No. 1 Noodle House

Last Friday, I went on an impromptu dinner out with one of my friends on Twitter. She had found out that No. 1 Noodle House in Gastown was having their grand opening and since I like ramen (or any food for that matter), I agreed to go. The place is a pop-up restaurant is owned by the same guy that opened Save On Meats and has been open for a few weeks now with a soft opening at the end of April.

The place is cash only and the tables are picnic tables.

The No. 1 Black Ramen was just added recently and being a sucker for garlic, I went for that. Normally it's $10.50 but because it was the grand opening, they had a special - any ramen and beer for only $10.

Complementary edamame and sparkling wine was given to us to celebrate the grand opening. The edamame was coated in sesame oil and slightly spicy. Nice to chew one while we waited for our ramen to arrive.

The ramen was ok. Broth was thick and creamy not too much of a garlic taste though. Noodles were slightly chewy. I appreciated the amount of ingredients in it - arugula, bean sprouts, bamboo shoots, half an egg, seaweed and maybe about four slices of pork. The No. 1 Black might be the Tonkotsu but with charred garlic added. Not amazing but not bad either. 

They also have three pinball machines in the back!

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Vancouver Weekend Events (May 24 - 26, 2013)

Friday, May 24, 2013

Eat! Vancouver -  Online: $14.00     At gate: $16.00
Friday, 2 PM - 9 PM
Saturday, 10 AM - 9 PM
Sunday, 10 AM - 5 PM
BC Place Stadium, Vancouver
EAT! Vancouver is the only consumer food, beverage and cooking festival in Vancouver, taking place at BC Place Stadium. Celebrity chefs, popular local restaurants, wineries, food and beverage manufacturers, cookbook authors, retailers, artisans, and many others from the culinary world will come together for a three day public extravaganza at the newly refurbished BC Place Stadium. EAT! Vancouver encompasses unique food experiences, opportunities to learn behind-the-scenes culinary magic from professional chefs, dynamic entertainment through celebrity chef cooking demonstrations and culinary competitions, diverse food, beverage and cooking related exhibits; and of course fantastic shopping opportunities.

Finder's Keeper's — a curated pop up shop - by donation
5pm - 11pm
Lost and Found, 33 W Hastings St.
Blim to hold popular local indie market at the new Lost and Found Cafe! This event will be a one night curated market event happening on Friday, May 19 from 5 pm til midnite.  There will be a cash bar, café, and baked goods. As well as a DJ set by Ultimate Lover. Hype Events will be promoting this event.  Admission will be by donation and there will also be prize give aways and swag bags for first comers.

Vancouver Comic Arts Festival - Spring Book Launch Party
7:00pm - 10:00pm
Displace Hashery Beach Bar at 3293 W 4th Ave in Kitsilano 
Featuring Matt Bors, Ed Brisson, and Jesse Davidge  Join us at Displace Hashery Beach Bar at 3293 W 4th Ave in Kitsilano to celebrate the spring book launches of some of our esteemed exhibitors! This event is open to the public; swing by, pick up a copy, and have it signed before the rush of the festival begins! RSVP to this event on Facebook! 

Saturday, May 25, 2013

UBC Alumni Weekend
8:30am ~ 6:00pm (see schedule for times)
University of British Columbia campus, various locations
 If you’re looking for the most fascinating, entertaining and intellectually stimulating day of the year, come to the Vancouver campus for UBC Alumni Weekend. With more than 60 activities to choose from, you’re sure to have a great day! Online registration is now closed but you can still register in person at the registration desk at University Fair on Saturday. A limited number of Rick Mercer tickets will also be available there ($25 – cash only). See schedule of events here.
 
Vancouver Comic Arts Festival
Sat 10am - 6pm
Sun 11am - 5pm
181 Roundhouse Mews Vancouver
The Vancouver Comic Arts Festival is a weekend-long celebration of comics that enjoyed its launch in May 2012. The festival features readings, panels, and workshops, culminating in a two-day exhibition for cartoonists from across the country and down the coast.  The goal of VanCAF is to appeal to everyone, whether they're already die-hard comics fans or simply experimenting. For this reason, admission to all events is completely free, and table costs for exhibitors are kept as low as possible. We're not so much concerned with making a profit as we are transforming Vancouver into a city of story-telling and comics.

