Chinese Restaurants – Page 61

Revisiting the Rotation: The Seasonal menu at Ba Ren and a Beer Week Dinner

October 28, 2009 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants

As I slowly recover from a terrible cold, I thought a nice way to get back into the swing would be a post on one of our two favorite restaurants in San Diego; Ba Ren. I know you all must be tired of my Ba Ren posts, but I promise a coupla new wrinkles, so if you'd like to come along…..

The Current Seasonal Menu at Ba Ren:

Over the years, I've tried to do posts on the changing seasonal menus at Ba Ren. I used to attempt to translate what some of the better dishes on the menu were, but no longer will have to do so.

Why? Well, turn the placard around……

And you now have English translations! But in case you're interested, we've had the chance to sample a few of the dishes……

#1 Ba Ren Fish Soup:

Though the fish was prepared to a perfect buttery soft texture, we found the broth to be a bit flat, tasting basically like Huo Guo (hot pot) broth. This was good, but not great.

#2 the Fried Spicy Lamb Ribs is a carryover and a photo can be found here.

Knowing the Missus's love of steamed eggplant; item #4 Steamed Eggplant with Chopped Red Chili was a no brainer:

The chilies on this dish are pretty potent, and different from the usual fresh chilies used in most dishes at Ba Ren. These chilies are pretty spicy, enough to turn your skin a bright red to the touch, as in a mild first degree burn. I enjoyed the garlic, soy, and the mild sweetness in the dish. The eggplant had been peeled before what I believe is a mild steaming, cooking the eggplant, but allowing for the flesh to keep its firmness. The Missus had expected something akin to the steamed eggplant I make at home, and was a bit taken aback by the dish.

#7 Dry Cooked Mixed Mushroom:

What seemed to be a great idea, fell a bit short, as we both felt it lacked "heft", and could have been a bit more savory for our tastes.

#8 Steamed Fish Filet with Green Onions and Red Chili:

This dish was a winner, and a new favorite of the Missus. The fish, as usual was prepared with skill, but those chilies, the same as on the eggplant dish was lip-burning hot. Of course, we always go for "spicy" at Ba Ren, and this one left a bright red ring around the Missus's lips. The dish wasn't just blasting hot, but also had a nice mildly sweet, soy based sauce. As a matter of fact, I really enjoyed the bean thread lying in wait, drenching up the the sauce (along with the heat from the chilies), on the bottom of the dish.

And of course, there are the old favorites………

Yes, Ba Ren is still on our rotation.

4957 Diane Ave
San Diego, CA 92117

Beer Week at Ba Ren?

A few weeks back, Josh Silberman contacted Candice and myself. Josh mentioned San Diego Beer Week, and an idea he had for doing a Beer Week "event" at Ba Ren, which he thought would be a nice change of pace amongst all the other multitude of events. First I had to find out what San Diego Beer Week was…… and after reading the "What is San Diego Beer Week?" page on the Website, you'll be pretty well informed. In a nutshell, it is 10 days of events showcasing San Diego's craft beers and breweries.

We met at Ba Ren, and went through a good number of dishes and beers, and Josh and Andy Waer matched up the favorites with various local craft brews, and we were off!

Now I'm pretty much a neophyte when it comes to local craft beer….. I mean, I enjoy a nice Ballast Point, Stone, or Alesmith brew on occasion, but hanging with these guys is a view into another world….

Andy Waer is a certified "Cicerone", which is basically beers' equivalent of a Sommelier. Which means he lives, breaths, and thinks….beer! So in case you're interested in attending, you can find more information, such as the beer and food selection here.

Tuesday, November 10th.

Of all the selections that impressed me, I think it was Andy and Josh's ability to pair a beer with the Eight Treasure Rice Pudding that surprised me the most! Beer, with dessert??? Shows you how little I know……

Revisiting the Rotation: Chinese Breakfast at Chin’s Miramar

October 12, 2009 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants

**** This location of Chin's is no longer.

I usually update our "rotation page" a couple of times a year, and thought this would be a good chance to do so. So over the course of this week, I'll post a few revisits and come up with a revised page at the end of the week.

