Wagamama's are a Japenese noodle bar and they have many restaurants all around the world. Believe it or not this was my first visit to Wagamama's and it was that good I went back 5 days later! On this occasion I treated myself to a yasai itame, which is a dish comprising of rice noodles in a spicy green coconut and lemongrass soup. The dish contains stir fried tofu along with a great selection of vegetables; chillies, beansprouts, red onions and spring onions, bok choi, peppers and mushrooms and is garnished with coriander and served with quarter of a lime to squeeze yourself. It was utterly delicious! We were little piglets because we also had a side dish of wok fried greens; tender stem broccoli and bok choi, stir fried in garlic and soy sauce.
The dishes are all made on the premises and use fresh ingredients, as soon as a dish is made it is brought to your table. Sometimes you don't get all the dishes arriving at once but that just adds to the occasion!
I know I am probably the last person in the world to have not visited this restaurant before now but just in case I'm not I had to tell you about it! What are you waiting for, book a table but please invite me!
After a wonderful and relaxed lunch we decided to visit Wing Yip Chinese Supermarket. Again this was my first visit but I had heard of its amazing selection of Tofu so I just had to try it out. The supermarket is just over 2 miles from the city centre and we decided to walk there, so we could burn off some calories from our lunch. We had to get the bus back though thanks to the amount of food we bought!
The supermarket was absolutely massive and held so many weird and wonderful food items. A word of caution, the weird was probably non vegan so I would advise that you don't look too closely in the freezer department. You've been warned!
However, there were vegan food treasures to be found including a fantastic selection of tofu! From extra soft through to extra firm and even deep fried! Here's a selection of the food that I bought. My bargain of the day agar agar for under £1!!!!!
I forgot to include all the tofu I bought in the photograph above and I've since eaten it all! As you know I love Tofu! Planning another visit to the Chinese supermarket for sure, evenif it is to stock up on tofu.
Have you ever visited Wagamama's or a Chinese Supermarket? Let me know what your favourite dish is and where I can find other Chinese Supermarkets to try.
I love Chinese supermarkets and we're so lucky to have several in Manchester as well as Japanese and Thai ones in the same area. I always get tea, tofu, seaweed, spring roll wrappers and goji berries like you. I've never found agar though! Is it in a block? I've only ever seen it as flakes from health food shops. Other things I like to get are tempeh and tins of mock duck. I drain the mock duck, toss it in sweet chilli sauce and then put it in a roasting tin with hot oil and roast until it's crispy. It's great as a wrap, spring roll or sushi filling.
ReplyDeleteYou lucky thing having so many supermarkets near you, I'd love to try out the Thai and Japanese ones. I can see a day trip coming soon. The agar agar comes in two bars (10g each bar) and the instructions state that it will set 1100ml liquid. I'll just break the bits off that I need and add to liquid over a low heat stirring until the agar agar has dissolved. You could also buy green dyed agar agar! I gave that a miss though as it was fluorescent! Your mock duck dish sounds interesting, I've never tried mock meat my brain still thinks its the real deal coz it looks so similar so I give it a miss, but I am tempted to try your recipe, thanks for sharing :o)
DeleteHi Jasmine,
ReplyDeleteThanks for reminding me about Wing Yip - there's two other Chinese supermarkets within the city centre so I always forget that there's such a big one located just outside! I never knew they stocked goji berries so I'll definitely have a look.
I also visited Wagamama's for the first time in March - it was for my birthday and I was pleasantly surprised at how they do things there and the choice for veggies and vegans.
Hope you're having a great week!
Besma (Curiously Conscious)
Hi Besma, thanks for stopping by! :o)
DeleteWagamama's was great and I'll definitely be going again and my stash from the Chinese supermarket has been eaten so I need another visit there soon too! :o)
Enjoy your weekend
No you're not the last as I still haven't made it to Wagamamas! I really should give it a try as I've heard nothing but rave reviews about the food. The seating arrangement does put me off a little though... if I go with my fella I just want to sit with him rather than a bunch of people I don't know. Maybe I should just have a girls night out instead ;)
ReplyDeleteYou definitely should. The Wagamama restaurant in Birmingham had booths so you could spend some alone time with your man :o) x
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