By Tana Kosiyabong
It’s been a busy couple of weeks for me. I’ve been working long hours with very little sleep. Coffee has become my best pal while I worked through the cold winter night. Duuring this hectic week, I had also tried an energy drink called “Monster” but it was too sweet for my taste. I felt as if I drank sugar syrup down my throat. The good ol’ coffee is the best for me. It not only keeps me awake in the wee hour, but also makes me warm.
Last week, my team and I had to give an important presentation which we got a short time to prepare. Fortunately, we had managed to pull off a great one. After the event, we decided to have a quick celebration at Well Tea, a Taiwanese style teahouse and restaurant located next to the BCIT downtown campus on Seymour street. Since the majority of the customers are the BCIT students, you can rest assured of the affordable food prices and generous serving portions. (The drinks are a bit pricey though.) Unfortunately I didn’t bring my camera with me at the time. So earlier today, I decided to revisit the restaurant and made it the Cheap Appetite mission of the week.
As I walked inside Well Tea around lunch time, the restaurant was not busy at all. Perhaps there were not many students around on Sunday. The interior décor was clean, young and hip, perfect for hanging out in-between the classes. After seating, it took me a while to go through their long menu (over 100 items). Eventually I decided to order the Taiwanese Style Fried Chicken Thigh Fried Rice ($7.95 plus HST). Because I like both fried chicken and fried rice, I was really looking forward to it.
Soon enough, the dish was served. I was surprised to see a big piece of deep-fried chicken thigh. It was pounded thinly similar to the Dae-Ji pork cutlet I wrote about a while back. And, perhaps because of the dark meat, the chicken was still moist inside while the thin crust was crispy. I could taste a mild curry flavor in the batter. All in all, they were yummy pieces of deep-fried chicken. But I have to say that Wo Fung deep-fried chicken wings are a notch better.
The fried rice was good but not great. The medium grain rice was stir-fried with eggs, peas, carrots and corn. I wouldn’t complain about the grease because it was expected. Unfortunately it lacked of “wok hei,” the flavor essence imparted by a hot wok on food during stir-frying which could have made this dish great.
Because both the fried chicken and the fried rice were both greasy, I couldn’t eat the whole dish in one sitting. So I had the leftover fried rice (no chicken) for the dinner earlier tonight. It was still good after a quick heat up in the microwave.
If you are on a budget, check out the Minced meat sauce on rice ($4.50). I haven’t tried it yet, but it’s definitely cheap.
Happy Holidays Everyone 
NOTE: Well Tea also sells deep-fried chicken nuggets and deep-fried chicken knees on their snack menu for $5.75 per each order. You can add a variety of flavors such as seaweed, kimchi, spicy, wasabi, black pepper, and fried basil to your chicken for 25 cents more. The flavored nuggets will be on my list for the next visit. Enjoy and Cheap Appétit.
Well Tea Taiwanese Style Fried Chicken Thigh Fried Rice: ©©©1/2
Well Tea is located at 551 Seymour Street, Vancouver, BC (T) 604.681.9777
BUDGET BREAKDOWN:
Remaining Budget: $32.05
Budget Spent: -$7.95
Budget Available: $24.10
©2010 Tana Kosiyabong and CheapAppetite.com™. All rights reserved.
Share your favorite cheap eats
Love teahouses. Too bad none around here! Love fried pork. Check. Love fried rice. Check. I need to go eating with you.
Come on over Belinda
I remember I had take-away bubble tea once at this place. Yes, I would say it’s one of the best around town.
I haven’t tried their bubble tea yet. But I like this fried chicken fried rice.
Oh my, I’m in trouble! I should visit here tomorrow morning not now. It’s 12.30am and you’re making me hungry. haha… Just look at those golden fried rice and the crispy looking chicken. They’re calling my nameeeee…..
Hope you’re having a fabulous day & enjoy your holiday. & Stay warm!
Blessings, Kristy
Lol kristy. You’re funny
I could hear they’re calling your name too! Happy Holidays kristy!
Oooooh that fried chicken looks so good. Dark meat would be a good change from the typical white meat.
For your potential future explorations, I’ve had good fried chicken (technically Taiwanese “peppery fried chicken nuggets”) at The One in Burnaby (Kingsway @ Buller …. Bus #106 gets you there directly from Metrotown), and also at i-Cafe (Broadway @ Heather). i-Cafe’s is more like a tonkatsu.
Oh speaking of good tonkatsu, The Clubhouse (W.2nd @ Crowe, Bus #84 from VCC-Clark Station gets you there directly) makes a big mean piece of tonkatsu on rice, with or without curry sauce. Really really good.
Thanks for the info LotusRapper. I hope to try them out soon. So many places to go. so little room in my belly . lol. Happy holidays Lotusrapper.
Merry Christmas and all the best of the season to you too, Tana !! Been a fun year being on your blog
Look forward to more in 2011.
Great to have you as one of our regulars as well LotusRapper
Cheers,
What, there is such a thing like fried chicken and fried rice combo in downtown Vancouver like less than 10 minutes from my office?! How can I not know this lol! I am there tomorrow!!! Thanks Tana!
Sadly they were closed today until after Boxing Day I believe. Well, next time. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays Tana!
Hey imkoonta, wow, you’re fast! I haven’t even had a chance to reply your previous comment
I wish you a great Christmas and New Year. Hope you had a chance to try the dish soon too. Let me know how you like it. Oh I talked to Chef Goh about Khao Mun Gai Tod. He doesn’t have the recipe, but he promised to find one when he visited Thailand during this holiday season 
. Stay Tune!
[...] peppers. The whole wheat bread was thick but soft. The chicken breast was bigger and thicker than the deep-fried chicken thigh I wrote about last week. It was well-marinated and tasty, but a bit dry. The ham was bigger than two (perhaps three) pieces [...]