I thought I'd start with"Chinese breakfast" at Chin's, since there are a couple of changes. First, service now starts at 930 am on Saturdays and Sundays, something I posted on here. Secondly, there's the English translation of the menu, which has been in place for a while. It does seem that the menu is missing a few items though…… oh, and prices have gone up a bit, 20 to 50 cents per dish. We are, of course waiting for Chin's on Convoy to open up…..

And yes, the interior still looks like it was once a Marie Callendar, or some other corporate restaurant:

The "backbone" of our order does seem to revolve around the same items, like the Suzhou Smoked Fish, which my MIL tells me tastes just like China:

The Shao Bing with Five Spice Beef, a dish of which FOY "YY" tells me, "I would eat breakfast more often if I could have this all the time….":

And one of my other favorites, the Steamed Bun with Pickled Mustard Greens and Mushroom:

It's not always steamed perfectly, but when it's on, it's quite good. Hot and fluffy, the filling a melange of sweet, savory, and a pleasant mild bitterness that just hits all the right spots for me.

Enough of the reruns, here's the third newish thing about this location of Chin's; a seasonal specials menu:

I'm not sure about the seven bucks for shaved ice, but we did order the Da Bing with Smoked Meat ($6.25 – the first item on the menu):

I probably would have enjoyed this much more if I hadn't had a wonderful version of this at Northern Restaurant in Rosemead. The smoked meat was very mild, and somewhat artificial in flavor, almost like the stuff you'd buy at 99 Ranch Market, and instead of a hearty and savory pork and fermented bean dipping sauce, this was straight up hoisin. The Da Bing was good, if a bit on the oily side, but it was actually the best part of the dish. I did consume all of it, because, well, I'm a sucker for these type of dishes. Overall, decent and I'll take that in a pinch.

A bit later while talking about this meal, the Missus told me that the second item on the specials menu was Tea Smoked Chicken Leg. Of course I exclaimed, "why didn't you tell me?" To which She replied, "I really didn't like you much at breakfast!" She had a point, getting paged at 1am in the morning will do that to me…. But to add insult to injury, instead of Tea Smoked Chicken, I got Kaufu (wheat gluten)!

How does that saying go; "there hath no fury like a woman scorned….."

Chin's Seafood & Grill
9355 Kearny Mesa Rd
San Diego, CA 92126

Chinese breakfast served 930 am to 2pm Saturdays and Sundays.

Maxim’s Seafood Restaurant

October 6, 2009 mmm-yoso Chicken Wings, Chinese Restaurants, Vietnamese Restaurants

Maxim is a restaurant on the periphery for us. We pretty much never head there as a destination. For some reason, I have a hard time remembering this place, until you drive past it on ECB.

The menu is varied, as is the customer base. On any given visit you’ll see African American families enjoying the Orange Chicken and other ABC (American Born Chinese) favorites, a pair of Hispanic working stiffs ravenously attacking a plate of fried rice, a Filipino family chowing on a sizzling plate or two, and large parties of Vietnamese ordering up plates of seafood usual seated in the larger dining area on the right side of the restaurant.

And the menu is as varied as the clientele, with everything from Yu Hsiang (fish flavored) and various clay pot dishes, to the inevitable Chop Suey and Orange Chicken, to Bun and Pho! That’s a lot of territory to cover, and honestly, not everything at Maxim’s has been good. That said, the prices make it worth a try. Funny thing, they’ve pretty much got us pegged… they start talking to the Missus in Mandarin as soon as She enters the place.

So here’s a sampling of what we’ve had over the last couple of months at Maxim’s. Starting with the good:

The Sizzling Beef Sate ($10.99):

We’ve had pretty good luck with Beef dishes at Maxim’s, and this was very nice. The beef was tender, and the sate rich though only mildly spicy. It was a bit on the greasy side, but pretty good.

Actually, we’ve had pretty good luck with anything Sate at Maxim’s, the Sate Shrimp($8.99) was no exception:

The shrimp were perfectly cooked, moist and tender. The garlic-peanut flavor was good. Again the only problem I had with the dish was the distinct lack of spice. Being that we believe the folks who run the place are Chiu Chow(I’m sure someone can tell us for sure), it’s not surprising that they do a decent Sate.

