Category: Chinese Restaurants

Circling Back to Spicy City

Chinese Restaurants

After our pleasant revisit to Szechuan Chef, the Missus was wondering how some of the other Sichuan style restaurants in San Diego were. So, I took a look at my “Big List” and oh my….we hadn’t been back to Spicy City since 2015! Like I said, we’d pretty much given up on Sichuan food in San Diego. Anyway, we thought we’d give Spicy City a try and headed on over.

When we first moved to San Diego in 2001, if I recall, the sign read “Beijing” Spicy City. Basically claiming to serve Beijing style Sichuan cuisine. Still, it was the only game in town for anything resembling traditional Sichuan food…until Ba Ren came along in 2003. Ba Ren really changed the game for us, we didn’t need to head over to the SGV for Sichuan. Of course Ba Ren closed in 2012. I have such great memories of the place. Well, enough of that. Spicy City has been around since 1997 or so, but has gone thru several ownership changes. My first blog post on Spicy City was when they went thru an ownership change in 2008. I know for certain that they went thru at least one new set of owners as of 2014. But have lost track since then. And viola! It’s April of 2026 and we’re eating at Spicy City!

Interesting to note that while Convoy Pointe Plaza was very busy…folks jostling for parking spots. I actually had to park on Engineer Road, Spicy City had only six tables filled by the time we left. And also of note…..we were the only Asian’s dining here!

I actually overheard two of the other tables ordering as they arrived after us. Stuff like Walnut Shrimp, Beef Broccoli, and Beef Chow Mein were being ordered. What the heck?

Also, the Missus for some reason wanted the Twice Cooked Pork with Garlic Sprouts, which they were out of. But they did have the “Homestyle” version ($16.99). In my own somewhat cynical mind, I think the “homestyle” means whatever they have on hand? Anyway, this was terrible.

The Hui Guo Rou, which should be somewhat chewy, was super tough and lacked flavor. Usually, in the Sichuan versions of this dish there would be some spicy and savoriness…this was just plain bland…where was the doubian, black bean, garlic, ginger?

The best dish of the meal was the Pork Intestine in Dry Pot ($16.99) and this still lacked the “ma-la”, the numbing spice typical of Sichuan cuisine.

At least it wasn’t bland. But the intestine was really tough and rubbery. Very little spice encountered. The best item in this dish were the soybean sprouts on the bottom of the dry pot. At least it had flavor and a nice crunchy texture.

I really wanted the Ko Shui Ji (“Mouthwatering Chicken” – $15.99) so I ordered that. For some reason it was the last dish to arrive. When it did…..well, it really gave me pause….. What the heck?

The portion size was humongous. It was covered with a thick layer of sesame paste which overwhelmed the dish, really blocking out the spice, acidity.

For your reference; this is what it looked like back in 2015:

The amount of chicken was huge, large dry slices.

This was a pretty disappointing meal…an “oh-fer-three”. The service was fine, at least the really rude guy who used to work here isn’t around anymore it seems. You know, I wasn’t expecting Mountain House or even Barshu. Just some solid Sichuan would have been fine.

But as it is; per the Missus, we’re done exploring anymore Sichuan in San Diego for now.

Spicy City
4690 Convoy St. #107
San Diego, CA 92111
Current Hours:
Mon – Thurs 11am – 830pm
Fri – Sun 11am – 9pm

Road Trip – Dumpling 85, South Lake Brewing Company (Lake Tahoe), Van Sickle Rim Trail (Stateline NV), and My Thai Revisited (Lake Tahoe)

Beer, Chinese Restaurants, Dog Friendly, Lake Tahoe, Nevada, Road Trip, Thai Restaurants, Travel

Leaving Avila Beach, it was almost a seven hour drive to South Lake Tahoe. We had enjoyed our time in Tahoma during a previous road trip, but there weren’t dog friendly places to stay or eat in the area, so we thought we’d stay in South Lake Tahoe. I had wanted to book The Landing for our entire 5 night stay, but I wasn’t able to get accommodations there until Sunday. So, for the Friday – Saturday night stay, I got us a room in Forest Suites Resort, which was basically across the street from the very touristy Heavenly Village. We arrived and checked in…our room was on like the third floor.

