Tsui Hang Restaurant sucks... and not in the good way

[xoxo Amie]

[random rant]

1:30 am Friday night before the mad rush of the after-bar crowd arrives and the dining room is hardly 25% full.

strike 1 : The silver fish dish is over cooked in such a way that it is oddly over crispy. It tastes like slivers of fried batter with little black specks for 'eyes' with hardly any flavour.

strike 2: The cold jelly fish is too spicy and just weirdly 'off' as well

strike 3: The black bean clams arrives with not one speck of black bean to be found in the sauce. It looks like clams and the black bean sauce you get out of a grocery store jar of Lee Kum Kee Even I can make a better black bean sauce and trust me, " I'm no Yan Can Cook!"

This part takes the cake: The plain white congee ordered to accompany the savoury dishes arrives luke warm. I send it back to be nuked only to come back 'just' warmed... I can't send it back to the kitchen with another re-heat request ... (at this point the clams haven't arrived on the scene yet and I prefer my clams to be spit -free )

Congee should be piping hot. How does one mess up plain congee?

It's rice porridge fer fawks sake! (cook rice to a mush and keep hot!)

Don't even get me started about the health code violation since the congee is obviously sitting in a tepid pot in the back. Food poisoning waiting to happen

"Tsui Hang, if you were a girl, nobody in Chinatown is ever gonna marry you!"

[/random rant]

lol

 

[nd1]

Late-Night Chinese

I haven't eaten at Tsui Hang for a few years now. It wasn't all that great back then, but it more or less was the only choice for late-night Chinese supper, especially in the Downtown area.

The selection is much better outside of Downtown. Landmark Hotpot on Cambie is pricey but reliable and quite delicious. More economic choices abound on Kingsway, especially McKim's Wonton Saga near Earls. Richmond has many that open late, chief among them Rainflower Restaurant on No. 3 just next to the Yaohan Centre.

There is also one on Fraser Street called Super Happiness Seafood Restaurant, which I think does open late, but I am not entirely sure. Its late-night snack dishes are very good though.

strike 1 : The silver fish dish is over cooked in such a way that it is oddly over crispy. It tastes like slivers of fried batter with little black specks for 'eyes' with hardly any flavour.

Chances are it had been re-fried and the fish had been frozen to tastelessness...

strike 3: The black bean clams arrives with not one speck of black bean to be found in the sauce. It looks like clams and the black bean sauce you get out of a grocery store jar of Lee Kum Kee Even I can make a better black bean sauce and trust me, " I'm no Yan Can Cook!"

Are you kidding? LKK sauce costs too much to be used there!

I can't send it back to the kitchen with another re-heat request ... (at this point the clams haven't arrived on the scene yet and I prefer my clams to be spit -free )

... or how about "something" in the congee itself? Smart of you not to send it back again!

Congee should be piping hot. How does one mess up plain congee?

Actually, this is the time of the year when I like my congee lukewam rather than piping hot; but you were the customer there...

It's rice porridge fer fawks sake! (cook rice to a mush and keep hot!)

Keeping it hot is the tough part here: it needs constant stirring or it sticks to the bottom of the pot and burns. It's so cost-ineffective that most restaurants just hate to keep a pot of rice congee around.

"Tsui Hang, if you were a girl, nobody in Chinatown is ever gonna marry you!"

Doesn't look like Tsui Hang has earned its keep to you, does it?

Better luck with late-night Chinese next time!

 

[smackyo]

hhhmmmmm, i haven't been there in a long time. i always did enjoy the spicey wonton's though. i've yet to find a place that made them as good as they do or did there.

 

[Harmony-bc]

I actually like this Tsui Hang, hahahaha, but I have never been in there before 3:00am, and alcohol does cloud your judgement and dull the taste buds, lol

I have had much worse Chinese food than Tsui Hang's in my life. Food where the ginger fried beef (back when I ate beef) came soggy, mushy and soupy Of course there is also much better.