*** Silver Ark has closed and is now Siam Nara Restaurant.
Man, three years, time sure does fly………
I'm not quite sure why Silver Ark always slips my mind. Perhaps it's the location, tucked away from the street. Or maybe because I usually have something already in mind when we hit Mira Mesa Boulevard. Still, three years between visits is pretty long. And it would have been even longer, had I not seen this banner on my visits to Manila Fast Food.
It was enough to pique my curiosity. Were the buy three dishes get a "live lobster" for $1.99 a sign of a desperate restaurant grappling to stay alive? If anything the banner was enough to get us into the doors of Silver Ark a few weeks ago.
To illustrate how long it's been since we've visited Silver Ark, the back wall used to be partitioned off, and housed a Chinese BBQ take-out area. That along with the weekday dim sum (Dim Sum only on weekends) are long gone I guess.
Sadly, we were the only customers in the place during the entire duration of our dinner.
After looking over the menu, and learning the "rules" - rice, soup, and noodle dishes do not count toward the total to qualify for the specials. We placed our order, and requested a crab ($5.99 special)….. but were told, "no crab today". So we decided to see what a $1.99 lobster looked like.
The first dish we ordered was the Salted Fish with Chicken and Tofu Hot Pot ($11.95):
This was one bland dish, with barely a hint of the salted fish fragrance. Not much chicken either. The dish was much better as left-overs the next day.
The best dish of the night was the Pork Intestines with Preserved Vegetable ($12.95), which was on the specials menu.
A bit short on fermented black bean, but there was a good amount of the sour and sweet preserved vegetable and a good amount of fairly well prepared intestine.
Actually, the Stir Fried Clam with Basil ($13.95) had potential.
This really coulda' been a contender….. The short comings are readily apparent. As in where's the basil? I found one sprig. No gravy/sauce? This was much too dry, and basically unseasoned in any manner. Too bad since the clams were of good quality, and were cooked to a perfect doneness. The green bell peppers were severely under-cooked.
And last….it's the $1.99 crawfish Lobster. We really didn't expect much, and in that vein, this more or less met our expectations.
The lobster was on the "cool" side, but was decently flavored with ginger and scallion. The sign does say "live lobster", and I'm sure that once upon a time this was without a doubt "alive". Perhaps during the last lunch hour? At least the meat was still meaty and tender, and hadn't seized yet. The sign should probably say "Recently Live Lobster"……
Overall, our meal was uneven, but okay, the portion sizes (except for the lobster) were generous. As for the specials, I think maybe the shrimp may be the way to go since you'll pay by the pound. We both felt that the food was under-flavored, though the quality of most ingredients was decent.
Dim Sum is now served only on weekends, and I noticed a couple of pages of lunch specials ranging from $5.95 to $7.95.
Silver Ark
8993 Mira Mesa Blvd.
San Diego, CA 92126