Old Buddies Seafood Restaurant 尚品海鮮麵館

Old Buddies Seafood is a newly opened restaurant on Alexandra Road in Richmond, next to Cattle Hot Pot. The restaurant is a lower middle class Chinese restaurant with fancy decor and the interior looks modern, following a colour scheme of taupe, grey and beige. Also, the restaurant is quite large with eight to ten faux leather booth seatings and a lot of tables with custom made chairs.

TOFU PUDDING, READ BEAN SOUP, SALTY EGG AND MUSTARD VEGETABLE WITH SLICED PORK SOUP, LAMB AND TOFU SKIN HOT POT , HOUSE SPECIAL PLATTER, CREAM AND BUTTER SAUCE, AND STEAMED EGG YOLK AND MINCED PORK ON CUCUMBER.

HOUSE SPECIAL PLATTER ($28.80). 

There seems to be some sort of confusion for the house special platter… The house special platter is the priciest platter available, and with the photo of roasted pork, BBQ duck, smoked shanghainese fish and jelly fish on the menu, it only made sense for it to be that platter. At the end of dinner, we asked which platter was shown on the menu and the waiter responded "that is an online photo we found, we don't have it." I thought it was kind of odd because any restaurant knows better than to use a random photo online. So, the next day I phoned the restaurant and asked what was in the house special platter. The manager (pretty sure the owner) mentioned there are seven to eight different items such as peanuts, marinated beef with tendon, pork hock and chicken leg. Looking at our platter we had sliced marinated beef with tendon, shanghainese fish, sliced pork hock, spring rolls and jelly fish. The manager did not mention spring rolls at all, was that the replacement for the chicken leg? Anyways, for what we got the platter is pretty pricey. If we were not missing peanuts and chicken leg, that would make up seven different items?

Starting top left clockwise, the slices of marinated beef tendon tastes tender. The smoked shanghainese fish tastes sweet as well as moist. The slices of pork hock tastes tender and comes with a side of vinegar and minced garlic sauce. The spring roll, errr spring roll? The last time I had spring rolls in an appetizer platter was at Penny's, and that was an intentional order. Usually spring rolls are only available at Western Chinese cuisine restaurants (excluding dim sum of course). The spring rolls are lightly deep fried, have a slight crisp and a slice of prawn as well as honeydew, it works. Also, the rolls have a slight cooked honeydew taste and the prawn provides some texture. And last, the jelly fish with sesame oil tastes clean and there is no sand (some restaurants cannot rinse jelly fish properly). For $28.80 is it worth it? Naaa. We thought it would come with roasted pork and BBQ duck like the photo shown on the menu. If the restaurant did not have enough ingredients to make a platter, they should have let us know.

2 3/4 CREAM AND BUTTER SAUCE CRAB ($11.80/lb). The cook who cooked the crab is pretty skillful with the wok and highlighted the crab's natural taste, however, the sauce tastes weak. The sauce has a slight creamy taste but does not taste flavourful or like a properly made cream and butter sauce. After ordering, we asked the waiter if the table was big enough and he mentioned that the kitchen will send out dishes one by one. When we noticed a table leaving, we asked if we could change tables, he said yes and confirmed with the manager. As the next dishes came, there was no space and the manager gave the next two available tables away. I think that is a smart business move (5/5), seat the customers waiting since the other seated table waiting already has food, right? Except a waitress was standing around not knowing what to do with the dish that she was carrying.

LAMB AND TOFU STICK HOT POT ($19.80).

This is the first restaurant I have been to that does not serve lamb hot pot on a burner. Every Chinese restaurant knows to serve lamb hot pot on a burner to preserve the constant heat, or the dish gets cold fast. The lamb tastes mediocre, slightly gamey (which is not a bad thing) and chewy, however, not too tough. The sauce tastes very simple, bland, not flavourful and has an unpleasant light gamey as well as salty taste. Other than the salty "meh" tasting hot pot, the bean curd sticks taste hard and were not cooked long enough. If I want to be super picky, I prefer the lamb to be cut into traditional square sizes, rather than sliced.

STEAMED EGG YOLK AND MINCED PORK ON CUCUMBER ($16.80). 

The meatloaf has minced pork, shrimp and chinese mushroom. Rather than tasting fluffy or tasty, the meatloaf tastes chewy, tough, dry and compressed. The hairy melon (not cucumber) tastes soft and is what it is, as well as the salted egg yolk. This dish is hard to eat and tastes very unpleasant.

SALTY EGG AND MUSTARD VEGETABLE WITH SLICED PORK SOUP ($8.80). 

It would have been nice if the soup came in the beginning… rather than the end. The soup has a nice clear pork broth and green mustard vegetable taste. The ingredients in the soup are tofu, green mustard vegetable, chinese mushroom and slices of pork toro which taste tender. Although the soup could have tasted more rich as well as tastier, it tastes average.

STEAMED RICE ($1.50).

COMPLIMENTARY RED BEAN SOUP. 

The red bean soup tastes rich, tasty and slightly sweet with a generous amount of red bean and a slight dry mandarin peel taste. It was quite good.

DOHUA, SOFT TOFU ($6.50). The tofu pudding is made to order and took around twenty minutes. The soft tofu tastes smooth, properly made and is the only average to above average tasting dish that we ordered. For the brown sugar and ginger sauce, there was no hint of ginger and the sauce tastes very bland (not enough brown sugar too).

POSITIVES

- Friendly waiters

- Newly renovated restaurant, nice cosmetics

NEGATIVES

- Below to average eats

- What's with the house special platter?

- Cream and butter sauce tastes weak

- Highlight of dinner was the red bean soup and tofu pudding

- Parking on Alexandra sucks

LITTLE THINGS

- There are too many restaurants with average tasting dishes to come back

- Restaurant's interior resembles Star Anise's (Star Anise is more spacious and has nicer decor but the food is horrible)

Food: 2/5

Service: 2.5/5