The Salted Fish and Chicken Fried Rice ($8.99), was sufficiently pungent:

But lacked the deep savory flavor of a good salted fish fried rice. The rice was decently stir fried, but lacked a decent “wok hay” that would have taken this up a notch.

The Seafood Pan Fried Noodle ($8.50) was pretty ugly looking, and I didn’t care for the noodles used, and there was a distinct lack of “seafood”:

But the flavor of the gravy, a nice salty-garlic taste, with a hint of sweetness, made this palatable. When looking at this dish, I started noticing something about the dishes at Maxim’s….. most of them were kinda, well, “fugly’ looking. The dishes really didn’t look that appetizing. And thus, Maxim’s became the place where things “tastes much better then it looks.”

The Flavor Duck ($9.50) was a very large portion of soy sauce stewed duck.

The duck suffered from star anise overload, as the anise flavor, along with excess saltiness took over the whole dish.

A heavy handed star anise and ginger flavor, along with a much too thin “gravy” also ruined the Special Beef Stew Clay Pot ($8.99):

Too bad, because otherwise this would have been a pretty good clay pot, as the meat was tender.

One day I noticed…gasp, Salt and Pepper Chicken wings($4.79) on one of the signs posted on the wall. There was no way I could resist.

This was interesting, the chicken had a batter that reminded me of something that came from a box with the letter B-A-N-Q-U-E-T written on the side. It also topped with fried garlic that obviously came from a jar….. not good eats.

One day, we went for the “Vietnamese Menu” and the Missus ordered the combination Com Tam (broken rice) dish ($6.99):

This was an interesting dish. The broken rice wasn’t very fragrant, but who doesn’t love a fried egg?The “Bi” (shredded pork) was extremely dry, but that “char grilled beef” was quite good. In fact, it almost tasted like a less sweet Mongolian Beef, and was very tender. I ended up poaching most of it off the Missus’s plate.

I ordered the Phnom Penh Noodle:

The broth was deceptively clear, it had a lot of flavor, but gave me the MS – heebie-geebies, perhaps a bit too much of the three letter flavoring. The noodles were done well, with a nice al dente pull to it. The combination of meat was fine, I didn’t care much for the slices of liver, and the fish balls were “meh”. The rest of it, chunks of what looked to be roasted pork and some offal were fine. Not that I’d have this again, but it was fine.

So what is my suggestion? Give Maxim’s a shot…… heck, you might find something that “tastes much better then it looks”!

The pricing structure with most items under ten dollars, makes Maxim’s a decent value. and they are open until midnight. Think of it as a sort of Sam Woo of the neighborhood…….

Maxim’s Seafood Restaurant
4616 El Cajon Boulevard
San Diego, CA 92115

Open Daily – 10am to midnight

Silver Ark three years later

September 28, 2009 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants

*** 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

Chinese Breakfast at Quik Wok in Rancho Bernardo

September 9, 2009 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Niu Rou Mian

**** This location of Quick Wok has closed

In my post on Manila Fast Food, "Roland" inquires about a place in Rancho Bernardo serving "Chinese Breakfast". Having seized my attention, I immediately tried to find out where this Quik Wok place was. Once I had the address firmly in hand, all I had to do was wait for the weekend……

And we made our way up the I-15, taking the Bernardo Center Drive exit and driving past Pearl and Hunan we found ourselves at one of those jumbo sized spread out strip malls. After driving around a bit, I found a sign with "Chinese Cuisine" written on it….I guess we were here.

The interior looked just like one of those pseudo fast food wok fresh kinda places that have popped up everywhere, except the crew here spoke Mandarin. You sure won't find that in Hillcrest! Still, there was no "secret menu" in sight. I guess that's why they call it a secret menu????

Actually, what most places call a secret menu, is not really a secret menu… it's not hidden, you don't need a decoder ring, or a special handshake….. you just gotta read the language. And Quik Wok is no different, I finally located a paper menu written in Chinese.