Since it was almost five pm, we decided to head on out and find somewhere to eat. I recalled seeing a Chinese restaurant when doing my research…and by this time, the Missus wanted some Asian food already. We walked thru Heavenly Village.

And up Lake Tahoe Boulevard and saw Dumpling 85 in the Chateau at the Village Shopping Center.

We crossed the street and noted that they were pup friendly. They led us to a table and the Missus placed our order.

We saw the XLB and jiaozi on the way in and they didn’t look real good. We had breakfast at Avila Lighthouse Suites and heated up the leftover Beef Bourguignon so we just got the Stir Fried Green Beans and the Pork Baozi.

The Stir Fried Green Beans were undercooked and underseasoned.

Super hard and in need of more savory components. Almost raw…..

The Pork Baozi was strange. The “bun” portion had almost a chalky texture, really weird, that gave way to a soggy doughiness. The bottoms were almost like crackers!

The filling was fine, if on the chewy side. At least it was porky.

Dumpling 85
4125 Lake Tahoe Blvd.
South Lake Tahoe, CA 96150

The Missus went back to the room, while I took JJ to the corner of Heavenly Village Way and the South Lake Brewing Company Libation Lounge.

They had outdoor seating, so I walked in, ordered myself a Pilsner and had a seat outside.

I picked up my beer when ready and enjoyed the crisp, clean Pilsner.

South Lake Brewing Co. – The Libation Lodge Restaurant & Brewery
4000 Lake Tahoe Blvd. Suite 26
South Lake Tahoe, CA 96150

After which we walked along Heavenly Village Way which led us back to our accommodations. I could see the Heavenly Mountain Gondola passing right over our hotel.

We slept well.

The Forest Suites Resort has a free breakfast, which is nice. We just ran over and got some yogurt and stuff, before walking to our morning destination.

One great thing about where we stayed is that basically across the street is the entrance to Van Sickle Bi-State Park. We just walked along the road, crossing the border into Nevada.

A bit further up the road was the Van Sickle Rim Trail. A nice, almost 7 mile hike, with a 1,000 foot elevation gain. And of course, JJ handled it much better than I did.

Nice views…..

And even a waterfall along the way.

It was nice to have access to a trail in walking distance from our accommodations.

Returning to our room, we decided on a return visit to My Thai which was a ten minute drive away. We had been pleasantly surprised when we had dined here back in 2023. We weren’t sure if they were dog friendly and thought we could do takeout. The host was really funny, he said we could bring JJ, but there was a “two bark” rule in place! Lol! There was an Australian Shepherd having lunch with his family there as well.

We ordered our two favorite dishes from our precious visit. The Lao Style Papaya Salad, which we got medium spicy. Just as before, this was quite legit, from the salted crab to the funky fermented flavors.

All balanced out by the acidic tones and tomatoes. The shredded papaya was crisp and refreshing. I enjoyed the chicharrons as well.

We also got the Basil Duck.

Which was a bit sweeter than on our last visit, but still nice anise-savory tones. The duck was chewy, but flavorful. There was much more “meat” this time as on our previous visit it was mostly skin and fat.

It seemed like they used an onigiri mold to plate the rice, don’t you think?

The rice was on the drier side, but fragrant.

All in all, a nice lunch.

My Thai Cuisine
2108 Lake Tahoe Blvd.
South Lake Tahoe, CA 96150

And after lunch…well, it was nap time of course!

Szechuan Chef Revisited

Chinese Restaurants

Recently, FOY “Xiāng Jiāo” messaged me, letting me know that she believed Szechuan Chef had been improving over recent months. I’d pretty much given up on Sichuan cuisine in SD, but heck, it had been almost seven years since my last visit….so, I convinced the Missus that the time was right for a revisit.

