Umi at Richmond center's new dining terrace

Not too long ago, Richmond center opened up their new food court that replaced the old Sliver city theater and made the space brand new again.  It was the talk of the town! Everyone just went there to see the new place and I must say that it is very pretty :).  It screams IKEA to me but it is nice.  The bad thing is it has very limited choices since its only one sided compared to before where it was two sides of the mall.  The food choice wasn't that great, it was just the same old fast food restaurants with a new-ish look.  The only place that intriguing to me was this Japanese restaurant called Umi.  Now I have never heard of such place but i do like their concept.

Their logo is this calming leaf green with a eco look to their place.  Their tables in the back are made out of wood and they have chic little white chairs for those that want to sit in their little bar area (no alcohlic drinks though). The place is really big compared to a lot of the other restaurants, they actually have a little drink and dessert bar which i forgot to take pictures of >_<. DOHH~

 Why this Umi place peeked my interest was that they make sushi by order.  They do have boxed sushi already but you also have the choice of taking a little form and tic-ing off the items you want and they will make it for you a la minute! There's really nice :D.  And on the far right side, you can see a man making fresh udon so you are guaranteed that they are serving you fresh udon too! Their udon bowls cost about $7-$9 depending on what you order but I don't find that too bad. My boyfriend and I might have ordered the must boring item on their whole menu but it wasn't too bad.  

Their decor is very chic, simple and clean.  I love it :).  And I love their lighting too! If you look closely, their lights are all shaped like shells.  Thats their logo in the back I believe, some interesting swiggle.

My little condiments; getting ready to eat :).  They have my sriracha sauce, some Japanese spices for rice and some standard soy sauce.

So we ordered the beef teriyaki since it had a little  bit for $7.99.  Not bad :).  There was a little side of edamame, two California rolls, some other type of sushi LOL, vegetable tempera, some sushi rice with beef teriyaki and a side of pickled ginger and wasabi.  Everything was pretty average but I like that I don't have to eat just burgers all the time when i go to a food court.

Right at the last minute, i grabbed a little box of sushi since I was about to order a udon bowl but I didn't really believe that we could finish it :/ so I got a little box of sushi too :).  This one was called "Green Dragon Roll".  Lol that's not the most appealing name but I can understand why they called that.   This type of sushi is just like a California roll, seaweed wrapping the fillings and rice surrounding it on the outside.  The inside has avocado and cucumber and on the top is some BBQ eel with more avocado.  Honestly I didn't really have any time to think so I just grabbed one that had avocado on the top LOL.  I love my avocado :), so yummy and buttery and good for you too! This was average too, nothing special.

My receipt.  I must say though the wait for my food was a little bit long, it was about 15 mins.  For a food court place, that felt like forever! My boyfriend was getting restless waiting LOL.  He came back to me and was like OMG that was at leaaasstt 20 minutes! UGH! I had to show him the receipt to prove to him that it was 15 minutes just to calm him down HAHA.

Last but not least! Dessert! Yes we did get a three course meal at Umi.  We were just sitting on their little bar area and I saw a lot of people ordering these so it peeked my interest. These were advertised for $3.99 so it wasn't so bad!  You got three flavors of "ice" to choose from, mango, green tea and taro.  Naturally me and my boyfriend shy away from taro since its always just powdered and unnatural flavored so it was down to green tea or mango.  We agreed on mango and the fun started from there. I believe they actually make their own "ice" and they put it in a giant machine that rotates the ice and shaves it really nice and thin.  Whats different about this shaved ice is the texture.  It isn't like shaved ice at all, its kind of like a cross breed of sorbet and frozen yogurt! Not dry at all but a little bit too sweet for both of our liking. They had this whole bar where you can choose what toppings you want.  The package included 3 toppings and 1 sauce.  We tried the rainbow jellies which the guy recommended since he said it tasted like gummy bears. We also got some pock and some sugar squishy things which i forgot the name of.  To top off the mountain of sweetness, we had some condensed milk! My favorite!  We sat down and wow :).  We were happy.  The mango was yummy but all together, everything was wayyy too sweet.  We got too sickened by this dessert not too long after but I was a trooper and ate it all :).  

Overall this was a fun experience but I will not be running to Richmond center just to eat here.  This would be a first choice if i was in Richmond center's food court since everything else there was just burgers and fries but yeah, average.

Hyatt Regancy Vancouver downtown Mosiac Bar and Grill Take 3

    About a year and a half ago, I went to Hyatt Regancy Hotel's restaurant in Downtown.  It was my friend Karen's last week before she was going to move to Toronto for school and stay there for possible her whole lifetime so I wanted to treat her to a dinner. 

My first experience there was absoultely mind blowing and that restaurant has been my go to restaurant whenever I went to downtown Vancouver.  Since I had this special card membership which allows me to have a buy one get one free on entrees since I work in the industry, it was just the no brainer place. 

 Tuna tataki salad rested on a piece of banana leaf, topped off with a brunoise of avocados, cucumber, mandarin oranges with a acidic sauce (guessing it’s a vinaigrette?)

I still remember we had the tuna tataki salad, paella and lamb.  Everything was soo damn good and I remembered that the presentation was absoultely inspirational. I actually losed the picture of the paella which is a shame since it was soo good but heres the picture of the tuna and lamb. $17

This was the pan seared Peave River Lamb resting on some mille feuille potato (basically scalloped potato without the cream and what not, but its nice and crispy on the outside, soft and yummy on the inside) and some sauce robert (brown mustard sauce).  I was seeing starts when i was eating this back then and i wanted more! Well later on i mean.

