Rating / 3 out of 5 stars

Marble Slab Creamery, a Texan franchise, is part of the redevelopment that has been happening along the West Broadway corridor near Cambie over the past few years. I’ve always found Ice Cream joints a curiously popular phenomenon in Vancouver. But Marble Slab brings a little twist with a fancy, frozen marble slab.

(Above: Marble Slab’s Rock Road — Chocolate Swiss with Chocolate Chips, Marshmallows & Walnuts.)

Inside, two stations sit side by side — first, a row of home made ice cream in tubs just chilling next to the marble slab station stocked with a mise en place of various toppings. I went plain jane and ordered a straight up Chocolate Swiss on a waffle cone.

Case ordered a Rocky Road. Now, my Chocolate Swiss was good — rich, creamy with a smooth texture, not frozen at all. But, the real magic began with the mix of Case’s Rocky Road. A meticulously weighed scoop of ice cream was placed on a marble slab. Scoops of chocolate chips, marshmallows, and walnuts were ladled onto the shapeless lump of ice cream and expertly mixed with a scoop and spatula.

The resulting concoction — an indulgent ice cream mix that’s smooth and highlighted by chunks of hidden candy treasure.

(Above: Marble Slab staff are mixing it up.)

Our frozen treats came to just under $13 for two child size waffle cones, which felt really price for a couple of ice cream cones. The ice cream was good, but what you’re likely footing the bill for is the novelty of freshly hand mixed ice cream on a gigantic marble slab. Nice as an indulgence every once in a while, but certainly nothing we’d make a habit.

Perfect for: some seriously pimped out ice cream.

The Details

541 West Broadway, Vancouver
604.568.9007
marbleslab.ca

Summer has finally decided to grace us with her presence. And as the temperature starts climbing up into the high(er) twenties, we can really feel the heat. So here are five ways we like cool down in Vancouver.

1. Vietnamese Iced Coffee (Cafe Sua Da)

The Vietnamese get their coffee mojo from the French. But they upped the awesome factor by adding sweetened condensed milk to create a velvet-like concoction after slow-dripping it through a medieval looking individual filter. Pour that over a glass full of ice and you’ll stay both cool and wired. You can find this icy caffeine masterpiece at any respectable Pho joint. We particularly like the ones at Au Petit Cafe, Ba Le and Le Do.

2. Taiwanese Icy Plates (Baobing)

Straight from the streets of Taiwan is the icy plate. Take a big block of ice. Shave it or crush it into a big pile of ice dust on a plate. Top with various sweet goodies like red bean, coconut jelly, grass jelly, all kinds of fruits and of course a generous portion of sweetened condensed milk. It’s similar to other iced dishes like halo halo — but it’s on a plate. Cherry’s Tea & Icy Bar at Crystal Mall and Leisure Tea & Coffee and Tapioca Express in Richmond will hook you up.

3. Bubble Tea (Pearl Milk Tea)

It seems like Bubble Tea is everywhere. But for the uninitiated, bubble tea is another Taiwanese import — sweetly flavoured tea usually shaken with ice and a milk. Many offer extras such as pearls (Tapioca balls), coconut jelly, grass jelly or whatever a particular tea shop may offer. For your bubble tea fix, try Dragon Ball Tea House on King Edward, Ochi in Chinatown or Yuen Yuen Cafe across the street from Oakridge.

4. Iced Slushes

Forget the slurpee, Asian iced slushes show us just how diverse something as simple as crushed ice can be. Consider the Avocado slush or three layer Pandan from Le Do, or the Hong Kong style red bean from Little Tea House. Regardless, there’s enough variety here to cool down anyone.

5. Ice Cream

If you’re seeking something more conventional to cool down, look no further than the humble ice cream cone. Ice cream has come a long way from chocolate chip mint and plain vanilla. La Casa Gelato, last count was offering up to 508 flavours including such classics as Wasabi and Garlic. Chicco on Robson has a unique Japanese twist, combining ice cream with a variety of unique toppings such as corn flakes and sponge cakes. Finally, if you’re looking for more traditional flavours, Cumpari’s Gelato & Caffe, has what you need.

