noodle soup – Page 5 – Michael Eats

Cheap Eats at Tsui Xiang Tsuen

Published on October 6, 2022 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 888 Dundas Street East, Mississauga
Website: None

The Mississauga Chinese Centre is a definite hidden gem if you’re looking for cheap eats in Mississauga. You wouldn’t know it from the outside (it basically just looks like a strip mall) but it has a small food court with several vendors serving up a whole bunch of dishes.

There’s a sushi place, a Filipino place, and a few Chinese restaurants with typically enormous food court menus. Tsui Xiang Tsuen falls into the enormous menu category; I was craving wonton noodle soup, so that’s what I ordered.

Was it the best wonton noodle soup I’ve ever had? No, absolutely not. In particular, the wontons were basically complete mush, and the filling wasn’t quite what you’re expecting. Instead of the usual pork/shrimp combo, I think it was all pork, and it had a mildly gamy flavour that I wasn’t crazy about. They were easily the weak point of the dish.

On the other hand, the generous amount of noodles were perfectly cooked with a good amount of texture, and the broth had a nice clean flavour.

Plus, I think I’m burying the lede here, because this thing was a pretty hearty lunch, and the price? Six bucks. You can’t go wrong there.

Quick Bites: Aquarela Restaurant, Hey Noodles, Good Taste Casserole Rice

Published on September 27, 2022 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Mofongo at Aquarela Restaurant

After realizing that I had never tried mofongo — a Puerto Rican dish in which plantain is mashed with garlic and crispy pork skin — I quickly discovered that Aquarela is pretty much the only game in town. Thankfully, they seem to be doing a pretty great job of carrying the torch for the dish in the GTA; I have nothing to compare it to, but it’s tasty, that’s for sure. It’s rich, creamy, garlicky and abundantly delicious. It’s kinda like mashed potatoes on steroids. It also comes with your choice of meat; I went with the crispy pork belly, and yeah, that’s a great combo. Something to cut through the plate’s overwhelming fatty richness would have been nice, but that’s a minor complaint for a very tasty dish.

Noodle Soup at Hey Noodles

The noodles at Hey Noodles are great (as you’d hope for from a place with “noodles” right in the name of the restaurant), but what really blew my mind was the price. I ordered the Chongqing Street Noodles, which is a very large bowl of soup that’s absolutely crammed with noodles, and that somehow only costs $6.99. The egg was an extra dollar, but even still, that’s a fantastic deal, especially considering how tasty it is. The noodles are nice and chewy, and the soup is delightfully zingy, with that addictive combo of spiciness and numbing heat that you get in this style of Chinese cuisine.

Clay pot rice at Good Taste Casserole Rice

Clay pot rice is an extremely simple dish — it’s basically just plain white rice that’s topped with meat and cooked in the eponymous pot, which makes the bottom layer of rice nice and crispy. It’s simple, but immensely satisfying when done well. The one I ordered was topped with eel and various meats and sausages, and yeah, it’s super satisfying. The fluffy/crispy rice, the tasty meats, and the sauce they have on the side (which was in a soy sauce container, but I’m fairly certain was more than just soy sauce) was a great combo.

Tasty Noodle Soup at Szechuan Noodle Bowl

Published on September 13, 2022 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 400 Dundas Street East, Mississauga
Website: https://szechuannoodlebowl.com/

Look, I’m a simple man. If you slap a bowl of freshly-made noodles in front of me, my level of happiness is going to go up by like a hundred percent. Szechuan Noodle Bowl — which, as the name implies, specializes in bowls of freshly-made noodles — makes me a happy man.

I ordered the Hand-Made Noodles, which comes spicy or non-spicy with your choice of topping (beef, ground pork, pork intestines, Chinese pickle, or chicken). I went spicy with ground pork, and yeah, it’s good.

Those noodles are great — they’re thick, chewy, and satisfying. The soup is mildly spicy and has a nice zippy flavour, and the generous amount of tasty ground pork complements it perfectly.

I wish there had been some chili oil on the table — the soup was spicy, but could have been kicked up a bit — but aside from that it was a top-notch bowl of noodles.

Pho Ngoc Yen is a Hidden Gem

Published on June 26, 2022 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 1090 Kamato Road, Mississauga
Website: https://sites.google.com/orderup.ai/ngocyenrestaurant/home

Pho Ngoc Yen is one of those restaurants that must rely pretty much entirely on word of mouth; hidden away in an industrial neighbourhood in Mississauga, it’s basically in the middle of nowhere. The odds of you stumbling onto it are quite miniscule.

But yeah, it’s definitely got the word of mouth that it needs, and I can see why — it’s great.

I got the Pho Ngoc Yen Dac Biet, which the menu describes as “NY’s special: rare beef, beef balls and boneless beef shank with rice noodles.”

It’s a great bowl of pho. The generous amount of meat is tender and tasty, and the broth is beefy, richly spiced, and thoroughly delicious. The noodles were slightly on the soft side, and my bowl was missing the beef balls, but the broth and the beef were both so tasty that this never felt like a big issue.

Chicken Tan Tan Ramen at Momofuku Noodle Bar

Published on November 11, 2021April 4, 2024 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 190 University Avenue, Toronto
Website: https://noodlebar-toronto.momofuku.com/

The chicken tan tan ramen at Momofuku is a taste explosion. Its flavour is so incredibly assertive that it seems like it should be overbearing, but it’s not. It’s so good.

The broth is zesty and creamy and rich, with a roasty sesame flavour and a mild nuttiness (not to mention a bit of a spicy kick) that’s fairly irresistible. It’s absolutely not subtle, but it totally works.

It’s topped with green onions, a whole bunch of tasty ground chicken, and a silky sous vide egg that basically just melts into the soup and makes it even richer. Add the chewy noodles into the mix, and you’ve got a seriously tasty bowl.

I also tried the fried brussels sprouts (“fish sauce, yuzu, chili, mint”), which are nice and crispy and feature a great balance of flavours — the fish sauce is the first thing you notice, but it’s also sweet and zippy in a way that’s really satisfying. Brussels sprouts tends to be a divisive vegetable, but I dare anyone to try this and deny that it’s delicious.