CHINESE HALAL RESTAURANT SCARBOROUGH

After visiting the North York location of Chinese Halal Restaurant with my parents, The Hubby and I wanted to bring his parents as well. Since they’re in Markham, we decided to try the restaurant’s alternate location in Scarborough. Between the two, there were a few menu differences (no toffee apples in Scarborough) and the North York location was much busier. Overall though, the flavours were consistent and all of the signature dishes were present.

Atmosphere: Compared to their North York location, Chinese Halal Restaurant Scarborough is much smaller, less than half the size, with 3 tables for large groups. During our visit, only 3 or 4 tables became occupied. The restaurant decor was modern and clean but at the same time, the tables were covered with layers of plastic table cloths. It was a casual, family venue.

Service: The menu was written in Chinese and English. For each signature dishes, a paragraph explained some history and elaborated on how the dish was made. I only read the English names, and there was signature “lamb noodle” and a normal “lamb noodle”. We didn’t know what the different was and ordered the normal one to try. Turns out that was actually a beef noodle dish and the English was incorrectly translated. We explained our confusion, the menu error and they replaced the dish. Other elements of the service was standard, a touch on the slow side.

Food: Dinner started with BBQ lamb skewers, my favourite. The meat was heavily seasoned, tender, with the fat rendered well. Outside of night markets, Chinese Halal is the place for lamb skewers. For our vegetable, we ordered the spicy green beans with lamb. This dish had a lot of flavour, from lots of garlic and oil. Next was the toothpick lamb which was seasoned the same as the skewers but with thinner pieces of meat. I found the meat tougher and didn’t understand the need for the toothpicks (Google hasn’t provided a good answer either). Between the two, I’d stick to just ordering the skewers.

One dish that did stand out was the stir fried Tripe with Tong Choy that had good wok air. The tong choy used was young, tender, crispy and the tripe was soft and chewy. The bowl of hand pulled lamb noodles had a savoury broth and a good noodle texture – another dish that is a must-try.

Our meal ended with a big bowl of Fish and Lamb soup. While a seemingly odd combination, the two strong flavours balanced each other super well and created a rich, milky soup that I couldn’t stop drinking. There wasn’t even a hint of fishiness, just a strong lamb taste, accented with plenty of white pepper. A nice addition would’ve been fresh lettuce leaves to hot pot in the soup or noodles. Regardless, we made sure not a drop was wasted.