And we were off…. just like your favorite Fast Food Chinese joint, you order at the counter, pay at the register, if you're eating in you take a number and amble over to your table. Eventually food will make its way over to you……

First to arrive was the Spicy Tendon ($4.25):

This was a good amount of sliced tendon for the price, and turned out to be the best dish of the day. A good amount of beef flavor, along with a passable (could have used more) amount of Sichuan Peppercorn made this a decent dish. On the negative side, the tendon was cut very haphazardly, and some pieces weren't prepared well and was very hard. The tendon was topped with scallions, which added some pungency, but it would have been better served with Chinese Celery.

Next up was the "Beef Roll" (Niu Rou Chuan):

The Beef had a decent five spice-soy flavor, but the bread felt, and even worse tasted unpleasantly greasy.

Next up, a huge bowl of "stuff" arrived. The Missus had ordered the Knife Shaved Noodles (Dao Xiao Mian) with Pork and Egg ($4.95).

The photo doesn't do the portion size justice. Overall the dish was bland and oily, and the Knife Shaved Noodles were too hard, not doughy, but hard….. Too bad, good, fresh, knife shaved noodles, where dough is formed into a sort of an oblong-log shape and strip of dough is sheared off by a sharp knife or other cutting implement is a fairly rare thing, even in the San Gabriel Valley. Slightly doughy, with a nice chew, it seems the uneven edges of Dao Xiao Mian tends to pick up sauce and broth a lot better than other types of noodles. To bad this wasn't it. It was a humongous amount of food for five bucks though.

The last item was the Niu Rou Mian – Beef Noodle Soup, with Dao Xiao Mian ($4.95):

I don't know if it was the broth, but the Dao Xiao Mian did better in the soup. To be honest, this NRM was way better than the version at Hunan in everything but the meat, which really isn't saying much. Like the previous dish had a ton of noodles in it, almost as if there was a fire sale on noodles on this day. On the bad side,the broth was barely mediocre, weak and lacking in beef flavor, with just a hint of heat, and needing an injection of richness.

We polished off the tendon, but ended up with a ton of leftovers, for just over twenty bucks.

Quantity just won't make it over quality in this case. And though the Americanized stuff coming out of the kitchen for the non-Chinese customers like the fried rice looked pretty good, nothing really compels me to return.

On the positive side, it's good to see places such as Quik Wok opening and making a go of it. And just the existence of such restaurants will have us up in North County a bit more often as well.

Chinese menu is only available on weekends.

Quik Wok
11967 Bernardo Plaza Dr
San Diego, CA 92128

Monday Meanderings……

September 7, 2009 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Local Kine Stuffs in San Diego, Taco Shops, yoso-silly

I hope everyone had an enjoyable Labor Day. Here are a few tidbits……

New Taco Cart:

This one in an interesting location. The Shell Station on the corner of Clairemont Drive and Denver Street. Because gas at this station is usually more expensive than other station in the area, I really don't pay much attention to the place. But on this day, feeling awfully lazy, I decided to grab some gas here. And to my surprise……..

Unfortunately, I'd already had lunch. Now you can get some Cabeza with your smog check! I'm sure to be trying out the tacos soon.

2606 Clairemont Drive
San Diego, CA 92117

Leilani's Restaurant Closes:

On September third, FOY JenniferB sent me an email informing me that Leilani's Restaurant in Serra Mesa had closed. Earlier this weekend I dropped by and noticed that the Leilani's sign has been removed:

As "Right Cow Left Coast" mentions in a comment on this post, August 25th was the last day of business in this location. The Cass Street location in Pacific Beach is still open. I'm kinda sad that Leinlain's couldn't make a go in Serra Mesa, this strip mall really needs a shot in the arm. I can't say I'm surprised though, during my last few visits, the place was empty, and Leilani was not to be found…. busy with the PB location I guess.

Bummer…..

Chin's on Convoy looks almost ready to go:

The termite tent is off, and a new sign is on…..

This is one I'm looking forward to.

