Chinese Restaurants – Page 61

Seafood Village – San Gabriel Valley

January 21, 2010 ed fromyuma Chinese Restaurants, Los Angeles County, Road Trip, Seafood, What Ed Eats -You too can be like Ed!

mmm-yoso!!! is Kirk's foodblog. Nice guy that he is, he lets some others like Cathy, Vicky, and even ed (from Yuma) post here sometimes. Today we magically go back to last summer when ed and Tina finish their culinary roadtrip with a stop in San Gabriel Valley.

Before leaving Monterey, Tina and I had begun the day with some pastries and lattes at Patisserie Parker-Lusseau by the post office, so by the time we rolled into the San Gabriel Valley more than five hours later we were hungry. Really hungry.

After locating a reasonable room for the evening, we headed out for an evening of Chiu Chow dining at the Seafood Village location in Temple City. This location (the original is in Rowland Heights) is larger, has more parking, is less crowded, and well, it was closer to our room. And did I mention we were Hungry?:
We parked in the giant lot behind the restaurant and entered the restaurant by its back entrance. At this time, slightly before 6 p.m., we were one of the few groups of customers in the spacious main dining room:
While we were looking over the menu, a small bowl of boiled peanuts accompanied by mildly pickled vegetables were placed on the table. Although not mind-blowing, these helped keep our hunger in check until real food started arriving:
That evening we had brought our own wine, a bottle of 2007 Roussane from Tablas Creek Winery (which had ridden down to SGV in an ice chest in my car). Tablas Creek is my favorite winery in the Paso Robles area, and to my palate at least, this bottle was the tastiest white wine I had encountered on my trip:
The restaurant charged a modest five dollar corkage fee and provided the stemware.

The seasonal vegetable that evening was pea greens ($12.99). They were wonderfully fresh and perfectly prepared. There was none of the toughness or stringiness that sometimes ruins this dish:
We also ordered baked oysters with XO sauce ($10.99). It arrived with eight breaded oysters on top of slices of a somewhat crunchy stirfried vegetable:
My first oyster was slightly disappointing because I was expecting more crunch from the breading — having already forgotten that the oysters were "baked." However, the more of this dish that I ate, the more I liked it. This preparation really focused on the taste of the shellfish. And the oysters were perfectly cooked, moist and full of wonderful funky oyster flavor.

The crunch in the dish was instead a product of the accompanying veggie. At first, I was puzzled by that crunchy vegetable as it seemed to resemble no vegetable that I had ever had in a stirfry, and yet it was very tasty. "What's this vegetable?" I asked Tina.

As soon as she said that it tasted like cucumber, I realized she was right and remembered that Kirk had recently posted a stirfried cucumber recipe. I felt only slightly embarrassed that I had missed the identification of such a common vegetable.

Our main dish that evening was the house special crab ($4.99 a pound — $14.97 total):
When reading about this restaurant at various places on the Internet, everyone said that this was the signature dish at the place. Still, at first it seemed odd to be eating crab that had been breaded and deep-fried in its shell . "Why bread shell?" I wondered.

As soon as we started eating the crab, any puzzlement I felt completely disappeared. This was really good crab (and the breading was pretty tasty as well). Flavors of garlic and mild chilies were predominant. The breading was good enough that I sucked some of it off of crab shell. The greatest part of the dish, however, was the succulent, moist, tender, and flavorful crab inside the shell:
And I realized then that the breading serves to keep the hot oil away from the crab meat, which was not greasy at all. This was so good it will be hard to drive through the San Gabriel Valley in the future without stopping in and eating it again.

Overall, Tina and I were delighted and impressed. We had tasted seafood and vegetables different than anything we can get back home. The wine proved to be an excellent match with the cuisine, having enough body and structure to stand up to the flavorful preparations. The service was not as superb as at Sea Harbour, but it was more than adequate, and our total for the evening was $50, not including tip, about half of what we had paid at Sea Harbour. Thanks, Kirk, for the recommendation — it was spot on!