Strangely, the parking lot of Convoy Village Shopping Center was basically empty when we arrived for lunch. Thus, in stark contrast to other locations on Convoy, parking was a breeze.

After being seated, we ordered four items. After our meal, we took a look at what we had ordered and noticed something quite “interesting”. We ended up ordering a couple of the recommended dishes and a few more. In terms of price, this seemed much cheaper than our recent meals at Cantonese style restauraurants.

First up, the Pork Intestines with Pickled Vegetable ($19.99). One of my favorite dishes at Eastern Dynasty is a version of this dish. And personally, I prefer that version, which is strangely much more tangy-sour than this version. Also, the intestine here, while being quite strong in the savory-“bungy” category, the intestines were overly rubbery, lacking in that initial resistance, followed by a creamy texture.

The preserved vegetable was very mild in flavor. Not a terrible dish, but perhaps I should have ordered the dry fried version?

The Fish Fragrant (yuxiang) Eggplant (aka Eggplant with Garlic Sauce on the menu – $14.99) was much too sweet.

The eggplant was also quite mushy in texture. Not a favorite of ours.

Next up was a dish that “XJ” recommended that I’ve ordered several times, the Beef Tendon with Pickled Peppers ($21.99).

So, this was better than what we’ve had before, but it still didn’t bring on as much sour-tangy-spicy tones as we like. We enjoyed the good amount of garlic though. And the tendons were so very….well tender! They almost melted in your mouth. I could just imagine this in a bowl of pho! We kept wondering how the chef prepped these to make it so buttery smooth? It did lack the spicy though…so we may look at another tendon dish if we return.

There was one dish that brought the heat and turned out to be our favorite of the meal; the Pork Trotters Hot Pot ($19.99) which was placed over a heating element at the table. The first thing to hit you when this dish arrives is the pungent-earthy-“BO” of cumin. Great when emanating from a dish….not so great when exuding from the person sitting next to you on a flight….can you tell I’m still traumatized by that???

This was spicy stuff….good ma-la going on here. The skin on the trotters was very soft and tender. The potatoes seemed to have easily absorbed the essence of the chilies, especially the one’s on the bottom. The Missus, who grew up eating cauliflower in Northern China loved it in this dish. We did enjoy this; though the leftovers were super spicy the next day.

Overall, including one order of rice, the bill came out to be $78 before tip and taxes, making it cheaper than any of the Chinese dining experiences we’ve had recently. We did notice that every protein based dish we ordered was basically offal. Could that be why? Anyway, we may return in a bit. And I need to thank “XJ” who helped to get us out of our Chinese dining “rut”.

Szechuan Chef
4344 Convoy St
San Diego, CA 92111
Current Hours:
Mon – Thurs 11am – 3pm, 5pm – 9pm
Fri – Sun 11am – 330pm, 5pm – 9pm

Dim Sum from Diamond Palace in Photos

Chinese Restaurants, Dim Sum

We’re currently out on the road with JJ, but I thought I’d share some photos from a recent visit to Diamond Palace with the Missus. While DP is our current favorite Dim Sum in San Diego; it comes with a matching price tag…even more expensive than the recently opened Hong Kong Kitchen & Dim Sum which is in Kearny Mesa! Since I’d done a pretty recent post; I’ll keep the verbiage to a minimum.

Anyway, as before, it was all the stuffs with shrimp that hit the spot…in fact, most everything we ordered had shrimp.

The Pan Fried Shrimp and Chive Cake was much better this time around. The wrapper was tender with a bit of crunch and pull, but wasn’t overly chewy. Great shrimp and light pungency-oniony tones.

For us, the Shrimp Siu Mai is a favorite.

Lot’s of plump, oceany-savory-sweet shrimp. Mild crunch……the wrapper was fairly tender.

The wrapper on the Har Gow is still a bit too thick, but the shrimp makes up for it.

