Happy Lamb Hot Pot - Warden (Chinese)

Happy Lamb (formerly Little Sheep Mongolian) Hot Pot is located at 2543 Warden in Scarborough, Toronto's eastern suburb, at the south end of Bridletowne Circle, south of Finch. Little Sheep has a modern nice interior, granite table tops, and there were plenty of other diners. There was also nice air conditioning on a very warm day, even with the broth pots going. Disposable chopsticks are used unfortunately, so I brought my own as always. We tried half-and-half spicy and regular broth this time, whereas at the downtown location we had only had the regular one. As with the downtown one diners pay a small fee of $2.50 to $3 for either a single-sized or sharing pot of broth, which is in topped up throughout the meal for no charge, so a second pot is not required. Four flavors of AYCD pop plus plum juice and soy milk and cold water are included in the lunch price; the downtown location did not have pop. Although the Diet Coke was rather diluted, I tried others and they were not, but I was just very happy to have the included pop regardless.

Lamb, pork and beef were all excellent in both the spicy and regular broths. Beef balls, shiitake mushrooms, dumplings, tofu were all excellent with barbecue and soy sauce, in both spicy and regular broth (well, for the lamb, as excellent as it can be for someone not partial to it.) As I noted with the downtown Little Sheep, normally I'd be averse to boiling meat, but the broth adds such a nice essence to the food cooked in it due to the added fruits and herbs. Unlike downtown though there was no pork belly. Other than beef and seafood, diners pick their own ingredients from trays on side shelves whereas downtown they are ordered and brought by a waiter.

Unfortunately, the dumplings have a lamb filling (which I really should expect from the name of the place.) Spring rolls were dry and there was very little flavor plus there was no plum sauce.  Sauces I tried included sesame peanut, soy, garlic, and barbecue which is Chinese-style. Another set of trays with more food was brought out midway through the lunch hour and filled up the secondary shelving area (with all of the items that had to be ordered earlier, ironically… I guess it was premature dinner prep.) Sausage slices were good. Crab stick was good (it was probably surimi) with soy. Seafood sauce has interesting flavor. Chicken garlic was fantastic as it is marinated in it and the flavour persists. Shrimp are completely unpeeled – including the head being on – so I didn't like preparing it very much but the results were good albeit a lot smaller. Fish cake was good. Luncheon meat was good like spam.

For dessert, snow fungus soup has a very mild flavor of molasses and not much else. Shrimp chips were not really a dessert item but are there regardless. No ice cream is present like downtown. Mishy did not like the custard cakes but I thought they were excellent. Weekday lunch was $17.99 which with the included AYCD pop and other soft drinks is an excellent price. While the offerings at the downtown location we found slightly preferable, the included pop (almost) made up for it, and as well there were items here not present there.

Rating: 8.5-9/10