freakzspeaks

freakzspeaks

Monday 23 June 2014

$50 credit giveaway from Just-Eat !

FOR ALL SASKATOON-IANS ! 
Free $50 credit giveaway for one lucky winner! Scroll down to find out how!
Also, enjoy summer savings of 25% for deliveries in Saskatoon (website)
   *Offer expires July 31st,2014. Only available at participating delivery restaurants in Saskatoon at JUST EAT. Terms and Conditions apply.   
   See restaurant menu pages for full details.


Royal Thai Delivery + 25% summer special @ Just-Eat, Saskatoon

From now till July 31st, 2014, Saskatoon-ians will get to enjoy Just-Eat.Ca's 25% summer savings for online delivery/takeouts at participating restaurants ! I thought this is a really good deal so decided to try it out myself. For those who are wondering, Just-Eat is an online delivery/takeout service that has been around for quite some time and currently active in 13 countries worldwide. It's really easy, convenient and free to use! 
This is all you have to do when you enter their website :
Adapted from Just-Eat.ca
After pulling an all-nighter to drive through the night from Edmonton (after Michael Bublé's concert ;p), I decided to just order for delivery for my dinner. I've tried out Royal Thai in Taste of Saskatchewan and thought their green curry was quite good so decided to get them again by making use of the 25% summer savings from Just-Eat ;p. There are quite a number of participating local restaurants that are offering the 25% discount in Saskatoon. Delivery fee ranges from free to about $6.00 and within 45-60 minutes delivery time. My order came a little over 45 minutes so it was ok. Well-packed, no spillage, and no greasy paper bags :)
I had the Royal Thai spicy chicken wings as appetiser. Quite tasty with a tinge of lemongrass (commonly used in Thai dishes) and spiciness. The only downside was that it was not as crispy, probably because of the moisture formed in the container. Perhaps, this will be better when its eaten in the restaurant. Maybe pubs should also consider this flavour for wings night ;p
Royal Thai Chicken Wings $7.95 (before 25% savings)
For mains, I ordered Pad Thai-shrimp deluxe with coconut milk. I'm assuming they meant cooking the Pad Thai with coconut milk? This dish was quite good, generous amount of vegetables, shrimp and bean sprouts. I would say this is one of the better Pad Thai in town. However, it was not spicy (although I requested for it to be super spicy…maybe they didn't see my request ? ). Probably to be on the safe side, you can also call them after your delivery is confirmed to make sure they notice your special request especially if its allergy-related. 
Pad Thai-shrimp deluxe with coconut milk $12.95
Green curry was to my liking; thick, tasty and spicy. Coconut-based curry with peppers, basil, string beans and a choice of beef, chicken or vegetarian. Again, you can probably request to adjust the spiciness level. This that I have was already quite spicy (I'm assuming they didn't see my request but general spicy level was medium). This definitely goes well with steamed rice :) A change from the usual red curry or Massaman curry. 
Kang Keow Wan / Green Curry chicken $11.95
Overall, the Thai food is pretty good. I would have preferred them even more if they can top the spiciness level ;p. Try them out by ordering online via Just-Eat! Don't miss the 25% summer savings!

Address :325 3rd Ave N Saskatoon, SK
Website : Royal Thai Restaurant
Royal Thai Restaurant on Urbanspoon

For online delivery/takeout, log in onto their website ( will be directed to Just-Eat) or directly use Just-Eat . Full menu of all participating restaurants are available in Just-Eat. You will be directed to restaurants that are available for delivery at that particular time, browse through menu, select, tip, special request/comments (home location, spiciness level etc), pay via credit card or cash, confirm and voilà…just wait for your food! Pretty easy!

Because we love you so much, we are also offering a $50 credit giveaway from Just-Eat.ca for a lucky winner in Saskatoon! Check out my next blog post for it~ You never know, you might be the LUCKY one!

You might also like :
$50 credit giveaway from Just-Eat Canada (Contest end July 5th, 2014)

