Ask, and I will find: A good paella place

J said...

Find me a good paella place, preferably in the cheap-moderate price range, good value, family atmosphere, etc :)

May 27, 2009 9:40 AM

According to studyspanish.com, "Paella is a traditional dish of Spain. Its home is Valencia, but variations exist in the different Spanish provinces. A colourful mixture of saffron-flavored rice and various meats, paella's name comes from the paellera, the flat, round pan in which it is cooked. Traditionally, the paella is cooked out of doors, over a wood fire."

I don't know what makes a "good" paella (I've never had an authentic, homemade one before), but I highly recommend the paella at the Diamond Alumni Centre (SFU Burnaby Mountain -- on University Drive East at the north end of the SFU campus, overlooking Indian Arm and Deep Cove), where I tried my first one.

I loved every bite -- from the yummy seafood (mussels, shrimp, etc.) and veggies to the yellow saffron rice. The lemon-blueberry cheesecake I had for dessert was also amazingly good (see below for someone else's photo of it), and I hardly ever find a cheesecake I really like.

I know that the great meal I had at the DAC wasn't a fluke because I attended a wedding reception catered by the restaurant a few years later, and found the food there to be better than any I've tried at other Lower Mainland buffets -- including several more-expensive ones at hotels. I enjoyed every one of the desserts they had available (and there must have been around 20 different kinds!), especially one of the cheesecakes, which was up there with some of the best I've ever had. But I digress.


The Diamond Alumni Centre is one of my favourite secret spots, and not only is their paella super-tasty, it's also one of the least-expensive in the Lower Mainland.

Sadly, I don't think that paella is a regular menu item anymore. I know that the DAC still serves it, because a menu from a Mexican-themed lunch buffet it had back in May listed "Spanish paella" as one of the entrees, but I'd call to check whether or not and when it's available.

I've had paella at La Bodega Restaurant (1277 Howe Street) as well, which neither I nor my dining companion liked. Although the restaurant is known as one of Vancouver's most authentic Spanish tapas places, we found its paella to be dry and unflavourful, with only a small amount of seafood. To the left is a photo of La Bodega's "Paella de la Casa" from its website.

The only thing I liked about the paella was the price -- I remember that it wasn't too expensive -- maybe around $10.95? Back when I had it, reviews described La Bodega's paella as "lacklustre" and "oversalty"; however, I've also seen other reviews that have been more positive, so it wouldn't hurt to try it yourself, as it's quite affordable.


To get a more holistic view of Vancouver's paella offerings, I looked through reviews of pretty much every restaurant serving paella in the Lower Mainland. Sadly, I haven't found one place that garners consistently good reviews about its paella.

Here are some of my findings:

• Latin Quarter (1305 Commercial Drive): Apparently, their $45 paella (meant for two people) is their house special. Here's what one reviewer from Feb. 2007 had to say: "Disappointing -- flavourless -- boring!! ... My partner and I shared the paella which is their signature dish -- which I guess at $42 [old price] just means it's the dinner with the most profit in it for them. Mussels undercooked, shrimp overcooked, rice flavourless, empty clam shells -- If they think that's how paella is meant to taste they had better go back to cooking school -- I won't go on -- but I definitely won't be going back to this sham of a restaurant. I think enough said about this place -- you have been warned! There are plenty of great choices on The Drive but this one is certainly not one of them." Later reviews and comments all appear to show that nothing has improved over time.

• Baru Latino (2535 Alma St.): Their $20 "Paella Classical" consists of "Spanish chorizo, mussels, prawns, chicken and halibut, rice, fresh cilantro and smoky tomato salsa, served with homemade flatbread. One reviewer from May 2008 commented that "... Baru's paella tasted more like jambalaya than it did paella."

• Me & Julio (2095 Commercial Drive): Their $18.25 paella consists of "smoked chicken, red wine poached chorizo, poblano peppers and fresh local seafood steamed in a spicy tomato and saffron stew, [accompanied with?] crispy chili plantains." Of the many reviews I found on it, none made it sound particularly good:

1. From May 2009: "The paella entree was probably the weakest of the items we chose. However, my dear husband liked it. It had nice, fresh seafood and decent flavour -- I just found it had too much broth for my liking."
2. From August 2008: "The food is good, but I must say I was a bit underwhelmed each time. On my dinner visit we tried the tortilla soup (sopa de tortilla) and paella –- both which were a bit light on the spices..."
3. From May 2008: "[the paella] was bland and uninteresting. It seemed to cry out for salt, but at the same time one knew that would simply change it, not improve it."
   

