Yan's Garden — Restaurant in Burnaby

So, Yan’s Garden has been on my list of places to try for a number of years (I suppose it’s partly because I used to watch “Wok with Yan” back in the 80’s). I’ve been hesitant to stop by here in the past mainly because parking always looked difficult here as the parking lot is generally always full.

We stopped by in early February (during the snowy weather) so we managed to grab one of the available parking spaces. A good thing too because the lot filled up rather quickly afterwards. We were surprised at how large this restaurant is because, from the outside, it appears to be a small location. However, despite the large footprint, the seating seemed a bit cramped… especially since they offer push-cart dim sum.

First up was the Steamed Beef Rice Rolls ($5.28) and Pork Siu Mai ($5.28) topped with fish roe – staples for our dim sum outings.

Two other classic Cantonese dim sum dishes followed quickly thereafter… Steamed Beef Balls ($5.58) and Steamed Chicken Feet ($5.28) in black bean sauce. The chicken feet were fairly tender but the dish seemed to be missing the black beans.

The thing with push-cart style dim sum is that you have to wait sometimes for the dish you’re looking for to show up. I also find that we tend to over order with push-cart dim sum. Our next dishes were the Pan-Fried Turnip Cake ($6.99) and Honeycomb Tripe ($5.28). I know that tripe (and chicken feet) can be a bit of an acquired taste for some people but you should really give it a try. By themselves, they don’t have much flavour but they do take on the flavour of the sauce and the texture is quite different than other dishes.

Their Stuffed Eggplant $5.58) turned out really nice with the perfect amount of light crispness to the bite and a generous filling.

For dessert, we picked up these amazingly cute Mango and Lychee Bunnies ($5.58). They were almost too cute to eat… almost. The mango was really good with a perfectly smooth and velvety texture.

Overall, the food here is pretty good. Service is a bit haphazard (they mistakenly marked a dish down twice for us and we had to flag them down to correct it).

UPDATE - Feb 2025: It's been about 5 years since we last visited here. It seems like they have done some refreshing of the interior since then and the tables seem a bit more spaced out than when we last visited.

Ordered the Steamed Beef Rice Roll ($9.38), Prawn and Chive Dumplings ($9.38) which were a bit too firm, Egg Tofu with Shrimp Paste ($10.99) which was really good with light and creamy tofu.

The Deep Fried Bean Curd Wraps with Shrimp and Veggies ($9.38 but only $$6.99 on special) had a light crispy wrapper with good filling.

While you can order by sheet, they still offer push cart dim sum here and we grabbed a plate of Steamed Beef Balls ($8.98) which were hot, fresh, and bouncy.

They had a special on a $36.88 crab dish with egg noodles cooked in a special ginger and onion sauce. They said it was a 2lb crab but it looked like it might be a bit on the small side and the meat was a bit difficult to pull...

We came at 10am on a Saturday and the restaurant was empty when we got there. When we left at 11:30 the whole restaurant was basically full. They serve everything in the carts. There's some things that they won't have in the carts which then they will tell you to tick off on the paper to order it.

We ordered steamed beef trip in special sauce ($9.28), steamed rice flour roll with scallops and seaweed ($9.88), deep fried sesame balls ($8.58), deep fried milk custard ($8.58), pork and shrimp dumpling shao mai ($8.38), har gao ($8.38), deep fried taro ($8.38), steamed pork ribs ($7.88). Tea is $1.50 each person

The steamed beef tripe in special sauce had a strong tripe flavour in a good way. You could taste the innards flavour. Some restaurants bleach it and clean it really well so that you can taste it but this place has cleaned it just enough. Flavour was good and I would order this again

Rice roll with seaweed and scallops. There were slices of scallops throughout the rice roll. This rice roll is different from the rice rolls you usually have at dimsum. It's not chewy like the ones you find at other restaurants. Instead it's really smooth and has a slight rice flavour. According to my grandma, this is the way it's meant to be. The ones that are chewy and bouncy is the new way of doing it now. This one is based on personal preference. If you like traditional style, this is the way to go.

Deep fried sesame balls were not too sweet on the inside but the outside was too thick (also not chewy enough) and it wasn't crispy enough outside. We found out later that they have a different kind that's the thinner one. This one is pushed out on carts and not on the sheet so be warned if you are looking for the thin skin one.

The shrimp dumplings or har gao were okay. Lots of shrimp inside and very bouncy but the outside skin was a tad too thick

The taro fried dumpling was not crispy and flaky enough for me. The inside filling was pretty decent

The pork shrimp shao mai dumpling was pretty good. Lots of pork little shrimp which is how it should be. It had a good bite too it and was well flavored

The pork ribs were not bad. Meat was soft and portion was big.

The fried milk dessert was interesting and definitely not what we were expecting. You drink the milk custard that's inside. Outside is crispy but also not hot. Inside was cold as well. Interesting but would only order it once.

Overall dimsum was not bad. They have dishes here you might not find elsewhere. No major faults. Some of the servers pushing the carts can be a bit pushy. They try to sell you the dishes that have been sitting their the longest. Other than that the other servers are really nice and fast. They have servers specifically just to pour tea and get the bill. Would I recommend it? Probably not as none of the dishes stand out. But if you are looking for some solid run of the mill dimsum. Then this place is...

This is the worst place I have ever been. My suggestion: do not go here! Bad management, people with attitudes, no respect for others! I was there helping with delivery, but the staff there were very rude, yelling at me since I asked the first guy where is the order two times in polite way, he argued he thought I cannot hear, then yelling at me! And I went to the second guys he did the same thing! Guess they treat people based on their positions in society. Personally, I really hate this. Sometimes I do delivery for fun, but this time, I had a very bad experience. People working here are not great people. Since bullying is unacceptable, I reported this on different platforms to try to ban this establishment from those platforms to prevent other delivery people from suffering like I did. Personally, I will not return, and I will also inform everyone around me to avoid this place. Maybe they do not care, as it seemed a lot of people were there when I visited. But at least I and anyone who cares about treating people equally and fairly should stay away from this place!

Obviously, a liar is a liar! In ur response, you said I am the one was rude! Yes, I got mad later, but it’s because you guys treated me with a very, very bad attitude! Let me ask you, when people treat you rudely, will you still keep a smile on your face? Maybe you will, but I will not! You have cameras, right? How about checking them first before you respond to this! I thought there would be a sincere apology from the management team, but I guess I was wrong! Everyone in this location seems terrible! Ignoring the truth and making up bigger words! That is so classified! Acting evil and being evil! I will follow up on this case from my end! I will not let you guys treat people like me in such an unprofessional and rude manner!

The community should come together to address people like here! Please check their response; it seems familiar, right? Yes, this is a typical manner these people play! They will never own up to what they did! I believe that businesses or people like this will not thrive, as they are rotten from the roots! To be a good businessman, one needs to be a good person first! Everyone who gets a chance to read this review, please spread this information around you. There are plenty of great places you can try; why go somewhere with such negative traits? I also checked around this place, and I am genuinely worried about their hygiene. I have seen people making comments here, complaining about their poor service, and even finding unknown things in their food. Seriously?! So many things need...