Yoshoku Ya – Japanese style western food
Yoshoku (洋食), meaning western food, is the name given to the Japanese take on western cuisine. Familiar looking dishes are transformed into an entirely different culinary denomination. ‘Eastern-ized’ if you will, with its roots dating back to over 150 years ago. Though not what people usually refer to as Japanese food, yoshoku is as much a staple of Japanese dining as ramen. Its derivatives, like curry, croquettes and katsu (breaded and deep fried) can also be found on menus of sushi spots and izakayas around town.
Located on the same block as the Denman+Robson golden trio(Kintaro, Motomachi Shokudo, Toratatsu), Yoshoku Ya’s certainly got some tough competition.
We ordered from a concise menu of curries, hamburger steaks, omu-rice, napolitan pasta, and steaks at fairly reasonable prices ($17 for a steak). We tried their omu-rice and hamburger steak.
The omu-rice for those who haven’t seen it before, is rice fried with ketchup, chicken, corn, onions, and wrapped with a thin layer of fried egg. Its served here with a bowl of salad. The hamburger steak a thick slab of hamburger grilled and served with a demiglace-like sauce.
Its been months since I’ve ate a burger, and found the juicy ‘steak’+sauce combo highly gratifying. The omu-rice wasn’t great as the eggs were slightly leathery, and it takes a lot more than a double serving of ketchup to make a fried rice interesting.
Overall it was worth a go, but the ingredients at Yoshoku Ya are too familiar, the dishes too conventional, for me to ever feel the urge to make a return trip. I will however be trying other yoshoku’s around town for comparison. Next stop is Ping’s Cafe (best web design ever). If anyone knows of other yoshoku restaurants in Vancouver, please let me know!
btw, Denny’s in Tokyo is pretty much all yoshoku style food. I know, WTF! (Want That Food!)
Yoshoku-ya has been a busy place every time I have passed by but have never gone in myself, probably more for the fact that I can make these kinds of dishes myself at home. I’ve been hearing though that Yoshoku-ya is a better representation of this cuisine than Ping’s offering. Look forward to hearing your thoughts if/when you get there. There’s another place I know of (Japanese run and operated), but its in Richmond, and called Bonqula (http://s1.shard.jp/bonqula/index.html). They have yoshoku items on their menu like curries, doria, gratins, katsu, croquettes, etc.
There is also Barefoot Kitchen in Davie Street, near English Bay; though this is more on the low end (none of the dishes “as is” were over $12).
During my visit to Barefoot Kitchen, the same thoughts as shokutsu came to my mind: “hey, this is something I could easily do at home!”. However, at the same time, thoughts like “would I actually prepare a frying station (to prepare some of the fried dishes)?” came as well. I guess just enjoy the meal for what it is for and leave them the prep work and cleaning… ^_^;
Shokutsu, Thanks for the heads up on Bonqula. Their menu looks interesting (looks like they bake their own bread too). I will be checking it out.
KimHo, Barefoot sounds like a good lunch spot for me to try. Thanks for the info.
I had similar feeling as you guys after going to Yoshoku-Ya….Omurice is what I make on weekend mornings to use up leftover rice, and the other items were not exactly gourmet. There’s still good reason for this place to be popular however, much like Denny’s is to some crowds.
hahah, my friend loooooves Japanese Denny’s. She showed me the site once and it looks so much nicer than our Denny’s. I wish I’d tried it while I was over there.
Yes, the fresh baked breads was another selling point I forgot to note here.
I love omurice.
Anyone know a place that makes it with demiglace sauce?
holly, are you referring to something like in this?
That would be a dream come true :D
Yesss. I loved that drama.
That”s exactly where I first learned about omurice and I want to eat it on this side of the ocean.
btw, I just tried a japanese fusion restaurant today in Richmond called BonQuLa. It’s a wierd name but well worth the experience. Most lunch dishes/combos are $10 but come with all sorts of side dishes, which I love. It’s located in a strip mall on Alexandra road and was furnished quite nicely with some quirky touches.
I ordered the teriyaki ground beef patty and it was delish. It came on a hot plate with thin crunchy potatoe strings and some cabbage and sprouts on the side. Included in my combo set was a miso soup (which tasted homemade and not out of a box), extremely light, melt-in-your mouth, tempura which came with some green tea powder for dipping (cool), rice topped with seaweed bits, bamboo shoot side dish, and if that wasn’t enough, a complimentary dessert of ice cream/cornflake/coffee jello (I know, strange, but it worked).
The servers were polite and attentive. I also tried a bag of the homemade bread which the chef bakes daily. There were interesting combinations like green tea, onions, cheese, etc.
This restaurant was definitely a labour of love and you could see the attention to detail in everything. For only $10, I enjoyed every bite. The only shame was that there wasn’t more patrons. This is a real hidden gem which I will definitely be coming back to.
If you’re interested, the address is #165-8460 Alexandra, Richmond, BC.
Cool! I actually went to BonQuLa too last weekend. Really fell in loved it, but didn’t get to take decent pictures, so I didn’t blog about it. But I did put some info up on urbanspoon
I totally agree with you that the place was ‘a labour of love’ as you can tell just from the details in the dishes. I’ll be paying them another visit soonish and hopefully write a post that will do them justice.
From your account, it sounds like their lunches are an absolute steal at $10! I missed out on the bread at night as they were sold out :(
Hi! I came across your blogs while researching on Vancouver restaurants and do want to say the I have been going to Bonqula since they opened a few years … the owner/chef, KAORI, does a great job in keeping up the quality of her food even though they are not busy most of the times.
KAORI has to change her menus a few times to come up with her current one but do try her pork cutlet sandwiches for lunch (there are two kinds, No.1 on the lunch menu is my favorite and honestly it is comparable to the katsu-sando of one of the best tonkatsu (pork cutlet) restaurant in Tokyo …
Do also go back and try Bonqula’s dinner courses because those are excellent value for the price.
yer you really helpted me on this 1 thanks guys i love cooking and japanese food
p.s im from korea
or however you spell that country
i would love to meet you some time daniel