Whaaaat! There is a Deer Garden in Coquitlam? No, there is not. Some photos must have been added to the restaurant by accident because this is not the Deer Garden Signatures! You know that feeling after sitting at a restaurant and literally not knowing what to order? Once in a blue moon when it happens to me, it is either because I am overwhelmed from so many choices or, there is simply nothing that I am interested in. Yeah, I was pretty upset after taking a look at the menu. Not only that but as a late lunch… I could not have Chinese food the way I like it, with plenty of dishes and seafood. So, we settled on grabbing a snack and to go for dinner a couple of hours later. The restaurant has plenty of booth seating arrangements as well as larger tables for parties of more than eight. Deer Garden is also a Hong Kong style cafe restaurant but unfortunately since we arrived around 4:00pm, the dinner menu was only available. Also, the restaurant offers crab meat and fish maw soup for $21.00! Is it fresh dungeness crab meat rather than the typical packaged?! Wow, even the higher end Chinese restaurants do not charge that much. I wonder how the dinner is here.
RICE, CARROT AND PORK BONE WITH HERBS SOUP, HAI-NAM STYLE CHICKEN, GREEN BEAN SOUP, SEAFOOD, PORK AND CHICKEN WITH TOFU HOT POT.
DINNER COMBO FOR TWO, HAI-NAM STYLE CHICKEN AND SEAFOOD, PORK AND CHICKEN WITH TOFU HOTPOT. SERVED WITH RICE, SOUP OF THE DAY AND DESSERT ($29.88). The daily soup has a rich clear pork bone with squash broth and a piece of tender tasting carrot.
HAI-NAM STYLE CHICKEN, HALF.
The free range chicken tastes fresh and the meat does not taste like it has been sitting there for days. The chicken looks smooth and is one of the tastier hainan chickens that I have had in a while. The meat also tastes quite tender for a free range and has a nice chewy stiffness. Deer Garden seems to specialize in hainan chicken because there is a big plastic container of sauce (at least ten to twelve litres!) for the chicken by the counter .
SEAFOOD, PORK AND CHICKENThe hotpot consists of chicken, sliced ham, squid, butterflied prawns, crab stick and deep fried tofu. All the ingredients taste pretty standard, the chicken tastes tender; the squid although not extremely chewy, could taste more tender; the prawns taste meaty; and the deep fried tofu is one of my favourites, extremely juicy and soaks up the sauce. Unfortunately though, the sauce has an unpleasant fishy smell which is possibly from not running the seafood through water.
COMPLIMENTARY GREEN BEAN SOUP.POSITIVES
- Plenty of seats
NEGATIVES
- Not much service (seated ourselves after standing for a while and waited ten minutes to wave someone down for the menu, when we sat by the counter where the staff was)
- Although unfair to say since we ordered so little dishes… but the food is nothing special and the kind of "average" that I would not come back for
LITTLE THINGS
- Would be interested in comparing Deer Garden to Lougheed Wonton Restaurant out of curiosity though
Food: 2.5/5
Service: 2.5/5 (kind of N/A though)
Did you forget the "overall" addition? It's a good guideline as to how much someone is about to spend at a restaurant
ReplyDeleteYeah! LOL I thought the same. It's nice to expect how much $$$ I would be spending around. I didn't add it here cause the post is a couple of weeks ago, before I started the price thing
DeleteThe visit is a couple of weeks old**
Deleteof course it's not the deer garden signature.. you do know all the deer garden signature and whatever were just opened within the last 5 years or so.. and this has been opened for 14 years? in your blog you made it sound like it's ripping off the other restaurant when they are the one that's ripping this one off? this is more of a family restaurant with majority of it's customer base all long time customers..
ReplyDeleteHi Willie,
DeleteI did not mean to give the impression that Deer Garden was ripping off Deer Garden Signature at all! Sorry, I thought it was clear that I assumed "Deer Garden" would be "Deer Garden Signature" because some photos from "Deer Garden Signature" was uploaded to "Deer Garden" by mistake from someone else. Also, Deer Garden does seem like a family restaurant which is why I mentioned that I would be curious to compare Deer Garden to Lougheed Wonton House. But I do not think that Deer Garden Signature tries to rip off Deer Garden because one is a noodle shop while the other is a Cantonese style chinese restaurant
I think you should give the dinner a shot! You can choose 3 (or more dishes) for probably a little more than what you got, and it comes with rice and dessert too
ReplyDeleteMy family frequents here often and we've always thought it was more solid than some of the restaurants around there :)
And sure, the service is lacking, though I find most Chinese restaurants are this way?
Usually there's not much service at a Chinese restaurant but I cannot remember the last time I ever had to seat myself. Or be neglected beside the owners lol. The hainan chicken was good and I might revisit if I'm in the area, but the hot pot was pretty bad. Although there's too many restaurants to make a revisit, especially when their prices are higher than really good restaurants elsewhere
DeleteFirst of all that's Port Coquitlam, not Coquitlam. Secondly this location is now a Deer Garden Signitures.
ReplyDelete