So the second time I went back at night with my boyfriend, we were just wanting to eat and we took the sky train from Richmond all the way to downtown just to eat their food.  It was a complete disaster. The pictures you see above, the food level was completely not there.  I was so surprised since they did so well the first time.  Keep in mind, I myself am a professional cook so I am really picky since from the time the plate sits in front of me to the time I taste it, I dissect everything in my mind. This might not be a fun thing for me since I can’t convert my mind back to the good old days when food was just food to me.  But because my passion for food grew, so did my knowledge. 

Me and my boyfriend ordered the lamb again, the same one from above, and a chicken dish with gnocchi. Ugh, it made me so mad.  I was expecting the same lamb.  They frinkin gave literally a rectangle of the potato, five French beans laying sadly on the side like dead corpses, three rounds of the lamb and sauce just splashed onto the plate! It looked like something the dishwasher plated….Like seriously? I was sooo pissed, I was ready to storm into the kitchen and throw the plate back at them.  That’s not even the worst thing.  The chicken was absolutely terrible! I don’t know if a smoker or whoever made my food, but did they taste the amount of salt they put into it? The amount of salt they put into it, I can clean bacteria out of my mouth without (You know, when you’re sick or have a sore throat, you would dissolve salt into water to kill bacteria). I was pissed.  I was completely pissed.  I didn’t come all the way just to eat their food and be completely disappointed.  If I wanted mediocre, somewhat edible food…I’d just go to McDonalds! I swore after that experience, I’d never go back. I even told the waitress that the food standard was not even there, even showed her the lamb picture above and she lied to my face saying that they changed the menu.  Bullshit…I hate it when they try to save their ass and make up excuses.   I didn’t even touch my chicken, it was so damn salty.

Just last Saturday, I told my boyfriend that he and I should go to Sears downtown since everything was 70% off since they were closing their store there. We got really good deals and those pictures will be on my other beauty blog www.mmnoob.blogspot.com.  Anyways we were hungry  but we couldn't decided what to eat.  Just on the way walking on robson street, we saw that there was a small section of the block was blocked just for us to....

Oh yes, it is what it looks like :). Whoever had this idea is GENIUS! After a long day at work and still walking around, my legs were KILLING me.  Me and my boyfriend almost didn't want to leave since it was so comfy but our hunger was getting to us LOL. But i was scared if we did fall asleep, we'd sooo get mugged. He said "Hmm since we don't know where to eat, let’s just go to Hyatt then." I was really hesitating but I said sure.

When we went there, we were greeted by a Japanese host and was sat down next to the window.  I was staring at a seagull staring at me while sitting on a light post which was quite entertaining since he moves around like a turkey HAHA.

For our first course, we got the Maan Farms Corn Bisque with jalapeno sopapilla $7.  The consistency was a little thin for a soup, but the flavour was pretty good.  I didn't really taste any jalapeno spiciness but the sweetness of the corn was nice.  Not too heavy, a good started.  I actually didn't even get to try the triangle things on the side since my boyfriend devoured it before i could get my hands on it. I really liked that the presentation was super simple, chic and modern.  Straight forward food is my kind of food :), although i do like fancy food too.

My boyfriend took quite a long time to drink the soup, but our mains were finally here! I was so hungry~ Here I had the Weathervane Alaskan bay scallops with a squid ink risotto, roasted corn, pickled red peppers.  I was really surprised that my risotto came black LOL.  I can't say that the squid ink gave any special flavour, but then again, I never tried squid ink before so I wouldn’t' know.  Look at that presentation! This is what I'm talking about! Little pink flowers, roasted corn, thinly sliced parmesan cheese and perfectly seared scallops. This dish was to die for! My boyfriend liked this dish more then his lamb (which is his favorite!) LOL, i was gonna be like "MY PRECIOUS!" but i had to be the good girlfriend and share HAHA. And the price is mind blowing too! $17~~ So cheap taking into consideration that we were eating in downtown, in a downtown hotel and the food was amazing...this was cheaper than Cactus club :).

My boyfriend got the Cumin five hour roasted lamb, rolled eggplants, tzatziki, preserved lemons.  I didn't really taste the cumin but the lamb was cooked perfectly.  Ughhh so good~ the sauce was alright.  Didn't really get to taste this since my boyfriend is a beast when it comes to food! LOL I joke i joke (but seriously). $21

Hello le boyfriend :). <3

Since my boyfriend was curious about what truffle (not the chocolate, the fungus) is, I decided that we should get a side of truffle pomme puree (essentially mashed potato but more delicate and lighter). So good...My boyfriend is officially understand why truffles so expensive :).

We somehow squeezed in a dessert but I asked the waitress what is the smallest dessert.  When she gave me the dessert menu, my eye just shot right to the white chocolate mousse since my boyfriend is in love with the white chocolate itself. I wanted to surprise him since he had to go find the washroom.  Right when our dessert came, they dimed the lights down so I apologize for the quality of the picture: /. Our chocolate mousse came as a pyramid, a strawberry aspic tip on the top and an airy white chocolate mousse. This actually isn’t my favorite dessert but it wasn’t bad.  The balsamic reduction is a little out of place since the white chocolate is so delicate flavoured, the balsamic reduction is just too strong and over powers everything.  There also was a side of brunoise of strawberries that was tossed in some balsamic vinegar and topped with some Chantilly (whipped cream + icing sugar + vanilla extract).

Overall, I was pleased to say that Hyatt is back on my HAVE TO GO restaurants. Their price point is awesome, most expensive thing there is only $21 and the food quality is absolutely mind blowing. Dinner all together was only $50 for two people (one main was for free), definitely will go back :). I hope any of you guys that read this or come to Vancouver, please please please go check this place out.