You know it’s fall when you can enjoy some pumpkin spiced lattes. Starbucks is currently promoting two drinks to ring in the Fall season – Salted Caramel Mocha and pumpkin spice latte. KoreanGirl and I were having a chit-chat over some coffee, so we decided to try out the drinks.
Pumpkin Spice Latte was what KoreaGirl ordered. She did enjoy it, but she found it to be very sweet.
Salted Caramel Latte was what I ordered, I didn’t get it with mocha because I don’t like mochas. Instead I substituted it as a latte. The drink was also very sweet. The drink has a few pumps of butternut toffee, so it is sweeter than a normal latte. I would suggest getting it half sweet.
Have you tried their Fall drinks yet? What did you think?
Indochine is located on Broadway and Ontario St. They have menu items influence by South Asian countries such as Thai, Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia. After heading from Science World, we drove a few minutes and decided to come here for the Wednesday special of half price wings and $4.99 import beers. Past visitors have remarked a few items are similar to popular restaurant – Phnom Penh. It is indeed related to Indochine! Same family of restaurants, but Indochine is higher end.
They have some good specials on other nights too! Notably Tuesday, Wednesday and Sunday.
The interior has a large bar with lots of TVs surrounding the room. It’s a great place to see the game or just kick back for a few drinks.
Heineken ($4.99)
Vietnamese Iced Coffee took a long time to arrive at the table. M finished half his beer before my drink even arrived. The taste was good, but the wait was long.
Indochine Garlic Butter Chicken Wings ($4.75) comes with garlic chips and lemon pepper dipping sauce. It was delicious and the most popular item in Indochine. Hands down, awesome! It is also similar to Phnom Penh but its in smaller portions.
Sriracha Buffalo Wings ($4.75) has traditional buffalo wings marinated with Sriracha hot sauce. It wasn’t too spicy either.
Honey Garlic Wings ($4.75) has deep-fried wings glazed with a honey garlic sauce. We enjoyed these and had a good balance of sauce ratio.
Butter Beef Carpaccio ($12) has buttery slices of raw beef in a citrus Vietnamese vinaigrette, garlic chips and cilantro. It’s a very popular item and people order this because it’s a popular item found at Phnom Penh. During our visit at Indochine, when our butter beef carpaccio arrived, the meat was warm and threw off the entire taste and texture of the dish.
Singaporean Laksa ($8.75) has rice vermicelli noodles in a spicy seafood coconut curry broth with prawns, tofu puffs, fish balls, Fish slices, a hardboiled egg and bean sprouts. It was a decent size, but it was definitely a hard dish to share. The flavours of the broth was very good and not too spicy. We enjoyed it.
Overall, the food was good during the 1/2 priced Wings on Wednesday, but I felt the regular prices are a bit expensive. A lot of people compare Phnom Penh and Indochine, but they have different target demographics, so if you have Phnom Penh expectations, you may be disappointed. Portion sizes and prices are different.
Yee Shun Milk Company is located in Causeway Bay and is a popular destination for tourists. I spotted this when using my Trip Advisor app and it was ranked quite highly. The company originated from Macau and opened 4 locations in Hong Kong.
They specialize in steamed milk custard. If you have heard about Australian Milk Company, the products are quite similar.
When you pass by the exterior of the store, you can see a large amount of the steamed milk prepared ahead of time. The turnover rate is quite high, so they do have to prep that many.
Double Steamed Milk (雙皮燉奶) is very smooth and creamy. My little sister loved it and would not put it down! If you come here, someone at you table must order this. The texture reminded me of tofu pudding.
Steamed Milk With Ginger (薑汁燉奶) has a strong intense taste of ginger. A lot of people online rave about how good it is and I absolutely hated it because I don’t eat ginger too often. Some people do love this but its not for me.
Red Bean Ice was what my mom ordered. Its a common drink found in Hong Kong and contains red beans, evaporated milk, ice and sugar syrup. Mom mom thought it was ok, but not great.
Overall, it was fun to come here for a snack to try Steamed Milk Custard. The line ups were not long and we did enjoy the experience despite my hate for ginger.
