Our second day in Vancouver was our dedicated "Richmond" day. Richmond holds a special place in my heart since we always stayed here on family vacations. So many memories of Asian mall hopping and eating all the amazing dim sum, sushi, and everything in between.
Our first stop of the day was the Richmond Public Market for breakfast. The public market is a no frills place with random grocers and stalls on the first floor, and a sprawling food court on the second.
We came for one stall in particular, Hei Hei Rice Roll. They're one of the newer additions to the food court, but have become extremely popular for their fresh, made-to-order rice rolls. We came a couple of minutes before they opened and there was already a few people ahead of us in line. During peak times, it's probably best to call and order ahead!
Hei Hei specializes in steamed rice rolls with fillings like beef, pork, shrimp, or char sui. They also serve various types of congee which you can order together as a set meal.
We decided to stick with the rice rolls, and chose the beef, pork & shrimp rice roll ($8.50) as well as the shrimp rice roll ($7.99) with added scallions. You can also specify if you want your rice rolls folded and cut, or their default presentation, which is scraped together into long ribbons.
The rice rolls are thin and silky, almost translucent in quality. They also give you a decent amount of meat and fresh shrimp. It was so, so good! I wish we had a place in Edmonton serving anything remotely similar.
After we finished breakfast, we drove over to President Plaza to check out Little Fox Bakehouse. Little Fox is tucked away in a corner on the first floor. They boast an impressive array of pastries and desserts with a fun Asian twist. Think pineapple bun croissants, milk tea cream puffs, white rabbit mochi doughnuts, and a whole lot more.
I would have bought the whole store if I had the stomach space, but I settled for a simple canelé ($3.00). It didn't look as fancy as the ones I bought the previous day, but I was actually very impressed with their canelé. It was caramelized and crispy on the outside with a light, spongy interior. After finishing mine in the car, I actually went back in to buy a couple more, one regular and one matcha, as we were on our way to meet up with GY at our next stop.
In Parker Place, there is a dessert place that I've had my eye on for the longest time. The store is called SoyTalk and they specialize in soy milk and soy-based desserts. It's the perfect place for vegans and the lactose intolerant.
We got a couple orders of their signature soy ice cream ($7.25) and a bottle of their black sesame soy milk ($6.99). The ice cream is not too sweet and has a subtle soy milk flavour. The texture is more icy than creamy but I was sort of expecting that to be the case. The bean floss was a unique topping, and added a bit of a salty crunch. I do wish the black sesame soy milk was stronger in flavour, but the bottle is too cute to pass up!
Over the next hour or so, we walked around Aberdeen Centre. This mall was everything to me as a kid. I remember spending hours at Daiso, browsing through every aisle and walking out with bags of goodies. The Daiso has since been replaced by Oomomo, which is essentially the same store. But now that we have an Oomomo back home, it doesn't hit quite the same way.
Later on that night, we met up with my sister's old coworker for dinner. She also brought along her twin sister so it was a double sister date! We tried out this Korean restaurant I found on Instagram called Beef King Restaurant. It looks like they didn't last very long as they have since closed and reopened as a Chinese hot pot place.
We tried their signature galbijjim ($48.99), which is a braised beef short rib dish. Before they serve it, they sprinkle on some cheese and torch it table-side. The beef is tender and the sauce is thick and slightly spicy. The dish also comes with potatoes and daikon, which soaks up a lot of the flavour. Overall, it was decent but not something I would probably crave or come back for.
Their seafood scallion cake ($19.99) was actually pretty good. Lots of ingredients and super crispy.
LT's friend requested the Korean spicy stir-fried intestines ($19.99). I tried a couple bites despite not being a huge fan of intestines. The intestines are chewy and slightly gamey, but I found the spicy sauce did help to cover up some of that taste.
Before we called it a night, we drove across the street to Lansdowne Centre to try Xing Fu Tang in the T&T Supermarket. I got their bunny jelly mango smoothie ($6.95). It was a bit too sweet and artificial-tasting to me, but it was super cute and Instagram worthy. Priorities, am I right?
To be continued ...
- CT
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