Speaking of Chin's:

I had lunch with some FOYs this past weekend at Chin's on Miramar, and noticed this sign. They'll now be opening for Chinese Breakfast at 930 am on Saturdays and Sundays. I guess they're doing pretty well!

Chin's Seafood & Grill
9355 Kearny Mesa Rd
San Diego, CA 92126

Other Stuff:

I've been kicking back and enjoying reading a couple of other blogs this weekend. It seems everyone is traveling; Judy of Tinker with Food has just returned from New Orleans, and shares some of her eats with us. Foodhoe shares her Alaska Cruise with us. And Kat is sharing a whole passel of posts of their Palau trip with us. I know I'm missing someone……

It's been a nice weekend for reading blogs……..

Road Trip: J.Z. Restaurant – San Gabriel (Los Angeles)

August 23, 2009 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Los Angeles County, Road Trip, Xiao Long Bao

**** JZ Restaurant has closed

On a recent drive up to the San Gabriel Valley, we arrived earlier than expected, and found that our choices for that day weren't open yet. The Missus suggested checking out JZ Restaurant, a place that has seemed to be here forever. The Missus is always pointing out this place, and I guess it's has a bit of an odd attraction for Her.

We had wanted to try this place out on previous visit, but the parking lot very small for a stripmall containing a couple of restaurants, including a Popeyes. On this morning there were a couple of open spaces, though folks were still double parking in front of the bakery.

The interior of the restaurant is clean and screams "I'm a Chinese restaurant"……

The menu was a study in Shanghainese standards. Since this was "breakfast" for us, we ordered two cold dishes, and some Xiao Long Bao.

We started with one of the Missus's favorite dishes, the Smoked Fish ($4.95):

We both thought the flavor was "spot on", the deep sweet-soy flavor was excellent. The texture was not so great as the fish was terribly hard and almost stringy. Good flavor, unpleasant texture.

I ordered the Salt Cured Duck ($4.95):

The Missus couldn't eat this….I think the grey pallor of the salt preserved duck really killed Her appetite. As for the flavor, it tasted a bit "off", with almost a stale refrigerator flavor. It wasn't very salty, and didn't have that wonderful cured flavor that the version at Wok and Noodle had. Come to think of it, the Missus couldn't bring Herself to eat that either……

And of course, to top off our breakfast, we had to try some Xiao Long Bao ($4.95):

The wrappers on these were okay, not too thick, and not too thin, but on the brittle side. There wasn't enough "soup" in the bao, and the overall flavor was less sweet than what I'm used to. Just medciocre overall, but another XLB to add to my collection. BTW, one of these days I'll return to Din Tai Fung to do a post….. I was just a bit underwhelmed by the XLB there.

The women working here were very nice, and came to check on us a couple of times. The place is very clean, and as you can tell, the prices are quite inexpensive! That parking lot can be a horror though.

J.Z. Restaurant
727 E Valley Blvd
San Gabriel, CA 91776

Hao Vi Chinese Restaurant

August 18, 2009 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Vietnamese Restaurants

**** Hao Vi has closed

If you're like me this is probably the closest you've ever gotten to Hao Vi……

You just kinda zip on by while driving on University, and say to yourself, "one of these days…." Whenever we'd pass by, the Missus would always mumble, "good taste". Which is what "Hao Vi" means. Over the years, there was only one individual I knew who actually ate there. My ears perked up when he mentioned Hao Vi, and when I quizzed him about the place, I was told, "it must be a front…..they had the absolute worst Pho I've ever eaten!" Scratching my head, I said, "isn't the place one of those Chinese-Vietnamese Noodle Shops, that serve Mi?" His reply, "what's mee….hey, there's Pho on the menu, so it must be a Pho shop." Dude needs to stick to writing those "reviews" on the board who we need not name……

And so the place remained on the "one of these days…" list. Until during a conversation with two of my favorite folks, MrQ and his lovely missus YY. MrQ mentioned HaoVi in passing. Which instantly got my attention, I pushed Q and YY for more info, and they filled me in a bit on the place. Which is why I ended up opening that door and entering Hao Vi on a recent weekend morning.