Words of Wisdom:
Not long waits compared to Australian Dairy Company
In the United States, they have some crazy menu items at some great prices. It’s always awesome to drive down to the states and try items that are not available in Canada. One of those items was the Smores Pie.
Smores Pie is like a normal pie, but it’s filled with chocolate and marshmallow. You have all the components that go into a smores.
Whats different about this pie is that there is a large slit at the top, so the inside is exposed for all to see.
The smores pies was a tad sweet, but it did have a unique taste. It was like a smores, but less messy!
20 Piece McNuggets ($4.99) is so cheap in the states! You could easily order 100 and not break your wallet! This location didn’t have a larger box for them, so it was split off into 2 boxes.
It’s quite hard to eat 20 all by yourself unless you are super super hungry. My friend and I just split these.
Have you had the chance to try the smore pie or bought yourself a ton of McNuggets?
House of Wings Restaurant and Lounge is located in Highgate Mall in South Burnaby. They are quite popular on Sundays for $0.37 cent wings on Sundays. There are no lineups unlike Wings a few blocks away. People usually come here if they want to avoid the line up at Wings.
You need to order a beverage with your wings. Alternatively, your group can share a pitcher to avoid everyone getting a drink. It saves money and the people who want to drink can drink.
The interior was very narrow and the decor was very bare and boring. There are a few large tables, so they can accomodate large groups.
There is a long list of dry and wet wings. What is cool about the menu is that there are a few unusual flavours such as peanut butter & jelly, Fire & Ice, and zippen pepper. The minimum amount per flavour is 10.
Pint of Beer ($9.99) they didn’t have a large amount of beers on their tap, so we just ordered any beer that was light.
We all ordered 60 wings and shared it amongst 6 people. The sizes were a bit on the small size and not as juicy as they could be.
Buffalo Wings were very very saucy, so your fingers do get very dirty. The taste was a tad spicy, but not too bad. If they cut down the amount of sauce, that would be good.
Roasted Red pepper and Garlic Wings was everyone’s favorite. It had good overall flavour.
Cheesy Parmesan Wings was really bad. You could barely taste the cheesy flavour.
Greek Wings looked exactly like the Cheesy Parmesan Wings. We couldn’t tell the difference.
Honey Garlic Wings tasted ok, but it went really cold very fast. I guess that can be said about all of the other wings too.
Salt & Pepper Wings is always a good choice anywhere you go. I liked it.
Overall, the wings and service were satisfactory. We ordered one ranch and one blue cheese dip and she brought us 2 ranch dips and confused everyone at the table. I wouldn’t come in for any other day but Sunday because regular price for what you get is kinda a rip off especially when Wings is a few blocks away. We were all kinda hungry, but we didn’t want to order more.
Chao and Hak has 3 locations all over Hong Kong – North Point, Sheung Shui, and Diamond Hill . They specialize in Chiu Chow cuisine. We came to the Sheung Shui location for some dim sum.
There was a large line up and getting a table for 5 took quite some time. If you come at 12 or 1pm, you will have to wait for a table.
The interior has a lot of tables and has a nice elegant decor.
Fried fish, bittermelon and vegetables in black bean sauce was not my favorite dish because I dislike bittermelon and bones. It’s also not kid-friendly either since its hard to find those small bones.
Marinated Pork Hock are the joints of the foot of the pig. You get a lot of flavourful skin, fat, tendon and bits of tender meat.
Pickled Jelly fish and Pork skin and meat in jelly tasted really good. It’s a dish served cold and makes for a great appetizer.
Pig ear, marinated egg, duck and pork sausage was quite an oily dish. This dish is great for sharing with others at the table.
Marinated eggs, beef, and marinated tofu with a side of vinegar. I enjoyed it!
Spring rolls were cool and long like bread sticks. No one else at the table seemed to like it, so I ate a majority of it.
Sui Mai was ok. We had to wait a long time for it and it was a bit disappointing.
Minced Meatball also took a long time to arrive. It was very moist and flavourful.
Xiao Long Bao was the last dish to arrive. We had high hopes for this dish, but was not what we were expecting.
Overall, the marinated appetizer dishes were very good, but the steamed dim sum items were very disappointing. Also the service was very slow.
