Resturant Sango!

It was Valentine’s Day, and I am a big lover of Japanese food, so my boyfriend decided to take us to this place that we had never tried before called Sango. Whenever I go out to eat Japanese food, It’s usually the normal Sui sha ya. But, we decided to go to Sango because it was more convenient to where the movie theater is & it’s something new to try.

We got their at a really good time, because just after us a whole load of people started coming in wanting to sit at tables but, there was no room so they had to wait. I started to think, this is probably a really popular place and the food must be really good. The place was really small, and were my boyfriend and I got seated was by the front so it felt like all those people were either watching us eat, or envying us because we were eating and they weren’t.

When we sat down, the Japanese lady gave us our menus, and we had a really hard time trying to figure out how to actually read it. Some of the food had numbers beside them but, no dollar signs and we didn’t know if they were prices or not, and some food did. We wanted to find out what the menu meant but it took the waiter a really long time to get back to us. With so many people, people waiting, and only 2 girl waiters, it just wasn’t enough.

When she finally came to us, she did in fact tell us that those were prices, and we got 1 order of gyoza, 2 orders of California rolls, and teriyaki chicken with vegetables and rice. It defiantly wasn’t long before our food came which is good because it made up for the long time we waited for her to take our order.

We started off with the gyoza and California rolls, which were good like they always are, and then after the teriyaki chicken. The teriyaki chicken was like nothing I’d ever had before. At Sui sha ya, they serve it to you in a bowl with rice and tempura (if you want) but, at Sango, they come out with your chicken and vegetables on a really hot metal plate that is attached to a wood block, and the rice is served in a small bowl. The chicken is steaming when they bring it out to you, and its cooking right in front of you. You can smell the sauce that’s burning but everything’s cooking perfectly. You need to wait a while before you bite in because it’s so hot, and the metal plate remains hot for the whole time.

After we were done, I still had some left over that I wanted to save, and we needed to get going so that we could catch our movie in time. Again, it took the girls so long to come to us that we virtually had to come to them. My boyfriend had to get up and walk over to where one of the ladies’s were and pay, we didn’t receive a check at our table. I had to stop one of them and ask if my food could be wrapped up to take, because we had to get going and I knew she wasn’t going to be coming anytime soon, and in no time between when we were eating and when we left were we ever asked if everything was fine and if we needed anything else.

In all, the food was great but the service wasn’t. That’s a huge deal breaker because I probably won’t go back there. Ill search for another place that has the same food with proper service.

I'm documenting the making of an Economic Beef stew. Since we'll all be living on our own soon, I figured it would be a good recipe to have in our pockets.

The ingredients are:
One Package of stewing beef (approx 650-750g)
Beef base 45 ml's
Two medium sized carrots
Six or seven  mushrooms
Half of a medium onion
2-3 cloves of Garlic
Two or three medium russet potatoes
One Tsp. of Soy Sauce
Approx 1/2 cup of flour
1 Tbsp Oil

Ingredients, (Oil absent)

Procedure:
Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees Farenheit.

Prepare about a liter of stock:
     Pour the stock powder into a bowl, and pour in about half a cup of hot water,
     Whisk quickly to disolve, and then fill with 3 1/2 cups of cold water.
     Set aside.

Liter of Stock

Preparing the stew:
Heat a tablespoon of vegetable oil in a large oven-safe pot on medium temperature
Put half of an onion, diced, into the pot
Let it sautee until the onion is translucent
Add stewed beef uniform size

Approx Meat size

Add either garlic powder (1 Tbsp) or freshly minced or pressed garlic  (2-3 cloves)
Cook until the pieces of meat are all browned.
Add pinches of flour until most of the moisture is absorbed and it looks approximately like this:

Roux plus Beef

Add the prepared stock slowly, stirring gently
Turn heat up to 8 or 9, we want it to come to a boil and reduce
When sufficiently reduced, about like this:

Roux plus stock, after reduction

Add the tsp of soy sauce and stir until it's blended in.
Add the two chopped carrots, the 2-3 diced potatoes and the 6-7 quartered and stemmed mushrooms.
The vegetables look like this when prepared:

Chopped Carrots, potatoes and mushrooms

Turn temperature off and put into heated oven without lid, let cook for 2-3 hours, and when done it will look like this:  

Finished Stew

And that is the making of a delicious, economic beef stew, the total preparation time was: 1 hour prep, 3 hours cooking   serves: 6

The recipe is also scalable, so you can adjust to feed fewer or greater amounts of people. The stew keeps well in the fridge, and like any stew, is better the second day. Serve with chewy buns for the best effect.
The total cost was: 10$, or 1.70$ per serving. And that, is a delicious, economical beef stew.

ON THE PLATE: Piast's reign extends far past the baked goods

piast bakery is a family owned bakery. fresh food is baked everyday.

my parents own a bakery on 3280 cambie st   called  Piast European Bakery & Deli
it has been around for more then 21 years. everything is home made. it was located on Fraser st for 16 years that we had to relocate only 5 minutes away. People say it's like Charlie Bucket stepping into some Willy Wonkian showcase of new and exciting treats that had never been revealed to anyone save for an army of unseen Polish oompa loompas. when I hear them talk like that it kinda makes my laugh cause I have been around this place my whole life.People always ask me why am i so thin i just say every thing what is made is organic and fresh.Here are some items Buraczki Zasmazane, which was the name of some jolly-looking red substance. Gazed and sugar-dusted donuts that were filled with rose hip jam. glorious-looking six-inch-deep slabs of cake, each aglisten with sugared gelatin tops that begged to be jiggled and wiggled. These turned out to be cheesecakes.Range of cured meats, sausages, and hams in the glass cases, and salivates over the broad selection of tiny, foil-wrapped soft cheeses. If you want to find out more come visit  them in the  Cambie Village!