Maple Yip Seafood Chinese Restaurant - Old School Cantonese

Looks like a normal Crispy Chicken from the outside...but it is completely deboned & stuffed with sticky rice (糯米飯)!

Recently, I wanted to find a Chinese seafood restaurant to try with 7 friends and decided on Maple Yip because of all the positive reviews on TripAdvisor and other review sites. We made 7:30 reservations for a Friday night and we were promptly seated when we arrived. Based on the reviews, we had pre-ordered the Winter Melon Soup ($45) and Chicken Stuffed With Rice ($42). The waitress was friendly, and when we told her we wanted seafood she gave us some suggestions on the fresh seafood they had. We decided on live Vancouver Crab With Ginger & Onion ($16/lb), steamed fresh Red Snapper ($23/lb), fresh Scallop With Garlic & Vermicelli ($9 each), Clams In Black Bean Sauce, and 2 veggie dishes. The seafood was fresh, the cooking method was perfect, and the taste was authentic Cantonese style - exactly what we were looking for. The bill was $461 (with tax & tip already included). This was a bit expensive, however the waitress had told us the prices at the time of ordering so we knew what to expect.

We live in an area that has hundreds of Chinese/Asian restaurants within a 20 minute drive and there haven't been any that I've tried in recent memory that I've wanted to recommend to my family until this one.  So a week later I made another reservation for 7:30 on a Saturday night for my family. There were 18 of us so we had a table of 10 and a table of 8 - once again I pre-ordered 2 Winter Melon Soups, a Chicken Stuffed With Rice, and a "Eight Treasured Braised Duck" ($48) which is also one of their specialities that must be pre-ordered.

On this Saturday night we had to wait 20 minutes before we were seated but the staff were very apologetic and we were prepared that there may be wait. This evening's dinner we ordered 2 Black Pepper Tenderloin, 2 Sweet & Sour Pork, 2 Scallop In Taro Birds Nest, Braised Pork Belly With Preserved Vegetables, a Cantonese Chow Mein, and a tofu/veggie dish. The bill was $387 (tax & tip already included). Reasonable for the size of our party and the amount of food we ordered. My family was happy with the recommendation and were generally pleased with the quality and taste of the food, the service and the prices.

This restaurant reminds me of the Cantonese style restaurants in Toronto Chinatown (Spadina/Dundas) in the 80's before they started migrating to Scarborough & Markham and before the "fancier" Chinese restaurants of the last 10-15 years. If you don't mind the tables close together, waiting a bit even with a reservation, and the old-school décor (or lack of), and just want some good Chinese food definitely give this place a try.

Here's a tip: Opt for the 7:00 or 7:30 reservation even though you may not get your table on time. The early reservations get "rushed" out even if you want to sit and chat or are slow eaters because the parties have arrived for the next reservation.

Y.C.

Safe

I am at my monthly doctor's appointment today.  On good days it is just another minor inconvenience, but on others, it turns me into a nervous wreck - heart palpitations all day, insomnia for the proceeding week, and all the worst possible scenarios playing out in my mind over & over until I almost cannot tell the real from the imagined.

It is also March Break.  So along with having to deal with these appointments and the wave of emotions & feelings that come with it, I have 3 school age children at home who have been trying to "play nicely" with each other - yesterday they made slime by themselves (without too much yelling & screaming) and they even cleaned up the mess they made on their own - definitely a successful day!

Today they are bowling with their cousins & they'll be with them again on Friday when I am back to do part 2 of my appointment.  My kids are close to all their cousins, but are particularly so with this family.  They are close in age and they go to the same school.  They have lots to talk about & will play board games, video games, watch movies, and we'll even go on vacation with them.  Besides the obvious help of taking care of my children when I am at my appointments, my extended family provides something even more important.  For me, it is knowing that my kids are taken care of, they are having fun & are distracted, when I am not able to do that for them.

My children know why I have these monthly appointments at the hospital.  Our family schedule & their social activities must be planned around me.  It could be a very stressful time for them too but I think we do a good job at creating as much normalcy as possible.  I think my children know that outside of our immediate family, there is always going to be another place for them, with their aunts & uncles, cousins & grandparents, where they can feel safe & loved.

Y.C.