Earlier in the month, I decided to use up my Groupon at Sunset Burgers on Nelson St. before it expires. The Groupon was $10 for $20 worth of food. It was set to expire at the end of the month…so good thing I used it since it closed and has become Ace Burger Bar.
If you haven’t used up your Groupon yet, I would suggest getting in contact with Groupon to get your money back.
As for Ace Burger Bar, it has completely new ownership but does serve similar items. I haven’t been there yet, so I am not sure if Ace Burger Bar is good or not.
Below are some pictures of what I had at Sunset Burgers before it closed.
Foodology Disclaimer: VANEATS.ca approached me to try out their “Cray-vings” dining package and write a review about it. I got a complementary dining package for myself and I brought along CandiedZen to keep the review as unbiased as I could.
Cray Kitchen + Bar on Main street near Broadway serves Louisiana Style Crawfish and seafood. If you’ve ever heard of Crab Pot in Seattle, it’s like that but with plastic bags and lots of aromatic sauce. I came here with CandiedZen to check this place out.
Vaneats.ca currently has a dining package called “Cray-vings”, which you can get the following for only $18.50 for a limited time.
1/2 lb of Crawfish, shipped live from Louisana
1/2 lb of Shrimp, shipped from Thailand/Ecuador
Cod Nuggets, deep fried and crispy (3 pieces)
Deep Fried Oysters, spiced in a Louisana cajun fry batter (2 pieces)
Cajun Fries, cajun spice peppered
The interior was nice and has a good amount of seating. It’s good for large groups too, unfortunately, they don’t take reservations on Fridays and Saturdays.
The menu
When you order the Cajun Seafood Boil, your table will be lined with a large parchment paper and come with a bucket with bibs, paper towels, and gloves. Eating this type of seafood is messy and you don’t want to get any of your clothes dirty.
The first basket of goodies that arrive are 3 piece of cod nuggets, 2 deep-fried oyster, and a bed of cajun fries.
The Cod Nuggets are very very delicious! The outer batter is crispy and thin, so you can taste the amazing light and moist texture of the cod. I would highly recommend this!
Deep Fried Oyster were very large and plump. When I bit into them, it was very moist and flavourful! Even a bit of juice started running down my fingers. Highly recommend these as well!
Cajun Fries were crispy on the outside and seasoned with cajun spice. I thought it was ok, nothing too impressive.
You also get 3 dips to go along with your item – Tartar sauce, ketchup and spicy mayo.
As we waited for the 1/2 lb shrimp and 1/2 lb crayfish to arrive, we prepared ourselves by reading instruction and putting on our bibs. We didn’t bother with putting on gloves since we wanted to get down and dirty with our meal.
Our Cajun Seafood Boil came with choices of seasoning and spicy level. We chose the Mild Cray Mix ( Juicy Cajun +Garlic Butter +Lemon Pepper). It arrives on your table in a plastic bag.
The Crawfish were very tiny and it was just like a mini lobster. All of their Crawfish is shipped from Louisiana. You can acquire meat from this creature from its tail and claws. This wasn’t our favorite item since it takes a bit of effort to get a little bit of meat. Another problem, the meat had very little flavour from the sauce, so you need to dunk it into the sauce to add more favour to it.
Most of the crawfish is our bag was fresh, but there was one that was completely black on the inside. I’m not sure what happened here, but we decided not to eat it and discard it. If you come across one that looks like that…its probably best not to eat it.
The shrimps are from Ecuador and very massive. It’s almost the size of a spot prawn. It had a lovely sweet flavour to it. I would highly recommend the shrimp!
Our table definitely got messy. After eating everything that was part of the package, we were still hungry and craving more items, so we ordred more.
I saw that they had Sapporo on tap, so I got a pint of it to enjoy more of the meal! It’s one of my favorite beers. It was about $7 or $8 for a pint.
1lb of Clams ($11.99)in a mild garlic butter sauce. The clams tasted great in the sauce, but I felt the clams were a tad bit small. We ate these pretty fast since the bag is mostly the shells.
1 lb of Shrimp ($10.99) in a medium Cray mix sauce. I did enjoy the sauce more when you increase the spiciness of it. It definitely adds a lot more flavour.
