Thursday, September 30, 2010

Chef Hung Taiwanese Beef Noodle

I remember walking by this restaurant last year in Aberdeen and seeing the hoards of people lined up outside. I thought to myself that this must be a good Taiwanese beef noodle house. I've been wanting to try this place and finally decided to eat there with a few of my friends. The great thing about going a year later is that I get to avoid the lines!

Chef Hung's noodle restaurants was established in 1995 and he has also won the National Beef Noodle Contest award for 3 consecutive years. The restaurant in Aberdeen is his first North American location to open.

And again.... I forgot my camera. I should always remember to carry my camera with me. But I sometimes forget... So, again, we had to use the Iphone4's camera.


Open kitchen! You can watch the chefs make noodles.




The menu at Chef Hung's noodle house is pretty extensive. 14 different types of noodles and various side dishes, snacks and even rice! To order, they give you a sheet of paper where you will mark off which items you want. We ordered the Bean Curd Side Dish, Beef Brisket in Clear Soup, Beef Soup and Soy Milk Shanghai Style.

Bean Curd Side Dish

The bean curd was fresh and this dish was refreshing.










Beef Brisket in Clear Soup

For Taiwanese noodle places, I usually expect a dark, rich beef broth. But at Chef Hung's they have a clear soup. I like the clear soup as it's lighter and isn't as salty. There were two types of beef in the bowl. A thinly sliced beef that is raw when put into the soup and a thicker cut brisket. The meat was tender and was really good. Noodles were cooked al dente and weren't soggy.

Beef Soup

The beef soup is just the soup with a few pieces of beef and some veggies. There are no noodles and the broth for this one is the more traditional darker beef broth that you would find at Taiwanese beef noodle places. The soup was okay. It was a bit bland and didn't have the flavour that most beef soups have.










Soy Milk Shanghai Style

When I think soy milk Shanghai style, I was expecting just a bowl of warm sweetened soy milk. And maybe accompanied by a fried Chinese donut. It's usually what it is when I order it from Shanghai restaurants. I wasn't expecting a savoury version of it. I was surprised to see chili oil, green onions and dried shrimp in this mix. I must say that this isn't my cup of tea. I didn't like this at all and it was just an odd combination of flavours.





Overall Impressions: I liked the clear broth, beef and noodles from Chef Hung Taiwanese Beef Noodle. The other dishes that we ordered were pretty average and I've had more flavourful beef broth (the darker one) at other Taiwanese noodle places. The one thing that I didn't like was the Soy Milk... For about $11 for a bowl of noodles, it's a bit pricier than most places but I think it's worth it to just try the beef brisket with the clear broth as it is something different.

Chef Hung Taiwanese Beef Noodle
2800-4151 Hazelbridge Way (Inside Aberdeen Mall)
Richmond, BC
Phone: 604.295.9357
Chef Hung Taiwanese Beef Noodle (Aberdeen Centre) on Urbanspoon

2 comments:

  1. For the soy milk, I think they did not translate it well on their menu, because it was suppose to be "salty soy milk"...and that's the common Shanghai breakfast...with vinegar added in afterward to make it curdle...

    I did try their salty soy milk and it tasted horrible...and too diluted that when vinegar was added, it did not curdle...moreover, I had servers quickly running up to me and told me NOT to add vinegar...I immediately knew that the restaurant was definitely not Taiwanese-owned or run.

    Chef Hung is actually owned by Fairchild Group, they franchise the name from Chef Hung...

    Buddha Boy likes the beef noodles from this place too, however, it's not worth the price (unfortunately, the prices reflect the high franchise cost).

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  2. I wished that they stated it was the salty soy milk on their menu. I was expecting the sweet one =( The salty one was just awful.. I wasn't a fan of the flavours... But the noodles were not too bad. Expensive though.

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