Seafood Village, 9669 Las Tunas, Temple City, CA, 626-286-2299

Road Trip: Hunan Style Restaurant – San Gabriel (Los Angeles)

January 17, 2010 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Los Angeles County, Road Trip

**** Hunan Style Restaurant has closed

Believe it or not, even after having Shengjian Bao at Kang Kang Food Court, Xiao Long Bao at Giang Nan, and Jiaozi at Qing Dao Bread Food, we still weren't through! You see we dropped by Tianjin Bistro to pick up Suan Cai Yang Rou Guo which I had on Christmas Day. While waiting for our take-out, I noticed that the long awaited Hunan restaurant had opened across the street. Seeing the name on the sign got my interest.

You see this restaurant had the same name as a place that was on our "list" for the longest time before it burnt down…… When I mentioned this to the Missus, we decided to grab a bite. In cases like this, we employ our "left-over" strategy, in which we make sure to select dishes that would still be good the following day.

We entered, and was seated immediately. The first thing we noticed was in spite of the place being almost full, there were no wonderful fragrances of chili in the air…. not a good sign for us. The menu was rather small in comparison to other Hunan restaurants in the area, and seemed to have quite a few dishes that seemed more like Sichuan than Hunan.

The interior of the place is very, well, red, with a kind of strange mish-mash of decor.

There was a woman manning the front desk right as you entered with toddler in tow. Three young ladies, all of whom seemed to be college students were scurrying around. And then there was the bell….. that all powerful bell, you know, the one that Chinese restaurants use to let the staff know that dishes are ready. I'm sure that the woman had taught the girls that the bell is all powerful, and a ring of that bell supersedes any action, be it taking an order, clearing a table, and perhaps bodily functions. Every time that bell went "ding", all three girls ran to the window like crabs scurrying up the shore at midnight. Once, one of the young women was in the process of taking our order when…. "ding". The girl immediately stuffed her pad into her apron and went running off! Unfortunately, she finished second best (I wonder if there's some kind of "ding" point system going on) as another girl had gotten there first. The young lady turned around, and headed off… to another table! The woman with the toddler had to remind the girl that she had been waiting on us!

And though the Missus was a bit irritated at this, and even a bit more at the freebie little dish of peanuts and peppers, which looked very pretty, but was very bland.

I was having a blast watching the girls run like crazy……. with all that wasted motion, it was obvious that they were new to this. I bet their feet hurt like the Dickens after work.

Eventually, we did get our order taken, and after a bit of a wait our order arrived. The first item was the Steamed Hunan Style Preserved Meat:

The Hunan Pork was the best of the items on the plate. The texture of the pork was nice, a bit waxy, but not too greasy. The smoked fish and duck were very dry and almost tasteless. As a whole, the flavors seemed watered down. There wasn't much heat to this in spite of the chilies. Not even close to the version we enjoy the best at Hunan Seafood. I will say that the steamed rice was of good quality, and fragrant….perhaps it was the best item we had all evening……

The other item we ordered that evening was the Sauteed Lamb ($9.98), the stir fried lamb and cilantro dish I enjoy so much.

First the good; whomever cooked this has good technique, the lamb was melt in your mouth tender. The ratio of cilantro to lamb was good. The not so good, of all the Hunan dishes I've had in the area, this was one of the blandest….. In spite of us ordering this dish "very spicy", there was not the faintest sheen of sweat on my forehead. It also needed a good dose of salt. When I reheated this dish the next day, I added a good dose of soy sauce and a pinch of sea salt…….

There was an interesting and very telling vignette that we watched unfold on a table right across the way from us. A gentleman in perhaps his late forties, early fifties, and two boys that assume were his sons were seated there. The boys looked to be perhaps of college age. The father looked around the place, and kept talking to his sons. He pointed across the street couple of times…. and then it came to us…. Hunan Chilli King is right across the street! When their dishes arrived, the gentleman had one bite….. and entered into "protest position"….. he folded his arms and wouldn't eat another bite during the rest of the meal. He kept talking to the boys, and though we couldn't hear what he said, he kept looking across the street……..

It's obvious that this place is still going through all of the problems associated with opening day. From what I saw on my way to the restroom, the kitchen is staffed generously, but the dishes come out fairly slowly. It was fairly obvious to the Missus and I that in regards to technique, our dishes were prepared well. But both dishes fell short in the flavor department. So perhaps we'll revisit one of these days.

