Reviews Goldstone Restaurant And Bakery

This is a casual restaurant in Chinatown with a large menu of Chinese and HK-style cuisine. Although quite spacious, the restaurant does get very busy: I had to wait 5-10 minutes to be seated during lunch time. I decided to get their "special" versions of their Baked Pork Chop Spaghetti and Baked Portuguese Chicken with Rice, which are currently priced at $9.75 and comes with your choice of either coffee or tea. While their food does certainly have room for improvement, it is still quite tasty. Portion-wise, their "special" versions are considerably smaller (probably 1/2 to 2/3 the size) compared to the regular versions, but still reasonably sized: while I could have done with a bit more food, it's probably more than enough to satisfy an average appetite. The service is what you'd expect from a lower-end Asian restaurant: the staff is reasonably friendly, but not the most attentive and the food can take a while to arrive. They are currently cash only, so be sure to have some on you if you wish to visit.

Baked Pork Chop Spaghetti (Special Version, $9.75):
4/5
This consisted of a generous piece of pork chop served over a bed of spaghetti and covered in tomato sauce. The pork chop was essentially like a schnitzel or Japanese katsu, and was pounded thin and breaded. It was very crispy and reasonably tender, although I would have liked there to be a bit more meat present. The spaghetti was cooked to my liking: tender without being too mushy. Although I'm not the biggest fan of tomato sauce, I did like theirs, which was not too watery and coated the noodles and pork chop pretty well.

Baked Portuguese Chicken with Rice (Special Version, $9.75):
3/5
The dish consisted of chicken and taro baked in a yellow sauce. I thought that it was going to be served with rice baked together with the chicken (similar to the pork chop); instead, the chicken came in a dish that's separate from the rice. Now I've never had Portuguese chicken before; I thought that the yellow sauce was curry but it did not have any heat or spice, although it did have a nice fragrance of ginger (and I think there might be some coconut as well). There were several large pieces of bone-in chicken, which was extremely moist and tender, as well as a few large pieces of taro. Unfortunately, I did find the dish to be overall pretty bland and under-seasoned.

I have been going to Goldstone since they first opened.  I love the place.  The bakery products are excellent.  My favourite is the cocktail buns and egg tarts.  The black pepper steak noodle is the best in town and probably the best this side of Hong Kong.  Crispy fried noodles smothered in a generous portion of beef and delicious black pepper sauce. The hor fun noodles with black bean, green pepper and beef is also a winner.  I have not tried the Hong Kong style western dishes (unique cuisine found only in Hong Kong).  It is popular with the Hong Kong customers.  I just have not got around to it because the regular Chinese selections are irresistible.  The owner is from Macao.  He is a down to earth hard working immigrant success story.  He is reaching retirement age so this wonderful food may not be available in a couple of years.  The decor is simple and clean. The service is fast and efficient.  The atmosphere is friendly with a lot of local regulars enjoying consistently good food at a reasonable price.  This is the Chinatown I love and treasure.

Gold Stone is a traditional cha chaan teng in Chinatown- one of the few surviving cha chaan tengs in Chinatown. Look for the red canopy with the faded sign of 'Gold Stone Bakery Restaurant'. It is next to an old car park, but if there are no spots, which rarely happens, parking should be easy. Gold Stone is a bakery in the front but in the back area is a huge dining area with a long kitchen at the far back. 

Gold Stone is run down but has insanely efficient service. Quick service is synonymous with Hong Kong. The seats are pretty cramped and very close to the table but this is to maximize tables, therefore having room for more customers- the tight seating is because they need to have more seating. The tiles were authentic, I have to say (reminded me of old-school HK cha chaan tengs, you know, those ones with loud old waitresses?) I was impressed with the cleanliness of the floors, seats, and tables of restaurant (the seats didn't have any visible grime)- because I didn't have high expectations for cleanliness (I've been to other cha chaan tengs round town and they are not this clean.)

 The lady took our order quickly and I ordered the ox tongue spaghetti from the daily lunch special menu. I added a 凍檸茶 (iced lemon tea) and cream soup with bun. The iced tea dried out my mouth too much but the cream soup was rich and decadent, and delicious too- there were little bits of ham and corn and DAMN the soup was sooo good. The bun was pretty good, but I still added butter (needa spread that goodness). I expected a really good bun cause they had a bakery but it was pretty much the same bun as most places. 

Then the ox tongue spaghetti came in a cute long silver bowl. I was surprised when I did not see any tomato sauce like what I was used to. The sauce was a creamy sauce with cheese- what decadence. The spaghetti was soft and crisp round the edges, and the ox tongue was tender and delicious. The cream added a layer of richness and so did the cheese. Overall a twist on my usual ox tongue spaghetti.

Service is minimal but I didn't expect lots of service. There weren't that many people though, it was already 1 pm when I arrived. A very authentic cha chaan teng indeed!

Another early morning at the clinic.  After my appointment, we needed breakfast before Buddha Boy heads to work.  Since we were near Chinatown, we ended up at one of our go-to places, Gold Stone Bakery & Restaurant 金石餐廳餅店.

Growing up, whenever my aunt and uncle babysat my little brother and I (pretty much every weekend), this large Chinatown cafe was our canteen.  We visited so frequently to the point that all the servers knew us by name, what we wanted to order and what our preferences were.  Decades later, the little girl became a fat woman, and some old time familiar faces still recognized me, only these days, there's a fat man accompanying me, Buddha Boy.

Owned by a Chinese family from Macau, did you know that Gold Stone 金石 originally started in Richmond?

Buddha Boy and I each ordered a breakfast combo so we had two drinks included in our meal.  Buddha Boy had a cold Coffee & Tea 港式鴛鴦 and I had a Hot Chocolate 熱朱古力.  Both drinks were rich and solid.  Other than its volume sizes shrunk over the years, the drinks at this Chinatown cafe never failed us.

Buddha Boy started with Breakfast #C and opted for Ham & Cheese Omelette 芝士火腿奄列.  For $6.10CAD, the two-egg omelette had considerable amounts of shredded ham and cheese accompanied by a drink (mentioned earlier), a slice of orange and a bun.

For $8.25CAD, I started with Breakfast #B, which had a two-part deal.  For the first part, I opted for Two Eggs with Bacon 雙蛋配煙肉.  Just like Buddha Boy's combo, this also came with a drink (mentioned earlier), a slice of orange and a bun.  The eggs were over-hard, by request.

The second part of the deal was some kind of carbs in soup and I chose Shredded Pork & Preserved Vegetable with Vermicelli 雪菜肉絲湯米粉.  As you can see from the photo, this was a sizeable breakfast portion with ample amount of well-marinated shredded pork.  Unfortunately, the preserved vegetable was a bit too sweet.  Noodles were al-dente.

I also added an order of Ham & Egg Sandwich 火腿雞蛋三文治, a must for me whenever I visit this cafe.  So what's so special about this sandwich?  Absolutely nothing.  It's just comforting food for me.

Including tax, our bill was $32.13CAD after Buddha Boy added a take-out noodle dish for lunch later.  This HK-style cafe is one of the odd places where service is detectable and noticeable.  Not only the food delivery is quick, this place also has one of the best wok-hei 鑊氣 in 604.

I recalled hearing from others that GoldStone on Keefer served up not only great old fashioned HK Cafe food but some great baked goods…egg tarts included! As soon as I entered the shop, I noticed there were only 2 remaining….I guess that’s a good sign that they are indeed popular!

I've only had their pork chop lunch special and egg tarts. The egg tarts were the best I have ever had and the pork chop was delicous - decent serving with rice. Not chewy and not too fatty.