Review: Quanjude iDen Tries to Impress

Carefully sliced duck meat at Quanjude

iDen & Quanjude Beijing Duck House has kept its Michelin one-star rating for the past three years in Vancouver, though most Chinese gourmets pan the place.

Some describe the interior like it is from a movie set with a grand-looking entrance and dining room with high ceilings, while the private room has over-the-top decor that is very dramatic.

Nevertheless, service is definitely a strong suit here -- and literally, as the head male servers wear blue tuxedos, and other servers wear brown vests and pants. There's even a non-Chinese server who remembers VIP customers. 

Sweet and sour pork with fruit

In general they are attentive to diners' needs, though one wonders when the menu will be more substantive.

We had lunch here yesterday, invited by VIP customers who have a membership at the restaurant. They think it's value for money, with the good service, and a small private room for five of us.

But the food is hardly impressive. We went here about two years ago and this time it hasn't changed much.

The set lunch menu is C$88 per person, with a few appetisers, a soup, and of course the famous Peking duck, and dessert, tea or coffee. 

While the decor looks nice, the food is made from inexpensive ingredients. Case in point -- to whet our appetites we were served marinated broad beans, followed by the duck soup, a cloudy milky looking broth with finely diced silky tofu, squares of seaweed and thin sheets of fried egg. 

We were also served crispy chicken. One would think of karage, or large chunks of boneless chicken, but here they were tiny bite-sized pieces that were hardly substantial.

Next came sweet and sour pork, with peppers, red onion, pineapple and large plump blueberries.

Our dishes were changed before the Peking duck arrived at our table and a chef came to slice it. He gave us a piece of the skin to dip in brown sugar, and it wasn't particularly hot or crispy, which made it taste oily. 

Glutinous rice balls with osmathus

But we were impressed by the thin slices of duck meat with a bit of the skin that we wrapped in thin pancakes with cucumbers, spring onion and plum sauce.

After three or four of these pancakes you are pretty much full, though there is still a full plate of sliced duck on the table waiting to be eaten.

The good thing is that you can pack up the meat for takeaway complete with pancakes, the sauce and condiments.

For dessert, one I haven't had in a while -- small glutinous rice balls in a sweet osmanthus soup with rice served in a tea cup.

We also had large cups of latte, which kind of overwhelmed the delicate floral-performed dessert.

We're still wondering why Quanjude iDen has a Michelin star... 

iDen & Quanjude Beijing Duck House

2808 Cambie Street

Vancouver

(236) 477 7777