Lucky Gate Chinese Restaurant
Lucky Gate – This place was a spur of the moment dinner choice. My cousin and I had made plans to head to another restaurant but things didn’t go according to plan. As a result, we completely changed our destination, and started craving for some skewers. Since we weren’t familiar or aware whether Coquitlam had any skewers to offer, we decided to use good old Google Maps to see what would pop up. What came up was Lucky Gate Chinese Restaurant. Northern Asian Cuisine. Reviews looked a little low, but from the photos, the place looked legit and the portions looked fairly generous. Upon entering the place, it was very quiet and it had only one booth occupied with patrons. I was starting to regret coming in since it was so quiet. However, once we were seat, we noticed the phone was ringing non stop. It appears takeout was keeping this place busy due to the covid. After looking through the menu, we decided the typical staple dishes that we both enjoy and will help distinguish whether the restaurant passed our approval of Northern Cuisine. We had ordered the garlic and chili pork slices / chilli refried green beans / Shanghai Pork Dumplings / Lamb Skewers / Beef Noodle / Seasonal Veggies with Garlic – Honestly, for two people, we ordered a lot! But since we rarely explore this area to eat, we decided let’s just go a little over the top and try out as much as we can.
One of the things we clearly noticed was the fact that the portions were fairly generous. Everything was fresh and made to order. The pork dumplings were packed with tasty soup but I felt the skin was a little too chewy and thick. As for the lamb skewers – each piece was very large and tasty with the aromatics of the cumin, a little fennel and chilli garlic peppers and infused with the charred taste. The beef noodles had the inhouse hand pulled noodles which was nice. But I felt the beef was a little dry and wasn’t tender enough for my liking. The seasonal veggies – ie. Chilli beans were overly seasoned that I needed to sip my tea for every mouthful of beans I ate. The same goes for the veggies – was way to seasoned. I felt a sodium overload! I was surprised by the garlic and chili pork slices because it was sliced so thin yet it was very tender and moist. The sauce itself was a nice balance that didn’t over power the pork. I would come back and try out a few more other dishes to see if I would be a regular patron to the place.