To be perfectly honest, the interior of this place has seen better days, but it looks like they make an effort to keep the place as clean as possible.

The menu is tri-lingual, English, Chinese, and Vietnamese, and Hu Tieu (tapioca or rice noodles) and Mi (egg noodles) appear prominently on the menu.

Without further ado, I'll get to my favorite part of the meal at Hao Vi. Much like Cam Ky, you're served a pork broth as a starter.

Much better then the version at Cam Ky, more "porky" in flavor. You know that there's no way in the world this tastes as good without a little "help" if you know what I mean. But after a sip or two, you really don't care.

On both of my visits the pieces of pork in the soup was soft without being mushy, and hadn't had the flavor cooked out of it.

And this is the free part of the meal.

Like a few other similar restaurants, only bean sprouts and lime garnish the noodle soup dishes.

The weather was unseasonably mild on my first visit, so I decided on the Beef Sate Rice Noodle Soup (Hu Tieu Sate Bo – $5.25):

The portion size was on the smaller side. The sate broth was more like gravy, as it was thick and vicious. In fact, it was just kind of resting on top of the Hu Tieu. When I moved the noodles with my chopsticks it drained to the bottom of the bowl. The flavor was quite strong. When I order Sate Noodle Soup, I'm used to a broth with a couple of tablespoons of sate sauce in it. This tasted like it hadn't been diluted much! It was pretty spicy, and there was the presence of a powerful cinnamon like flavor. It was also quite salty. The beef was tough and forgettable, but the noodles were perfect, chewy, with a nice pull.

It wasn't bad, but the pork broth brought me back a couple of days later. This time I had the Dumpling Egg Noodle Soup ($5.25). Because it was quite hot, I ordered my soup "dry", so a sweet-soy-oyster sauce with bits of ground pork was poured over the noodles.

I gotta say, this dish really didn't do it for me. The hard dumplings had only thin slivers of cardboard like filling, which tasted exactly what it looked like. It was also one bland dish…. except for one thing, MrQ had told me that the Mi always comes out perfect at Hao Vi, and he was right. This was about as good as egg noodles could be prepared, crunchy, but not hard….. just perfect. Unfortunately, I can't say the same thing about the rest of it.

Actually, this wasn't the way I wanted to leave this post. I fully intended on returning and trying the classic Hu Tieu Nam Vang – Phnom Penh Noodle Soup, but I'm just not feeling up to it right now. Maybe one day soon, so this'll have to do until then.

A few details; street parking only, and cash only, the folks here are quiet, and on the serious side, but nice. The restaurant is not as gritty looking on the inside as it would appear from the exterior.

Hao Vi Chinese Restaurant
4451 University Ave
San Diego, CA 92105

Road Trip: Hong Kong Fishball House – “Fried Pork Rectum” redux – Rowland Heights

August 15, 2009 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, yoso-silly

I'm always wondering how my tastes have changed over time. And what better way to check than to try something that I've found… ummm….. "undelicious" (is there such a word?). So on one of our trips back to the "old neighborhood" I decided to try a dish I found somewhat "undelicious" back in 2006.

Yes, it was time to return to Hong Kong Fishball House and retaste a dish that I thought was appropriately named; the Fried Pork Rectum. Yes, I know it really is just Deep Fried Pork Intestine which it seems that I've been consuming quite often recently.

Hong Kong Fishball House looks just about the same, same greasy patio furniture, the potted palm looks much taller, and of course prices have gone up. The Fried Pork Rectum has gone up 50 cents to $2.75. I also noticed that the Fried Pork Rectum sign has developed a thicker layer of grease over it.

The Missus placed the order, and while I waited for my rectum (ok, this one is too easy, so I won't add anything to it), She took a stroll.

After a few minutes, my rectum was ready. As before, it was placed in a styrofoam container. While waiting for the Missus, I opened the container and took a whiff!

First off, it didn't smell quite as dank as I recalled. When picking up a piece, I noticed that this was pretty greasy. I popped the sliced piece of intestine into my mouth. I quickly noticed how bland it tasted. The fried slices of intestine needed more salt. The initial mild sweetness was still present, but this was lacking the earthy tones that I've become used to. On the good side, the unpleasant film that often coats your mouth after eating fried intestine was missing. No nasty sour aftertaste as well.

