Tin Tin Seafood Harbour Restaurant opened just this past Monday on January 21st. It is in the exact location of the former popular Chinese restaurant, Sea Harbour Seafood Restaurant which has now moved to River Rock.

Seating was quite comfortable and roomy. The place was bright and everything was new. If you pay before 11am, the bill is 20% off.

Overall this restaurant's price and food quality is not as high as the former restaurant at this location. The majority of the dishes I tried today were quite good except for the rice roll which was overdone so the texture was a bit rough.

Scallop Taro Dumpling

Fruffles Dumplings - Fish & black truffle

Fish Fillet Rice Roll

Steam Chicken Buns with Shrimp

Fish Bones in Chili Sauce

Baked Durian Pastry

As a restaurant quite close to UBC I've heard about The Eatery many times before and tried it last week! The decor does live up to its hype. It's not photographed very well here because it's quite dark but there are a lot of quirky things hanging off the wall, many of which are Japanese inspired.

The menu is quite extensive with many, many rolls to choose from so if you're indecisive you should probably check out the menu online before heading to the restaurant. I ordered the Spider Roll which has fried soft shell crab in the roll. Overall I liked it but it didn't have the surprising factor like the decor.

Spider Roll

Totoro Cafe in December opens at 7:00pm and we were one of two tables in the restaurant at 7:30pm. It does not have great ratings on Urbanspoon and the name of this restaurant has been around for eight years. However, around two months ago Totoro Cafe changed owners so the previous reviews were based on a different management. 

The decor of the restaurant was colourful with cats everywhere. There were tables along the wall and couches for larger groups.

We ordered a Pork Floss and Seaweed Waffle which was pretty soft whereas I enjoy my waffles with a bit more crunch on the outside. All the plates and cups we used had cats on them!

This thick toast does not look as delicious as the waffle but it was! It was hot with a layer of butter and sugar baked on top.

The Chicken Gyoza was evidently bought from the store and not self made so they were just the typical ones you can find in the freezer section.

I really liked the cat mug that contained my hot Ovaltine with Pearls. I appreciated the amount of pearls that the drink came with because I love chewing them on their own.

Below is another photo of the cute cup and teapot that this restaurant is full of! I think Totoro Cafe's decor and cat decorations outshines it's menu items. The food and drinks served here can be found at many bubble tea restaurants but if you appreciate cute decorations then it is worth a visit!

You can't tell in the following photo but coincidentally I was wearing my cat paw earrings when I ate at this cat decor filled restaurant!

Catching a glimpse of Santa Claus is always fun around Christmas season, especially because he changes looks wherever you go! That day he was inspecting his elves with Mrs. Claus.

Anyways back to the food at Haroo which is a small Korean restaurant on Alexandra Road. For lunch, it is only open for the short hours of 12:00-2:30pm (closed Tuesdays).

I ordered the L6 lunch set with Bulgogi soup and Korean rice cake. I really liked my meal! The Bulgogi soup and rice cake were both on the sweeter side but you can always add the complimentary spices to enhance the flavour. This restaurant is quite family style but much cleaner than other Korean restaurants I've been to. I appreciated the details from the finely sliced egg pieces (yellow garnish on the rice cake and soup) to the paper thin sliced carrot flower on the salad. To top it off, it came with a yogurt drink that I loved as a child.

Overall, I will definitely be coming back again to try their other menu items!

It was the cold day before the first real snow fall for Vancouver this winter season so we went to Michigan Noodle Restaurant for some warm comfort food. Michigan is known for their congee but we ordered off their lunch special menu instead.

The vegetarian spring rolls came hot and crispy fresh out of the fryer! I thoroughly enjoyed them on their own without the semi-sweet dipping sauce.

The Beef Brisket & Tendon with Rice Noodle Rolls wasn't as good as the beef brisket I get at Parker Place but still a pretty good dish that will fill you up! The sauce is flavorful with various herbs and soy sauce marinated with the beef brisket.

I visited Gyo-O for the first time when it opened a few years ago and have not been back until today! However, I did remember that I had a good experience there so I was eager to try their food again tonight. The restaurant is quite small with two rows of tables on either side so it is not the place to go with a large group.

We ordered an appetizer called BBQ Salmon Skin and I was expecting it to be deep fried and crunchy but it wasn't. Some pieces were slightly crispy but most were not. The salmon skin pieces rested on top of some greens and was drizzled with sweet teriyaki-like sauce. It was pretty tasty but I wouldn't necessarily order it again since I'd want to try something else next time.

BBQ Salmon Skin

The Garlic Ramen with tonkotsu broth (marinated pork bone soup base) was one of the best ramen  soups I've had! It was creamy and full of flavour with every sip. There were a few pieces of squid, shrimp, and clams in the bowl but I would have preferred pork slices. This may even be better than the ramen I tried at Kintaro!

Garlic Ramen

 The Salmon and Tuna Don was honestly nothing special. It was simply what it looks like in the photo: salmon, tuna, and plain rice. I mixed the rice with the teriyaki sauce from the BBQ Salmon Skin to give it more taste but otherwise the whole bowl was very plain. I remember I tried a chicken karaage don here before and the sauce made the whole dish tasty!

Salmon and Tuna Don

Overall, I still really like Gyo-O and I would come back to try the other ramens.

After my last chocolate fondue experience at Capstone I thought that it would be awhile before I try  fondue again but awhile turned out to be less than a month later. This time I tried the chocolate fondue at Mink which is near the Pan Pacific Vancouver.

The dark chocolate choice was more rich and cocoa flavoured than Capstone's dark chocolate. The strawberries were very sweet and ripe which was a treat in the middle of this fall/winter period. All of the food tasted great dipped in chocolate but the mandarin oranges were my least favourite.

 Mink also offers S'mores complete with graham crackers, marshmellows, chocolate, and a little burner! This is a convenient option for those who aren't going anywhere near a campfire soon but I still prefer the authentic bonfire made S'mores with chocolate pieces instead of fondue chocolate. It seems too much of an outdoors tradition to bring indoors.