Overall, the concept of getting messy with your food is very fun! I would definitely come here again, but I would not order the crawfish. I would order the cod nuggets, deep-fried oysters and the shrimp. Parking was a bit difficult since it was on a major street, so I parked a few blocks down in a residential area. Service was ok, but we felt it was a bit awkward at times.
You won’t get full by just having the amount of items included in the dining pass. you probably want to add an extra appetizer or a few extra pounds of seafood like what we did. Nonetheless, if you haven’t experienced getting down and dirty with your meal, I think the dining pass is a good opportunity to do that and try new types of food. You can get the dining pass at Vaneats.ca for $18.50.
Words of Wisdom:
Best to make reservations just in case it gets busy
Shrimps are massive and so are the deep fried oysters and cod nuggets
We were looking inside Silvercord in Tsim Sha Tsui for Ho Choi Seafood Restuarant, but in its place is Grand Hall restaurant. It serves the same exact food, except they did major renovations and changed their name. This was confirmed by our waitress and is still operated by the Ho Choi Group. They own various restaurants all across Hong Kong.
We went around 11:30 and it was quite empty until around 1pm. It got really busy around 1pm. We ordered a bunch of different dim sum dishes for a group of 9. There were so many dishes that it was hard to keep track of whats what.
Rice Rolls, Deep Fried Wontons, and Beef Stuffed in Rice rolls.
These all tasted pretty good especially with the sauces they are accompanied with. There were so many sauces on our table that it was hard to remember which sauce goes with what dish. As long as you dunk the rice rolls into a dark sauce, you’ll be alright.
Minced Meat Balls was very moist and contained a variety of items inside the meatball. Very delicious!
Minced Chicken on Steamed Rice tasted ok, but was a bit dry and could have used some more sauce.
This was another rice dish, but I don’t remember what this is.
Spring Rolls look like long bread sticks! It was so weird seeing them in this form!
Steamed Pork Dumplings (Xiao Long Bao) comes in 4 pieces. The skin was very thin, so no matter how carefully you picked it up, it would always break.
Big Dumpling in Soup tasted very good. The broth was delicious and the seafood stuffed inside was yummy.
Double Steamed Milk was so delicious and melted in your mouth like custard. So good!
Overall, the meal was pretty solid. Some items were a hit and miss, but it was a good venue for a large family gathering.
Words of Wisdom:
Great for large parties
Decent Prices
Gets busy around 1pm
Lots of tables
Recently renovated and clean
We Rate Grand Hall:
Address:
3 / F, Silvercord, 30 Canton Road, Tsim Sha
The Sandbar Restaurant has a happy hour special for mussels called “mussel mania” in their Teredo Lounge. It includes mussels, fries, and a pint of Granville Island Beer for $12. It used to be $10, but prices have risen. You can get this on the weekday from 3-6pm. It’s a good deal considering Sandbar is a bit expensive for dinner.
KoreanGirl, CanuckGirl and I came here to grab a quick bite.
It wasn’t very busy inside, nor was the Teredo Lounge very busy either.
Complementary Bread arrived at the table, but they didn’t give us utensils to spread the butter onto our bread. We had to ask them to give us side plates and cutlery.
Service was very poor from the start of the meal and didn’t improve. We found this was very interesting because the restaurant had lots of staff, but most of them were standing around.
Granville Island Pale Ale is my favorite beer since it’s light and sweet.
The mussels come in 3 sauces of your choice – Thai Curry, Vindaloo, and Tomato Provencal. When the mussels arrive, you think you are getting a bucket of mussels, but the bucket is just for the shells.
Vindaloo Mussels was ordered by me and I did enjoy the sauce. It wasn’t too spicy and coated each mussel nicely. The size of the mussels were fair and there were no complaints.
Tomato Provencal had pieces of chorizo inside. CanuckGirl enjoyed them because of the meat and the mussels.
Thai Curry Mussels was enjoyed by KoreanGirl. She was kinda disappointed by the size once she realized the bucket didn’t contain as my mussels. Looks can be deceiving.
Overall, it was a good-sized snack before dinner. We girls did have a good meal despite the lack in service.
