Friday, April 18, 2014

Jyuban Ramen House

Still not sick of ramen yet.  There seems to be a few new ones that have opened in downtown Toronto that I have yet to try.  A little closer to home is Jyuban Ramen House.  I rarely go to Commerce Gate, because parking is atrocious there.  But of the times that I do go, I've noticed Jyuban, kinda like the quiet kid sitting in a corner in a room.  The fact that this place has been opened for years (Asian restaurants typically aren't open for long), must be good right?

They have regular ramen noodles, and they also have squid ink ramen noodles.  We got one of each to try.  For the regular ramen noodles, we ordered the regular tonkotsu, for the squid ink ramen, we got the seafood ramen.  We also ordered the ramen as a combo.  For a few dollars more, you get a pork rice ball and a red bean cake for dessert.  The pork rice ball was essentially a shredded pork onigri.  I've never been a big fan of rice, so this wasn't really for me.  It was also a tad heavy on the salt.  Ramen wise, the tonkotsu soup base was quite weak, the flavours just weren't really there.  I think the soup base is actually the same for all their noodles.  Noodle wise, I really didn't like them.  Their regular ramen noodles tasted just like spaghetti.  Their squid ink ramen noodles, tasted a bit fishy, and texture was similar to spaghetti as well.  The chasiu was dry.  The egg however, was done well.  The yolk was cooked perfectly.  Red bean cake, was ok.  Nothing special.

Pork Rice Balls

Squid Ink Seafood Ramen

Tonkotsu Ramen

Red Bean Cake




































Overall, not that great of a ramen restaurant.  If I had a ramen craving I would be heading downtown. And if I really couldn't get downtown, then I would head to Sonoya at First Markham Place instead.

Jyuban Ramen House
505 Highway 7 E, Suite 65-66
Thornhill, ON
L3T 7T1

905-882-1188

Hours:  11am - 3pm, 6pm - 11pm , Tuesdays Closed

http://jyubanramen.com/WordPress/

Calabria Bakery

This bakery is located in a plaza that I didn't even know existed.  Ok, thats an exaggeration, but there's nothing really in the plaza that necessary will draw people in, so I never went to the plaza.  So thats why I never noticed the bakery there before.  The reason why I even heard of this bakery was actually through a 'best donuts' thread on Chowhound.  Within that thread, it mentioned that not only does Calabria Bakery make awesome donuts, but they also do great pizza.  Since I had a craving for pizza, off we went.

We ordered a margherita, and the other one I kinda forgot.  The oven was not a stone oven.  But from what I read, their Scarborough location does use a stone oven.  Sounds like the pizza there may potentially have a better crust.  Overall, the pizza here was passable.  I was disappointed their their margarita pizza didn't have fresh basil on it, and the cheese just looked like shredded mozzarella, not fresh mozzarella.  Thats what makes a margherita pizza does it not?  The other pizza was just overly salty in my opinion.

Margherita Pizza

Other Pizza



















Donuts for dessert!  I have a bad memory, so I can't remember the flavour of one of the donuts.  The other one was strawberry filled.  The donuts themselves, minus the toppings/fillings were so good!  I love yeast donuts, so light and fluffy.  The icing on one of the donuts were too sweet though.  And the jam filling was a bit artificial, tasting.  If they improve the quality of the fillings/toppings, they would make an amazing donut for sure!
Donuts











Calabria Bakery
5694 Highway 7 E
Markham, ON
L3P 0E3

905-471-1033

Hours:  Monday - Friday 8am - 8pm
             Saturday 8am - 7pm

http://www.calabriabakery.ca

Thursday, April 3, 2014

Healthy Choice Gourmet Steamers

It's nearing the end of the school term.  I can see the light at the end of the tunnel sort of, not really.  This week, and the next 2 weeks will be pretty hectic for me.  So I didn't think I would be blogging again until a few weeks later.  But after eating my lunch, I felt obligated to post, to prevent all of you from eating this junk.

 I have a coworker that loves to eat these funny looking frozen dinners.  She said that they're sooooo good. The combination of this is soooo good, plus my head being stuck in presentations and studying the textbooks is exactly why I bought some Healthy Choice Gourmet Steamers to keep in the freezer.  That and I had coupons.  I think these Gourmet Steamers ended up being $1 or $2 each.  Last night was a day where we didn't have enough leftovers from dinner to pack a lunch for the next day.  So perfect opportunity to give this frozen dinner a try.

The idea of it is great.  The pasta, meat and veggies are separate from the sauce which keeps the pasta from going mushy.  Again, idea and design of the container is great.  While the food was nuking in the microwave, it smelled pretty good too.  It's not until I took it out of the microwave that my appetite began to decrease.  It looked kinda gross to be honest with you.  I was hoping that once I mix the sauce it, it would be better.  Nope.  Just as bad, just with sauce on it.  I tried a piece of the chicken, made me think of a news article I read a few years ago.  It was about pieces of meat, that used some sort of glue to reform them into 'whole' pieces of meat.   Needless to say, it was not a very enjoyable lunch.  I really should just cook a bit more pasta next time I make it for dinner, and portion it for lunches and freeze it.  My very own, healthier version of 'frozen dinner'.  So please don't buy it.......it's not even worth paying a $1 for.

Healthy Choice Gourmet Steamer - Pre Mix

Healthy Choice Gourmet Steamer - Post Mix







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