Sansotei Ramen & Summerlicious

Massive food post ahead!! I've been doing nothing but working and eating...and also crafting and watching anime, but I'll save that for another post. xD

Last  month I bumped into an old high school friend at work and we decided to meet up for some ramen and catch up. I only ever remember eating noodles at some place in Harajuku...(but it wasn't really a ramen shop?) and at Ajisen ramen many years ago with my parents... and I kept hearing about popular ramen places in Toronto so I kinda jumped at the opportunity!

My friend sent me the link to Santouka Ramen...which is where I thought we were going... but we went to Sansotei Ramen instead lol. Which is funny because my other friends were talking about that place too but at the time I was too lazy to travel all the way downtown for noodles... =w=;;

We ate around lunch time/1pm and we managed to get seats, it was rather small inside and filled up rather quickly.

I ordered the shio (salt) ramen and it came with egg, pork, spring onion and bamboo shoots. It was delicious!! Another reason I'm iffy about ramen is because I'm afraid I won't be able to finish the entire bowl... but it didn't seem to be the problem here as the portions were not as huge as I expected. I didn't finish the broth though as it was too salty for me (but then again I never like to drink the broth in noodle dishes anyway). Despite it being salty though, I didn't feel super thirsty afterwards.

I also keep hearing about Kinton Ramen... so I think next time I'd want go there and Santouka!

A couple weeks after I went downtown again for Summerlicious. We dined at Starfish Oyster Bed & Grill for dinner. 

We sat on some very comfy seats and had a nice view of the bar area where the oyster shucking happened. There were several clocks displaying the different time zones across the wall. We got there pretty early at 6pm, but when we left (1.5hr seating time) it was rather busy. I think most guests came here for Summerlicious like us, but we saw some other people order things not on the Summerlicious menu, like lobster!

My friends all ordered oysters as the appetizer but... I'm not too enthusiastic about them when they're cooked and even less so when they're raw...^_^" my friends all said they were delicious though!

I ordered the haddock fried fish cakes instead... not sure what those yellow cubes were but they were very sour and had a texture like nectarines... o.O

For the mains, my friend Jordan ordered the pickerel on risotto...

...and Jillian ordered the salmon with butternut squash.

Susan & I ordered the PEI steamed mussels which came with fries, so they arrived condensed into one big plate for all to share. These fries were SO delicious...well seasoned and probably a tad too salty, but with mayonnaise, and the mussels, they were really tasty and I couldn't stop eating them!!!

 The mussels!! I was surprised at how many there were... but then again, some were really tiny. These aren't the gigantic mussels you get at all-you-can-eat buffets that have that awful fishy aftertaste. They were cooked in a broth that really brought out their natural flavour and it was refreshing eating them this way instead of always stir-fried with black bean and garlic sauce, which seems to be the only way my family knows how to cook shellfish. xD;;

Another shot of my bowl of mussels. (Did I mention that I happened to be sitting right below a patch of natural daylight so I was able to get some decent photos of the food? xD)







Time for dessert!! My friends all ordered the sticky toffee pudding... and although I was tempted to try a bite, I resisted. The waitress recommended that the fries (from before) tasted even better dipped into the caramel sauce, so we all tried it... and she was right. It was like a match made in heaven! *__* The fries were salty and the caramel sauce was sweet... it sounds like a weird combo but in your mouth it was like eating salted caramel macarons or something! Needless to say, we couldn't stop eating the fries with the sauce...once again.

I was comfortably full and managed to finish all of my dessert. I had been craving chocolate lately and this brownie really hit the spot, along with the cherries on top. Really, everything at Starfish was so good we ate everything! I highly recommend going to this place for Summerlicious :)

Afterwards we decided to walk around a bit to digest and we ended up cutting across this nice little park on the way to the subway station. Since I had my DSLR out, I made an effort to take pics of other things too besides food. ;)



We walked past the St. James cathedral on our way to the train station... there are tons of historic buildings and cute shops and other interesting places downtown but I never really take photos of them to document. Anyway, I don't get out much so there's my excuse lol.

This is all fine and dandy, but I really need to write an entry about the anime I've been watching and the things I've been making otherwise I feel like the fangirl inside me is going to explode hahah. Until next time~! :)