Words of Wisdom:
Poor service
Weekdays 3-6pm Mussel Mania for $12
We Rate Sandbar Seafood Restaurant:
Address:
1535 Johnston St, Creekhouse #102
Vancouver, BC
After coming back from the Ten Thousand Buddhist Monestary in Sha Tin, we went to a Home Square mall and it contained an IKEA. This location is the largest in Hong Kong with 8,400 sq meters. I really wanted to see how the store layout and food compared to how it is in Vancouver.
It also won one “Best Restaurant Awards in 2012” for a Fast Food Restaurant on OpenRice.com.
All of the items in the IKEA bistro are similar to what you can find in North America. The item that I noticed that they have is popcorn. I haven’t seen this in the IKEAs in Vancouver.
There is also the Swedish Food Market where you can find frozen Swedish Meat Balls, fish, jam, juice, etc.
At the IKEA Restaurant, they have a few of the usual items like Swedish meatballs, vegetarian medallions, shrimp cocktail, and apple pie.
Their kids meal is a bit different too. Spaghetti, corn and sausages.
We were still full from a large lunch, so my sister and I got bottled drinks.
Grapefruit Juice was good and similar to the usual bottle juices.
Organic Soy Milk isn’t sweetened, so it tastes pretty bad if you are not used to drinking unsweetened soy milk. It is healthy for you, but I found it so hard to drink.
Another thing I found that was super different was the washing machine in the kitchens! It’s usual in Hong Kong. With the limited space, that’s where it goes instead of the dish washer.
Address:
L6, HomeSquare
138 Sha Tin Rural Committee Road, Sha Tin
We were walking along the street markets and we all got very thirsty because the weather was about 35 degrees. There were even warnings about how hot it was outside.
On the corner of Wing Kut Street, there is a man who sells juice. The juice is made fresh right in front of you, so there are no preservatives or an other ingredients. Pure 100% juice!
He offers a wide variety of juices and you can even request your own combination. You may even want to try juices that aren’t available in North America. A small drink is $7 HKD, large is $12 HKD and extra Large is $17 HKD. Very cheap and affordable.
There were lots of people ordering especially business men that were passing by. He wait wasn’t too long as he works really fast to make the juice.
Depending on the item you order, it can be made from a juice extractor…
or if its a orange..it will be from a juicer.
You can also purchase fruit as well if you don’t want juice.
Pineapple Pear Lemon (Large-$12) and it was so good. It was a surprising combination of flavours. Unfortunately, since he doesn’t use ice, the drink isn’t cold enough. Nonetheless, the flavours were great.
You can continue doing a bit of more shopping after you get your drink! There are other places all around Hong Kong that sell juice on the street. I don’t think this particular stand is famous or anything, but it has a convenient location in the business district in Hong Kong.
Lin Heung Tea House was established in 1926 and is one of the oldest tea houses in Hong Kong. With over 8 decades of serving locals and tourists, dim sum is served with the most traditional recipes that results in an endless flow of diners. This place is packed all the time! Not many places in Hong Kong still serve traditional dim sum. You may want to come very early in the morning or late in the afternoon ( 6am and 3:30pm).
They serve dim sum during the day and main dishes during the night.
Don’t be afraid to get cozy with strangers. You may be forced to share tables, but it’s a natural occurrence in Hong Kong. It really helps if you come with someone who can speak Cantonese! It will help a lot when ordering and finding your table.
Service is quite horrendous as the servers are very rude and not very helpful. People are here for the food and not the service.
You will need to wash your utensils even if they look its clean. Just dunk it in tea! They don’t give you napkins either, so make sure you bring a pack of tissues with you.
The tea doesn’t come in a tea-pot, but they have these traditional type of tea pots. You steep the tea in the larger cup and pour it into your tea cup when it’s done steeping.
It’s really difficult to pour if you’re never tried it before.
When you need to get your tea refilled with hot water, the server brings a huge kettle and pours with crazy accuracy. Every time they come by to pour hot water, I am always so scared just in case they scald us with hot water.
Steamed Beef Balls comes in 3 pieces and are delicious!
Pork tripe is a bit scary since it’s an organ. It’s a bit tough and chewy
Beef Tripe and intestines were very chewy, but the sauce that it was in was delicious.
Steamed Sausage Bun is yummy and a great item for kids.
