Shanghai Elan Restaurant Ltd - Burnaby

ShangHai Elan Restaurant is a Chinese Restaurant located inside the Crystal Mall. There are two entrances. One is inside the Crystal and another one is outside. My boyfriend and I have passed by this restaurant so many times. But, we still didn’t get a chance to have a try. Finally, we got a chance to give a try on early Saturday Morning at the beginning of this year. We got in from the entrance inside of the Crystal Mall. Inside the restaurant was smaller than what we expect. There are the couple of four people tables and three or four big circle tables in this restaurant. Traditional Chinese decorations and settings. Since we were at the restaurant early in the morning when the restaurant was just opened, the staffs were eating their breakfast at the restaurant. After we arrived at the restaurant, I quickly found a table and sat down. The server brought the menu and some hot water to us. After few minutes looked at the menu, we decided to order some small dim sum dishes for breakfast. Spoon, Chopsticks, bowls, cups, and plates are nice and clean in Chinese style settings. $7.50 Shanghai small wonton chicken soup. Growing up, a bowl of Shanghai wonton soup was definitely a treat. My grandmother always made them at home because it’s super easy to make and takes so few ingredients. The taste of Shanghai small wonton chicken soup is exactly like my grandmothers’ wonton soup. The wrapper of wonton is super thin: silky and light as a cloud. The soup is boiling hot and tasty. Love this soup so much. $4.50 Shanghai Spring Rolls (3pcs). It serves with some a lighter Shanghai red vinegar for dipping! The taste was great. fry the spring rolls immediately after assembling. We didn’t want them to sit out for a long time, because the wrappers can become soggy from the moist filling. This dish was OK. If it has more meat inside the spring rolls, it will be better taste. $5.50 Shanghai Style juicy pork buns (6pc). It’s one of my favorite dim sum dishes. Inside the pork buns are little pockets of gelatinized broth made from chicken, pork and cured ham. The pork buns were homemade and juicy. There are lots of meat in the buns. It was super hot. The taste of the food is very authentic and delicious. I love it. $6.50 Marinated beef wrapped with pancakes. A crispy flaky chewy scallion pancake, fresh crunchy cucumber and a warm melt in the mouth tender beef with a sweet and savory sauce all throughout. My boyfriend’s favorite dish in this restaurant. He told me that the taste of this food more like Beijing Ducks. Inside of duck meat, this dish is used Beef. $7 Chinese Donut and Salty Soy Milk. This Savory Soy Milk Soup with deep fried Chinese Donut is a popular breakfast/brunch item in China. It’s basically a soy milk soup, curdled slightly with the vinegar, and flavored with scallions, sesame oil, pickled radishes, and the crispy Chinese deep-fried Donut. We supposed to order Chinese Donut. It turned out we ordered the wrong dish. We got this one. It’s hot, well cooked. But, we dont really like it. All the food in this restaurant were well cooked, tasty, and delicious. The prices of the food was a little bit more expensive than other Chinese Dim Sum Restaurant. But, the quality and quantity of the food was great. Totally worth the prices. Highly recommend.

Noisy, badly decorated and bad lighing. Who cares. The food is incrediable, the service is friendly and the prices are vey reasonable.

Authentic chinese food not like you get at home, but freshly cooked together with excellent service.

We ate here twice during a recent visit. Loved the spicy tofu and other dishes. The portions were generous and the prices were very fair, especially considering the quality of food. I wish we had this restaurant back home! Note that they serve authentic regional cuisine. You will NOT find lo mein, fried won ton with cream cheese, or other americanized dishes.

We came here after a whole day trip and wanted something Oriental. We are native Chinese and know what we like and want. The menu selection is pretty extensive. We only ordered Sliced Fish w Tofu and Beef with Green Onion. The dishes actually looked very good but the taste is really not there. We have been to many different Chinese restaurants in many different cities, both formal ones and mama papa stores, this one is probably the worst one I can remember, honestly speaking. My son always likes the Beef with green onion with Oyster sauce and this is the worst one he ever tasted. He said it absolutely had not taste. They even charge C$2 per small bowl of rice. As an added disappointment, they said they could not take my credit card since it was under CS$50. However, they never posted anywhere about the minimal spending. They actually have posted Visa and MC log on their entrance door. To be fair, I am only comment on the two dishes we ordered and they are disappointing. I hope they have better other dishes.