In the end, this was pretty anti-climatic. But it was a nice little study in how my tastes and preferences are constantly changing.

Hong Kong Fishball House
18414 Colima Rd
Rowland Heights, CA 91748

So tell me, how have your tastes changed over the last two years?

Postscript: The redone HK2 Food District has opened. A post is forthcoming……

Roadtrip: Northern Chinese Restaurant – Rosemead (Los Angeles)

August 10, 2009 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Los Angeles County, Road Trip

**** Northern Chinese Restaurant has closed

On our last trip to the SGV (San Gabriel Valley) it was our intention to stop by Northern Chinese Restaurant first, since I read that they open at 1030 am. We'd grab some small eats and head to the next place on hour list. But things change quickly in the SGV, hours are rearranged constantly, and when we arrived at the strip mall that houses Northern Chinese Restaurant, Shin Sen Gumi Hakata Ramen, among others, we were told that Northern doesn't open until 11am (even though the menu lists their hours as 1030am – 10pm). Which is why we ended up doing a return trip to Hunan Chilli King, whose sign says they open at 11am, but were open and going full tilt at 1040 am…..go figure!

After building up a good sweat at HCK, we went through my ever shortening list of places to hit in the SGV, and decided to head back to Northern Chinese Restaurant. When we arrived, the restaurant was fairly empty, but had a table full of take-out orders. In fact, there was a steady stream of customers picking up their orders while we ate. We quickly looked over the menu, and made our selections, which came out extremely quickly….I mean really quickly!

First out of the kitchen, in a flash was the Stir Fried Mushroom ($8.88):

Maybe it was the curse of having Hunan food before returning to Northern Restaurant, but we both found this interesting stir fry of various wild mushrooms to be unsatisfying. There was an interesting combination of textures, but some of the flavors, especially the small, hard, somewhat astringent tasting mushrooms, were rather unpleasant.

Next up was the Suan Cai Yang Rou (Pickled Sour Napa Casserole with Lamb – $9.88):

First off the good; the lamb was prepared well, great texture, good gamey flavor, nie ratio of fat to meat. The wider cellophane noodles went well with this dish. The bad: there was too much cabbage, and not enough Suan Cai, a pickled cabbage much like sauerkraut. This made the broth terribly bland. There was also a large amount of ginger cut into triangles which were bothersome, unless you love biting into pieces of ginger every three bites or so. For my money, I prefer the version at Tianjin Bistro, though the lamb was prepared better here. I had leftovers a day later, and the broth was still much too bland……

For our last dish, the Missus ordered the Xun Rou Da Bing ("Smoke meat and Cake" on the menu – $4.95):

Here we have a winna! Unlike the Niu Rou Chuan (Beef roll), this came deconstructed. You smeared a good amount of the pork and bean paste on your slice of Da Bing, added the shredded scallions, and a slice of the mild, but savory pork. Roll it up, and you have at it! As much as I really, really, enjoyed the bean paste, it was the bread that did it for me. The Da Bing was prepared perfectly, at least for me. Usually, either too much, or not enough oil is used, making the flat bread greasy and soggy or too dry and unpalatable. In this case, it was crisp on the exterior, yet pliable, the thin middle layer was moist and almost flakey, and not greasy at all.

It appeared that we had gone through the menu rather hastily, because looking over my photos of the menu, there were a few items we missed:

We were impressed by the woman who waited on us, she answered all of the Missus's questions in detail (in Mandarin of course), and displayed a good knowledge of the food, to the point of describing the different mushrooms the stir fry, now lost to posterity. According to the Missus, the accents of staff were decidedly "very Northern, like Shenyang Northern", which makes sense. The restaurant is clean, and thankfully on the day we ate, had the A/C going at a nice level. I think we'll be back for the Da Bing…. and maybe some Shenyang Fake Dog Meat????

Northern Chinese Restaurant
8450 East Valley Blvd.
Rosemead, CA 91770