Braised Chicken feet is a typical dish found in Dim Sum. Some love it, some find it super scary. You kinda have to get use to it. I personally like it since you essentially just eat the skin off the bones.
Steamed Fish Head is very succulent and has a delicious flavour when you suck the meat off the bones.
This dish has chicken, mushroom, and fish maw in a yummy flavourful sauce.
Braised Liver looks really nasty, but the liver does have a chalky flavour and texture to it. If you haven’t had liver before, you may not like it.
Chicken Feet wrapped in bean curd wrap was something I haven’t seen done before. the bean curd did taste good.
Fish Cake wrapped in Cabbage was one of my favorite dishes.
Steamed Chinese Sponge Cake (Ma Lai Go) is very very tall compared to most places. It’s usually made out of flour, eggs, butter, lard and brown sugar and then steamed. It tasted very good!
Words of Wisdom:
Wake up early to order the Big Chicken Bun (“Dai Bao”)
Gong Cha first launched in Taiwan in 2006 and soon opened locations in Hong Kong, Singapore, Macau, China, Malaysia, and Philippines. There are a lot of locations all over Hong Kong and attracts locals and tourists. They are best known for their signature milk tea with a dollop of cream on top.
The location in East Tsim Sha Tsui was very busy and had lots of tourists ordering drinks. The menu had some english and the cashiers knew a little bit of english too. It’s not great english, but at least it will make your ordering experience go smoothly.
On top of each drink are instructions on how to consume it:
Open the lid and drink, letting the tea pass through the foamy layer.
Insert the straw and enjoy the flavour of the tea.
Use the straw to stir and enjoy the combined flavour of the tea and milk.
Milk Tea ($10) has the tea on the bottom with the dollop of cream on top. It was delicious and different than usual bubble teas. The cream does change the taste a lot and not everyone will love it. My sister liked the drink at first, but eventually started hating the cream on top.
Gong Cha Milk Green Tea ($12) needed a good mixing in order to incorporate the layers together. I tried mixing it together very well, but it was a bit hard to do that. The cream itself was salty.
Afterwards, my sister and I headed to Kowloon Park to walk around and enjoy the fountains and trees.
Overall, Gong Cha was ok, but not the best bubble tea I’ve ever had. We were not a fan of the cream on top.
Every Summer, my friends and I would go berry picking somewhere within driving distance of Vancouver. Last year we went to Driediger Farms , but this year I chose Krause Berry Farms a few blocks down. It is about 40 mins drive from the city.
Krause Berry Farms is family operated and offers visitors to participate in “U-Pick”, where you can go into the fields to pick blueberries, strawberries, blackberries, and raspberries. All you do is pay the weight of what you picked. It’s a great activity with friends or family.
If you are feeling lazy, you can purchase berries from their market.
Besides picking berries and purchasing produce, they also have a small playground, a petting farm, and carriage rides.
We headed into the blueberry patches and saw rows upon rows of bountiful blueberries. You have to pay attention to what you pick because there are berries that aren’t ripe yet.
If it’s a sunny day, remember to bring a hat or wear sunscreen. My friend brought me a small red straw hat to wear. It was really random, but at least I was shielded by the sun.
I got really excited when I see really big plump blueberries like these. We probably spent about an hour or so in the fields. Some people may take longer depending on how much care they put into picking the berries.
At times, you can hear people screaming in the blueberry patches. It’s because they are startled by the spiders and insects. It’s nature, so what can you expect? You will come across bugs in the fields but they won’t hurt you…at least I don’t think they will. The insects just look ugly.
There are also really big flying bugs too. Don’t let this detour you from picking blueberries. It’s part of the whole experience!
We picked about a whole bucket. If you do fill the whole bucket, it’s about 6 lbs and will cost around $10. Not bad of a price!
The Porch is the area where you can grab some food after picking your berries. They have a selection of different pies, donuts, pizza, roasted corn, drinks, ice cream and other yummy treats.
It’s usually a nice sunny day, so it’s really awesome to eat out on the patio. There are lots of seats and not too cold during blueberry picking season.
Raspberry Smoothie ($3.50) was really good and made out of the raspberries picked fresh from their fields.
Blueberry Smoothie ($3.50) was yummy as well. The downside about drinking this smoothie is that some of the blueberries might be stuck in your teeth. When you finish this drink, remember to check your teeth.
