Vita Bella

I live in burnaby and I have to travel down hastings everytime I go downtown. I love staring out the window and looking at various shops and restaurants. Some are funny (double one? peninsula with a cow and chicken on the sign? best one yet .. tin tin.. hahahahaha..then laughter dies down. and Tan tan appears LOL) some remind me that I have to go to them one day.. like sfinaki, pear tree, papagallo cafe, and baci... but when I do go down hastings, it's always for downtown, never FOR hastings.. but this time I finally went to one of these restaurants.. vita bella

Before my friend's play, we decided to check out this super cute restaurant. We arrived around 5:30 and I saw people eating chopsticks inside.. wtf, is this some japanese restaurant in disguise? it was just their staff eating a quick dinner before the dinner rush came in... that's fine, but in front of the window?? The service was ok.. nothing spectacular or bad.. The complimentary bread tasted a little stale.. my friend ordered the fettucine and I had the penne del vio.. It took a while to arrive, when it does, there's this stick coming out of both our pastas.. It wasn't a very pretty presentation..

The pasta itself wasn't cooked al dente.. it was undercooked. The fettucine was ok apparently. We didn't have time to complain since we had to go see the play! We barely made it back too :S Til the time we left, no other tables were filled except one (7:00).

I don't think I"ll be back, but I can't wait til I try that japanese restaurant.. tenkatsu?? I don't know but it looks good!

Palomino: Seattle

Before the jmraz show, we went to a restaurant called Palomino in Downtown Seattle because the prices seemed reasonable and close to the Paramount. It's on the top floor of a mall which is kind of cool. Once we were seated, our waitor hastily walks over and pours our water, getting ice and water onto the table. Then hastily rushes away. I thought, great, crappy waitor- tip is going down by the minute. I was wrong..

The next time he came over, the whole demeanor changed. I ordered the pork, to which he replies: it's a lot of food you know. me:"Well I am hungry. I'll be fine". him"do you like salads or soups?" me: "no". him:"what.. do you like anything?" me"is it free? if it is, bring anything that is complimentary over, we like anything"

He comes over with the bread and a plate of salad on the house. I looked around thinking he was just bsing me, but no one else had it. o-k.. The bread was ok but they served it with a salsa that I didn't like. The salad wasn't my thing because I don't like eating chunks of mozza. He comes back and I express my dislike, he quickly takes it away and replaces it with a free mushroom and shallots. uhh wthell I am not complaining about this complimentary service here, but mushrooms and shallots? gross.

Then he brings us the main course and my dish looked like a chinese dish my mother makes. It was a pot was pork. ew! I thought it would be a piece of pork with the apple chutney on top, but no no.. a pot of just pork. Barbaric??

He knew I was not happy so he brought over a lobster ravioli for me and took the pork off my bill. We were hurried to go to the concert, but if we stayed any longer he said he was going to bring shellfish over or even free desserts..

Ok tip went back up.. I don't know why he was so nice?? but thanks. The lobster ravioli was ok, it got to be a little too much after awhile, but def better than a pot of pork!

Aria+Cibo

Before my love Jason Mraz's concert, we went to Cibo for a quick lunch. Since we've been eating the whole day and my friend wasn't used to this lifestyle, we wanted something small at Cibo. Inside is very very small, much smaller than I imagined, but the design was very nice and upscale. My friend couldn't get over the "candles" that were battery operated. She was so tempted to take one because they were so amazing. Don't worry, we weren't in the stealing mood tonight :) haha

The service was nice, except she kept saying ya ya a lot.. which was a little annoying.. "you girls just went shopping? ya ya ?" "do you want me to take these dishes away? ya ya ? " "ya ya are you girls done ya ya? " oh my god. It almost drove us insane.

I just had the gnudi and she had the gnocchi. The gnudi was pretty light and packed with spinach and cheese. they were soft and tasted like my safeway bought spinach/cheese tortellini with alfredo sauce, but better? well it must have been for the price! they were small dishes for a little higher prices. But if I ate more, it would have been too filling I think.

We went off to Aria next for dessert and wine and to chill. I've been to Aria once a long time ago before clubbing. It is a nice open restaurant/lounge. It's rather small, but it seemed to match the atmosphere of the whole hotel. I had another glass of wine (not as good as the one at Cibo). and I had the zuccoto and she had the apple fritter.
Look at all those strawberries! yuck! oh well, the gigantic blueberries made up for it because they were really sweet. The cake was ok. The pistachio gelato didn't really have a pistachio taste.. The apple fritter was half an apple that seemed to be deep fried with ice cream. They were both really hard to eat with a spoon. oi I don't understand why people give spoons for desserts, everything would work so much better with fork! (minus ice cream, but it's plausible)

Macaroni Grill

Before fireworks, we went to mac grill for some pasta + drinks. I've only been there once before and I had a great time. We had the family style dinner and was absolutely stuffed. This time around.. it wasn't that great.

The place itself is pretty nice. It's a huge mansion with places for large and small groups. I am not a fan of the paper on table but it's cute when they give you crayons to draw on it. hum not this time :P

we had a pitcher of sangria and the complimentary bread to start. They were both ok. I had the bruschetta and I guses it was just 5 dollars. but it looked like crap. Like I could have made it. They toasted 3 baguettes, sprinkled cheese and tomatoes on it. awesome. The ones from timbre are soo much better.
Then we shared the straberry cheesecake.. and it was too moussy for my liking. Also had a baileys on the rocks which came with wayyy too much ice! :(

My friend had the spaghetti and felt like they decreased their portion size.. which really sucks if so. I don't know, Mac grill isn't exactly a top priority on my list/fave place . But the mansion is nice to sit in. and close to fireworks..

