IT Burger - New Westminster

This place truly fits under the heading, 'hidden gem' so much so that I am tempted to steer you wrong on its location. That would be selfish and just wrong however, plus its really not that hidden in the literal sense.

Located in the inside corridor area of Royal Square at 8th and McBride, this is a food court eatery. BTW, why are so many places in New West called Royal? It hasn't been the capital since 1866. Can't we move on? As malls go, this one provides a very nice 'dining room' for IT Burger! 

Complete with a beautiful 2 story wood carving and skylights, and seemingly, minimal traffic, we ate in a mall and didn't hate the surroundings! 

Now we don't usually seek out 'mall food' but I had read about IT Burger in a couple of trusted local food blogs (and this is why you should read food blogs) and knew that the burger was worth coming for! Two beefy nicely charred patties, with bacon and cheese and delightful sweet caramelised onions. These onions must have cooked slowly and forever. They were amazing!

The fries were world class also. Skin on and very crisp, I upgraded to Chilli Fries. This was not a mistake. Marie is not keen on burgers but that's OK as IT serves a variety of other things also. 

She had the Butter Chicken on Rice which was as good as we have had at many Indian restaurants. The chef here has some history having cooked at The Westin Calgary and Buchanan's Chop House and by all accounts, is always present. We had all this food and a couple of Cokes for only $25. Amazing!

Belmont Cafe - New Westminster

The rumours of the Belmont Cafe's demise have been greatly exaggerated. Evidently the Belmont Bakery at the same address under different owners bit it some time ago and both Yelp and Zomato continue to display the 'permanently closed' mark on the listing. True, there are separate listings for the new owner but having the same address and same name makes it confusing and this place should not be missed due to confusion.

Kind of tucked in an odd little niche, the Belmont Cafe is unfortunately easy to miss, especially this particular weekend with the Recovery Festival dominating the street.

It was worth the effort however as we enjoyed a very good lunch and were very impressed with our hosts. 

This is a very casual place that serves some home cooking breakfast and lunch dishes but also some stand out Malaysian dishes and even Bubble Tea! There were 4 'mature' ladies in the cafe while we were there and I got the impression that this was their regular haunt. I noticed that one was having a little trouble with the heat of her curry (I expect that she should have ordered mild and not medium).

I had no such problem and enjoyed the warmth and richness of Brisket Curry which was serve with rice. The beef was very tender and the sauce was wonderful!

Marie had Baked Spaghetti with Chicken and Portuguese Sauce. This was also a very nice dish with tender chicken and lots of cheese!

They do a pretty good job with the bubble tea also. This one was melon flavoured. While we were eating, an older lady with a walker got up to leave. One of the young women working at the cafe rushed over to open the door for her which made quite an impression on me! Nice folks, nice food, very decent prices. I wish I lived in the neighbourhood!

Recovery Day September 8, 2018 - New West

The Recovery Day Festival is an acknowledgement that, despite the fact that people continue to fall in record numbers due to overdoses, the presence of fentanyl (known and unknown) in substances, not to mention the many long standing dangers of life with addiction, that meaningful recovery is possible.

New Westminster closed off 6th Street from 6th to 5th Avenue as well as Belmont and many booths were set up providing information on recovery programs. The purveyors of woo were present to be sure (I am looking at you Deepack Chopra followers) but so were representatives of many outstanding programs such as the amazing John Volken Academy, the Salvation Army and various "Anonymous" groups including Debtors Anonymous ( Sorry. Never heard of them but there are like at least 100 groups that use the 12 step program originated by Alcoholics Anonymous).

There was entertainment in various forms, some not so high brow such as wrestling by Royal City Wrestling....

We stood here long enough to get a picture and that's about it. I don't really need to know who won. Plus I can never figure out how the refs miss all those illegal moves. 

There were speakers on many uplifting and educational subjects.

The weather held until the final couple of songs by the Matthew Good Band who provided the headline climax to the festival.

Thank you to the organizers and New Westminster. God bless the efforts of those in the recovery community.

Perverted Ice Cream

I don't know if I consider myself a pervert but I love soft serve ice cream and the Instagram photos from this place have been making me weak in the knees. We wanted to get there before the summer morphed completely into autumn and eating ice cream on the side walk became less of a pleasure.

And really, there is not much room inside so you need to plan on grabbing a cone and getting out. 

There are just enough choices to make most people happy, and they don't seem too perverted (unless I am missing the innuendos). 

Read the menu and make your decision ahead of time so you don't feel the pressure of people lining up behind you!

We chose Brand Spanking which was wonderful (we both loved the perverted crumble) and Coquette.

The cherry is hidden on the other side. This one was a little more subtle in flavouring but still satisfied that craving for cold and sweet! I was also happy with the $5 per cone! Given the unique nature of these cones, I sort of expected to get beaten up a little more. Get in to try this before the weather cools off too much! 

Save On Meats

So about thirty years ago, I was trying to expand my kitchen horizons, getting a little more off the beaten path into some regional French cooking and so on. At the time, out in the Valley, some ingredients were hard to come by or ridiculously expensive. Then I discovered Save On Meats on East Hastings Street. It was a butcher shop where I could get rabbit and lamb shanks and other things and at reasonable prices. So the occasional trip to Vancouver for ingredients came to include a stop under the neon pig!