Hunan Style Restaurant
529 East Valley Blvd
San Gabriel, CA 91776

Road Trip: Revisits to Giang Nan and Qing Dao Bread Food – Monterey Park (LA), and a little slice of life……

January 16, 2010 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Los Angeles County, Road Trip, Xiao Long Bao

The Missus and I were still hungry after having the Shengjiang Bao at Kang Kang Food Court on Christmas Eve. The Missus wanted some Xiao Long Bao, and I was craving some Lamb Jiaozi. Driving down Garfield, I thought why not get both…… and so we did.

**** Giang Nian has closed

Our first stop was Giang Nan, tucked away in the back of one of the seemingly hundreds of strip malls in the area.

It had been a while since we were last here, but we still considered the XLB here to be among the Missus's favorites. Still being early on on Christmas Eve, the place was fairly empty, though it had filled up by the time we left.

I had recalled the Duck in Supreme Sauce from our previous visit, so we ordered it. It was as before, sticky sweet-soy in flavor, standard for Shanghainese cuisine.

We also got an order of Pork Xiao Long Bao, which we enjoyed more than the pork and crab version.

This was as good as we had recalled. Wrappers of good thickness, not too thin, good soup to meat ratio, the soup not being too sweet. The meat was not overly processed, and was just soft enough to enjoy. Still under five bucks, this was a pretty good deal….. I had two, the Missus the rest, since She was the one who really wanted some XLB.

While we were eating, and enjoying our tea, a family of six arrived; an older gentleman, along with his wife, a younger couple, and two kids in their early teens. The family dynamic was pretty interesting…. you could tell some things right away. The younger couple, and their kids were obviously from out of town, you could tell by the way they dressed and acted. It was quite apparent that the woman was the daughter of the older couple. You could tell by the way the guy pretty much didn't say a word, and just tried to fade into the background. The older man turned to his wife and said, "I wanted intestine, and spicy Sichuan food, they don't have anything I like on the menu". The older woman made a little "chin nod" in the direction of their daughter and told the older man, "but we're eating Shanghai style, so let's find something." Aaah, they had come here for their daughter. The older woman started making suggestions to her daughter; "remember how much you used to like this?" "This was one of your favorites….." "You always enjoyed this dish…." All of which the young lady replied to in a indifferent manner. "Whatever you think…" "It's ok, order what you want…." The older gentleman entered "protest mode", by closing the menu, placing it on the table, dramatically crossing his arms, and looking off into the distance. Meanwhile, "Mom" kept trying her best….. Meanwhile the son in law stared stoically straight down at his plate, and the two kids kept on playing their handheld games oblivious to the drama unfolding around them……

The Missus suddenly felt bad, and called Her Mom. There were many times that She's been that "ungrateful daughter". Sometimes, we forget that there are people in our lives that are pleased by making us happy. In this dance, it's our responsibility to enjoy…. because just as we are receiving, we are giving…….

Giang Nan
306 N Garfield Avenue
Monterey Park, CA 91755

We had considered having another order of XLB, but instead crossed the street, and headed on over to Qing Dao Bread Food. The Missus knows that I love the Lamb Jiaozi here. For the Missus, this is a little taste of Her hometown; Qing Dao. It also gives Her a chance to needle Her Mom, documented in my previous post on Qing Dao Bread Food. So of course, She was soon calling Her Mom on the phone again. While I enjoyed my lamb dumplings:

Of course the standard condiment is what I call the Missus's "little dish of memories", the pounded garlic in black vinegar. When the Missus was a child, it was always Her job to pound the garlic, a job She hated with a passion….. which now prompts a bit of nostalgia.

As I noted before, I love the lamb flavor, and there's a small amount of "soup" in these Jiaozi. The wrappers have what I call a "pillowy – pull" to them. Perhaps I'm just a little bit nuts when it comes to Jiaozi, but how can you blame me?

While we were eating, a very pregnant young lady entered carrying a toddler. It was obvious she was the daughter of the husband and wife team that runs this little shop. The Missus, overhearing their conversation had to laugh. When I inquired, the Missus told me, "the daughter told her parents that they should close up." The daughter had told the parents, "you should close up, nobody wants to eat in places like this on Christmas Eve, they all go to the big restaurants!" Well, I for one was glad that they were open on Christmas Eve.