Rating / 2 out of 5 stars

Everyone I know appears to have some sort of childhood memory of Uncle Willy’s — that quintessentially mid-80′s dining phenomenon known as the all-you-can-eat buffet. Quite frankly, it surprises me to no end that this artifact of the past is still around. On a mutual dare, a group of us decided to head out to Uncle Willy’s to revisit this culinary curiosity and to reminisce about days gone by. Fried chicken and ice cream, here we come.

(Clockwise: 1. The Roast Beef is actually not bad. 2. Lime Jello, a classic buffet condiment. 3. Uncle Willy’s has a time limit policy — you know, so you don’t stick around overnight for breakfast the next morning.)

Not much has appeared to have changed at Uncle Willy’s, although to be quite honest any memories I have about the restaurant is just a haze of foggy recollections of extended family gatherings. The parental generation has always regarded Uncle Willy’s as good value — whatever twisted notion of value that cramming as much food into your face as your stomach could handle actually offered.

We arrived on an early weekday evening and the restaurant was unsurprisingly empty. The vast restaurant felt like a cafeteria in a retirement home. One corner of the restaurant was cordoned off with tape. We paid for our meal and received a green slip with the rules of dining printed on them. Our friend Steve, who had arrived earlier and was already seated at a booth, had already been admonished for not displaying his green ticket on the table. Rules are important here.

(Clockwise: 1. A plate of food, including the infamous fried chicken. 2. The roast chicken is roasted on-site and is perfectly edible. 3. The feed line.)

When we’ve all settled, staking our claim on a table in the middle of the restaurant, we headed towards the beginning of the buffet line. The familiar row of heat lamps hovering over trays of steaming food was highlighted by neon signs proclaiming a particular section as a certain course in the meal. There were the old standbys: green salad with your choice of familiar dressing: italian, thousand island, ranch; corn niblets; peas and carrots; some kind of pasta; french fries; roast potatoes and mashed potatoes with gravy. There were also some new dishes I didn’t recall having seen before: sweet and sour pork; curry chick peas and chow mein. Dishes like the pasta were predictably terrible: haphazardly seasoned and the consistency of baby food. Others like the corn niblets and peas and carrots were sufficiently adequate, as these canned and frozen types of products are ideal for withstanding abuse.

What most of us were actually looking forward to was the infamous carvery and the fried chicken. There, at the end of the line — the holy grail of the buffet. Meat. Today (as it was decades ago), they had roast ham and roast beef. The server at the end dutifully slices off two thin layers of meat and gingerly places it on our plate. The ham was a bit dry, but otherwise the flavour was decent. The roast beef was not bad: adequately seasoned and tender and moist (depending on what end you get sliced off).

The famed fried chicken didn’t disappoint. I mean, it wasn’t outstanding by any stretch, but the batter was nice and crunchy and the majority of the pieces were quite juicy.

(Clockwise. The four desserts of the apocalypse. 1. Cream Puff. 2. Rice Pudding. 3. Apple Crumble. 4. Chocolate Brownie.)

The dessert bar was basically a stainless steel and glass cabinet, much like that of your typical high school cafeteria. Lonely, carefully portioned cups of dessert sat waiting in the chiller awaiting someone to select them. Together, with our friends Steve, Mike and Virg, Case and I altogether tried out the soft serve, cream puff, rice pudding, chocolate brownie, apple crumble and lime jello. The cream puff, we were told, was decent. We found, however, the rice pudding and apple crumble to be hideously unappetizing. The chocolate brownie was so-so, but suffered from being dried out while the lime jello had a similar texture to a rubber tire.

