What8ver - Toast Box

Restaurant: What8ver Cafe

Cuisine: Taiwanese

Area: Richmond, BC

Address: 1108 - 8328 Capstan Way, Richmond, BC

1: Poor 2: OK 3: Good 4: Very good 5: Excellent

Food: 4

Service: 2.5

Price: Fair

After we went to Deer Garden, we went around Richmond for a while before Toast wanted to eat the Toast Box Faith and I always talk about since the first time we went. So we went to What8ver Cafe in Richmond. What8ver Cafe is a really small cafe in Union Square (near Yaohan), the same square with Bubble World. What8ver is famous for what else? The Toast Box! Though it's not on the menu, they have 3 flavors, Strawberry, Matcha and Original. They also serve bubble tea, some Taiwanes snacks, sandwiches and desserts. Also on the weekends they have a time limit of 90 minutes. The thing that we both really like about this restaurant is that the HST is included in the price they put on the menu so you know what you're paying for.

On the table:

Since Faith and I were really full, we decided to share a drink. We got the Mango Milk Tea ($4.25)(Middle). It was a average mango milk tea.Toast had the Osmanthus Flower Milk Tea with Half Pudding and Half Pearls ($3.75 +1.00)(Left). It had a nice, strong tea flavor that we liked. We found the pearls a little too hard and the pudding had no flavor.Matcha had the Almond Milk Tea with Pearls ($3.75 + 0.50)(Right). The almond milk tea tasted like almond extract, it had a pleasant taste to it. Matcha really liked this drink.

The Matcha Red Bean Toast Box! This toast box came with red beans, custard cream, matcha ice cream and cereal on top of the matcha ice cream.

Inside the toast box were bread sticks coated in sugar and honey.We found the sticks a lot better than the first time we had it, it was a softer and easier to eat. The actual box wasn't covered with anything so it was quite plain, we did not eat the outside of the box. The red beans were soft and smooth and there was a lot of them, they weren't too sweet and we really liked them. The custard was just custard, there wasn't really a flavor to them but it was a nice contrast to the sweetness of the whole box. The matcha ice cream had a strong, good matcha taste to it and was also a nice contrast against the sweetness since it wasn't so sweet. We thought there wasn't any point to the cereal at the top of th e toast box, though it was a nice decoration it was not necessary.

Last Time:

These are the food Faith and I got the first time we were here at What8ver Cafe. The first time we came it was crowed! But luckily Faith and I got a seat in 5 minutes, some people had to wait 30 minutes!

 

 Of course the first thing we got was the Strawberry Toast Box ($9.99). The strawberry toast box consisted of strawberries around the box. Custard Cream at the corners of the box, strawberry ice cream at the top with strawberry sauce on top of it, it also had rice krispy (?) at the top of it. On the top of everything is had a piece of chocolate (white) on top of the ice cream.

The toast sticks inside the box was a little too toasted, making it hard. It was coated with sugar as honey (like every other box), the sticks was also a dry so we had to drink a lot of our drinks as we ate the toast box. The custard cream was just custard cream and the strawberry were sweet. The ice cream was good, it had a strong strawberry taste but it wasn't too sweet, the sauce was average and the chocolate was good.

 For drinks I got the Sweet Red Bean Milk Tea (4.25) (Right). This drink was basically milk tea with a lot of little small pieces of red beans inside of it. It came in a jug and was a really large drink , like 2 to-go cups, it was worth the money. I really liked this drink but as I was at the bottom of the cup, I got kind of tired of it. Faith got the Milk Tea ($3.50) (Left). So she also really liked the drink. The drink had a stong tea flavor to it that we really liked and wasn't too sweet. It was also in a jug. 

We would totally come back to What8ver Cafe to try their other Toast Boxs! It's a great place to just hang and eat with your friends even though it was a little cramped. The bubble teas are good but it depends on what you get. Some of the bubble tea, like the mango bubble tea, we thought it was expensive and average. The service is a hit and miss, sometimes they are very attentive and sometimes it takes a while to get their attention. But we would definitely come back with some friends!            