Qing Dao Bread Food
301 North Garfield Ave.
Monterey Park, CA 91754

Saturday Stuffs: What’s up with Royal Mandarin, and some Taco Truck Stuffs

January 9, 2010 mmm-yoso Chicken Wings, Chinese Restaurants, Food Trucks, Mexican Restaurants

Royal Mandarin update:

To follow-up on a comment made on my December 30th post by Johari, regarding the fire at Royal Mandarin. You can see a more detailed story here. I decided to take adrive down to National City myself and check out what's going on.

As you can see, the entrnaces and a couple of the plate glass windows have been boarded up.

What was really interesting was the large group of folks in the place…. lot's of chatter going on…..

To get to the point, it looks like Royal Mandarin will be reopening soon, though I think a March date is pretty ambitious.

Taco Truck Stuff:

Over the holidays, I noticed that the Mariscos German Taco Truck was gone from the lot on the corner of Balboa and Clairemont Drive. I hoped that it was only for a break over the holidays, and I was rewarded with a sighting of the truck this past week. So it looks like the truck is back.

On a sadder note, it looks like the La Princesita Taco truck is gone from the Linda Vista location for good. A sad day indeed…..

Road Trip: Kang Kang Food Court – Alhambra (Los Angeles)

December 28, 2009 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Los Angeles County, Road Trip, Xiao Long Bao

A pretty long while back, uber Foodblogger Wandering Chopsticks mentioned that she thought that Kang Kang Food Court in Alhrambra made the best Shengjian Bao in LA. Kang Kang Food Court…… So I made a note, and on one of our road trips we decided to drop by, and check out the SJB.

Though the storefront is right on Valley Boulevard, you drive to the rear and find parking in the parking lot. Once down the hallway, you enter the world of Kang Kang….

Bare bones and very cafeteria like, Kang Kang offers both steam table and cold items, in addition to various menu items. The word "menu" kinda understates "THE MENU" which takes up the top of an entire side of the place. It's one thing to have a book-sized menu delivered to your table….. and another to have to look at what seems like an unending number of items lining a wall…….

And it seems like that entire side was just not enough room to contain this "menu on steroids" as various banners around the place display other "specials".

But we were here for only one thing:

Which became a non-starter, since we found out the SJB cook comes in at 11, and it was 10. So we decided to check out the Xiao Long Bao, and return at a later time for the SJB.

As far as XLB are concerned these weren't very good. First off, a couple had leaked….. so "no soup for you". Second the folds of the Bao were hard as rock, and the wrapper too thick. Not enough soup, which was flavored pretty neutrally, not too sweet. The meatball was too hard and "squeaky".

Usually, food like this would pretty much ward me off. But in this case, there were a couple of things I kinda enjoyed. First, when you place your order, you give the cashier your table number. And in a few minutes, you get a pot of tea delivered to your table, along with the standard black vinegar based dipping sauce. I admit that this place goes a bit overboard with the styrofoam, and the tea is basically tea colored water, but it's a nice touch. Second, the cashier is very nice, a step up from the perfunctory, sometimes rude service you get at the other Shao Mei's and Sam Woo's. And in fact, some of the steam table stuff looked pretty good. I'll say this much, the stuff at Sam Woo's take-out here in San Diego looks pretty bad in comparison.

So on Christmas eve, the Missus and I decided, to drive up, and kinda do a semi-crawl, very leisurely going back to a few places we enjoyed, maybe try a new place, and do some take-out for calm Christmas Day. So why not stop at Kang Kang and try the Shengjiang Bao? Which is what we did.

We followed the drill, and after about 15 minutes, our Shengjiang Bao arrived, glistening under the fluorescent lighting.

So how did we enjoy it? Well first off, these were blasting hot, and full of juice. They'll literally explode when you bite into them. The "soup" has a strong pork flavor, which the Missus thought was too "porky", for me, the porkier the better. I love the crust on the bottom, but thought the rest of the Bao had not risen enough, and we were left with gummy dough. I want the tops of my SJB or Lu Bao to be somewhat fluffy. Again, I had a problem with the filling, which was a hard and squeaky meatball.

