🏮 Festival Feast: Light Up Chinatown (Vancouver)
| Event Hubs: | Chinatown BBQ, Foo Hung Curios, and Hawkers Lane (500 Columbia St) |
| Top Standouts: | Roasted Pork Quiche and the irresistible Mandarin Plum Glaze vegetable spring rolls. |
| The Experience: | An amazing celebration packed with incredible community talent, energetic live main-stage music, and brilliant, highly creative local food collaborations. |
Happy Sunday! After attending the 11:00 AM Mass at St. Patrick's today, hubby and I decided to head north along Main Street toward Chinatown to experience the lively celebrations surrounding the Light Up Chinatown festival. And, as you know us, our number one priority is always checking out the food scene!
We spent the afternoon eating our way through exclusive local collaborations and exploring the vibrant food stalls set up along the neighbourhood streets. I told my husband that we should start intentionally going to more festivals together as we've missed out on so many amazing community events lately, and today reminded me just how much fun it is to get out and celebrate together (and eat).
Here is a complete breakdown of the five dishes we tried during our festival food crawl!
1. Beaucoup Bakery x Chinatown BBQ: Roasted Pork Quiche
Our vfirst stop took us straight to Chinatown BBQ for their highly anticipated exclusive collaboration with Beaucoup Bakery: a limited-edition Roasted Pork Quiche. This gorgeous pastry features Chinatown BBQ’s signature crispy roasted pork nestled inside Beaucoup Bakery's famously buttery, flaky pastry shell. It's filled with a rich, savory egg custard, aged cheese, and fresh herbs, all finished off with a beautiful drizzle of house-made hoisin glaze and real gold leaf flakes.
The pastry structure was absolutely perfect. Every single bite delivered that sweet and savory punch from the roasted pork mixed with the buttery layers, and it was pure chef's kiss perfection!
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| The stunning Beaucoup Bakery x Chinatown BBQ Roasted Pork Quiche. |
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| Showing off those perfectly flaky pastry layers and savory filling inside. |
2. Foo Hung Curios x Buttermere Patisserie: White Rabbit Bubble Tea Roll
Next up, we visited Foo Hung Curios to grab their special collaboration with Buttermere Patisserie: the White Rabbit Bubble Tea Roll.
Growing up, White Rabbit candy was always around, but to be completely honest, I actually really disliked it because the intense sweetness used to give me a headache! I'm not sure if it was just the version we had back home in the Philippines or what. Because of that, we packed this gorgeous roll to go, and we're looking forward to enjoying it safely at home later this evening alongside a fresh cup of chrysanthemum tea.
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| The beautiful White Rabbit Bubble Tea Roll from Buttermere Patisserie. |
The Hawkers Lane Takeover (500 Columbia Street)
After collecting our bakery treats, we made our way back over to the outdoor Hawkers Lane market area along 500 Columbia Street. We ended up settling in at the Mama in the Kitchen x Chef William Lew stall to try their classic Cantonese street food dishes. The only menu item we intentionally skipped here was the chicken wings, mostly just to be a bit mindful of our health goals and overall budget!
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| Our beautiful street food spread at the outdoor Hawkers Lane market. |
3. Chili Chicken Wontons ($9.50)
I absolutely adore wontons in general, so these Chili Chicken Wontons were immediately right up my alley. You get a serving of six pieces steamed perfectly soft and tossed with toasted sesame seeds, crispy fried shallots, and a rich Shrimp Garlic Chili Oil. The flavourful kick from that chili oil was completely drool-worthy! I was happily doing a little food dance right at our table to the live music echoing from the festival's main stage.
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| Soft steamed Chili Chicken Wontons swimming in savory chili oil. |
4. Crisp Vegetable Spring Rolls ($7.00)
I was genuinely shocked by how much I ended up enjoying these simple Spring Rolls. They were beautifully golden and crispy, but it was really the accompanying Mandarin Plum Glaze (infused with a hint of spicy kick) that completely stole the show for me. I would honestly put that glaze on everything! I initially assumed I'd prefer dipping the crispy rolls into the savoury curry sauce from our next dish, but that sweet, tangy plum glaze blew me away. Does anyone know if they sell this bottled anywhere?
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| Crispy Vegetable Spring Rolls paired with that incredible Mandarin Plum Glaze. |
5. HK Curry Fish Balls ($7.00)
To finish off our street food tasting, we grabbed the HK Curry Fish Balls. I don't really have a personal history with this specific dish, and it's not something I typically think to order, but I am an absolute sucker for curry of any kind whether it’s Japanese, Thai, or even Irish curry sauce! This version was wonderful. The fish balls were incredibly soft and tender. The sauce was so good that it left me wishing I had a piece of fried tofu or something to soak up every last drop!
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| Tender Hong Kong Curry Fish Balls with coconut cream and crispy vermicelli. |
Did you get a chance to check out the Light Up Chinatown festival this weekend? What was your favourite food vendor collaboration? Let me know in the comments below!
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