Other restaurants that have had mixed or no reviews about their paella include --

• Chivana Restaurant Bar Lounge (2340 West 4th Avenue): They have two kinds of paella. Their Havana-style paella ($21) is a "fresh mixture of shrimp, chorizo sausage, scallops, black tiger prawns, chicken, mussels and daily catch with saffron, pineapple and lime, coconut sauce", while their vegetarian paella ($14) is a "fresh mixture of green peas, broccolini, sugar snaps, snow peas, baby carrots, bell peppers, cherry tomatoes, and saffron, pineapple and lime coconut sauce."

• Century Restaurant & Bar (432 Richards St.): Their $18 Spanish paella consists of "saffron rice, halibut, mussels, clams, prawns, seasoned chicken, chorizo sausage, lemon, green peas, and sweet peppers."

• Senhor Rooster Restaurant and Catering (850 Renfrew St.): This Portuguese Restaurant serves paella that's a whopping $29.95 -- a "rice casserole with mussels, clams, prawns, pork, chicken, and chorizo."

• Senova Restaurant (1864 West 57 Avenue): This Portuguese and Spanish restaurant dishes up seafood paella every Sunday. From the description of the Spanish paella they served during their Spring Paella Festival this May, it likely consists of "clams, mussels, shrimp, calamari, chicken, chorizo and porti."

Senova's owner and sommelier, Manuel Ferreira, was invited to prepare paella for EAT! Vancouver 2009's International Culinary Stage -- which might indicate that Senova's paella should be particularly good -- but I haven't found a single review that mentions Senova's take, except the following review, which also discusses Senhor Rooster's paella:

"I have heard really good things about the food [at Senhor Rooster] from some of my friends. It's not the greatest 'hood but not bad. I also heard that he will make things that are not on the menu if you call ahead and a friend of mine says that the Paella there is fabulous (you have to call ahead for it I think) which is great as someone else told me they were really disappointed in the Paella at Senova. Having said that, isn't Paella a Spanish dish?"

La Masia (19209 Fraser Highway) also serves paella, though you won't find it on the menu. A Spanish friend of a colleague of mine said that the paella there was very good and was authentically made by a Spanish family, so I emailed them about it, and here's what they had to say: "We serve paella when people ask for it when they come for dinner; we make it for two people or more; it is a seafood and chicken paella and it is $30.00 per person."

In the end, I still recommend trying the paella at the Diamond Alumni Centre. I can vouch for its great taste, and it meets all of J's criteria: It's moderately priced, set in a great atmosphere (with a gorgeous view), and delivers great value.

Now that you have a list of the great majority of places serving paella in the city, you can try whatever sounds good to you.

If you have a favourite paella place or have had a poor paella experience, let us know.

Ask, and I will find: red velvet cake

Tiffany said...

Do you know any place in Vancouver that sells red velvet cake by the slice? I know two places that occasionally make red velvet cupcakes. They make cakes too but then you have to buy the whole cake which is too much to eat.

Thanks in advance!

May 17, 2009 8:55 AM

"A Red velvet cake is a type of rich and sweet cake, with a distinctive dark red to bright red or red-brown color." The red colouring comes from beets or red food colouring.

Some recipes/reviews I've encountered have said that real red velvet cakes should contain a whole bottle of food colouring. I think that's a great way to speed up the onset of cancer, since I doubt that most bakeries are using this stuff.

But hey, we're young, so, as Marie-Antoinette has been misquoted as saying, and which I will now misappropriate, "Lettuce eat cake."

Red velvet cake can come topped with either butter roux icing (also known as a cooked flour frosting) or cream cheese frosting. The cream cheese version is apparently ever so much better.

There don't appear to be any bakeries or restaurants that sell red velvet cake by the slice in Vancouver. I checked the great bulk of the Southern restaurants, "fancy" restaurants, and bakeries in Vancouver, and none of them carried it.

Red velvet appears to be a special occasion item that that mostly shows up around Valentine's Day. I know that Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts (aka PICA) had them as part of a post-Valentine's Day theme. Maybe they carry them occasionally during other times in the year?

I suggest you make a reservation at PICA around that time in February (come with me!) -- there's a 2-for-1 three course meal-deal that happens during the months of January and February (which I know you've already done, and which everyone else should take advantage of -- it's equivalent to $12 for lunch and $18 for dinner). Right now, they're offering the same promotion every Monday.

La Baguette et l'Echalotte on Granville Island used to carry red velvet cake five years ago (alas, no longer).

Waterloo (where Tiffany currently resides) also appears to be red velvet-free.

I did (correct me if I am mistaken) manage to locate the two cupcake places you mentioned.

Cupcakes -- now with five different locations -- describes their version as "red cocoa cake topped with cream cheese frosting and dusted with white sugar".

Butter Baked Goods on 4321 Dunbar St. also sometimes has red velvet cupcakes on rotation.

Based on the reviews I've seen, neither rendition is particularly spectacular.

If you want the good "to-die-for" stuff, I think you have to be willing to drive down to the States. Aside from the fact that red velvet cake is a Southern specialty, the mere existence of a post about the "best red velvet cakes in Seattle" (there are seven on the list) points to the fact that you should be planning a trip to the States now (how's that for a mini-honeymoon?). There, they even sell red velvet cupcakes at Target!

