#top one

[mcforwhatiam]

Photos from Rockin'on magazine, Sept '98 and Nov '98 issues

Not sure of photographers

(Scans via Pop Catastrophe on Instagram)

[wildthings04]

[missguomeiyun]

AYCE dimsum

1st of its species in Edm .. AYCE dimsum @ Top One.

Located on Whyte Ave, this restaurant used to be a Korean/Japanese fusion place.

I came to this place for lunch on a Tues in mid-February. To be exact, I came on Feb. 13. From my knowledge, a lot has changed since my visit. Therefore, I will only be sharing my experience here (maybe at the end I'll share what I heard from my coworker's experience, which was 2 weeks after mine).

Okay, 1st off. I got this picture menu. I think this was suitable & useful.

The 2nd piece of paper. Also laminated, this is the ordering sheet. It has the table number as well as the check-out time. When they 1st opened, it was 2hr limit. When I went, that became 90mins; however, the lady said bcos it wasn't busy, they gave extra 20mins, which was 110 haha still not the full 120min but. .. that's the most you could get :P

Their system was actually very efficient. When I heard AYCE dimsum, I had assumed it was the traditional 'pick up whatever you want' from a communal area with steamed dishes. That was NOT it, at all.

So what did happen was. .. we filled out round 1 on the sheet. The staff lady would take the sheet into the kitchen & prep the stuff (& bring out the items as they're prepared). Once the order is complete, they will bring back an empty order sheet.

Of note, there were some minor ordering details. ..

I'm sure you see the wastage fee in the upper right corner. Keep that in mind.

& also, the lady told us that during busy times, tables of diners can only max 5 items per person per round of ordering. For instance, if you have a party of 2, during busy hrs, the 2 of you can order max 10 unique items (doesn't matter the quantity of each one; they only care about unique items). The reason for this was to ensure every table gets something, & the kitchen isn't just prepping your order.

Waiting for our round 1~ It's really unlike a dimsum restaurant haha

Took some time to see the back. The interior is same as before when it was the Korean/Japanese place. (I've been here once)

I don't know much about their hot pot but it's by weight & only available during dinner service. The AYCE dimsum service, at the time of my visit, is available all day (till they close). Of course, you can't order both kinds of service at your table. Everyone has to only do dimsum OR hotpot.

The standard: shrimp dumplings & the siu mai.

The siu mai was good; decent size, flavour was good. Freshly steamed. The shrimp dumplings - not so good even though also freshly steamed.. The dough/wrap portion was kind of stiff. The filling was alright though.

Ribs: good. Looks sad but you can always order more. I didn't eat chicken feet.

Xiao long bao was mediocre. I think you gotta be reasonable for certain things. For AYCE where I expected to just grab from a table, these were freshly steamed when the order sheet comes in so I felt it was decent. Also, the lady said they order from a supplier for most things so . .. I mean, it's not really the restaurant, it's the supplier. I think the xiao long bao is better than the store-bought frozen ones but lacking compared to other places. The beef ball, I didn't have bcos it contains the dried mandarin peel stuff, which I dislike in meat balls.

Pan-fried rice rolls. Okay, this was good as is but misleading in terms of what the name suggested. Pan-fried rice rolls should have a bit of the umm. .. well, evidence of pan-fried-ness lol these were pan-fried but VERY slightly. They lacked the crispy edges. But, like I said, flavour was good (just simple soy sauce) & the rice rolls were soft, so I don't particularly have anything to complain about. Just. .. didn't match what I expected.

Now this one is the steamed plain rice roll. This was legit like the Cantonese stuff that I've had in the motherland, which was pleasantly surprising. This kind of plain rice roll is essentially a large sheet & it steamed/scrunched up like this. Unlike the typical steamed rice rolls you see in dimsum restaurants in Edm (the ones that contain some sort of filling, whether it's BBQ pork or beef or shrimp). I REALLY liked this! It had no flavour on its own but it comes with peanut sauce. Each table also has chili sauce & soy sauce so you can customerize your 'flavour'. I chose the ribs juice from above & soy sauce.

Deep fried shrimp wontons: 10/10!