10″ Baked Corn Pizza ($14.95) is divided up into 4 slices. Ordering the whole pizza is great for a group of people. It contains a lot of corn, tomato sauce, cheese, green onions, peppers, and artichokes.
Slice of Corn Pizza ($3.99) you can alternatively order a slice instead of the whole pizza.
The pizza is packed full of corn and is very yummy. I just didn’t like the crust of the pizza. It didn’t seem very fresh.
Farm Fries ($3.95) were golden brown to perfection, but lacked in taste. It needed a bit more salt and needed to be a bit more crispy.
Roasted Corn wasn’t on the menu, but you can still order it. It is rubbed with a bit of butter and tastes yummy!
Slice of berry custard pie ($4.50) was loaded with tons of berries, but I wasn’t in love with the pie. I loved the look, but I found the combination of the custard and the glaze to be a bit too sweet.
Scoop of Raspberry Ice Cream ($2.50) was delicious in the hot weather.
Inside the market is a lot of produce, products and a bakery.
If you are too lazy to pick berries, you can purchase then from the counter. It’s a bit more expensive, but it’s still delicious and fresh.
Everyone fall in love with the custard berry pie. It’s $15.99 and you can be staring at this forever!
Overall, picking the berries and having lunch at Krause Berry Farms is pretty awesome. Some of the food from The Porch is a bit hit and miss, but you can’t go wrong with a refreshing smoothie. I really enjoyed the U-Pick portion of this adventure. I always pick a whole bucket so I can freeze them for later months to make milk shakes.
Words of Wisdom:
Check website for up to date prices and what berries are in season
TaiwaneseGirl spots something called McBites on Instagram and lures KoreanGirl and I on an adventure to Seattle for McDonalds McBites and outlet shopping. It was a spontaneous decision, but I really wanted to see what these mysterious McBites were all about. They are like popcorn chicken from KFC, but McDonalds Style. they recently introduced Spicy McBites.
It’s available in the United States, but not in Canada.
We all decided to get the spicy McBite meals. The interior of McDonalds was crazy air-conditioned, so we sat outside.
The drinks are a bit different than the ones in Canada. They have Powerade and Hi C.
The meal cost $5.42 after tax for a regular size of McBites, fries and drink.
The Spicy Chicken McBites comes in the regular box, they don’t have any specialized packaging for the spicy version.
The McBites are a bit smaller than McNuggets, but there is enough in the box to get full.
The packaging in surprisingly ingenious! There is a slot to put in your dipping sauce.
It’s chicken meat inside and the coating of the McBites was similar to the coating of the chicken strips. It wasn’t very spicy and was a bit bland. You definitely need some sauce to go along with these. I was a bit disappointed by these and KFC definitely has better popcorn chicken.
My travel agent in Hong Kong did a horrible job at finding me a decent place to stay in Korea. The hotel that they wanted to book me in looked really rundown and was way overpriced for what it looked like. I decided to find my own accommodations and Trip Advisor suggested Tria Hotel for a nice budget hotel in the Gangnam area. It was under 100,000 won per night.
Since I was traveling on my own, I needed to find a nice and safe hotel that was affordable.
If you are wondering, I didn’t see anything related to the Gangnam Style song by PSY. I actually didn’t hear about this song till weeks after I came back home. (It’s a pretty good song FYI)
A lot of people complained about how the streets are filled with “sexy” hotels in the area. They aren’t wrong, there are a few around, but no one really bothers you during the day or night. There are lots of restaurants in the area, so it’s convenient if you want a snack or a meal.
Since I did book very last-minute, there was only a double bed room available.
The bathroom is very weird in my opinion. The wall and doors are frosted so you can kinda see into the bathroom. I was so glad I wasn’t travelling with anyone because this would be awkward seeing someones silhouette in the washroom.
They provide you with a TV and computer, but I didn’t use them since I brought my own laptop. There is wifi access in the room and there is no password to it. Just connect to the network with your room number.
They provide you with complementary combs, hair product, shower caps, hair ties, and mosquito repellant.
They also have toothbrush, toothpaste, a razor, and shaving cream. If you forget anything, they have you covered.