 

Deer Garden 鹿園魚湯米線 - Delicious Noodles

Restaurant: Deer Garden 鹿園魚湯米線

Cuisine: Chinese

Area: Richmond, BC

Address: 8580 Alexandra Road, Richmond, BC

1: Poor 2: OK 3: Good 4: Very good 5: Excellent

Food: 4.5

Service: 3

Price: Cheap

Friday was a Pro-D Day for our school <3

We decided to do our "Sibling Bonding Day" on that day, though it really just a excuse to go out and eat with our brother paying! Free food <3 My brother also promised his friend that he would take her out to eat as a birthday present. So on Friday we set off with my brother (we'll call him Toast) , Faith, Toast's friend (we'll call her Matcha) and me. Faith had been wanting to go to Deer Garden Signature in Richmond so we decided to go there. Deer Garden is a popular Chinese Noodle House in Richmond. They are known for their "build your own noodle bowl."

The restaurant was almost impossible to find. The GPS was no use in this situation >.<

By the time we were able to find the restaurant, it was packed! Lucky we anticipated this and made a reservation! And just as we went in a group of people were leaving so we got a table really quickly. Always make a reservation here if you come in during lunch time/dinner time!

 

The menu to build your own noodle bowl.

On the table:

The noodles all cost $7.95. They come in big bowls! Faith and I couldn't finished the noodles off, we tried though but couldn't do it so we had to take out the leftovers. Toast and Matcha was able to finish it all up! Matcha was the first to finish, we almost couldn't believe it! That girl sure can eat! LOL that's why we like her :) Anybody who can eat is our friend :)

Faith ordered the Laska Soup with Thick Noodles, Homemade Cuttlefish Balls and Beef Brisket. It came with a lot of cabbage, green onions, mushroom and bean curds. The laska soup was good, it was flavorful and delicous. It tasted like curry. The thick noodles was just like the noodles that you get with Taiwanese Beef Noodle Soup. It was Al Dente. The homemade cuttlefish balls Faith's favourite in the whole meal, it had a lot of small little cuttlefish in it and was pretty big. The beef was big but average.

I ordered the Orignal Fish Soup with Vermicelli, Beef Tendons and Pork Intestines. The soup also abundant amount of cabbage, green onions, mushroom and bean curds. It also had a sprinkle of parsley on top. The mushrooms and cabbage were tender. The soup I fond was a little too bland for my tastes. The noodles were average, a bit bland. The bean curds were good and soft. There was a good amount of pig intestines, they were a little bit too chewy but good. The beef brisket was soft and there were a lot of beef tendon. They defiantly don't skimp out of the meat!

Toast also had Original Fish Soup with Vermicelli but for the meat he had Beef Tendons and Beef Brisket. He liked everything especially the meat.

Matcha, like me, had the Original Fish Soup with Vermicelli but had Fish Tofu and Sliced Beef. She really liked the noodles and finished the whole bowl!

We also had 2 side dished that cost $1.75. They were Pan Fried Fish Puffs and Deep Fried Pork Chops. The Pan fried fish puffs were pretty good, they were soft and came with a sweet and spicy chili sauce. Faith really liked the sauce. The deep fried pork chop were fried too long, making it dry and hard to bite into. It came with tarter sauce.

Drinks were also included in the price but only if it was hot. Cold drinks cost a extra $1 and drinks from the special menu cost an extra $2.

 For drinks Faith and I had the Hot Hong Kong Style Milk Tea, it came unsweetened, we found it tasted kind of bitter since we preferred our Hong Kong style milk tea sweet, we added like 8 packs of sugar each but no matter how much we put in, it didn't taste sweet at all. We left this drink unfinished.

 Toast had the Hot Almond Milk, it was basically powered almond milk you can get in a Asian Supermarket. Faith and I liked his drink more so we basically finished it off for him which pissed him off. Oh well...

Matcha had the Lemon Tea ($1). The drink was a nice cold drink. Matcha liked it but since we didn't try it, we can't really comment on it (we also forgot to take a picture of it >.<").

Overall we really like this place. The restaurant may be hard to find and may be crowed with a lot of people but it's worth it! The bowl of noodles are big and they aren't cheap with the abundant of ingredients they put in there!  The service is nice and fast but we wish that they could speak English because they  seem to be only able to speak Cantonese and we have no clue what they are saying every time they speak! But we would definitely come back! Of course we would make a reservation first though or else we have to wait like 30 minutes before getting a table!