A new favorite is the Shrimp and Chive Crystal Dumplings.

Now, the 64,000 dollar question……what did this cost? Can you guess? I guess this is where they would cue up the countdown song in Jeopardy?

Well, can you imagine…$75 for dim sum? Ouch! I mean, this is Diamond Palace, not Sea Harbour? But such are prices these days!

Diamond Palace
3993 54th St.
San Diego, CA 92105

I know “FOY” Dereck was interested in checking this place out. I’m wondering if you made it here yet?

La Rou from Taste of Hunan and Recently Consumed

Chinese Restaurants, Cooking, Online Food Suppliers

I had to smile when “FOY” Dereck just commented on my revisit to Taste of Hunan which I did almost a month ago. We have already revisited yet again! But, since I’d recently done a post, I didn’t take any photos of that visit. There was one item on the menu that we noticed for the first time. ToH actually sells La Rou, the Hunan cured and smoked pork by weight! The Missus asked the always friendly Server about that and She was told that it is shipped to ToH from Hunan Province! They don’t always have it for sale, but she went to check and said they had one piece. So, here’s where it gets interesting…..you have to purchase the entire piece, they will not portion it for you. The price is $25.95 per pound. Not cheap, but you really don’t use a lot of La Rou per dish. We really like the La Rou ToH uses, so we decided to get it. The piece came in at 2 pounds! The woman was so nice, instructing us to freeze what we don’t use.

In case you’re wondering what 2 pounds of La Rou looks like.

And that my friends is a full sized cleaver!

What I did is divide up the LA Rou into four, almost equal sized portions, let’s just say a half pound or so.

I kept one portion for current use and the other three went into the freezer. There’s a hard “rind” at the bottom of the piece. When first using the piece, I’ll remove the rind, which also had a good fat layer. This comes in handy later….. We found that one piece can make about 4 dishes…so let’s say about a quarter pound of la rou….and that’s a generous amount!

So, of course first up was what we’ve been making a lot of recently, Clay Pot Rice. Instead of using duck fat or drippings to coat the nabe, we use the pork rind and melt the fat off the piece to lube the baby up!

In addition to the La Rou, we used Lup Cheong and slices of the Garlic Sausage from Wang La Ya in this.

The Missus loves La Rou with Celtuce (i.e. Chinese Lettuce – Wōsǔn/Wōjù).

So, I cut some fairly thin slices along with the Celtuce.

Adding some dried chilies, garlic, etc….. A very simple dish. No photo of the final product, because as soon as it hit the table, the Missus set out to devour it!

I’ve made a couple of other dishes since then, the Missus loves La Rou with Chinese Celery. Here’s a photo of the La Rou stir fried with Chinese Cauliflower (which I mentioned in the post).

I used Fresno Chilies, dried chili de arbol, and fermented chilies for this. I did a low heat stir fry of the cauliflower first, removing it from the wok, then going for it with the other ingredients and adding the cauliflower back in later.

Anyway….it’s been fun, since the frozen La Rou you get at 99 Ranch Market is horrible!

Some other stuffs……

I needed to use up the last of my beans from Rancho Gordo and only had those huge Royal Corona Beans left. So, I made up a pot of it.

I took half of the beans and made a dish with Merguez, Harissa, and chard from the yard! The Missus took most of it with Cous Cous for lunch and we also had some on toast, which was quite good!

When the weather recently warmed up, I went and made marinated beans with the remainder.

The beans mainly with lemon juice/zest, EVOO, sun dried tomatoes, red onion, garlic, and Italian Parsley. Nice and refreshing!

And just for the fun of it, I recently made this as well.

You know what it is, right? Took me back to small kid time!

Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

Hong Kong Kitchen & Dimsum Opens Part 2

Chinese Restaurants, Dim Sum

So, in part 1 of my posts on the newly opened Hong Kong Kitchen & Dim Sum, I went over two visits, that were basically solo because the Missus just didn’t think the place was worth a visit. So, after some not so bad food, I thought the Missus would be all for a visit. Well, She was not! Calvin however, whom I hadn’t had lunch with in a while was up for it! So we met right at the 10am opening time. Seems that Calvin, who lives in Scripps Ranch and has roots in the SGV has been down on the d-sum North of the 8 in town for a while. So, I thought we’d have some fun….he’d pick 4 dim sum items and I’d go with two mains and we’d have some fun.

So, in terms of the dim sum, in ranking from first to worst.

Scallop Dumplings ($9.50). These were by far the best items I’ve had at HK Kitchen thus far.

The wrappers were adequately thick, with a nice mild stretch to them. The scallops were tender and sweet; this was quite good.

Second was the Siu Mai, which I covered in my previous post. This was even better as you can clearly see….

The filling much more tender, decent savory-porky tones, the wrapper tender as well.

Took a bit into the Cheong Fun ($8.50) that Calvin ordered and went “what the heck”? Calvin had ordered the Char Siu version. I guess I expected the shrimp version.

So this was a bit too sweet for my taste. The rice roll was fine; perhaps a bit too brittle. The sauce was overly salty for my taste.

The Turnip Cake with XO Sauce ($14) was a fail. Both of us lamented the lack of the savory-umami tones and mild spice provided by XO sauce.

In fact, there seemed to be a total lack of the savory punch needed for this. The turnip cakes interior was mushy and this was a bit on the greasy side. Which reminds me that the Missus wants me to make my own XO sauce and it’s been a while since I’ve made turnip cake at home.

As for the two mains.

The Black Pepper Beef ($28) was fine, though not as good as what I get from Eastern Dynasty.

It was fairly tender; though the sauce was on the sweeter side. The sugar snap peas were nice and crisp.

Of only I knew about the XO Sauce when I ordered the Shrimp with XO Sauce ($25).

While the shrimp was adequately cooked, fairly tender, with a slight sweet-savoriness; there was a lack of XO in this dish. Thus not fulfilling the umami potential of the dish.

Still, this was a decent meal. Calvin mentioned that he’d definitely return for the dim sum here….looking out into the parking lot, we noticed that it had filled by 1115! So, if you’re thinking of going for dim sum; I’d suggest getting there early. You can read about Soo’s recent visit here.

Hong Kong Kitchen & Dim Sum
5375 Kearny Villa Rd.
San Diego, CA 92123
Current Hours:
Daily 10am – 9pm

Sizzling House Has Closed, Juewei becoming L.A. Hot Duck, and Isaki Japanese Restaurant Taking the Former 85°C Spot

Bakery, Chinese Restaurants, Desserts, Japanese Restaurants, yoso-silly

Here’s some stuffs I noticed in the Clairemont Mesa/Kearny Mesa area recently.

Sizzling House Has Closed:

Noticed this during our most recent visit to Eastern Dynasty.

Whoa, Sizzling House didn’t even last a year. So, much for the sizzling plate/pepper lunch fad, huh? Looks like this is going to be an outlet of Las Vegas based Urban Matcha…so one feeds another?

4698 Convoy St. Suite 107
San Diego, CA 92111

Juewei Becoming L.A. Hot Duck:

**** Update: Looks like this location is going to become Coco Bomb

Also during that visit we noticed a new banner covering the Juewei sign.

Funny thing, I just mentioned how dissatisfied we’d been with our most recent visits to Juewei in my post on Spicy Duck Wang La Ya. Juewei seemed to be constantly changing concepts, last I saw they were trying to do Hot Pot, before that they had initiated doing skewers. They had an inconsistent inventory of items we enjoyed and we just decided to stop and not waste our time there.

So, I’m not sure if it’s still the same owners with a new concept….I do know there’s a LA Hot Duck in Rowland Heights. What’s up with all these places from the SGV opening here? They do not appear to be open yet; so we’ll see!

4690 Convoy St. #103
San Diego, CA 92111

And finally….

