[CRA 2010 Signature Dish] Roasted Squab ???? and Sauteed Spot Prawns with Soya Sauce ???????from Koon Bo

Finally.

I had been wanting to go to Koon Bo for the longest time. People had been telling me that their Squab is the best.

And just a month ago,  I had to pull out (at the last moment) dining there with a very well respected chowhound from Portland. “Portland Hound Iona” was the first to document the Vancouver Chinese food scene on Chowhound. I kicked myself over missing that dinner because I would love to hear first hand how the Chinese restaurant scene was from the early days. I am hoping a reader out there who knows Portland Hound Iona to comment and let us know a bit of those early days … fmed? :-)

Koon Bo is a restaurant that you can find so much fault with and yet amazingly it is very popular. Any lesser restaurant would have closed a long time ago.

The location is not impressive. It is on a small strip mall right at the intersection of Fraser and 41st.

Parking is an issue too. Well, not much on an issue considering you could park by the street along Fraser or 41st nearby. But if you expect to find parking in the strip mall, it is not easy to come by.

The decor … it is dated and certainly nothing fancy. If you ask me, I think they are in the dire need for a makeover but I do feel that Koon Bo is happy with the status quo. They do not seem fazed by all the swanky new, modern Chinese restaurants opening these days.

Service is not bad because we were there off peak times. So we did not have any service issue although I heard that people complaining about their service.

Koon Bo is a Cantonese restaurant. Our original intention was to try their 2010 Gold award winning dish from the CRA. That was until we also found out that they also won Gold last year in 2009 and was amazed with all their other dishes on the menu.

The above is their specialties. We pretty much ignored the rest of the menu because there are enough here to make our selection difficult.

Their food is not cheap if you consider the decor and the looks of the restaurant. We really thought that their prices were kind of expensive for the most part, although they have cheap lunch specials with congee ($2.00-$6.00) and soup noodle ($3.50-$6.50)

Chinese Restaurant Award 2010 ? WINNER in the SQUAB Category ? Roasted Squab ????

What surprised me is that the CRA has a category specifically for Squab. Maybe it is because I can’t think of many ways that one could cook squab.

So, Koon Bo won Gold this year pipping Sea Habour in Richmond for the same dish — both awarded for Roasted Squab.

Actually we were taken aback by how much this costs. Fine, we did not ask when we should have. Squab are basically pigeons and definitely much smaller than chicken. So if you use the price of chicken as a yardstick for the meat, I would say the Roasted Squab would be $8-$10 each. But no. It was … More after the jump. Click to read the rest of [CRA 2010 Signature Dish]
Roasted Squab ???? and
Sauteed Spot Prawns with Soya Sauce ???????
from Koon Bo (1,009 words)

© ben for Chow Times, 2010. |
Permalink |
8 comments

Post tags: Chinese, Restaurant Review, Vancouver