The best is supposed to be at The Kingfish Cafe (602 19th Avenue East), where it "comes in slices as big as your head" for around $9.

If worse comes to worst, definitely look into this: According to weddingchannel.com, red velvet cakes are sometimes given as a groom's cake in Southern USA. "Intended to be a gift from the bride to the groom, the groom's cake is usually dark (often chocolate or liquor-soaked) and designed with a nod towards what's traditionally considered "masculine" (i.e., no rosettes in sight)."

My advice: splurge on a tasty treat for your husband-to-be! (Aren't newly-weds supposed to share everything?)

Or, even better, start a new tradition -- the bride cake. ;)

Believe it or not, pictured below is a Spiderman Red Velvet groom's cake. How awesome would that be?


In the meantime, since "[a] Red Velvet Cake is really a Devil's Food Cake that has red food colouring added to it," I suggest heading to True Confections for a slice of their devil's food cake "with dark chocolate layers, chocolate filling, and marshmallow icing."

I liked it so much the first time I had it that I actually had it again :o. Make sure you get it fresh -- it's not as good the next day. It's definitely worth trying if you haven't already.

If you don't mind BIY (baking it yourself), just ask if you want some good recipes for red velvet cake. Be sure to specify exactly what you're looking for -- I've come across sooo many (gluten-free, vegan, all-natural, all-artificial (just kidding) etc.).

Bon appetit!



UPDATE: Wow, you made it this far -- and not for nothing anymore, either! I have found a place that sells red velvet cake in Vancouver! Unfortunately, I don't think it actually tastes all that good. You can buy red velvet cake by the slice at WE. Coffee (1696 Robson St., a few stores to the right of Robson Public Market). The girl working the counter said it was her favourite cake slice, so I was expecting extreme deliciousness!

It looked like this:

I took it home to share with my mom and little sister. I also picked up half a dozen cupcakes from Cupcakes (one of which was red velvet), for comparison purposes.

I have to say, I was very disappointed with the WE. version. Inspired by this post, I'd made a point of trying pretty much every red velvet cake and cupcake I came across during a trip to New York, and the WE. version was on par with the worst of them. The cake part was extremely dense and not very flavourful, and the icing was a plain white one that tasted like the crummy store-bought kind. To be honest, I was quite surprised, given the $5.75 price tag for the slice. All three of us agreed that the version from Cupcakes was superior by far.

Cupcakes' red velvet cupcake was moist and delicious, complimented perfectly by their cream cheese frosting. I think the Cupcakes version is a much better value for your money. If you like dense, rich cakes, however, feel free to give the WE. version a try and let us know what you think of it.

Other places you can find red velvet cake/cupcakes in Vancouver:

Superstore. I've heard great things about their PC Red Velvet Cheesecake, but haven't had a chance to try it yet myself. I haven't found a reviewer yet that wasn't impressed by it.

Cassia Cupcakery (1706 Commercial Drive). I tried their mini red velvet cupcake for $1 and thought it was pretty tasty. The bakery itself doesn't look like it's gotten very good reviews overall though... I can't give my thoughts because the mini was all I tried (I was already full of other stuff from the Italian festival that was taking place that day).

Super Valu (1645 East 1st Avenue, just off Commercial Drive) also sells big red velvet cupcakes in packages of four. I haven't tried those, but I did try a strawberry frosted cupcake by the same brand, and that was delicious.

I'm sure there are a lot more places that sell red velvet cake nowadays, as it's gotten pretty popular... I just haven't been looking all that hard since I had my fill of them in New York City. A lot of the cupcake shops in Vancouver sell cupcake versions, while WE. Cafe is the only place I've found that actually sells red velvet cake by the slice.


One last note about WE. Cafe -- I had their famous Mariage Frères Marco Polo tea there the same day I picked up my slice of red velvet, and felt quite ripped off by it. Mariage Frères is supposed to make some of the best teas in the world. It smelled so refreshing and appetizing in my cup, but had next to no taste whatsoever. I think that the barista didn't steep the tea bags for long enough. Unfortunately, I couldn't simply wait for the tea to steep longer, because the cafe's policy is to remove the tea bags before they bring your teapot to you. So I basically paid $5.99 for a nice-smelling pot of flavourless water.

But that is the subject of another blog post that I will probably not get around to writing, because I have given up food writing to write quirky novels and short stories. My first novel, which I am now looking to get published, is called Teaching for Apples. It's about a girl who likes apples so much that she decides to become a teacher, because everyone knows that being a teacher is the best way to get free apples. Too bad none of her students will give her any!

You can find out more about the novel and even read some of my stories by liking my Facebook fan page: www.facebook.com/TeachingforApples.