Yet another night of OT and the piglets need some nourishment... where to go for a nice warm meal on a dreary rainy day? We drive inside the Continental Center and see a small place that looks open and has available seating. Urbanspoon? 85% and a part of the Gyozaking restaurant group! Ok, in we go.
Hm, only one other table occupied... maybe it'll get fuller. Iron Chef Japan is showing on the tv and I L-O-V-E the interior. As the night goes on, maybe 4 tables are full at one time. Maybe it's jut a slow night... Mr. Piglet and I settle into our booth seats and check out the extensive menu consisting of udon in soup, don and something called the unfortunately named bukkake udon, soupless noodles mixed with assorted goodies (if you want to know what the other meaning of "bukkake" is, go to your local XXX store). When I say extensive, I'm not kidding - the menu is split into a multi-paged booklet and 4 other stand-alone sheets. Too much to choose from but fortunately, there's a page that lists its most popular entrees and side dishes so we're off to the races!
Pork and Prawn Pan-fried Gyoza - 8 pcs $10
We figured this would be a hit since this IS a Gyozaking-run restaurant and with a name like that, the gyoza better be good. Big pieces of prawn and great flavoring but unfortunately, these gyoza were not treated very well. A few of the skins were already split open before we even got to them and they were fried unevenly. So sad.
Salmon Carpaccio - 4 pcs $6.50
It's not really carpaccio but we love the wasabi based sauce on top and the salad was a great compliment. I hate to whine and gripe but there was two pieces of severely wilted, to the point of disintegrated, pieces of lettuce in our salad. It reminded Mr. Piglet of the boxed stuff from Superstore and sure enough, in the food window of the bar was the aforementioned box of salad. Salmon tasted fresh, definitely farmed but at $6.50, one gets what one pays for.
Takoyaki - 6 pcs $6
This was listed as the #1 side so we were pretty excited to try it. Verdict? Maybe we psyched ourselves too much because we both felt meh towards it. Nothing special. It's agreed that we'd had better elsewhere and enjoyed the gyoza more.
Seafood Tonkotsu Ramen - $9.50
A dish off the top entree list. A steaming bowl of ramen on a cold day... you had me at konbanwa. Great depth of seafood flavor, the ramen is perfectly cooked and there's plenty of seafood in the bowl. A dash of that chili seasoning and it was the perfect balance of flavor. Slurp!
Spicy Nabeyaki Style Udon
Udon in a spicy soup with tempura, marinated tuna, raw egg, seaweed, fish cake and chicken karaage. The problem? No fish cake to be seen. The tempura, marinated tuna and chicken karaage were very good though but the broth was not spicy - just kind of sweet and we're not sure what the egg was supposed to add to the dish. The piggies would pass on this one next time.
G-Beer - $8.95
Meal washed down with a large and tasty beer. Piglet approved!
Overall, we're not sure if this place is 85%... We'd say more like 70%. Dishes were good but not great and not something that would only be found exclusively here - very good ramen and udon places are plentiful in the Lower Mainland. Overall, maybe we'd come by to try the don dishes next time.
Pros:
Easy seating on a Thurs night
Free parking in a large lot
Energetic ambiance - great for a rowdy get-together
Moderate pricing
Cons:
Small establishment - expect long waits on weekends
Cash only
Menu is TOO extensive (maybe stick to a smaller menu and be really good at the small number of things you make!)
Food was only ok - dons and ramens were a hit but others were not so much
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