In the last few years, Save On Meats has been home to a diner, with socially conscious management who are active in the local community, even handing out tokens redeemable for a breakfast sandwich to those in need. Prices are reasonable for the stated purpose of being accessible to the local folks.

Save On has been on my to do list for quite a while so this sunny Sunday we stopped in at about noon. The folks here could not be friendlier and we were soon seated in a comfortable booth and enjoying the artwork and vibe.

It didn't take us long to decide and order.

Chicken and Waffles! This came with a wonderful meaty gravy and syrup and the chicken was nicely tender and moist. Marie and I were split on the crunchy coating. I found it a little dry and was not a fan but she munched down every bit. The waffles themselves tended to be a little heavy. That's the thing about gravy and syrup though, they cover other weaknesses. 

We also had a burger with cheese and bacon. This was a basic winner with a tasty pickle and a nice no nonsense bun. Served with a generous side of in house made "Haystack Fries" which were a good delivery system for any remaining gravy or ketchup! Not sure what the best way is go get them into your mouth though. Someone suggested chopsticks! We recommend this place for its food and its service to the community!

PNE 2018

Growing up in the Fraser Valley, I have been to the PNE more than a few times but surprisingly, not so recently. So I was a little excited to return and see what was new and what had not changed.

Happily, one constant has been "Those Little Donuts". Available here and there throughout the park, these hot and cinnamonny little guys conjure up scenes from my childhood and put me in a good mood as soon as we walked in the gate! Surprisingly, we did not come just for the food. I think my favorite thing is, and always has been,  seeing the animals.

I'm pretty sure that this is stressful  for some of the animals but its a chance for folks to learn a little about how animals are cared for and where their food comes from. The horrible videos we see of animal mistreatment are the exception and not the rule.

And someone has a green thumb. Wow!

There is some impressive entertainment if you time it right including the long running SuperDogs show.

SuperDogs is a wonderful entertaining show to all but the crankiest of fair goers (the dogs are those little blurs in my photo). 

And there is much more depending on what your inclination is, be it dragons and mythology...

Or science and technology. And OK, so we kind of did come for the food too.

But I am going to go right ahead and recommend that you stay clear of the deep fried hamburger. This was a novel idea but in order to contain a hamburger the batter needs to be industrial strength and it was!

I would say good try if it didn't take 30 minutes from getting in line to getting a burger from this understaffed food stand. Still, now I can say, "Oh sure! I've had a deep fried hamburger!"

Don't worry though! There are plenty of other deep fried things to be had, like mediocre fish and chips.

And Kit Kat bars referred to as "Fries". These were good! 

No, we didn't try the candy apple with the bugs on it. I would like to taste crickets and believe that they will become an important future protein source, but stuck to an apple is not what I envision. Sorry!

It was a fun day but we are too tired (and not that interested...sorry Burton) to stay for the evening show.

The best part of the day had to be Juelle's (Marie's Granddaughter) first pony ride!

See ya!

Tandoori Flame - Delta

The only thing better than Indian food is more Indian food! Well, you can see where that is a slight exaggeration. As much as I adore Indian food, south, north and in between, there are love, orcas, kittens, world peace, the John Volken Academy and a bunch of other things that, strictly speaking are better than Indian food (some not by much).

That doesn't mean that I wasn't giddy to finally get to Tandoori Flame. Having read about the long line ups when they first opened, we were happy to see that things have settled a bit and we were seated right away. I admit that I had some misgivings because of the negative reviews with niggling problems that I had read but you can ignore all that whiny stuff (Tip: If you are choking on chicken bones, you are eating too fast!). Our experience was all positive.

While it is true that the buffet is not as large as what I had observed on the website (apparently the Brampton branch is pictured), there is a huge selection of very good food to try. And the place is quite beautiful although I neglected to photograph the dining room!

We started at the beginning and faithfully worked our way around the room. 

It was best to catch the deep fried items as they came out of the fryer and the naan when it came out of the tandoor. As for the rest, Indian food lends itself to buffet style because many of the dishes are braises or stews and can be held on a warming table with no adverse effects.

To be honest, I can't even remember what most of these dishes are but some of my favourites included the goat and lamb dishes. The meat was ridiculously tender and so well flavoured! And I enjoyed anything labelled "Murgh" which evidently is a style of cooking dating back to the Mughal empire of medieval India! How about that! You and I are both learning something now!

We enjoyed some old favourites as well. Marie loves her butter chicken which was lovely.

I avoided the tandoori chicken until there was nothing new to try. As expected, it was a little on the dry side. Not sure why this is such a popular dish...because its red? And I must confess that the dosas were a bit of a disappointment also but its is something that needs to come to you directly off the cooktop and does not lend itself to being kept warm.

Finally a little desert. There was a large selection of diabetic comma inducing Indian deserts. Take it easy in this section but try the white pumpkin pieces (see the little white thing on my plate in front of the ice cream?). It has a bit of interesting almost crunchy texture and is something that I had never experienced. 

Let's talk economics. I know there are cheaper Indian buffets around and too be honest, I can't demolish a buffet like I could when I was younger but the quality of the food here is quite good (and nicely spicy ) and continuously being prepared and replenished. It is worth it just  because of the wonderful selection and I, in trying to be brief in my review have not even told you about everything! The folks here were lovely and attentive! Please give this place a try!