If you live in Surrey, or know people who live in Surrey, then you probably have heard what a great Japanese restaurant Hanako is. I admit, I’m a Vancouver downtown type of girl, but I’ve fallen in love with Hanako. With love comes commitment – I’m committed to driving out to Surrey (a long drive for ET and me) just to go to Hanako.

The food at Hanako is amazing. The sashimi is fresh and top quality. Prices are not cheap but still in the reasonable range (~$60 for ET and I). I highly recommend all Japanese food fans try out this restaurant, even if you have to drive for a bit to get there.

On a recent visit with some friends, we had the following:

A crab salad with crab (of course!), tomatoes, radicchio and vinegarette. This is my friend’s favourite and she has all the reasons to like this dish. It’s a pretty and very tasty dish.

UNI! This could easily be the best Uni sashimi I’ve had so far. The Uni tasted so fresh that as it melted in my mouth, I can smell and taste the ocean.

I wanted to get Toro sashimi but it was all sold out. Waaaaaaaaah! :”’( That was a big disappointment because I know this restaurant has very good Toro. We order Hamachi and Salmon instead and they were a good consolation.

Various rolls – all up to standard.

The spider roll was up to standard. There was an adequate portion of crab in the roll and the crab stayed crunchy.

Deep fried soft shell crab. This dish was only so so. I have had better soft shell crab at other Japanese restaurants. It’s all in the fying – the batter has to be light and yet crispy.

Like the soft shell crab, again, the tempura could be improved. The batter was a little too heavy. I guess this restaurant is not the best at fried dishes.

This is Ankimo, which is Monkfish liver and also known as “foie gras of the sea”. As the description suggests, Ankimo is soft, lightly sweet and slightly buttery. I think comparing this with foie gras might be unfair, as Ankimo doesn’t exactly has the rich buttery taste of foie. However, it was still a rich dish.

Finally, agedashi tofu. Strangely enough, this was cooked perfectly. A perfect warm ending to a cool meal.

Being a Chinese girl raised in a family where rice must be eaten for every meal, I didn’t grow up trying many different cuisines besides Chinese food. Sometimes though, my mom would be in her creative mood and cook her own version of pasta. I still remember those mornings when I woke up to a hot bowl of pork rib and little shell pastas swimming in black bean sauce. As I reluctantly force the little shells down my throat, all I could think of was why would anyone like this kind of noodles? My mom’s pasta was purely disgusting. Since then I have learned and will always remember that black bean sauce is not the most suitable sauce for pasta. Although discouraged by the pasta experience, I never gave up wondering what other non Chinese dishes would taste like. I knew something out there would taste better than pasta in black bean sauce. I knew something out there would taste amazing. As I was 6, I was waiting for my next opportunity to try something different.

Such an opportunity came when I started living on campus. In my first year of university, I lived in a complex where all students ate their meals at a nearby cafeteria. The same items were always served for breakfasts – eggs, bacon, pancakes, toasts and different kinds of cereal. Lunch was also always the same – pizzas, chicken strips, pastas (luckily never in black bean sauce) and made-to-order sandwiches. Dinners were somewhat more interesting as each day had a different theme – Japanese, Chinese, Italian, Greek etc. Everyone complained about cafeteria food: “That beef is disgusting; I’m now a vegetarian.”. “Oh, that greasy pizza I had for lunch made me sick! I was in the bathroom all afternoon!”. I was complaining along too. But deep inside me, I was glad that besides rice, I had chicken strips, pizzas, sushis or sandwiches to choose from. However, after having chicken strips, pizzas and sandwiches for three months, I wanted to try something different. At 17, I was constantly finding excuses to eat off campus.

Then I met ET. Having a Singaporean background, he and I went on an endless gastronomic exploration of Southeast Asian cuisine. We found ourselves eating at Malaysian, Thai, Vietnamese and Indonesia restaurants. One day he brought me to Phnom Penh, “It’s voted as the BEST Southeast Asian restaurant in town”, he said. After entering the restaurant, we were greeted by a wall fully hung with awards, newspaper and magazine interviews. On our way to our table, we noticed every table ordered a bowl (or multiple bowls) of tossed noodles and a plate of chicken wings:

Unlike the Vietnamese pho, the tossed noodles are served dry along with minced pork, pork slices and shrimps. The noodles are tossed in soy sauce, oil (I highly suspect it is lard which explains why the noodles are so tasty) and green scallion. Bean sprouts, chili and lime are also provided for you to mix into the noodles. The best noodles are sitting in the bottom of the bowl because that is where all the minced pork, scallion, chili and soy sauce hide. There are different versions of tossed noodles on the menu, I recommend you to try item #4.

I love the tossed noodles at Phnom Penh. However, my favourite is item 78 on the menu, the buttery deep fried chicken wings:

Fried in an extremely light and airy batter, the chicken wings are cripsy with a hint of buttery flavour. Lime juice mixed with freshly ground pepper is served as the dipping sauce. Every time I eat these wings, I can’t help but think that if KFC’s chicken are finger-licking-good, then these wings are just finger-licking-fantastically-the-best!

Another item which we always ordered is the Vietnamese spring rolls. The spring rolls at Phnom Penh are smaller, shorter but somewhat more flavourful than those that I’ve eaten at other Vietnamese restaurants.

Last night we visited Phnom Penh again with foodies Ben and Suanne from ChowTimes. Since there were more people, we ordered the a pot of chicken curry in addition to the noodles and chicken wings:

The chicken curry had a mild curry flavour. What’s most interesting about this curry is we saw something that looked like potatoes and they turned out to be taro root. Baguettes are recommended to be eaten with the curry, which we used to quickly soak up all the curry sauce.

Ben and Suanne are very knowledgeable about Southeast Asian cuisine. When they learned there is a dessert with durian on the menu, they were excited to try it:

It was a plate of glutinous rice submerged in coconut milk and topped with a few pieces of durian. Although the durian smelt strong, I was disappointed by how thin the slices were and I almost couldn’t taste the fruit at all. When I looked at the slices closely, I realized they were not durian flesh but rather a pile of durian mousse. All in all the glutinous rice tasted yummy with the slightly sweetened coconut milk.

Now in my late twenties, I have tried a lot different cuisines besides Chinese food. I have learned that pastas are very delicious in a tomato or cream sauce, or even simply mixed in a good extra virgin oil. My mom is very good at cooking Chinese food. But because I never learn cooking from her, I never learn how to cook Chinese food properly. Once in awhile, I miss a meal in which rice is served with many home style Chinese dishes like the ones that my mom made. Now I’m trying to recreate familiar home style Chinese dishes that I grew up with as well as waiting to try dishes that I have not yet tried.