The curry squid. .. okay, they brought out a 'cold' one in error. They were really nice about it when I told them that it was cold.

The hot "ready" one; I give .. 8.5/10. Honestly, I think it was actually good to realize they do steam things fresh. Like that 1st dish of curry squid was literally... not ready.

Round 2!

Pan-fried shrimp cake & chiu chow dumpling. I don't like this kind of dumpling so I didn't commit to any lol the shrimp cake was not bad. It had a lot of shrimp but also a lot of vegetables. I've never had shrimp cake like this before.

Pork + century egg congee. This was delicious!!

Wonton in chili oil. We ordered 2 just for trying purposes but got 5. We would've kept it if we liked it but ended up sending 3 back into the kitchen (didn't want to pay wastage fee when we didn't even order that many). The wonton was good but the sauce was not. I had imagined it was like. .. a diff chili oil. This was chili oil mixed with red vinegar - it's a northen Chinese thing, I later found it. Had that Szechuan numbing spice in there. I just wasn't a fan but. .. maybe you will be!

Wings were kinda dry but pretty good; flavour was 'original' haha ie: salt. Spring rolls = no good. They were the grocery store frozen kinds & contained mushy vegetable inside.

Soy sauce chow mein. GOOD! Freshly made & you can smell the wok-smokiness.

Eggtarts . .. 8/10. Others have high standards for egg tarts but for me, my biggest thing is the filling. Not the amount, not the ratio with the crust . . just the flavour & texture itself. I dislike egg-y ones & ones that are too sweet. This was not bad but the texture was not as smooth as I would have liked it to be. May have been over-baked. But otherwise, the crust was okay. I also dislike flaky crust lol & this one wasn't very flaky.

Coconut jelly. It was alright. Refreshing, that's for sure.

Osmanthus jelly & mango pudding. The jelly was really not my thing. The texture was weird! & I generally don't like floral-y things. The mango pudding though. .. 10/10!

Alright, so what my coworkers experienced. .. they also went on a weekday for lunch, when it wasn't busy but they were given a strict 90mins. It was enough for them so they didn't mind. Plus, they didn't like the food so they were looking forward to leaving :( they had a smaller menu (like maybe 33% smaller than mine) that was presented on an iPad with some items being unavailable, which made the list even shorter! They also said they paid more than $23.88/person. Altogether, more expensive with fewer food options & strict time limit . .. & 'bad' food. Now I feel terrible for recommending. But hey! When I went, it wasn't like that =(

[ano-po]

My dream is to have enough friends (that can sing!) to harmonize the beginning of this song on the spot.

[twinliches]

my friends held an intervention for me to "stop asking intimidately specific questions". i tried to explain that i am just a good listener but there is apparently "a line between follow-up questions during small talk and interrogation tactics that gets crossed sometimes". turns out my curious nature is "scaring the hoes"

[batcavescolony]

Katniss is such an unreliable narrator. She says "Then something unexpected happens. At least, I don't expect it because I don't think of District 12 as a place that cares about me" girl you deliver strawberries to the Mayor, you hunt and trade for the district, when you fell at Prim being chosen someone caught you, when you went to Prim people parted for you, when you volunteered EVERYONE stopped. Idk how to tell you but I think you're a pillar of the community.

[kensatou]

those!!! are!!! his!!!! tits!!! be gentle 👉👈

[starbuck]

i say i like tragedies and everyone’s all like ‘why do you like sad stories? are you depressed?’ and never ‘how was the catharsis? was the catharsis fun?’

[symphonyofsilence]

Let the poor man rest.

[hinamie]

to moving forward

[000bun]

[collaredkittyboy]

[sunkissmarimo]

Across the width of the Grand Line and deep in the Dungeon, I can only feel honored to see such beauty.

⬆️artist linked on top

[lesbianjamies]

Why did you do it?

[zuulosdovah]

do you know how hard it is to get access to the crime scene as a defense attorney? no i do NOT come here often

[mahgck]

KABRU!!!!!!!!! GET AWAY FROM THE ELVEN TWINK!!!!!!!!!! KABRU YOU HAVE NO IDEA THE SHIP WARS YOURE STARTING!!!!!!!!!!! KABRU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!