Chinese Restaurants – Page 73

Road Trip: Dumpling 10053 – El Monte(Los Angeles)

April 17, 2006 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Los Angeles County, Road Trip

After a satisfying lunch at Manie’s Restaurant, we drove around the neighborhood, and decided to drive down to Pasadena, where the Missus managed to scratch Her shopping itch at Anthropologie. As we headed back to the car it started pouring, so instead of dealing with the parking lot that is the 210 Freeway, we decided to take Colorado Boulevard, made a right turn on San Gabriel, and a left on Valley(of course). All the while ogling all the restaurants we passed.

As we passed through El Monte my stomach started rumbling so we decided to make a stop at Dumpling 10053 for a "small snack".

Now, the Missus who is from Shandong province would never, ever have Jiaozhi at a restaurant, since She can whip up a few dozen on short notice, or perhaps if She’s in the mood. Plus my Mother In Law makes really great dumplings. But once in a while the Missus will humor me. Dumpling 10053 is one of several Chinese dumpling/noodle houses that gets regular mention on Chowhound.

Even though it was 230pm on a rainy afternoon Dumpling 10053 was nearly half full.

Not being very hungry, I "just" had two orders of boiled Jiaozhi.

I had an order of the "3 meat dumplings"; Pork, Crab, and Sea Cucumber boiled dumplings (10 pieces – $5.95):

I thought the thickness of the wrapper was perfect. I’m not into really thin wrappers, for me, the wrappers are a good 50% of the dumplings, adding texture, and helping to "temper" the flavor of the filling. The texture of these wrappers were a different story, I felt they didn’t have enough "chew and pull", being a bit on the brittle side, and too easy to tear.

The plump dumplings’ filling was excellent. The pork and crab melded together to add a rich, sweet and salty flavor. The use of Chinese celery in the dumpling also added a nice texture and flavor; something we made note of, I think we’ll try to use them in a future batch of dumplings. Simply dipped into a vinegar – soy sauce mixture, the dumplings were very good. I’d be happy to have them again!

The Rock Cod boiled dumplings ($6.95 – 10 pieces):

I was pretty excited about trying these since I’ve read about them for a while. The wrappers were the same as the previous order of dumplings. But I really didn’t care for the taste, which I liken to a pretty lousy fish ball, and with a mushy, grainy texture. The Missus couldn’t finish one. I tried one using the standard vinegar soy sauce "dip", which made it taste like a sour fish ball. The Missus finally told me to sprinkle the dumpling with white pepper, then dip them into soy sauce, which made them more palatable. I still only finished 3 of them; and if/when I return, I think I’ll avoid these.

If I make a return visit, I think I’ll try the steamed beef and pork dumplings. We watched an old Gentleman scarf down 4 orders of these dumplings while we ate ours.

The service at Dumpling 10053 was typical San Gabriel Valley, detached and perfunctory, but not rude, nor were we rushed. I walked back out into the rain satisfied from eating those "3 meat dumplings".

Dumpling 10053
10053 Valley Blvd.
El Monte, CA 91731

Road Trip: Manie’s Restaurant – Rowland Heights(Los Angeles)

April 16, 2006 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Los Angeles County, Road Trip

**** Manie's has closed

Disclaimer: Those who are depressed about prices in San Diego should probably NOT read this post.

During our last trip to our old neighborhood we spent a good amount of time around Hong Kong Plaza. We used to live right up the block and would walk on over to Hong Kong Plaza almost daily. During our last trip we passed one of the restaurants that had been there for a long while but for some reason we had never taken the opportunity to eat in. What really caught our attention was the signage:

The large crowd on that evening was pretty impressive, the prices caught my eye, and when the Missus told me it was a Sichuan Restaurant, and started naming the dishes on the poster, I was sold. So this past Friday, I took a day off, and we drove up to Rowland Heights and got to the restaurant just as they opened at 11 am.

After looking over the menu I noticed something and asked the Missus, who checked with the Server, who mentioned that the Chef was from Chengdu, the provincial capital of Sichuan. I had never had Chengdu style Sichuan which I heard was a bit different from Chongqing style Sichuan, so needless to say I was very excited.

We placed our order and was served some clear soup with a pork bone in it. Not great, but pretty good and mild.

