Authenticity in Cooking and Dining.

What is authentic?

Yesterday's debacle could have been avoided, in fact it SHOULD have been avoided.  I should know better.  When Sushi Dragon opened a month ago, the staff went around to businesses in the area and handed out copies of their take out menu.  The young ladies that dropped off the menus were Chinese, not Japanese.  There are huge exceptions which I will discuss later, but deep down, I am suspicious of restaurants owned and operated by individuals of one country trying to re-create food from a country other than theirs.  For some reason, the whole world thinks that all you need to open a sushi restaurant is a supplier of fish and some rice.  This is preposterous, and in some cases, insulting.

I have been to sushi restaurants operated by Chinese, Koreans, Vietnamese, Japanese, and likely many other ethnicities.  Yet, the only dim sum restaurants I have been to seem entirely operated by Hong Kong Chinese.  The pho places are all run by Vietnamese.  Korean BBQ?  Strangely, never seems to be run by Japanese staff, and Taiwanese beef noodle soup?  Again, oddly, never run by Mexican chefs or the French.  Always folks from Taiwan.

What is it about sushi that makes it fair game for everyone?

Korean operators actually makes a lot of sense.  There are almost a million ethnic Koreans in Japan, with about half of them being non-Japanese citizens.  We have family friends who are born in Japan to Korean parents, but who never were able to obtain citizenship.  The Koreans in Japan have historically been considered lower class, and to survive many of them would have operated restaurants, pachinko parlours, brothels and other "lower" forms of employment.  It is certainly possible that some skilled Korean-Japanese sushi chefs have emigrated to Canada and have set up successful sushi restaurants.  In fact right next to Sushi Dragon in Port Coquitlam there is a decent ramen shop called Takano.  It is my understanding that the owner operators are Japanese Canadians of Korean ancestry, and while there is better ramen available in the Vancouver area, their ramen is pretty good, certainly the best in the Tri-Cities. 

Any discussion about authenticity and food, where ramen is brought up, has to mention David Chang and Ivan Orkin.  Chang is famous for his Momofuku empire, which has something like 12 restaurants in New York, Toronto and Sydney Australia.  Born and raised in Virginia if I recall, he has a strong culinary education, worked in New York for some excellent chefs at very well know restaurants and then rounded off his education by going back to Japan (he was first there to teach English) and working in ramen and soba shops.  Orkin also went to Japan to teach English, but he got married and stayed there, and in time opened a ramen shop.  He had a built in marketing campaign, as I am sure many of his first customers were curious to see how bad (or good) the ramen made by an American was.  He did so well that he now has two shops in Tokyo, and you can buy his premade ramen in supermarkets in Japan.  He recently opened two ramen restaurants in New York, and the reviews have been very good, in fact he was recently on CBS Morning News who ran a segment about him and Chang.

Both Chang and Orkin have had people question their authenticity.  With Chang, while I have not eaten there, the overriding theme is "it has to be delicious".  I own his cookbook, and it very much seems that he takes authentic, historic recipes and adds twists learned through his experience at cooking school as well as from his working in fine dining restaurants in New York.  And example is his "Bo Saam", which is basically a Korean lettuce wrap.  He makes a vinaigrette with sherry vinegar, saamjang and gochujang.  It is delicious, but the sherry vinegar clearly is not part of any historic recipe for the dish. 

Orkin on the other hand, from what I know, ran a pretty authentic shop in Tokyo.  He made his broth with chicken and pork bones, just like everyone else.  He was the 'inauthentic' part of the equation, and while at first the curiosity effect must have helped get his customers in the door, the ramen must have been good enough to get them to come back.  His places in New York deviate quite a bit from the authentic however, with menu items such as smoked whitefish donburi (which is apparently excellent).

I suppose in the end, the intention of the owners and chefs is what really what matters, and whether a restaurant holds itself out to be authentic or not.  Chang and Orkin hold themselves out to be providers of delicious food; Chang's menus are clearly a form of Asian inspired "world food", while Orkin's hold more true to his inspirations.  But you know what you are getting - if the place is called Ivan Ramen, you can logically infer that you are getting Ivan's take on ramen.  Unlike Sushi Dragon, who holds themselves out as an authentic Japanese sushi restaurant.  For someone walking off the street, there is no way that they can prepare themselves for the debacle to come - the place looks like a Japanese sushi shop, the menu includes everything you would normally expect to see; the disguise is set, you are not going to find that you chose a bad spot for your lunch until the food starts to come, and at that point it is too late.