A Malaysian dinner @ Tropika (Southgate), Edmonton

I finally had a chance to try out Malaysian cuisine in a proper Malaysian restaurant in Canada! I was in Edmonton, Alberta over the weekend with sunbae for Michael Bublé's concert at Rexall Place. Tropika is a Malaysian-owned restaurant group and specializes in Malaysian and Thai dishes in Edmonton. Currently there are two restaurants; Tropika West and Tropika South (location). Being a little bit biased this time, we decided to go to the one at South due to the better reviews;p. A large, nicely-decorated interior awaited us when we got there close to 9pm (they close at 11pm on Sat!).
Loved the ambience
In case you wanna know more about the restaurant…apparently the restaurant won a couple of awards previously.
A nice menu with pictures and lots of varieties
Being Malaysians, we were excited to try out some of their spicy dishes so we basically ordered everything spicy (and tambah pedas / higher spicy level ;p). For appetiser, we had Gado-gado, Malay salad with bean sprouts, deep-fried tofu, egg, lettuce and topped with peanut sauce. This salad is generally not spicy (though you can request to make it spicy), and sweetish. This dish originated from Indonesia but its rather famous among Malay restaurants in Malaysia. Of course some ingredients were altered to fit the different taste buds. I personally like this dish (basically due to the fact that I've not eaten this for quite some time and also thought that they were charging slightly high for the other vegetable dishes;p).
Gado-gado, Medium $8.00
Instead of having individual dishes, we went for steamed rice and ordered two seafood dishes (ps: for Muslims, this restaurant is not HALAL). The waitress recommended us a few of their famous dishes beforehand, so we had the Daun Pisang Rendang Fish, which is sea bass filet with coconut juice and sambal sauce (Malay chilli paste) served on a banana leaf. As of now, they only have fish filet-based dishes and no whole fresh fish. Although the name of this dish sounded tempting to us, I thought it was just ok. The deep-fried filet was quite fresh (although I'm not sure whether the fish pieces were fried beforehand in the kitchen for easy preparation when dish is ordered) but lacking in taste. The rendang (coconut sambal sauce) was so little that it seemed like a topping rather than a sauce cooked with the fish as with how original rendang chicken should be. Perhaps, they wanted to maintain the crispiness of the fish pieces (or maybe because they know most people here can't take too spicy food) but I really felt they should be more generous with the sauce so that it had more rendang taste to it as the name implies. 
Daun pisang rendang fish, $17.00
The other main dish we had was Sotong belachan (calamari fried with Malaysian shrimp paste). Again, the level of spiciness can be adjusted and we requested for it to be more, more spicy (lols). This dish fare better than the fish I though it felt like some chilli powder was used to make the paste rather than fresh blended chilli. The taste of belacan (shrimp paste) was not that strong, we would have prefer it to be more but I believe that this has to be mild over here in Canada (some people might find it too pungent!). They were quite generous with the calamari and lots of vegetables as well. One thing lacking is the taste (and not spicy enough, no kick!) but overall, this dish is quite ok. Blends quite well with rice while the fish dish was way too dry. 
Sotong belachan, $16.50
Steamed rice $2.50/bowl
Sunbae (cheery face even after 6 hours of driving and 3 hours of shopping @__@)
Overall, food was ok (considering the fact that its sooo difficult to even find a Malaysian restaurant here). Ambience was lovely and servers were attentive. Lots of varieties on their menu, I'm sure you'll find something that will fit your taste bud. Table beside us had the satay and pineapple fried rice (looked appealing) while Pad thai was…so-so. Price-wise, some dishes were slightly on a higher side especially the vegetables. Also check with them the price for some of the seafood before you order as prices are seasonal. We would have enjoyed it even more if they had make it spicier for us though ;p. 

Address : 6004 104 St NW Edmonton, AB 
Opening hours : Monday - Thursday, Sunday & Holidays 11:30 am - 10:00 pm; 
Friday & Saturday 11:30 am - 11:00 pm
Tropika (South) Malaysian Cuisine on Urbanspoon

Saturday 14 June 2014

All-you-can-eat supper@ Smiley's, Saskatoon, SK

I'm not sure whats with me and buffets (we seem to click quite well ;p). Anyways, for a small place like Saskatoon, the number of buffets in town will definitely burn someone's goal to slim down. Reviews on Smiley's have been a mixed so I decided to try it out myself. For a dinner buffet at $16.95, I would say this is definitely cheaper than the whole lot out there. A huge building that also caters for events, banquets and of course, the daily buffet.  Reminded me much of a hotel buffet.
They have the usual salad bar with quite a variety of items. Although I didn't really try anything from there, the items looked fresh even though it was close to closing hours.
I was actually quite surprised with their hot buffet as I did not really expect much from this buffet. The variety of items they have was quite impressive. Friday was seafood buffet, so probably that was why there were so many variety of seafood; mussels, shrimp, fish filets, squid etc. Their Asian spread was also quite acceptable; maybe not the best Asian food in town but they covered the noodles, fried rice, pork roll, egg roll and even Vietnamese cold rolls with peanut sauce. A newer addition was the sushi bar with a few types of sushi offered; sushi were well-made and presented in a neat fashion (although I'm not sure what they do with leftovers!). And then of course, the much talked-about Smiley's Gourmet Fried Chicken. I honestly think it was quite good. Chicken was quite fresh, crunchy, and not too salty like KFC's. I was contemplating to whether have seconds but was just too full @__@
Eat eat eat with sunbae


Ok, the pics are not doing justice to the real thing but the stuffed zucchini at the top pic tasted awesome. I'm pretty sure its stuffed with fish and shrimp. Zucchini was a little bit mushy but this item reminded me of 'yong tau foo' (tofu/vege stuffed with fish meat).
One of the better dishes : Mussels ! Loved this!

