Restaurant #81 - Kim Long - March 22nd 2013

One word: Meh.

It was a buffet, there was good stuff and bad stuff. I didn't appreciate that the dishes weren't labelled, as I ended up with a piece of fried fish, thinking it was chicken (I have fish allergies, so if I ate it, it would have been a problem, but maybe there's a potential North American-type lawsuit in there somewhere...??). Anyways, the food was all just ok, nothing really special for me. Stephan did say that once again, like Chan's house, he enjoyed the mushrooms. They didn't taste the same as Chan's, but they were both good. (I liked these ones more than Chan's though).

The Novinscak Index wasn't all that good either, too much breading, not enough chicken.

 

 

Restaurant #80 - Kichee Sushi - March 15th 2013

I've been wanting to go to this place for a while to see if it's any good. We were going to go to 1755, but turns out it's just a drinking pub, not an eating pub, so we had to go elsewhere, and nearby was Kichee sushi.

It's in an old converted house, so we were seated in the upstairs portion. The menu looked good, they have a mix of Japanese and Korean dishes. Stephan got the teppenyaki beef, and he said it was good. Overall, we gave this place a 7, it wasn't bad at all, and to me, it compares to Pink Sushi, which is my standard, but I really enjoy the yam maki and chicken maki from Pink Sushi, so it's hard to beat those two.

 

Restaurant #79 - Piscies - March 8th 2013

The Gang went to Piscies. They said it was good. Stephan had fish.

 

 

 

Restaurant #78 - Chan's House - March 1st 2013

We went to eat at Chan's House. It's a Chinese buffet in Dieppe. The one thing that I found cool about this place is that you can do take-out with the buffet. They give you one of those styrofoam boxes and you fill it up, they weigh it, and you get your Chinese take out. The disadvantage of this is than when you're trying to navigate the buffet, you have all these extra people that are trying to fill up their trays. The other negative was that the floor was wet/slippy and I almost fell a few times, and almost ended up doing the splits once.

On to the food. To me, the food was just ok. I didn't enjoy it that much, I found that a lot of the vegetable dishes were just mushy, greasy vegetables, so I didn't enjoy those. The egg rolls were good (I think that everyone agreed on that, but they aren't the best. If memory serves, Stephan gave them a solid 7.5 on 10). For the chicken balls, it started off well, Darren had good balls with lots of meat. Which led us to come up with the Novinscak Index for chicken balls. It's calculated as the ratio of chicken/chicken+batter, so the higher the number is the better. We were willing to give it a quite high ratio, but as we all had more chicken balls, the ratio went down drastically. (I took a picture of a bad ball, there's a molecule of chicken in the center of all that batter).

Now, on to the good stuff, Stephan's favorite item on the menu was the Mushrooms and Beef (however, he did mention that there was little beef in the mix, but it didn't stop him from enjoying them). Darren also like the chow mein (I think it was this one) and it actually was pretty good. I liked the pork balls, the Novinscak Index was quite high, but mostly because there was no batter on the balls. I'm not sure what Stephane's favorite was, but I do remember him getting a plate of mussels, and I think he even went back for more, so they must have been good.

As for desserts, they were ok. What I didn't like was that I didn't see the names of the items, so I wasn't too sure what I was getting. I did get a piece of chocolate pie, a ginger molasses cookie and some ice cream. The ice cream was good because it wasn't hard as a rock, but it was in getting the ice cream that I slipped an almost did the splits. Stephane got an interesting ice cream that we couldn't tell the flavor in the beginning, but Darren ended up identifying it as Butter Rum.

All in all, in my opinion, this place was ok, not my favorite buffet, but not the worst either, so it should get something like 5 thumbs up.

 

 

The offending "chicken ball" 

Restaurant #77 - Thanh's Palace - February 22nd 2013

Thanh's place is in Dieppe. It's a bit away from the central part (on Champlain Street, almost near the airport). Most of us had been there once or twice before, but for Stephane and Pierre, it was a first time. We ended up sitting at a round table, which was a bit weird for me, because that way I felt like I had to have a conversation with everyone, but I'm only used to having to talk to two or three people max, so it was a bit unnerving, but I got over it.

On to the food. Based on what we remembered from our last experience, no one had real high expectations. It ended up that the food was a lot better than what we were expecting (maybe due to our low expectations), and everyone seemed to enjoy their meal and I think that we would consider going to eat here again. Stephan had lemongrass chicken, and he said that it was good, but not his favorite, but didn't have a real reason to explain why it wasn't as good, except that it wasn't the one that he was used to, so there was no real negative to his meal. Besides that, the imperial rolls were good, I liked my Ginger chicken, but I would have wished for a stronger ginger taste, but I added some rooster sauce, and it spiced it up and tasted quite good.

Overall, a good eat, except that it's a bit out of town and can be annoying to get there with all the people trying to get into Dieppe after work.

 

 

 

Restaurant #76 - House of Lam February 15th 2013

We went to House of Lam on Mountain Road. This was the first time that I have been there, Stephan, Stephane and Darren had already been there before. I wasn't quite sure what to expect of the place, as with buffets, the dishes with vegetables always taste mushy and when we went to Sun Sun's, it wasn't exceptional food either, but I ended up getting the Lemon Chicken (it was between that and the General Tao's chicken) and I was pleasantly surprised. I got it spicy, it was nice and spicy and flavorful and not mushy or anything. If my memory is correct, Stephan got the Jumbo Shrimp Shanghai Style, and he had enjoyed his food also. Darren and Stephane liked theirs too.

If I was in the mood for Chinese, I would definitely consider this place. Nine thumbs up.

 

 

 

Restaurant #75 - An's Café and Restaurant - February 8th 2013

If you have ever had the problem of going out with friends and one wants Italian, one French and the other Korean food, well, this is the place for you! Definitely a weird mix of food styles on the menu, especially since the place is set up as a café. They do have a bunch of cookies and cakes/pastries when you walk it, so it is a nice little display in front of you.

When it came to the food, the soup of the day was mushroom soup, which was good, and for our main meal, we each ended up picking a different nationality. Darren was French, Stephane Italian and I was Korean. Darren ended up getting the most expensive meal of the menu, it looked quite good, but it wasn't really worth the price. Stephane got pasta (the one with sour cream and cream in the sauce...) and he said it was just ok, he's had better before. As for me, I got Bibimbap, and it was ok, but I've also had better before too.

For dessert, Darren and I had a piece of a raspberry mousse cake and Stephane got a cookie. I really enjoyed the raspberry cake, it was nice and light and went down very easy. Overall, I think that this place is ok, but that it should settle down to one type of food and do that type well (I feel like Gordon Ramsey on Kitchen Nightmares right now :))

I'd suggest this place more as a spot to get a soup or have a coffee and a piece of dessert. It gets 6 thumbs up.