Eat! Vancouver -  Online: $14.00     At gate: $16.00
Friday, 2 PM - 9 PM
Saturday, 10 AM - 9 PM
Sunday, 10 AM - 5 PM
BC Place Stadium, Vancouver
EAT! Vancouver is the only consumer food, beverage and cooking festival in Vancouver, taking place at BC Place Stadium. Celebrity chefs, popular local restaurants, wineries, food and beverage manufacturers, cookbook authors, retailers, artisans, and many others from the culinary world will come together for a three day public extravaganza at the newly refurbished BC Place Stadium. EAT! Vancouver encompasses unique food experiences, opportunities to learn behind-the-scenes culinary magic from professional chefs, dynamic entertainment through celebrity chef cooking demonstrations and culinary competitions, diverse food, beverage and cooking related exhibits; and of course fantastic shopping opportunities. 

Public Works Open House  
11am - 3pm
City Operations Yard, 5599 Lynas Lane, Richmond  
Stick your hands into wet cement, play in the largest sandbox you’ll ever see and enjoy lots of other fun activities at this popular and award-winning free family event.  Public Works Open HouseThis event offers a hands-on experience that includes plenty to do for all ages. Gardeners can grab some free topsoil, while future Bob the Builders can get up close and personal by going on and inside dump trucks, graders, excavators, and other real-life, real-size heavy equipment. Kids of all ages can win free prizes, purchase delicious hot dogs and other food choices or go for a hay ride tour of the Works Yard.

Portobello West Summer Market - $2
11am - 5pm Sat & Sun
Creekside Community Centre, 1 Athletes Way, Vancouver
Fashion, art, jewellery, accessories. Amazing line-up of talented local vendors, live music, and great food! 

16th Annual European Festival - $8 online, $10 at door
Sat 11:00 AM - 11:00 PM
Sun 11:00 AM - 6:00 PM
Swangard Stadium, Burnaby corner of Kingsway and Boundary Rd, Burnaby
Annual celebration offers chance to experience diverse European culture, cuisine, entertainment and more. On May 25th and 26th Swangard Stadium will host the 16th Annual European Festival bringing together some 30 countries in this weekend cultural festival of food, fun and performances.

11th annual South Hill Festival 
12pm - 4pm
East 47th and Fraser Street, Vancouver
This festival is a community event that celebrates the South Hill neighbourhood.  Again this year the South Hill BIA is hosting a Food Fair as part of the festivities. The Food Fair will be located on East 47th and Fraser Street and will comprise of several member restaurants including Dairy Queen, Magda’s  Restaurant, Pizza Plus, and Lovely Thai Restaurant. Make sure to visit the Food Fair and have a tasty lunch with friends and family!  Musical entertainment is by Jim Cook (12-1 pm) and lesismore (1-4 pm) in the Food Fair area.

Can't Stop The Serenity Vancouver - $16 
12:30pm - 5:30 pm
H.R. MacMillan Space Centre
8th annual charity screening of "Serenity" to benefit Equality Now, BC Women's Hospital & Avalon Women's Centres. See Serenity on the big screen, participate in costume contest and auction. A scavenger hunt is on right now (deadline Thurs midnight).

Demo & Book Signing with Wim Vander Zalm
2pm 
Chapters South Granville 2505 Granville Street Vancouver
What fruits and vegetables grow best in patio pots? What vegetables can I plant as winter crops? When is the best time to cut back rhodos? How do I overwinter my geraniums and fuchsias? What fast growing evergreen hedge will work for my narrow urban yard? How late can I plant spring-flowering bulbs?  These are just a few of the burning questions that renowned gardening expert Wim Vander Zalm answers again and again as owner of two Art Knapp Plantland garden centres and a long-time regular on CKNW”s The Bill Good Show.  Meet Wim Vander Zalm on Saturday, May 25th, 2013 at 2pm, at Chapters on South Granville for a demonstration and book signing.

RoundAbout Kits
2:00 PM to 4:00 PM
Mary's Place - near 4th & Trafalgar, 2610 W 4th Ave Vancouver 
Come and work on making your garden more community (and bee/butterfly) friendly. You can make a (friendly) sign for your garden at this workshop.  We have a Neighbourhood Small Grant to offer support and funds to gardeners (not just RoundAbout gardeners) in Kitsilano to enhance gardens to build community connections and/or bee and butterfly habitat.  This is the first workshop in the RoundAbout Kits series - meant for anyone who's interested, and especially RoundAbout (traffic circle) gardeners who'd like to enhance their gardens for community building and bee and butterfly habitat.