Isaki Japanese Restaurant and Nothing Bundt Cakes Taking the Former 85°C  Spot:

I noticed some signage on the doors of what used to be 85°C off Balboa so I walked on over. Looks like they’ve split the spot into two businesses.

One of the signs said Isaki Japanese Restaurant.

And the other looks to be another franchise of Nothing Bundt Cakes.

I don’t have much to say about this one…..

5575 Balboa Ave.
San Diego, CA 92111

Hope everyone is having a wonderful week!

Spicy Duck Wang La Ya Opens in 99 Ranch Market Food Court (Balboa location)

Chinese Restaurants

On a recent visit to the 99 Ranch location on Balboa, I headed to the restrooms and found that Dao Xiang Noodle was gone! Man, they had lasted what…maybe three months? The business that replaced it caught my attention.

Spicy Duck Wang La Ya……hmmmm…..it really got me because as much as we had enjoyed Juewei, things had changed over the last couple of months. That smoked chicken we enjoyed had become only served on weekends and then they stopped serving it altogether. Then, many of the liang cai; cold dishes were not consistently available….the yuba wasn’t available on a couple of visits…then they started doing skewers, and the hot pot???? We just kinda stopped and now they are changing concepts it seems (post upcoming). Now this was interesting as it featured all those duck parts and the cold dishes, and when I looked at the menu smoked chicken.

There was one problem though……even though the sign said “open” it didn’t seem so as all the dishes were covered and no one was manning the booth.

So, I just kinda stood around for a few minutes….until a really nice older gentleman came out. Now here’s where things get interesting…..he only spoke Mandarin! And I just wanted to try a Smoked Chicken…so, much like what I did at Juewei….I used my phone!

And even though I didn’t get any of those liang cai….which wasn’t on the menu board, I got the smoked chicken ($15).

And man, this was pretty good. You have to understand, this ain’t American BBQ ok? The meat is quite firm, there’s a nice savory-soy-winey thing going on. The Missus said it reminded Her of what She had in China…going to middle school-high school-college in Beijing. In other words, She was hooked!

And so we headed back ASAP!

This time they seemed fully opened and the Missus had a nice chat with the gentleman and came to find out that the “main” business is in Monterey Park.

And along with the smoked chicken, we ordered a bunch of other stuffs.

While he walked away, the Missus could not help but smile….I asked Her why and She told me “his accent…..I think it’s so Northern!” Turns out he’s from Shenyang. Since then, we’ve made multiple visits and here’s a summary.

The Pig’s Ears…..are nicely flavored, but in need of completion. The gentleman said add cilantro and cucumber and some chilies……and then he made the motion of drinking some beer! Lol! Anyway, I separate and trim the slices into more manageable pieces and then add Sichuan Peppercorn Oil and some Chili Crisp….and “viola”, we have a nice side dish.

One of my favorite items is the boneless chicken feet…..which always seems to be “givin’ me da’ finga la dat!”

Mild spice-sour acidity, collagenic crunch, some spice….good stuff…

The marinated bamboo shoots are by the book as well. Earthy-vinegar-not over spicy, soy sauce and crunchy.

They have two types of housemade sausages available. The sweet is a bit too sweet and not savory enough; but the garlic version is quite nice.

And the Missus has even used it in some clay pot rice! It’s precooked, so you can just eat it when you buy it.

Well, in case you’re wondering if I like everything here….well no. The Yuba, tofu skin one of my favorite liang cai items, is way too sweet and not spicy enough.

Which is a bummer; but there’s quite a bit of variety.

In an interesting public service announcement….if you speak Mandarin; they may ask you if you want something “extra spicy”….which we did with the Lotus Root. They pour on ground chili and chili oil to what’s already mildly spicy and it’s quite “hot”.

The lotus root was nice and crunchy; though I think we’ll just get it “as is” next time.

