Food::Saturday Dinner @ New Station

        We planned on having dimsum for dinner tonight at Capital Tea Garden in T. Street, downtown Sacramento.  Good thing I checked their hours online and found out that they are closed on weekends.  I noticed that after our unforgettable experience at Yummy Kitchen, I have been wanting more Chinese food.  Danii has been wanting to try duck again so I found the best place to try tonight.  I've been reading good reviews online about this Chinese restaurant on Broadway, downtown Sacramento called New Station.  They also have fried squab which I've been dying to try all these years.  Pardon the yellowish tinge in the photos.  I forgot to change the white balance in my camera to incandescent, was too eager to take the pics.

Wor Wonton Soup - $7.95

         New Station looks just like one of those hole in the wall eating places but don't let the exterior fool you.

        First of our orders to arrive was the Wor Wonton soup.  When it comes to picking which soup to order, Dylan calls the shots.  I imagine having Wor Wonton for many more Chinese dinners we will be having in the future (sigh).

       

 Their Wor Wonton was the best we had so far in all the Chinese places we tried.  It had shrimp, wonton, roast pork, fish cake, shiitake mushroom and baby bokchoy, baby snow peas for greens which still had a bit of crunch.

Roast Duck (quarter) - $5.50

         Their Roast Duck was excellent.  I asked Danii if she liked the Roast Duck more than Peking Duck and she said she still preferred Peking Duck, Roast Duck comes at a close second.  As usual,  Danii ate most of the duck being one of her favorite poultry dishes nowadays.

Salty Fish Chicken Fried Rice - $7.75

        
        Dinah and I decided to order some fried rice to go along with the other orders.  We tried their Salty Fish Chicken fried rice.  Nothing special with this one, just like the other salted fish/chicken fried rice we tried in the past.

Fried Squab - $11.95

        
        Then, the fried squab arrived.  It looked just the way I expected it to be, with the head still on (including the beak).  At first, Danii and Dylan was hesitant to try it but then Danii made the first move.  I wasn't expecting Danii to like it.  She even ate the crispy skin off the bird's head!  Dylan on the other hand didn't finish his piece so I ate it.  The squab's skin was well seasoned and crispy.  Some of the meat tasted a little gamey for me, like the breast portion which looked more like dark meat rather than white which was strange.  The rest are of the bird was tasty and flavorful.

Combination Seafood in Bird's Nest - $11.75

        Lastly, we had the Combination Seafood on Bird's Nest.  When I saw this item on their menu, I had a good idea of how it's going to look like.  My only disappointment was that there was not enough sauce in the dish to drench the deep fried egg noodles.  In Chinese restaurants in the Philippines, the veggies come with a thick sauce that gets absorbed by the crispy fried noodles making them soft and flavorful.  Nevertheless, we had a very nice dining experience that night at New Station.  I see some other items on their menu that I want to try next time.  We'll be back for sure.  I just hope Dylan will have other soup ideas next time.

Places::Big Sur (Bixby Bridge & McWay Falls)

        When we visited Carmel last fall, we also took the scenic CA Hwy 1 drive on the way to Big Sur.  I have several places on my mind that I want to visit that day, too bad one day was not enough to see them all.
 

        First stop was Bixby Bridge which was built in 1932.  It was high noon when we got to the bridge so it was so hard to get good pictures of the structure.  Good thing there was this dirt road before you get to the bridge where you could walk a little further and get a good view of the bridge from the other side that was not directly against the sun.

        Our next stop was Julia Pfeiffer Burns Park to see McWay Falls.  This was taken inside the concrete culvert beneath Hwy 1 that you have to cross from the parking lot to get to the falls.

        This is the trail/walkway where you get to see a spectacular view of the Pacific Ocean on your left.

        This is a view of McWay Falls which is an 80 foot waterfall that spills directly into the Pacific Ocean.

        We also saw this black and yellow, hairy caterpillar near the Pelton wheel area of the park.   I Googled for it afterwards and found out that it was a Spotted Tussock Moth caterpillar

        We saw a lot of California poppy on the way back to the parking lot.  I learned from Dinah that this is the official state flower of California.











        
        I took this picture by the roadside on our way back to Carmel.  It looked like a very low cloud hovering over the beach.

Food::Early Saturday Dinner @ Shoki Ramen

        There was a time when I got addicted with Naruto.  I'm still quite addicted though I no longer watch the anime series.  Nowadays, I just read the scanned manga pages online.  The main character in that anime series is Uzumaki Naruto who happens to like ramen very much.  It was this anime series that started my craving for ramen.  No, not the instant ramen that you get by opening a packet of dried noodles which you then boil in water.  I mean the real thing.  So I started Googling ramen places in our area and found out about Shoki Ramen in downtown Sacramento.
        Today, Dinah and I went to Seafood City to go grocery shopping with Tita P.  We agreed we're all going to Shoki Ramen afterwards.  We went to the R Street location which is the newer branch since the original 24th Street location is quite cramped. 

Tan Tan Men

Hiyayaku

        For starters, we ordered Hiyayaku, which is a cold appetizer made with firm tofu garnished with bonito shavings, scallions and garlic paste.

        I've always wanted to make this at home the first time I saw this on Flickr.  Now is my chance to try it first to see if it tastes as good as it looks.

