Lee

Last night, I went to Lee (Susur Lee's restaurant). Susur Lee is world renowned and one of Canada's most respected chefs. He came in second place on season 2 of Top Chef: Masters (Marcus Samuelsson came out on top) and was the second Canadian chef to appear on Iron Chef (he tied against Bobby Flay in battle bacon). I have been watching Susur on the food network for some time now and couldn't of been more excited to eat his food! Not only did I get to eat his food but he came over to our table to say hello. I guess he had no choice because when I saw him from across the room, I started beaming and smiling at him (thinking back, I probably looked a bit nuts). He walked right over to see how our meal was. I was in the presence of a culinary genius. Susur was very sweet to come over and chat. Lee was a delectable!

We started off our incredible meal with Sashimi of Charred Tuna and Spicy Tartar with marinated edamame, tomato sauce and tofu crisps. It was a stunning dish! The tuna was very light with a punch of scotch bonnet pepper sauce. The tartar in the middle was tasty especially with the crunchy tofu chips! It was a good dish but I probably wouldn't order it again. There are so many delicious things on the menu that I would want to try.

Then came the most wonderful dish of the night. I've seen Susur make this dish on Top Chef Masters and was excited to try it! The Singarporean-Style Slaw with salmon sashimi blew me away! The slaw has 19 ingredients in it and the flavours are out-of-this-world! There are so many different tastes and textures. Everything went together like bananas and chocolate. I definitely went away dreaming about this dish! 

Before the Singaporean-Style Slaw was mixed (photo cred. foodnouveau.com)

After it was mixed

For our main course, we started off with the Thai Satay with chicken, beef and shrimp skewers. It came with a peanut sauce, a spicy mango salad, and an assam glaze. This was my least favourite dish of the night. Don't get me wrong, it was good. It was nothing special... the dish was lacking the 'WOW' factor. The assam glaze on all the skewers was very tasty. The chicken was tender and even though the beef was a bit chewy, it was my favourite skewer. It seems like something I could make at home, so I wouldn't recommend it. 

The next dish was deeee-licious! We had the Peking and Char Sui Duck with Beijing duck garnishes, steamed pancakes and foie fras pate mousse. The duck was really tender and the Char Sui Duck had so much flavour. I happen to LOVE fois gras so I thought the mousse was divine! It was creamy and rich and went so well with the rolled pancakes. The dish also came with tofu chips that were heavenly! The taste of all the different components in one bite... priceless!

We ended off this scrumptious meal with, possibly, the best dessert I have ever had... The French and Chinese Tong Yuen. They were warm, sweet rice dumplings filled with melt-in-your-mouth chocolate nougat. They were topped with creme anglaise and a fresh strawberry. They were a one-biter, so I suggest you savour it! When you bit into it, the warm chocolate oozed out. It was rich and creamy, with lots of different textures (smooth sweet dumpling, creamy creme anglaise, and nuts in the nougat)... just wonderful!