Taiwan Beef Noodle King

If Vancouver is good for one thing, it's ethnic restaurants, particularly Asian restaurants. I don't think I'd ever tasted authentic Chinese food before moving to Vancouver. So much of what passes for Chinese food in the US, where I lived before moving here, is nothing so much as a sad comment on how disinterested most Americans are in authenticity, quality cooking, other cultures, and the rest of the world in general. I myself was content with "Chinese Food" before becoming enlightened as to what that term really means.

And really, it means nothing. And a lot of things. There is no such thing as "Chinese food". Chinese food is, rather, an umbrella term for some of the most diverse and inventive cooking traditions in the world. Tibetian food could not be more different from Beijing food from Yunnan food from Shanghai food from Hong Kong food from Hunan food from Xinjiang food. Vancouver is the first place where I had a chance to taste the specificity buried in that vague term. In Vancouver, where the population is seemingly majority Asian, there is not only cognizance of the difference, the difference is lived and expected. The people who frequent the many dim sum joints that dot the city are not the same people who frequent the mandarin restaurants, and their taste buds are attuned differently.

Although I enjoy some dim sum, I have found over the years of experimentation that I gravitate towards Mandarin style cooking as opposed to Cantonese style cooking. My experience at restaurants of the Hong Kong tradition has been hit or miss at best. One of the most reliable restaurants in the city to experience this culture is Kirin on Alberni. At restaurants of the Mandarin persuasion such as Lin's and Peaceful (both within a few blocks of each other on Broadway between Cambie and Granville), however, my taste buds have rarely been happier.

Several days ago I had dinner at Congee Noodle House on Broadway at Main. This is the restaurant that several months ago introduced me to the wonderful world of congee. Congee, or rice gruel, is enjoyed in many parts of the world. It was the traditional food of peasants in Japan in the middle ages, and is still eaten in the Philippines, Burma, Taiwan, Indonesia and elsewhere. In China, my impression is that congee is a star dish primarily in the Cantonese-speaking areas.

Congee is a great dish on a number of levels. A $5 bowl is nutritive and filling and tasty, is quick to prepare, is reliably tasty in its various guises, is not greasy like much dim sum, and is authentic to a specific tradition without being excessively weird. Congee Noodle House is a great place to discover the Hong Kong vein of this tradition in Vancouver. There are a few other congee places in Vancouver, but the congee at a few of these restaurants I've sampled doesn't measure up to Congee Noodle House in any way - they are either watery or parsimonious with the filling.

The other day, for the first time, we ordered something other than congee, and it turned out to be a big mistake. Notwithstanding the restaurant's nomenclature, let it be proclaimed forthwith that Congee Noodle House shall hereinafter foreshorten its name to Congee House, as its noodles are inedible. Let me count the ways in which the dish of pork noodles I ordered was disgusting. The wheat noodles were hard as shoelaces, but less savory. The broth was a black oil spill with, mysteriously, no taste at all. The saving grace was that, Proust-like, the pork brought back a flood of childhood memories of a dish I had forgotten in the meantime but whose unmistakable combination of rank beany sweetness with porkiness could apparently not be wiped from the olfactory area of my memory banks despite my best efforts to do so and the tide of many decades. Pork and beans is what it tasted like, and I don't mean that as a good thing.


I bring this up because last night we had the opportunity to dine at another authentically Chinese restaurant of a different tradition whose noodles were absolutely heavenly, and among the best I've sampled in Vancouver. Taiwan Beef Noodle King is a little hole in the wall buried in a miniscule, neglected strip of commercial property on the barren wasteland that is Oak Street between 70th Ave and 12th Ave.

So diminutive and unassuming are its proportions, in fact, that we almost missed it. The interior is bare and plain, the tables cheap Wal-Mart affairs. The menu is spare and to the point without being obfuscating with page after page of endless variation as is the case in other restaurants bigger, fancier, more expensive, and far less good. There are about 15 noodle dishes on the menu, each priced between $5.25 and $7.50.


I ordered the Wonton and Stewed Beef with Noodle in Soup at $7.50. It arrived quickly within 5 minutes and proved to be a big appetizing portion. We also ordered a side of spicy cucumbers and spicy wonton, and even after sharing those two dishes I was able to finish the big portion. It's a perfectly sized portion - just what you want to pay, a perfect value. Everything about this dish was a pleasure. The beef pieces were substantial and numerous, cooked to a perfection and savory. At some other restaurants I've been too, such as the Cambodian restaurant in Chinatown, the been noodle dish I ordered was inedible, the beef not so much animal meat as tasteless, fat-laden pieces of rubber. The noodles at Taiwan Beef Noodle King, quite unlike the careless, store-bought garbage I was served at Congee Noodle House, were thick and soft to the bite and uneven in shape - the trademark of the handmade noodle. Peaceful also makes their own noodles in house, and you can see them spinning the noodles out right behind you in the open kitchen. The wonton was delicious, with a thin but tight skin, and the broth was a heavenly balance, not too salty and not too sweet. A truly satisfying dish, and I suspect that the other noodle dishes are well worth the effort to sample over repeat visits.


This is the dish of spicy wonton we shared. It was perfect, the slight crunch of the green onions and the mild sour bite of the vinegar balancing out the red pepper spiciness to just the right level.


They had some funky Chinese soft drinks in the fridge to sample, and this apple soda drink was the perfect companion to the meal - quintessentially Chinese and down-to-earth and authentic in its artificial saccharine sweetness. (and don't worry, this one is "without chemical ingredients")

Overall, the visit was a very satisfying experience, doubly so due to the spontaneous discovery of the restaurant. How wonderful it is when a spontaneous find turns out to be a hidden treasure. To all the lovers of authentic Chinese noodles out there, I heartily recommend making the pilgrimage all the way into the middle of nowhere at least once to sample the handiwork at Taiwan Beef Noodle King. I only wish they were located closer to home so that I could visit more often.