pork was tender and so rich again with just slight salty notes from the shrimp paste. I found myself using the side of shrimp paste and enjoying it which I consider a huge leap forward in my personal foodie development!
Kare Kare, Binagoongan, shrimp paste and rice
Marie chose Chow Mien and Laing. The Laing ( Taro leaves cooked in coconut) is another one of those dishes that can suffer from shrimp paste overload but again this was not the case. The leaves were tender and so coconutty! The Chow Mien while not bad was our least favourite dish. Marie doesn't care for the combination of different kinds of noodles. Still overall it was decent.
Laing, Chow Mien and rice
I am going to go ahead and say that this is one of my favourite Filipino restaurants. It is home style and basic and they are not given to a lot of garnishes and the like but the quality of the food is definitely there. Given their location in a strip mall on Scott Road, my expectations were not stellar but in the end, I was very impressed by the whole package!
Bahay Kubo Menu, Reviews, Photos, Location and Info - Zomato

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Are you guys eating again? At some point Marie and I became the kind of people who take pictures of everything we eat, whether in a restaura...