Sunday, May 26, 2013

Vancouver HTML5 Gaming Workshop & a Yeti - $10 donation 
9:30 AM to 5:00 PM
The Imperial (Formerly District 319) 319 Main St Vancouver
This full day workshop is presented by Vancouver Polyglot {Un}conference, Startup Weekend Vancouver and Microsoft Canada!  With advances brought to us by HTML5, modern browsers and free libraries like CreateJS, we can create games and rich interactive experiences more easily than before. In this workshop, we will show how you can use HTML5 to build games and interactive experiences today (with plenty of demos to pull apart). Then we will show how you can take those HTML5 games and migrate them to Windows 8 to take advantage of monetization opportunities with over 60 million potential users. 

Eat! Vancouver -  Online: $14.00     At gate: $16.00
Friday, 2 PM - 9 PM
Saturday, 10 AM - 9 PM
Sunday, 10 AM - 5 PM
BC Place Stadium, Vancouver
EAT! Vancouver is the only consumer food, beverage and cooking festival in Vancouver, taking place at BC Place Stadium. Celebrity chefs, popular local restaurants, wineries, food and beverage manufacturers, cookbook authors, retailers, artisans, and many others from the culinary world will come together for a three day public extravaganza at the newly refurbished BC Place Stadium. EAT! Vancouver encompasses unique food experiences, opportunities to learn behind-the-scenes culinary magic from professional chefs, dynamic entertainment through celebrity chef cooking demonstrations and culinary competitions, diverse food, beverage and cooking related exhibits; and of course fantastic shopping opportunities.

Vancouver Comic Arts Festival
Sat 10am - 6pm
Sun 11am - 5pm
181 Roundhouse Mews Vancouver
The Vancouver Comic Arts Festival is a weekend-long celebration of comics that enjoyed its launch in May 2012. The festival features readings, panels, and workshops, culminating in a two-day exhibition for cartoonists from across the country and down the coast.  The goal of VanCAF is to appeal to everyone, whether they're already die-hard comics fans or simply experimenting. For this reason, admission to all events is completely free, and table costs for exhibitors are kept as low as possible. We're not so much concerned with making a profit as we are transforming Vancouver into a city of story-telling and comics. 

Portobello West Summer Market - $2
11am - 5pm Sat & Sun
Creekside Community Centre, 1 Athletes Way, Vancouver
Fashion, art, jewellery, accessories. Amazing line-up of talented local vendors, live music, and great food! 

16th Annual European Festival - $8 online, $10 at door
Sat 11:00 AM - 11:00 PM
Sun 11:00 AM - 6:00 PM
Swangard Stadium, Burnaby corner of Kingsway and Boundary Rd, Burnaby
Annual celebration offers chance to experience diverse European culture, cuisine, entertainment and more. On May 25th and 26th Swangard Stadium will host the 16th Annual European Festival bringing together some 30 countries in this weekend cultural festival of food, fun and performances.

World Resource Investment Conference 2013
Sunday, May 26 at 8:30am - May 27 at 6:00pm 
Vancouver Convention Centre West 1055 Canada Place Vancouver BC V6C 0C3 Canada 
The annual World Resource Investment Conference will be held at the world renowned Vancouver Convention Centre. Mineral exploration, mid tier producers, mutual fund, bullion, and online research companies will exhibit throughout the two days. Financial experts, newsletter writers, fund managers and analysts will host workshops and keynote sessions where attendees can expect a wealth of knowledge covering, direct investments, speculative investing, macro trends, economic analysis, metals outlooks and investing strategies. Pre-register for free here.

Reoccurring:

Vancouver Farmers Market - Trout Lake

9:00am - 2:00pm every Saturday from May 11 - October 19

North Parking Lot of John Hendry Park at Trout Lake, Vancouver

North Parking Lot of John Hendry Park at Trout Lake Between Templeton and Lakewood south of the 13th Avenue Alley Please note: There is no parking in the North Lot and no parking on 13th Avenue. Please park away from the area & walk in. Or better yet: walk, cycle or take transit if you can!

River District Farmers Market
10:00am - 3:00pm every Saturday from May4 - Oct26
Kerr Street Plaza – on Kerr Street, one block South of SE Marine Drive, Vancouver
This one-of-a-kind farmers market is the only riverfront market in Vancouver. Come shop for fruits and veggies, prepared foods, and handmade products produced farmers and artisans. Enjoy the waterfront, playground and pier.