They also have shampoo, conditioner, and body wash.
They have a kettle for you to boil hot water for tea and coffee.
There was also a fridge in the closet. When I opened it, there were 2 bottle of water, a can of orange juice and a can of coffee. It was complementary!
I took all the coffee, juice, tea, and bottle of water. I hid them all in my suitcase so the cleaning ladies would replenish my fridge. It was complementary, so might as well take it all right?
If you need anything else like additional drinks or meals, they have a menu that you can order from their cafe. Do keep in mind, you do get complementary breakfasts every morning in their cafe. Unfortunately, I never went for the breakfasts since I wanted to go out for food.
On the last day, they have breakfast delivered up to the room. They will call you once you are back and they ask you for a time you want the food to be delivered. It was a sandwich and a coffee.
The coffee was drip coffee and you can add your own sugar and cream.
The sandwich is really big and it has a lot of vegetables, egg, chicken, and cheese. It was a decent sandwich. I think it tasted better because it was breakfast in bed. It was a lovely touch!
Travel Tips
Buy a T-Pass from the convenience store once you get out of the arrival gates. Having it will save a lot of time and effort of figuring out how to pay for transit. Just load it up and tap it everytime you get on the buses or subway. I would suggest taking the 6703KAL Limo Bus from Incheon Airport since it takes over an hour to arrive at the hotel.
It costs 14,000 won and it saves the trouble of overpaying for a taxi or switching subway lines. You can also take a nice long nap! The bus is air conditioned and the seats are confortable.
Get off at Renaissance Hotel and walk a few blocks. It’s not very far.
After getting off the plane, if you need a cell phone. The Incheon Airport has a few companies offering rental cellphones. I chose S-Roaming since it was one of the cheaper option. Plus, you get 50% off when you reserve a day before. You can rent smartphones or regular phones. I chose the smartphone since I wanted data to look at maps and use travel apps. It was a fair price and comes in VERY handy.
Final Thoughts
Tria Hotel was a nice hotel to stay at especially when having a last minute booking. The staff was very helpful and could help me store my luggages since my planes came at strange times. There are other cheaper options around town, but compared to other hotels, this is a good option. It’s nice looking, clean, and has a lot of amenities.
The location is far from most tourist locations, but the subway is very convenient and the green line does go to most tourist places, so not a lot of transferring.
Address:
677-11 Yeoksam 1(il)-dong,
Gangnam-gu, Seoul,
South Korea
Sanchon or “Mountain Village” is one of the most famous restaurants that specialize in traditional vegetarian food served in Buddhist temples. The food is made from organic vegetables fresh from the mountainside. If you are tired of all the fried and grilled food in Seoul, this is definitely a great place to go to.
The location was a few restaurants away from my hotel – Tria Hotel. I came to dine here during lunch with M’s relatives.
The restaurant is located on the second level and instead of sitting on chairs, you sit on the floor. For those who are cannot cross their legs or not accustomed to sitting on the floor, you may feel uncomfortable dining here.
We ordered a set meal and a bunch of banchan arrives at the table. There are over 10 small dishes that arrive at the table made out of different vegetables. Even though these portions are small, it was a lot of food! Each dish had its own unique taste. Some spicy and some non-spicy.
Next, they gave us a plate with pork, perilla leaves and some other vegetable. We ate these together and it was so good!
There was even kimchi stew and a side of tofu that came along with it. There was a lot of food and it just kept coming.
There was also tofu soup.
Then there was more soup and then rice. By this point, we were SO FULL. I haven’t eaten this much in a long time. The meal was my favorite in Korea. It was a tad pricey than other meals in Korea, but it is so worth it to try this experience. I haven’t had this type of dining experience before and I loved it!
After the lunch we headed on up to Seoul Tower to check out the view of Seoul. It’s just amazing how large the city really is. We were fortunate that the monsoon storm disappeared so we were able to see most of the city clearly.
On one of the windows it shows how far away from home I really was. 7,174.20km to be exact.
Overall, this day was pretty awesome. I had incredible food at Sanchon and got a great view of Seoul from Seoul Tower.
We Rate Sanchon:
Address:
677-11 Yeoksam 1(il)-dong,
Gangnam-gu, Seoul, South Korea
