Tuesday, October 30, 2007
LEGENDARY NOODLE HOUSE IN VANCOUVER
Noodle Making at the Legendary Noodle (photo by Nick Procaylo, The Vancouver Province)
When we got back from Whitehorse, we stopped off in Vancouver for a couple of days to visit relatives. We were dying for some Asian food (the Chinese restaurants in Whitehorse are not vegetarian-friendly, unfortunately), so we had lunch one day at the Legendary Noodle on Denman St. (Here's a map.)
It's a small, snug place (I read it described as a "hole in the wall"!), but nicely decorated. We sat where we could watch the noodle maker. He had the dough already made and covered on his countertop. When an order came in he would cut off a chunk of the dough and start stretching and folding, stretching and folding, until, about 30 seconds later, miraculously (or so it seemed) there would be thin noodles! They would be plunged into boiling water for another 30 seconds and then mixed by the chef with whatever vegetables, sauces, etc. make the dish. Talk about fast food!
NOTE: THE FOLLOWING VIDEOS ARE JUST ONES I FOUND ON YOUTUBE-- THEY ARE NOT FROM LEGENDARY NOODLE! BUT THE TECHNIQUES ARE THE SAME. BCG
Here's a short video showing the technique for making the dough:
Here's a short video in which you can see how the noodles are formed:
The prices are amazingly cheap, the portions generous, and the menu has quite a few vegetarian options. We started with a cold peanut-noodle salad with spinach, and some vegetarian steamed dumplings, chock full of greens and green onions with some smokey sesame oil. So delicious and fresh that I forgot to take a picture before we ate them all! Sorry! (They just list the pork dumplings for the big plateful on the menu, but we just asked them to substitute the vegetarian ones-- no problem.)
For the entree, My husband had noodles with peanut sauce, nicely spicey:
I had a stir-fry with lots of vegetables and thin slices of tofu (vegans, ask them to skip the scrambled egg). It was so tasty in a subtle, smokey way:
If you eat there (and they have a restaurant on Main St. and one in Richmond, too) try the Legendary Noodle house tea!
It comes in a big glass and it's green tea with an assortment of exotic dried fruits (goji berry, longan, etc.) and chrysanthemum flowers. It's fruity and fragrant and delicious!
Enjoy!
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9 comments:
I bought two of your cookbooks at Boston Vegfest ;o). So far, everything I've made is delicious!
oh my goodness gracious, I absolutely LOVE noodle dishes - wow, noodle-making looks like so much fun!! and wow again, at those noodle dishes (especially the noodles with spicy peanut sauce - yum!)
YUM! Bryanna, I love noodles and grew up with noodles. I saw while I was in Beijing from the tour bus although I didn't go to a restaurant that served it. It would have been a phenomenon. Thanks for sharing. Very interesting indeed!
SIV
sweet vids!
Can't get fresh jalapenos? Oh noes... My apologies.
You might use dried red peppers, or try this instead... made from red jalapenos, it's natural and as far as we're concerned it's our kitchup replacement :) http://www.huyfong.com/no_frames/sriracha.htm They will ship a sample pack for just $7.00US.
I always forget how lucky we are around here, food-wise. Within ten minutes of me, we can shop at five grocery stores dedicated to different ethnicities; if we go fifteen minutes, we have three kinds of ethnic supermarkets. We have a local tofu factory, huge fresh daikon grown locally, and the incomparable sweetness of the Texas 1015 onions and the Texas Ruby Red grapefruits.
It's easy to think of Texas as unfriendly to vegetarians, but honestly I think we'd have trouble anywhere else.
Wish you were here. :)
In the city it would be no problem, and they do have them in our nearest small city sometimes, but it's sketchy, and, as I said, I live on a little island. I don't order from the States if I can help it, even with our dollar so strong-- customs, etc..
I will try to get some next time I'm in Vancouver and freeze them, but we usually don't bring our car over, so we walk onto the ferry with our bags. We have to be choosey about what we bring back! Sometimes it's food, sometimes, music (CD's, etc.) and books.
Actually, it's pretty good around here for foodstuffs, but we have very few Latinos in our area, so it's harder to get Latin American ingredients than Asian or Middle Eastern. It's getting easier to find them in Vancouver, though.
But, even if they have them in Courtenay (our nearest shopping town), I have to think ahead, because we only go twice month. I have a crammed pantry and freezer, as you can imagine!
It was interesting seeing the noodle house tea. When I was in China this is how tea was served to us. It was always in a glass with lots of dried 'things' (can't think of a better word) floating around in it. I loved it.
I was very lucky yo visit China in 2007 and got t experience a noodle house tea. I had a freind living there at the time really enjoy the experience.
Great article. Thank you for posting.
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