Mum's birthday at Ho Yuen Kee

It was my Mum's birthday last week, so my sister and I organized dinner at Ho Yuen Kee. It had been a while since I'd been there and I was looking forward to going back and seeing if the food was still as good as it had been. Since my last visit the restaurant had won Vancouver Magazine's Gold Award as the best casual Chinese in the city. I was a little worried the restaurant might have been overrun by those who otherwise would have overlooked the rather non-descript restaurant. Fortunately I was still able to easily obtain a booking, so I was happy. Our dinner began with a soup. Winter melon with lots of seafood and bits of chicken. A standard of Chinese restaurants.
After that the duck arrived. The bat bo aap. I'm of course guessing at the spelling, though I was able to get my point across when I ordered the dish when I made the reservation. You need to order it ahead of time you see and, well, I don't speak Chinese so it is always a little bit of a gamble when I try to order things ahead of time. It is essentially a stuffed duck with all sorts of delicious things. I've only ever had it at Ho Yuen Kee. I love it. Incredibly rich, but worth every bite.
Once we had the duck the rest of the dishes came very quickly. We had a steamed rock rock which was a little small, but very good with ginger and green onion. Abalone on pea shoots which was really something special. Honey garlic spareribs. Fried rice with salted fish. A chow mein dish. All very well done. Ho Yuen Kee was spot on with all the dishes with the abalone really standing out. It had been quite some time since I had any and this was delicious.
For dessert they had the obligatory red bean soup, but we also ordered their soft tofu with a sweet ginger syrup. It is steamed to order and really good. While I wasn't crazy about the rice dessert I had at Shanghai Wonderful the night before, I was quite keen on the tofu dessert at Ho Yuen Kee. It had an incredibly smooth texture like a creme brulee or a panacotta and with the ginger syrup quite good. Overall dinner at Ho Yuen Kee was as good as it always is. They haven't let the award go to their head and they're still banging out some of the best Cantonese food in the city.

Ho Yuen Kee. 6236 Fraser St. Vancouver. 604-324-8855