Section (3) and Joeys

My friend from Victoria came out for an environmental conference, so we met up after to go to Section (3). I felt so bad because her feet were dying from heels and she didn't expect so much walking (from Westin Bayshore). oh well.

We shared a yam fries and prawn linguini. They were both not good. The yam fries reminded me of the ones I had at Hamilton Street Grill (which were the worst ones I've ever had). They were too dark on the outside and not soft enough inside. I don't know how to describe.

The linguini wasn't great. The prawns were over cooked and everything else was pretty plain.

The service was really nice though??

Then we went to joeys on burrard for dessert. We had the apple pie which was really good because I love apple pie :) It was good too because she found the apple pie to be too much so she ate the ice cream and i ate most of the pie :) yay. The ambience of joeys is really nice. I have yet to venture into the bathrooms of joeys (the one on broadway is freaking amazingg).

Restuarants

Today, we went to Tequila Kitchen, we had a salsa flight. I didn't really like it that much, I would love to come back and try the other dishes. The service kinda sucked.. It was nonexistant for us.

Then we went on over to Amarcord and shared a gnocchi.. it's my first time eating it, It's ok. The waitors were nice. They thought we were visiting because I took pictures of my food haha.. The outside looks so tacky but inside is nice

Next we went to Doux Crepes for a peanut butter and condensed milk crepe. Dang it was really good for 5 bucks!! I wanna try the peking duck one day haha

Finally we went to simply thai. We shared a rice platter, that was soo much better than damn anything at Urban Thai. Although the service here was also nonexistant. ugh what the hell

We lied on the beach for an hour and headed on over to raincity grill for a dessert. We shared the pain perdu (grilled pear) and I think it was too sweet for my liking. I tried to look for Indica again and I can't find the bloody place. wat the hell

Anducci's

Hungry and needing to buy groceries, we ventured to Lougheed to Anducci's. I wasn't SUPER hungry but I was craving pasta. So we ordered the 3 pasta plate. It consisted of spaghetti and meatballs (my fave), fusilli with shrimp and fusilli with chicken. it was supposed to be linguine but we were in a hurry to get back to our class, so we didn't say anything.. I prefer long pasta over short though so we finished the spaghetti and barely touched the other two.. Instead we gave it to a homeless. Afterwards, I went and got groceries which proved to be a bad idea because my roommate went and got bananas, soup, and peach yogurt for me. Which I got myself, so now we have like 10 bananas. hahaa.. oi, i m gonna be a monkey for the rest of the week. I WOULD make banana bread or cupcakes (banana and coconut? banana and oat muffins?) but we have no electric mixers and etc.. gah

La Terrazza etc

My latest dining experiences have not been super.. This is so disheartening..
After a lousy presentation, me and my friend decided to get some good food downtown to make up for it. We went to Bardot first, after standing at the door for 15 minutes, we just left. There was NO service to be seen AT ALL. what the fuck. I have never witnessed that before. it's also sad (for me) because this is the 3rd time I've went to this place wanting to try it (first time they were closed for nye, second time my friend wasn't impressed with the menu, 3rd time waited for 15 min) but yet I still want to try... hah. Anyways, after that we ended up at La Terrazza.. It was so expensive we decided to eat appetizers. I pointed mine out to him (crab cakes) because I couldn't read it. He said oh Portabello? I didn't really listen to him and said yes..
So I got this. When I got it I thought i twas just creatively made but still crab cakes. I bit into it and it was disgusting. I couldn't even finish it.
The bill came.. it cost the same as..
are you fucking shitting me. You're telling me my fucking disgusting ass MUSHROOM stuffed into spring roll form is the same as this seafood stew!! WTF. He charged me for the crab cakes. which Obviously I did not eat.
Unfortunately, I did not realize all this until I went home.
I guess stupidity is also at fault here.

Oh well I got crab cakes at Sip another day. They were ok. This was the first time I actually got food at Sip. The restaurant is nice and the concept is cool.. I don't mind this place, they have the best background to take a picture with (haha) and their bartender looks like jared leto apparently, who is hot (I've heard this from a couple people) . I also prefer this place much more than whineo's next door (loud and dark)

Pastaaaaaa

I m not a big fan of pasta but I really wanted to try this place called Il Nido on Robson. They sat us outside which was a BADDDD idea. I have a huge fear of a lot of mosquitoes/fruit flies/gnats in one place (weird i know).. I actually freak out and usually do not like walking in forests. I guess it was mating season but there were huge swarms of there nearby. I didn't want to be a hassle so I didn't ask to be moved in.. because no one was inside sitting and it was a gorgeous day outside.. blah.
The first plate was mine.. a spaghetti plate.. as you can see I m not adventurous. I have no idea what the other plate was.. didn't look too yummy to me. The food was bland.. especially the calamari we ordered before the pasta (didn't take a picture). They weren't deep fried but they didn't have a taste. :(
It also didn't help that the waitor kept staring at me and touching me everytime he came over.