Anyway, the Missus is hooked on this place….we’ve visited four times! Though they haven’t seemed to have attracted much customers yet. In something that’s very “Asian”…..whenever we visit, people wandering the area see us waiting and then suddenly they’re interested! Lol! So very Chinese/Taiwanese, huh?

We’re hoping they do well; this location has been four businesses over the last couple of years; from Saigon 5, to Mama Lin’s, to Dao Xiang……

After all, the Missus does need Her “smoked chicken fix”….

Spicy Duck Wang La Ya
5950 Balboa Ave (Inside 99 Ranch Market)
San Diego, CA 92111

Hong Kong Kitchen & Dimsum Opens Part 1

Chinese BBQ, Chinese Restaurants, Dim Sum

Back at the end of December, I noticed the signage for the restaurant taking the place of the long standing Golden City. It was going to be Hong Kong Kitchen & Dim Sum. A few weeks back, I noticed the Grand Opening sign was up and I drove over to check the hours. The place opens at 10am!

So, I tried to talk the Missus into visiting; but She wanted me to check the place out first. Sigh…so of course, I headed on over.

The place was empty when I arrived and was seated. Soon after a couple of larger parties drifted in.

The interior looks basically the same; though they’ve tried to spiff it up a bit. Still, the tell-tale signs of Golden City were quite obvious to me….

The woman running the place was very nice and told me they had just been open for a couple of days. She gave me two menus. Since I was here during “lunch”, I also got the dim sum menu. Dim Sum is served between 10am and 3pm daily.

So, I decided to try a couple of dim sum dishes; which run from $7.50 to $11….such are prices these days as well as two regular menu items.

I started with some Har Gow and Siu Mai, both priced at $9.50.

Some tea arrived soon after.

Of the two sets of dim sum; the Har Gow was the weaker one.

The shrimp filling was decent; a bit on the chewy side; but the shrimpiness came thru quite nicely. These were quite large.

I didn’t care for the wrappers which were too thick, chewy, and rubbery.

I did enjoy the Siu Mai.

While the filling was still on the chewier side; both the flavor of the pork and the shrimp came thru nicely…a good savory-mildly sweet flavor and also quite fragrant.

The wrapper was fine; at least it wasn’t as bad as what I’d last had at the reopened China Max…..this actually had the taste and texture of dim sum!

Both the Har Gow and Siu Mai were quite large and I only had two of each and took the rest home. I reheated using the Microwave “steam” technique which works fairly well. The Missus ate both of the siu mai and had half of a har gow….’nuff said!

As for the menu dishes….well, I wanted to see how the Sauteed Intestines with Chinese Pickles ($22) here fared against my current favorite.

Well, not bad at all; though a bit on the sweeter side in terms of flavor. The pork intestine was definitely not as good as it was really chewy. Good amount of suan cai, adding a nice sour tone to things. Still, I probably won’t be getting this again.

And I just needed to get a half roast duck; which priced at $20, is even cheaper than Eastern Dynasty!

The subcutaneous fat had been nicely rendered and the skin decently caramelized and crisp. However, the meat was on the drier side and the flavor was lacking in anise-five spice tones and was pretty bland. The jus was good in a dry pot that the Missus made the next day.

But this was definitely not as good as Noble Chef or Eastern Dynasty to us.

Still, it was a promising visit. So, I tried to talk the Missus into visiting, but She told me to check things out one more time first. And then gave me some items She wanted me to order???? Say what????

Anyway, I arrived at a quarter after 10 and on this weekend morning the place was already packed!

I guess word had gotten out?

I decided not to order dim sum this time around and tried to order several items from the menu. Unfortunately, they were out of two of them.

So, instead of the West Lake Beed Soup, I got the Crab and Fish Maw Soup (small – $24). Man, even the small portion of this was quite sizeable.

There was some real crab in the soup, which was nice and thick. There was quite bit of fish maw (the air sac) which was fairly spongy in texture as well as egg white.

There’s a bit of oceany-savory “funk”. I thought it was fine; but the Missus really didn’t care for the slight fishiness in flavor.