1/4 Hiyayaku with soy sauce

        
        Hiyayaku tasted really good with a little splash of soy sauce.  The saltiness of the bonito shavings and soy sauce along with the spiciness of the scallions and the garlic paste complemented the flavorless tofu really well.

Tan Tan Men with Tamago (egg)

        
        
        Dinah and I shared a large bowl of Tan Tan Men.  Tan Tan Men is basically the Shoyu ramen with chili oil topped with goma-miso minced meat, scallions, spinach, bamboo shoots and nori.  Tita P. also got a large Tan Tan Men.  She planned to bring home half of it for Paulina.

 

Chasu Pork plate

        We also ordered extra Chasu pork for toppings on our Tan Tan Men.

Tan Tan Men with Tamago and Chasu

        
        Dinah got to complete the stamps on her Shoki card for the 2 orders we got along with Tita P.'s.  We were able to get a large Tan Tan Men to-go for just an additional $3 (free if we got the regular size).

        The only funny thing about Shoki ramen is that they just give you containers for to-go items.  You have to transfer the food yourself.  I wonder why they couldn't do it themselves since it will save them some dishwashing work. 

Food::Late Saturday Dinner @ Yummy Kitchen

        I promised Dylan that the next time we go to a Chinese restaurant, we'll go to one of those that have the rotating center tables.  I also wanted to try having the traditional Chinese style dinner with the family, not the usual Orange Chicken or Mongolian Beef menu items that we usually get during lunch specials.  I've heard that Yummy Kitchen has some pretty good menu items during dinner.  First thing I checked on their menu was the seafood section and thought of ordering the Lobster with Supreme Broth but the waitress suggested the Lobster with Ginger and Scallion instead.  This was Dylan's favorite that night.

Lobster with Ginger and Scallion

Jellyfish Salad

        For appetizers, we ordered their Jellyfish Salad.  Dinah and the kids didn't like it that much.  They said they don't like it because it's cold.  Well it's a cold appetizer after all.

Honey BBQ Pork

        We also tried their Honey BBQ Pork.  We all loved this one.  It's like a cross between lechon and tocino.

         
        Aside from the Lobster with Ginger and Scallions, we tried their Peking Duck 2 Ways.  2 ways because first they serve the duck's crispy skin, wings and legs with sauce and steamed buns that looked like siopao with no filling.  For the rest of the duck's meat, they make lettuce wraps out of them (2nd way).  The Peking duck was Danii's favorite and said the crispy skin is like lechon.

Peking Duck 2 Ways

1 Way - Steamed Buns (for the crispy duck skin)

Wor Wonton Soup

        Finally, we had some Wor Wonton soup.  We were all very satisfied with the food and the service.  Dylan was no longer feeling bad that he didn't get to order some Orange Chicken :)

Food::Saturday Dimsum Brunch @ Hoicin

        I was craving for some dim-sum the night before so I Googled for Chinese restaurants in our area other than the usual Rice Express and China House place that we usually go to.  My son suggested Fat's Asia Bistro, which strangely made me think of P.F. Chang's.  We've been to both places before, their food is just too Americanized for me.  Then I found Hoicin.  I also noticed that they have a weekend lunch promo for dim-sum, perfect!

Deep fried squid - $3.00

Wonton noodle soup - $6.00 (1/4 serving - $1.50)

        Their weekend dimsum promo starts from 10am-3pm.  We got there around 2pm.  We were surprised that it was just beside the Vietnamese noodle place that we went to once, long time ago.  The place looks like your typical Chinese place, nothing fancy.  The waitress gave us their menu after we got seated.  I noticed that the promo items were not on the menu she gave us so I asked if they have another menu for the dim-sum weekend lunch promo.  She came back with the menu and we started discussing what to pick.  We ended up ordering each item on the dimsum menu except for the egg rolls.  Dylan also wanted wonton soup which was not on the weekend dim-sum promo list.

        First to arrive on the table was the deep fried squid which was really a good deal for just $3.  Danii and Dylan really enjoyed it.  I quickly turned my Olympus Pen on to start taking pics and guess what?  I forgot to replace the SD card!  I just used my Motorola Cliq's phone camera instead.  The plate was almost clean before the next dish arrived.  Next was Dylan's wonton noodle soup.  The waitress brought us individual bowls and served us.  Nothing special with the noodle soup.  It tastes just like the chicken mami we have back home.

Deep fried diced tofu - $2.00

        Dylan and I loved the deep fried diced tofu.  It was garnished with toasted garlic chips and scallions.

Steamed pork buns - $2.50

        They look like Hongkong style siopao to me, pork asado filling.  These were really good.  I ate 2 of them.

Shrimp Har-Gow - $2.00

        You can never go wrong with these shrimp dumplings.  Just a dip in soy sauce with chili-garlic oil, and that's all she wrote.

Pork Shu Mei - $2.00

        
        
        Their pork siomai was also good.  Didn't get to try more though.  We wanted to order some more but the waitress said it will take some 20 minutes so maybe not.

Sticky rice chicken wraps - $1.50

        
        Danii just tried a little bit of the sticky rice with chicken wrapped in lotus leaves.  Dylan didn't want any so Dinah and I got to finish them.

        



        
        
        
        We were very satisfied with the taste as well as the service.  We also noticed they have Peking duck on the menu so we'll surely be back to have dinner there sometime.