Sushi
What I had on my plate - First round ;p
They have a huge assortment of desserts at their dessert bar; I'm pretty sure you will not be able to try all of them. Apart from pop and slushies (which I think there's additional charges), the rest of the items included frozen yoghurt and vanilla ice cream (with toppings!), assorted cakes and cookies, coconut bun and custard bun, English toffee pudding and rice pudding. One thing that I definitely like was their coconut bun and custard bun. Its really hard to get this kind of buns in Saskatoon because no one thought of opening a bun bakery (@__@, last spotted were some assortment of buns at the Asian Market on Clarence). Totally fell in love with these buns. They were freshly baked, soft with lots of coconut filling. Even the custard bun was pretty impressive, a little bit crispy on the top and tasted super good (maybe I'm being biased coz I love bread and buns ;p)
Left : Coconut bun, Right : Custard bun
Ok, not really presentable coz I took a bite and then snap a photo but there was lots of coconut filling that I just had to show you. 
I did not take any photos of their desserts because I did not touch any apart from their frozen yoghurt. One thing lacking in this buffet is the aesthetics of food presentation. Although there were lots of variety, the desserts did not look quite tempting to the point I was wondering whether they were left overs from events or banquets that they hosted. I'm sure they will taste good though (can't really go wrong with desserts I guess).

Will I be back ? Yup, probably. And I think Friday will be my favourite day because its seafood buffet. They have specials everyday so, it will be better if you check out what features they have for the day. We were there quite late so servers were quite attentive since there were already not many customers around. 

Address : 702 Circle Drive East Saskatoon, SK 
Opening hours : Dinner buffet at 4.00-8.00pm
Smiley's Buffet And Catering on Urbanspoon

Friday 6 June 2014

(Revisit) Dinner Jap-buffet @ New Island Sushi, Saskatoon, SK

Since we were so impressed by New Island Sushi the last time we were there (blog post), we decided to give the dinner buffet a shot as well. It's $5 more compared to lunch but it's still cheaper than the dinner buffet in Nagoya or Go For Sushi. Here's the cheating part; if you are a sashimi-lover, you have to pay an additional $5/person (!!), which will then make it the most expensive dinner buffet compared to the rest. Also, make sure you go with everyone that eats sashimi, since they are going to charge the additional price / person at the table...smart 'ey. Anyways, those highlighted yellow are the extra things they have for dinner as compared to the lunch buffet…
Mango salad : I dunno why but we both loved this salad. Mango, vege, fish roe and dressing seemed very good combination 
Seaweed salad topped with fish roe : This is super tasty. Refreshing and healthy ?
Grilled shrimp - skip this. nothing special, really
Im pretty sure this is salmon belly teriyaki. Sinfully good though with lots of fats, and if you like deep-fried stuff
Salmon asparagus roll : small piece of thing but my friend said it was good.
Dim sum / steamed dumplings : Looked nice from the outside. Honestly one of the worst I've ever tasted. I reckoned eating those frozen dumplings from Superstore or Asian groceries tasted better.
The tiniest (cute though) ever siu mai (pork dumpling) that I've seen.
Tiger roll : Not sure what is the filling, but its slightly spicy and tasted like a mixture of crumbs, crabmeat or salmon. 
Slice beef with enoki mushroom. Good stuff.
Must-not-miss tempura-s! Shrimp was scrawny during the first order but look at the second one (right), super huge and with lots of fried batter.
Overall, food was good ( despite some people saying its not authentic Japanese!), serving was fast and waiters were attentive. Some might not like the fact that the sushis are smaller than the usual size that you get from Umi Sushi or other places but I think its ok (why stuff yourself silly with all the carbo @__@). If you prefer more of the authentic stuff like sashimi/salmon/teriyaki, you can try the dinner. If not, I think its not much of a difference compared to lunch. Desserts are the same for both. So I'll probably just stick with lunch the next time around! lols