Dine Out Vancouver Festival 2017 - C Prime

It was girl's night again with some other friends and we decided to try C Prime, located inside the Century Plaza Hotel downtown. The menu was a tad different than what was posted on the Dine Out Vancouver website, but the choices were delicious still!

We started with some delicious garlic bread and olives.

Grilled clamari steak on a bed of arugula.  

Mediterranean octopus with heirloom tomatoes and fingerling potatoes.

Arctic char with chickpeas and chorizo.

Gnocchi, wild BC mushrooms and porcini truffle cream sauce.

Lemon tart and Italian meringue. This was a little odd, since the filling was super runny and just poured into the tart shell. I'm not sure if it wasn't finished setting yet.

Spiced pumpkin bread pudding with salted caramel gelato.

I really enjoyed this meal! This is the last weekend of the Dine Out Vancouver Festival so make sure to book soon!

Dine Out Vancouver Festival 2017 - WildTale Coastal Grill

It was girl's night last week at WildTale Coastal Grill in Yaletown. The Dine Out Festival menu sounded delicious for $30, so we all went with that. We tried to order one of each dish on the menu so we could try it all.

Organic beets and watercress with toasted almonds, crisp apples, horseradish crème fraîche.

Albacore tuna carpaccio with baby gem citrus salad.

WildTale seafood chowder corn and crab fritter.

7-hour braised Alberta beef short rib celeriac pomme puree, roasted bone marrow jus.

Herb-Crusted wild coho salmon on bay scallop risotto, brown butter caper sauce.

Bittersweet chocolate mousse - no biscotti?

We sat near the kitchen so were able to watch the chefs prepare the food, which was really cool. The food was delicious! The chocolate mousse was suppose to come with a housemade biscotti but we didn't get one and it seemed like none of the desserts coming out of the kitchen had it. Maybe they ran out :( We looked at the regular menu and the dishes sounded yummy, so we all might go back another day!

The Dine Out Vancouver Festival is on for another week, so make sure to make your reservations soon!

Dine Out Vancouver Festival 2017 - Stages Bistro & Lounge

I took my family out for our second Dine Out 2017 Festival meal at Stages Bistro and Lounge, located at the Holiday Inn. This was one of the places with a $20 menu that looked pretty good.

Roasted beet salad with goat cheese.

Fire roasted tomato basil soup.

Pork tenderloin with a wild mushroom demi.

Cod loin pan seared and topped with a pineapple salsa.

Mango mousse cake and raspberry cheesecake.

I had the soup (a tad salty), the cod (a bit bland, but the pineapple salsa helped add flavour) and the mango mousse (yum!). The food was decent for the price and what you'd expect for $20. Dine Out Vancouver is happening until February 5, 2017.

Nerd Block Classic Subscription Box - [December 2016 Unboxing]

You know I can't resist sales sometimes and this was the case with the Nerd Block Classic. Nerd Block offered 50% off all their blocks for Black Friday and when I heard there were going to be 4 Star Wars Rogue One items included, I hit that subscribe button. Unfortunately with the holidays, the mail got held up and I received my December Nerd Block pretty late. But here it is, finally!

We get a Protect the Galactic Empire lanyard with a Death Trooper keychain and a plastic sleeve. Perfect for my bus pass.

We also get a four pack of coasters that features a stormtrooper, Darth Vader, a death trooper and the death star. While useful, these coasts are made of cheap compressed cardboard so I am not sure how well they will hold up after a few uses and they get wet.

One of my most dreaded things to get in a subscription box is a mug because I have so many now! But here is a chrome Darth Vader mug. I thought it was a little weird not to make it a chrome black but it's silver - I think Captain Phasma would have been a better candidate for creating a chrome mug!

We also get a Death Trooper coin bank! Into the gift pile since I rarely have any coins anymore.

The last item was a little out of place - we get a Transformers decepticon shirt. I'm not really a fan of Transformers so I was a bit disappointed. Where is the Star Wars shirt?

I thought the December Nerd Block Classic was a bit hohum. Nothing really wowed me. I've cancelled my subscription for now, but who knows what will happen during the next 50% off sale (spoiler: I'll probably re-subscribe)? 

The Nerd Block starts at $19.99 USD month to month, plus shipping and HST. The February subscriptions are open now and will include items from Back to the Future, Doctor Strange and Donnie Darko.

Dine Out Vancouver Festival 2017 - Oceans 999

Dine Out Vancouver has started this weekend and my family went to our first one tonight. We went to Oceans 999 at the Pan Pacific, which serves Pacific Northwest cuisine using fresh local ingredients. Every Saturday night, they have a buffet with Italian cuisine as well as singers serenading you with popular songs from operas, so we had a glimpse of that while we were there as well!

Crispy pork belly with green papaya salad, fish sauce caramel, micro coriander.

Herb crusted line caught ling-cod with Pemberton purple potatoes, baby bok choy, yellow lemongrass coconut curry, coriander chimichurri.

Star anise braised short rib with pickled 5 spice carrot puree, and king oyster mushroom, roasted cashew chili gremolata.

Exotic chocolate extravaganza: Chocolate chiboust crème, Passion fruit mango mousse, coconut crisp, Asian sponge, Kumquat compote.

Dine Out Vancouver is happening now until February 5, 2017. Make your reservations now to ensure you get a seating at your favourite restaurant!

Loot Crate Sanrio Small Gift Subscription Box - [First Unboxing]

I thought I was done with subscription boxes for a while, but nope! Loot Crate announced a collaboration with Sanrio to release the Sanrio Small Gift Crate in October, a quarterly subscription that would be filled with adorable Sanrio items. As a kid, I never got to go to the Sanrio store because things were too expensive. So I really wanted to subscribe to this...and I didn't. At least, not right away. I actually waited an entire month until there was a Black Friday sale of 25% off all subscription boxes and I subscribed for the entire year! I finally received the first Sanrio Small Gift box and I was so pleased with the contents. Take a look!

The box itself is pretty cute. The sides are printed with the most popular Sanrio characters.

When you open up the box, there is a cute Sanrio wrapping with a little bauble attached. From watching a few other unboxing videos, apparently Sanrio stores used to attached something like this to all your purchases.

Like all Loot Crate boxes, the inside is printed so you can flip it inside out and have a cool looking box. Sanrio seems to be rebranding to "Hello Sanrio".

The first item is a simple grey tshirt. It has all the characters falling out of the pocket. The shirt is really soft and a thinner stretchy material, which I don't particularly like.

An adorable journal - it's fun looking at the design and seeing all the characters! A sheet of puffy stickers are also included and the pages have characters printed on it.

A Hello Sanrio pen and eraser set. The erasers are round heads of all the characters. I collected erasers as a kid so this is going to be perfect in the collection!!

A super useful pouch. I'll probably use this for travel.

A bag clip.

A pretty hefty Hello Kitty vinyl figure. I like it except for the fact that Hello Kitty is covered in silver sparkles.

The booklet that tells you the contents of the box is printed on this cute Hello Sanrio cityscape on the back.

What did you think of the first Loot Crate Sanrio Small Gift Crate? You can subscribe yourself over here. You have until March to order the next box!