They did have the Mei Cai Ko Rou ($26).

Some of the slices of pork belly were so melt-in-your-mouth tender. This version was a bit more salty than other versions, which the Missus enjoyed. She also strangely enjoyed the chunks of sauteed lettuce…..which was quite crunchy. A bit less preserved vegetable than other versions. Overall, not a bad dish. If you prefer your MCKR more on the savory side, with less sour-sweet tones, this one is for you. I do think we’ll have this again.

They didn’t have the Minced Pork with Salted Fish on this day either. So I got the Salted Fish, Chicken, and Eggplant Claypot ($21).

And while the Eggplant was a bit more mushy than we prefer, the chicken was pleasantly tender. I know you can’t really see it in the photo, but there was an abundance of small diced pieces off salted fish, which was a nice surprise as most versions of this dish in SD lacks the strong, savory-salty flavor in this dish. The Missus now really wants to try the Minced Pork with Salted Fish.

So, overall not too bad. Perhaps a level down from Eastern Dynasty and Noble Chef, though Hong Kong Kitchen does have dim sum during lunch service. It was also much better than what we’d had during our last visits to Golden City.

I was looking forward to returning and actually trying some of my favorites on my next visit….

So stay tuned for part 2!

Hong Kong Kitchen & Dim Sum
5375 Kearny Villa Rd.
San Diego, CA 92123

Taste of Hunan Revisited

Chinese Restaurants

Recently, “FOY” Dereck sent me an email about his visit to Taste of Hunan. It used to be a favorite of the Missus, but I couldn’t believe it’s been over six months since we last visited! I think the Missus has been fixated on Cantonese fare from Eastern Dynasty! Though once I mentioned ToH to Her….well guess where we were off to? It was a weekend visit, right as they opened at 11 and the place was empty.

But within 20 minutes the restaurant was almost full, with several large parties.

We decided on one favorite, one standard Hunan dish, and two newer dishes that we hadn’t seen before.

Of course, if you’ve read my previous posts on Taste of Hunan, you know that my favorite dish is the Xiangxi Style Beef Entrails. And yes, this dish is still my favorite.

Served over a live flame heating element; they key is to let the dish sit for a few minutes to let the onions at the bottom of the dish cook and soak up the spicy-savory sauce. It becomes nice and sweet as well. I enjoy the combinations of flavors and textures; the soft beef tripe, the more toothsome and flavorful beef.

La Rou with Bamboo is a classic Hunan dish. And I must say, this was the best we’ve had in a while.

The house made smoked pork is somewhat chewy, but so porky-savory and smoky, with the perfect amount of saltiness. Add to that the earthy and still somewhat crunchy bamboo shoots this was quite good. We did think it could have used more chilies; but the garlic tones made up for that.

While we the previous dish could have possibly used more chilies; let me tell you that the dish named “Beef Loved by My Wife” had more than enough spice going on!

It also had a heck of a lot of cumin….think of it as being a version of cumin lamb, but made with beef and much more spicy! The beef was slightly chewy, but man, this was umami overload!

The Missus was interested in trying the Steamed Egg with Minced Pork, so we ordered it.

Man, this was so porky; the Missus loved the broth/sauce. The eggs, which were actually poached were overcooked and the yolks dry. We’d actually get it right with the leftovers at home. The pork was very tender and savory…..though both the Missus and I agreed that it could have used some textural contrast….maybe some water chestnut or something?

Overall, it was a good meal. I’m sure the Missus will be wanting to return soon to try other items as it seems that new ones are added every few months!

Thanks to Dereck for reminding us of Taste of Hunan!

Taste of Hunan
9880 Hibert St.
San Diego, CA 92131
Current Hours:
Mon, Tues 11am – 9pm
Thurs 1130am – 230pm, 5pm – 9pm
Friday 1130am – 230pm, 5pm – 930pm
Sat, Sun 11am – 930pm