I guess if we could get the crust and soup from this SJB, and cross it with the filling and semi-leavened breadiness of the SJB at Food Cabin we'd be happy. As it was, this was not bad, and soon enough it was time to move on to our next stop.

Kang Kang Food Court
27 E Valley Blvd
Alhambra, CA 91801

Happy Thanksgiving

November 26, 2009 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Japanese Restaurants

We're keeping a pretty low profile this Thanksgiving, just hanging out and relaxing.

The Missus and I did run into Dennis of A Radiused Corner at Izakaya Sakura. Dennis and I have a long standing joke about running into each other at Sakura, and it finally happened….on Thanksgiving of all days.

The Missus had Her standard; Unadon, while I had Menchi Katsu, usually described at "deep fried meatloaf", "deep fried hamburger" or or something like that.

Nice and crunchy panko crusted exterior, moist ground beef with just the right amount of filler………it sure did fill me up!

Tonight, perhaps it'll be another place on our rotation. You know which one, right?

And maybe some Gan Bian Niu Rou Si……

Anyway, we'd like to wish you all a wonderful and safe Thanksgiving!

Darda Seafoods – Amazing Chinese-Islamic Food

November 18, 2009 Vicky (SF Bay Area) Chinese Restaurants, San Francisco and Silicon Valley, What Vicky Eats

It's Vicky again… blogging away about another restaurant up here in the Bay Area.

Sam and I recently moved in the Bay Area and left the vicinity of this restaurant that used to be a staple-go-to-place. For months we didn't swing by but would occasionally entertain the thought of eating there. Yesterday, bogged down with 18 library books were pushing the deadline for being overdue, we had rushed to my cousin's solo concert at San Jose State to hear her perform for her graduate studies… and still forgot to go to the library. When we got home, we decided to go to Darda for dinner since there was a library branch along the way.

It's interesting… how over time and distance certain cravings become more muted. When I first decided to move away from La Jolla, I couldn't fathom how I would be able to survive with Roberto's or Mister A's. Over time, I whetted my cravings with a taqueria crawl up here and spanning distance, those cravings slowly disappeared. To us, Darda was the same way. Fortunately, it's not a plane ride away. Unfortunately, it meant that we'd have to fight tooth and nail through some really bad traffic in order to get a good meal. Last night was the perfect opportunity.

It was a nice familiar shopping center and we found parking at our usual curbside spot. Walking into the restaurant, Sam had told me that we moved to the Peninsula to be closer to San Francisco, yet it seemed like our dinner variety had greatly been reduced and at the end of the day, we actually visited SF far more frequently than now. I guess that just means we should schedule in more day trips up to eat.

Darda is a favorite amongst the Muslim community here. I remember when I was attending UCSD, and meeting some of my new suitmates, one of them hailing from Walnut Creek (which is an hour northeast of San Jose) we bonded over our mutual liking of the green onion bread from Darda.

Sam and I settled in and ordered our classic staples: Knife Cut Noodles Stir Fried w/ Chicken, Green Onion Pancakes, Beef w/ Scallions, and Szechuan Green Beans… Ahhh… it was glorious!

The beef dish came out first, glistening was flavor and absolutely fragrant with the "high heat wok smell." The beef was extremely tender which leads me to put in a little blurb for how much I love Halal restaurants… their meats all taste extremely fresh and are tender to the bite.

The beef was followed up quickly by the knife cut noodles. Being that we just came back from TW, the noodles weren't as chewy or "Q" as we'd like them to be. They didn't have that much of a bite to them and the thinner pieces were bordering on the mushy side. At the end of the meal we had mentioned this to our server and she advised us to make it a point to order it on the "Q" side in the future and it would come out perfectly.

Ahhh… and the green onion pancakes… they were more like crepes, super thin, yet extremely extremely chewy. It was perfect! Sam wrapped the beef in the crepes and ate them a la burrito style.

I love that they sear the beans with oil at an extremely high heat which results in the skins separating and wrinkling. The beans are cooked with marinated turnip and ground beef and finished with some wine and soy sauce. Delicious!!