 

Sushi Dragon - Port Coquitlam

**Sushi Dragon is closed.  Space now occupied by a donair shop.**

This is a new restaurant on Westwood, occupying a space formerly held by a defunct donair shop.  I would have prefered a left over donair, lost behind a seat some three months back when the donair shop packed up and left.

This was horrible.  I had the box C, and my friend had the box A.  The difference?  I had 6 pieces of zombie sashimi meat, or so it appeared, while everything else was the same.  Started with complimentary edamame.  It was flabby and underseasoned.  Followed with "tempura tuna", also complimentary...  Here is where I got suspicious.  Who gives tuna away?  Unless it is old and can't be used for something else?  The batter was wallpaper paste thick, and this gut bomb is still giving me issues 11 hours later.  Ugh...  Next was the teriyaki portion of our meal, mine was beef, his was chicken.  My beef looked like someone ran a chuck steak through a meat grinder, then soused it with teriyaki sauce.  It was disgusting, my dog eats better food than this.

The miso soup was crap, hot water with slivers of tofu and a spoonful of miso.  No onion, no wakame, nothing.  I found no reason to finish it. The California roll was average, which is sad, as the average California roll sucks balls.  There were also two gyoza, which were palateable.

The salad was large but boring and premade.  The sashimi was a strange colour and tasted extra dense.  Speaking of extra dense, I ate all the fish.  I am insane.

Consider yourself lucky, no pictures of the train wreck, but we do have a shot of the restaurant.  Note the remnants of the "Donair Stop" sign above the Sushi Dragon sign.

Pizannini @ The Silver Reef Casino

If you are over 55, on Mondays the Silver Reef Casino just outside of Ferndale has a great deal for you, a voucher for $7.15 towards your lunch!  The ticket can be used at any of their restaurants, as long as you use it by 2pm.  Wifey and I had no idea of this until recently, which is unfortunate, as Monday is often the day we cross the border to buy gas and groceries.  The day we found out about this deal, we were sitting in Pizzanini, the pizza and sandwich shop at the casino.  We were having our (undiscounted) hot dogs, and our neighbouring table was composed of an unusual couple, a regular, who knew all about the deal, and a first-timer.  The regular was eating a half sandwich and a soup, while the new lady was having a calzone.  In discussion, the regular told the first timer about the $7.95 deal, and we were lucky enough to eavesdrop.  Further, the first timer raved about her calzone, saying it was amazing.  Given that we had paid a similar price for our two hot dogs (well, mine had cheese), we resolved to try the calzone next time, it truly did look like a good deal, and the lady seemed to love it.

So, like conspirators planning a crime, my wife and I waited until the following Monday, and headed down to capture this deal.  The menu of calzones unfortunately only had 4 items, and we ran with the Spicy Mushroom.  I, being a devout carnivore, insisted on adding sliced Italian sausage.  Well, for a guy starting a food blog, I suck hard, there is no photo.  Worse, I have had the same calzone three times now, and I did not take a picture one single time.  I hope to add one later, but what a moron.

As for the calzone, it does not need the sausage at all, though it does not detract one bit.  There are several great big, fat slices of portobello mushrooms, surrounded by onions, olives, some chili peppers and a lot of cheese.  Just spicy enough, hearty and meaty, and absolutely delicious.  With a pepsi, and without sausage, the cost is $9.95, which turns out to be about $4.50 after the voucher.  It EASILY serves two adults.  Heck of a bargain.

Going back next Monday!

Silver Reef - Pizzanini

So, I did go back on the 9th, too good of a deal to pass yup.  This is 1/2 of the calzone, it literally weighs something like 2 pounds total.  I added the sausage again, as I just can't seem not to, though the calzone really does not need it at all.  Cheesy, nice balance of olives, nice amount of onions and stuff, really delicious.