Overall, for just under $30 for two people — we found it to be a terrible value. Consuming large quantities of subpar food is not a good deal, no matter how you slice it. It wasn’t all bad, though. For 3 hours, we enjoyed  reminiscing and carousing, well past the 1.5 hour limit. To be fair, we really only ate for 1 hour, the rest was just friendly chatter — proving that even the most terrible meals could be enjoyed in the company of good friends.

If the stars are properly aligned one day, then we may do what our friend Steve suggested — come back in 15 years and try it all again.

Perfect for: reliving the past or preparing yourself for winter hibernation.

The Details

6411 Nelson Avenue, Burnaby
604.431.0399

Rating / 3 out of 5 stars

Okay, hot shot. Pop quiz. You’re in the suburbs on an early summer evening — trapped somewhere between Burnaby and Coquitlam — and your sweet tooth begins to ache. What do you do? What do you do? Well, you could get onto North Road and head towards Cumpari’s, the local Gelato and Coffee shop.

Cumpari’s is kind of like an upscale version of Baskin Robins and Tim Horton’s all rolled into one. It’s even got a drive-thru for the incredibly lazy gelato connoisseur. The interior is fancy for an ice cream joint — the glass table-tops, well-upholstered bar-high seating grouped in tables of 3′s and 4′s remind me of a night club.

Two refrigeration units sitting to the left of the cash register house the various flavours of gelato offered by Cumpari’s. Case chose the mint chocolate chip and I had a single scoop of the Nutella.

Our $4 scoops of gelato went into this plastic muffin-like container. The gelato’s texture was a bit hard, the flavours tasted synthetic, and they aren’t shy with the sugar (might need to pay a visit to the dentist after this). Overall, we’d prefer making the trek to the other gelato place, but Cumpari’s would suffice if you were ever in sugar pinch in the middle of suburbia.

Perfect for:

A suburban gelato oaisis.

The Details

535 North Road, Coquitlam
604.936.8089

Rating / 4 out of 5 stars

As summer begins to wind down in Vancouver, Case and I are trying to cram in as many summer traditions as we can before the cold hits. One of those traditions is heading down to Venables and participating in the insanity that is known as Las Casa Gelato, or as some of the locals like to refer to it: The Ice Cream Factory.

Why the insanity? Well, on a typical hot summer afternoon, you’ll find dozens of cars crawling around Venables and Union street trying hopelessly to find parking while hordes of people spill into the street from the entrance of La Casa Gelato. It gets hectic at times, so be prepared for the crowds.

The Ice Cream Factory are famous for their insane number and variety of flavours. So, Baskin Robbins has 31 flavours? La Casa Gelato has 218 — that’s right, 218 flavours — including such obscure and exotic varieties as Durian, Green Tea, Jalapeno and Wasabi. They also have your more conventional variety like Amaretto and Chocolate Chip Mint.

Once inside, you’ll find yourself surrounded by fridges full of buckets of ice cream and gelato. The fridges circle you like a colosseum while the center becomes a pooling mass of parents hopelessly reigning in their children who have at this point gone completely bonkers at the sight of all this ice cream.

Over the years, La Casa has refined their payment method. It used to be that you’d push yourself through the crowd and shout out your order to the flustered ice cream jockey behind the fridge; and then attempt to pay by lobbing some cash over the crowds and counter. Now, you simply prepay at the cashier, who’ll give you a coloured poker chip that varies depending on your order.

Across the street there’s a parking lot specifically for customers. Good luck getting a spot. They also have some benched seating — but most people are content to loiter around the sidewalks of the Ice Cream Factory, happily licking away at their cones.

Each year, Case and I try to convince each other to go for the crazier flavours. Unfortunately, we’ve been reluctant to try it out. A helpful hint to the patient patron: If you ask for a sample, the folks at La Casa are more than happy to oblige. In the end, we’ve been content with basking in the wonderfully refreshing creamy taste of the regular standbys. Perhaps next year we’ll be brave enough — or, that’s what we like to keep telling ourselves.

The Details

1033 Venables Street, Vancouver
604.251.3211
lacasagelato.com