Kitsilano Farmers Market  

10:00am - 2:00pm every Sunday from May 12 - October 20

2690 Larch Street at 10th Avenue, Parking Lot of Kitsilano Community Centre

Shop for organic and conventional product, meat, cheese, seafood and plants as well as tasty baked goods, beautiful crafts while being entertained by local musicians. Hot coffee and hot food available on site each week.

Chinatown Night Market
6pm - 11pm Fri, Sat, Sun May 17th to Sept 8
Keefer Street between Main & Columbia, Vancouver
This summer, the Chinatown Night Market is bringing a heady mix of time-honoured tradition and new school flavour to the festivities on Keefer Street. Live music, storytelling, and Mahjong; new vendors, more food, and some other stuff that wasn’t here last year like outdoor classic movie screenings and epic ping pong tournaments. See some photos from last year here.

Richmond Night Market - $2
Fri-Sat  7PM - 12AM 
Sun & Stat Holidays  6PM - 11PM 
Sat (Jul & Aug) 7PM - 1AM
8351 River Road, Richmond BC
Lots of food, live entertainment and vendors. $2 fee for regular admission (Subject to changes). FREE admission for children 10 & under and FREE admission for Seniors 60 & up. $10 and $20 Zoom Passes are available for purchase.  Check out my photos from last year here.

International Summer Night Market
7pm - 12am Fri, Sat, Sun, May 10 - Sept 8
12631 Vulcan Way, Richmond BC
6th annual Summer Night Market in Richmond starting May 10, 2013! Lots of food, live entertainment and vendors. Check out my photos from last year here.

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Plateau Mont-Royal - Montreal, QC

This is a photo dump of the houses, buildings and streets around the Plateau Mont-Royal area in Montreal. I take a lot of photos while walking. lol We visited a few restaurants in the area as well as a board game store.

Le Valet d'Coeur was our first stop. They sell board games and have a decent selection of on sale games though a lot of them are in French only. I bought a small card game "Un éléphant ça casse énormément". Instructions are all in French but the store clerk said that it's really simple to interpret. Somehow we haven't played it yet even though it's been what half a year ago since we bought it? (We should play it W!)

Ah this was the other poutine place that I considered. Unfortunately, it was closed so good thing we went to Montreal Poutine instead!

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Mother's Day Brunch at Italian Cultural Centre

K and I have been taking out our mom for dinner almost every year on Mother's Day but this time, K happened to chance across some tickets to the buffet brunch at the Italian Cultural Centre. Tickets are $40 but it is all you can eat with the following menu:

COLD ITEMS
Salmon Gravlax
Platter Yogurt Parfait with Seasonal Berries
Fresh Fruit Platter
Chocolate Croissant, Danish, Banana Bread
Purple Cabbage Coleslaw with Beets and Grainy Dijon
Mediterranean Salad with Feta, Olives, Green Beans and Pomegranate Dressing
New Potato Salad with Honey Dijon Vinaigrette

HOT ITEMS
Brioche French Toast
Belgian Style Waffles served with a Selection of Toppings
Classic Eggs Benedict
Spinach, Feta & Roast Tomatoe Baked Frittata
Dill Potato Cakes and Hash Brown Potatoes
Steelhead and Cod Duo on Lentils with Butter Sauce
Cappelletti with Ground Sausage, Mushrooms and a Demi-Glace
Rotini with Pesto and Vegetables
Inside Round of Beef with Pearl Onions
Brown Sugar Glazed Ham
Thick Cut Bacon and Pork Sausage

DESSERT BUFFET
Selection of Sweets, Bars and Puddings
Coffee, Tea
Free pop and juice, cash bar available for other drinks.

Sounded pretty good and mom gave the approval so off we went.

The dining area was in a grand ballroom. The parties were staggered by every half hour starting from 10:30am finishing at 12:30pm. There's only about 10 or so tables each half hour so there isn't a rush of people all the time at the buffet tables which is a great system! It was a little funny since we were the only Asians there besides W's sister's family who coincidentally was also having brunch with the in-laws!

I'm never good at buffets. Didn't eat that much, I kind of filled up on my first plate!

Dessert. This cute chocolate cup dessert always went first! Had to keep an eye out when they brought out more from the kitchen! It was some kind of blackberry mousse inside the cup. A little tart but I liked it.

Brunch was ok. It's not like fine dining but Mom liked it and that's the important thing. My aunt saw the pictures and demanded I take her next year! LOL

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