Cafe de Tropika, Tasty HK Cafe (Edmonton 30 in 30)

Cafe de Tropika opened up in the last year when I was finishing medical school. Styled as a Hong Kong style cafe, it offered solid quick nutritious meals at impressively low prices and quickly became a popular spot for me to go whenever famished after a long days of work. I sorely missed the restaurant when moving to Winnipeg as I have thus been unable to find a similar style of cafe in my new adopted city and would oftentimes find myself craving the roasted meats and casseroles from the cafe. Thus when I returned to Edmonton for this elective I knew I had to reconvene at Cafe de Tropika.

On the southside of Edmonton just off of Calgary Trail on 30th avenue, Cafe de Tropika stands imposingly on the side of the street with its bright moniker and large bright windows. The interiors are similarly decorated with large marble tables and booth style seating. Small pieces of artwork and two large televisions showing Chinese dramas frame the restaurant.

The menu(s) are rather confusing. As opposed to having a dedicated menu of all the options, Cafe de Tropika lazily hands you three different menus. One features the usual stir fries, rice plates and roasted meats. A second menu features their hot pots, casserole dishes and savoury noodle dishes. A third featuring specials sits flipboard style on each table. For new diners, this type of menu is both prohibitive and intimidating while for old diners, it becomes annoying and redundant. Although I am impressed by the amount of dishes the small kitchen is able to pump out I would have preferred a dedicated single menu outlining all their options.

I went with two dishes tonight. The first was a combination that included the Daily Soup. Simply average, the daily soups, add-ons for most Chinese meals, are just the leftover boiled meats and vegetables in a broth. Granted there was a certain depth here that exemplified the length of the boiling process, but nevertheless one cannot get too excited over simple broth.

The BBQ Combo (Two Items) on Rice consists of your choice of two meats, I chose BBQ Pork and Roasted Duck, along with vegetables and rice. The BBQ pork had a nice fattiness and a slight sweetness on the exterior while the roasted duck had a thick fatty skin with minimal tender meat. Needless to say both meats were simply average and on par with what one would get at a Chinese butcher.

One of my favourites in the past were their baked casserole dishes, especially the Baked Portuguese Style Chicken with Rice. The large casserole dish consists of tender crispy dark meat chicken with potatoes and peppers all baked in a coconut milk and Turmeric based sauce. I loved the ooey-gooey consistency the sauce would get and the mild flavour of coconut and strong turmeric flavour that is imparted into the dish. Delicious!

Overall Cafe de Tropika remains a solid Hong Kong cafe featuring yummy casseroles and average roasted meats. I was impressed by the popularity of the restaurant as tons of customers trooped in during and after my supper there and am confident they will remain a mainstay of the Edmonton food scene going forward. Just make sure to peruse through all the different menus to get a true idea of everything they offer!