Banana Leaf - Vancouver, Canada

green papaya mango kerabu

This review was for the Kitsilano location. Me and hubby and another of his friend met up on our last day in Vancouver to have lunch together. The place wasn’t very busy for lunch. I was actually surprise to see that it wasn’t busy. Years ago we went to the one on Broadway off 12th and it was busy. Through out the years they opened more locations now.

It was a hot day (for Vancouver standard, I guess) but inside the building was cool. There were big windows so the air circulate. The place was nice and cozy. We looked through the menu and decided on pumpkin curry ( I was trying to bring back part of my vegetarian life), green papaya and mango kerabu and seafood nasi lemak. Hubby chose an iced calamansi which I wrongly communicated to our waitress. But later on she was nice enough to come back and told me that calamansi is better served cold instead of hot. I don’t know what’s wrong with me that day. What I thought and what came out of my mouth was different. Yikes !



Anyhow, our food came out and we started digging in. The nasi lemak looked sad actually. The amount of food didn’t quite match the big plate that it was on. The surprise came from the mango papaya kerabu which tasted pretty similar to the Thai papaya salad but less spicy. It had a nice refreshing citrusy combination of shredded papaya, young mango with just a bit tanginess of citrus background dressing. I would definitely order this again next time.

pumpkin curry

nasi lemak with seafood

The other surprise came from the pumpkin curry. It is the opposite of the nasi lemak. The curry came in a big deep dish and filled to the top. Beside pumpkin, there were also pieces of bell pepper, okra, green bean and tomatoes. Surprisingly the curry sauce was nice and thick and rich. Lovely. After the experience with Kedah House a few nights ago where we had watered down curry this one was really satisfying. Only one thing left in my mind was how to get the curry tasted that good. I considered myself quite experience with curry since I have made Malaysian style curry, Thai curry and also Indian curry. But I still couldn’t quite put my finger on it yet.

3005 W Broadway
Vancouver, BC
1 604 734 3005