Joojak Restaurant

Scoutmagazine.ca's, "Never Heard Of It" list, brought us next to Joojak. This little restaurant on Kingsway, a short walk from Joyce Skytrain station, serves Xian style Chinese food, and may have jumped to the top of my favourites list (OK, so I am a little schizophrenic when it comes to favourite places. Often my most recent meal was the greatest meal ever!) Xian, a one time capital of China at the end of the Silk Road, is another unique cuisine of China and our lovely friendly hostess, being originally from that place, was happy to fill us in on some of the details. The Pork Burger was something I could have ordered a half dozen of and been perfectly happy with that alone for a meal. A tender steamed bun made crispy on the flat top, filled with such tender gently spiced pork ( cumin and peppercorns maybe?) was excellent and apparently something you do not fail to eat in Xian. Hand Pulled Noodles with Meat Sauce is another iconic Xian dish and this brought us close to swooning. The flavouring is complex. I was sure that I picked up on cinnamon and citrus in addition to the aforementioned cumin and peppercorns but the noodles were truly the star here. Hand pulled and so tender, I'm sure that you have seen better pictures of these wide long noodles. Xinjiang Flavour Braised Lamb on Rice made us happy also. Xinjiang is a province of China not exactly adjacent to Shaanxi (whose capital is Xian) but their flavours are found throughout much of the country as a result of the movement of the largely Muslim population. Again this was a complex and delicious dish with a generous amount of tender lamb. Stir Fried Green Beans are labelled as spicy on the menu but we found them more sweet and salty (good salty not too salty). We were assured that the spiciness in Xian style food was not comparable to Hunan or Szechuan cuisines and to be sure, there was no face numbing involved. Something did make me sweat a little though which was pleasant but my tolerance is a little low. This is a small restaurant with seating for 18 (I actually counted). Our server and hostess were pleasant and patient with us and their food was wonderful. You need to put this place on your list!

It’s been a year or two since my first visit to Joojak Restaurant. Been back twice recently. They’re a Northern Chinese hole in the wall spot right next door to Sushi Aji. The inside is small with only 5 tables but service is sweet and run by two ladies who run the front. Nice that they bring you out water and hot tea.

Decided to come here after watching Mike Chen/Strictly Dumpling’s YouTube video about how good this place was. The place is kind of small, only a couple tables fitting something like 16 – 20 people in total. Fortunately, we did have a reservation. Xian Burger ($4.50). The burger looked delicious and had a lot of filling. The outside of the burger was firm and slightly crispy making it sturdy and easy to eat. It was also quite hot, pretty sure it was just fried. The filling I believe was pork and cilantro. The meat was juicy and flavourful. From the video, I was expecting it to be fattier which I think would definitely have elevated the burger, but it was still quite good.

We were running errands along Kingsway one day and decided to try and get some lunch. Unfortunately for us, the whole area was hit with a power outage and most of the regular restaurants that we would go to were closed because of it. For some reason, mid-way up the block, some of the places were still with power so we decided to try Joojak, which specializes in northern-style Chinese cuisine.