I'm starting to drool as I'm writing up my recap. As we finished our meal and walked out with really full stomachs, again… we questioned why it took us so long to make the drive out here after we moved… Darda… oh Darda…

Oh and ironically since I finally did do my TX post… I just booked my tickets to head back to Houston to spend New Year's. More southern eats coming ahead! 🙂

Darda Seafood Restaurant
296 Barber Ct
Milpitas, CA 95035-7915
408.433.5199
http://www.dardaseafood.com

Nha Hang Quoc Te

November 8, 2009 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Vietnamese Restaurants

**** Nha Hang Quoc Te has closed

When we moved to San Diego the Missus and I tried the two locations of Quoc Te severals times…. and had some horrendously bad meals. It ended up that the only thing I'd ever get at Quoc Te is the Banh Cuon, which is a bargain at a shade over six bucks. Over the last couple of years however, I've gotten several recommendations for the Quoc Te location on University. There were two items mentioned, the Fried Rice, and the Roast Duck. The prices at Quoc Te have always been pretty reasonable so I thought "why not"?

Not much has changed from our previous visits, except the prices which have gone up tad over the years. The dining area is a bit dated, and don't look at the carpet, and you'll be fine. The parking lot, with a very limited amount of parking stalls can be a challenge.

We decided on getting those recommended dishes, and throw in a few more Vietnamese style dishes as well.

So we started with the Papaya Salad with Dried Beef:

This was probably the best dish of the night, served ice cold, refreshing, with a good amount of herbs. The Missus has been craving this in the time since this meal, so we've been making it at home quite often.

Taking the fried rice recommendation, we went with the Shrimp Fried Rice:

This one was almost there. The shrimp was cooked perfectly, just past rare, not allowing the flesh to seize and become too chewy. The rice had a smidge of "Wok Hay" (Guo Chi), that caramelized smokey essence of the wok. On the downside, the dish was quite bland, and needed a good bit of soy sauce and white pepper to bring the flavor up to par.

Of course, I got the Banh Cuon Tay Ho ($6.25):

This was strangely bland for me as well. The only item I enjoyed was the Banh Cuon with the dried shrimp, everything else was very dull…. even the Nem Chua (fermented sausage). Even worse, the Nuoc Mam Cham tasted watered down. It sure looks like I'll have to head to Little Saigon soon for my fix, as this sure wasn't it.

And of course, the Roast Duck ($12.95 – half duck):

This was a bit of an "odd duck", no pun intended. It was very meaty, but sorely lacked a decent flavor….even the "drippings" were bland. The skin was strangely cracker-like, not the usual lacquered look and texture, but crumbly. I think this duck had been deep fried to revive it before serving. Personally, I'd take a more boney duck with good skin and great flavor.

A couple of days later, the Missus and I were chatting about Quoc Te, and how it seems that most of the dishes were just a bit off. So we decided to make another trip up to Quoc Te.

Having thought the papaya salad was pretty good last time around, we started with the Goi Xoai Tom Thit, the Green Papaya Salad with Shrimp and Pork.

Again, the fish sauce based dressing tasted watered-down. Good amount of herbs, specifically Rau Ram, the pork was tough but had decent flavor, and the shrimp was passable. Not as good as versions I've had at Seafood Island or Que Huong, but okay.

We also ordered the Stir-fried Egg Noodles with Seafood:

I thought the calamari and the shrimp were cooked to perfection. The egg noodles were a bit over-cooked. And much like the fried rice, this fell short on flavor and needed a good dose of soy sauce and white pepper.

We also decided to try the Whole Steamed Sole ($12.95). The dish that first drove us away from Quoc Te was a Catfish Hot Pot that was so heinously bad, that it still remains in my memory banks. Unfortunately, this dish would have the same effect on us five years later:

First off, apparently the oil used to top the fish had not been heated properly, and so there was no sizzle, nor wisp of steam coming off this. Thus, this caused the dish to have an excessively greasey feel to it. Also, the soy sauce was not appropriately flavored, and didn't add enough flavor. And worst of all, the oil tasted rancid…….yuck. My tongue was coated with a nasty rancidness that was really difficult to conquer. To add insult to injury, the Missus got a fish bone stuck in Her throat after the very first bite. I don't think we'll forget this dish for a while….for all the wrong reasons….

Nha Hang Quoc Te
4448-A University Ave
San Diego, CA 92105

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.