Smoked Duck with Chilies ($5.95 – all prices are lunch prices):

This take-off on the classic Sichuan Chili with Chicken, was probably the best rendition of any type of this dish I've ever had. The wonderful, crisp, sweet-salty-smokey duck was stir fried quickly with dried red chilies, green bell peppers, Sichuan peppercorns, and garlic, creating a very flavorful dish with great textures. As hot as this dish may seem, we found it to be more "numbing", then burning hot. There was alot of Sichuan peppercorn in the dish, creating that wonderfully addictive numbing sensation. Very delici-yoso!!!!

Pork Meatballs with Cellophane Noodles($4.95):

The Missus selected this dish off of the specials listed on the wall. I've had this type of pork meatballs with a brown sauce, where it has been silken and rich, and have felt almost decadent when eating these simple meatballs. These were not like those however. The meat was dry and grainy, and I thought the sauce was very bland. The Missus enjoyed the noodles though.

Fuqi Feipein – the famous "Husband and Wives" dish ($5.95), of course I could not go without trying one of my "baseline" Sichuan dishes:

This was another disappointment, very bland. This version was all beef brisket, no Sichuan peppercorns, no peanuts, no tendon, no tripe, no Chinese celery, nothing to help give the beef any flavor. Probably the worse version of this dish I ever had, just having chili oil alone on not very high quality beef made the dish feel greasy.

Chicken with Three Chilies($4.95):

Almost the same dish as the Smoked Duck dish, with some green onion and onion. Much milder then the duck, but very tasty. Watch out for those bones though. Again, not overly spicy, but nice and numbing.

Chung-Do (Chengdu) Cold Noodle($3.95):

I really love Sichuan Cold Noodle dishes. Chungking Restaurant in Monterey Park and Ba Ren make my favorite versions of the dish. Finding this dish on the menu also clued me in as to the origins of the Chef, as it was on the menu as "Chung-Do" style. I really didn't enjoy the noodles dish at first, I thought that it wasn't spicy enough, and used too much vinegar. But after eating a bite of the duck and chicken, then having a bite of the noodle, I discovered how refreshing and palate cleansing this dish was. When eaten in that context, this was very good.

But wait; we weren't finished yet! The Missus ordered the Sticky Rice Cake($3.95):

Called something along the lines of "Liang Chi Ba", this was very, very good! I'm not big on desserts, but this combination of peanut and sesame paste over gooey sticky rice has changed me. What a great way to end a meal.

So what's the damage for a six course lunch with tea and rice(which we never touched)? Thirty-two bucks! With leftovers for at least one or two more meals!

You can tell by the photo what we cleaned up, and what we took home!

Overall, we did find that the dishes at Manie's used more Sichuan Pepper then Chili Peppers, and was more numbing then "hot". This goes along the lines of what I've heard about Sichuan cuisine. Chongqing style is much more spicy and hotter then Chengdu style, which is milder, but more numbing. The other variable that comes into play is, that though the Chefs come from Chengdu, Marnie's (something like Luong Chau Shou in Chinese) is Taiwanese owned, which could change the food. Nevertheless, the food was a bargain, and some of the dishes were excellent.

Manie's Restaurant
18438 Colima Road #106 (In Hong Kong Plaza)
Rowland Heights, CA 91748

Yoso-Silly – LA Roadtrip: Hong Kong Fishball House and a Very Special Dish

April 15, 2006 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Los Angeles County, Road Trip, yoso-silly

*** You know……tastes change; and I now find this stuff kinda bland, who'd have thunk???

We just got back from LA, so I thought I'd do a short post. Elmo from Monster Munching mentioned a very special dish during the course of a comment on my post last Saturday.

The special place that sells this dish is the Hong Kong Fishball House, and is covered in detail on Monster Munching.

HK Fishball House specializes in very, very, reasonably priced(usually under 3 bucks) soups and other snacks. But there was a special snack that the Missus just had to try…….

How could you resist the temptation of Fried Pork Rectum, and only $2.25! So while I waited for my frozen Xiao Long Bao from Yi-Mei Deli, the Missus waited for Her Fried Rectum from the Fishball House – why does that sound so wrong? It didn't help any, when the Gentleman frying what is actually Pork Large Intestine told the Missus, "Oooh, this smells so good!!!"

So what did it look like?

Nicely fried and seasoned with salt and green onions.

So how did it taste?

I think it's an appropriately named dish…….after all the large intestine is attached to the?????

The initial taste was a fairly pleasant sweet and salty flavor, with a crisp and "spongy" texture. But as you kept chewing the hard to describe, very earthy and strong "intestine" flavor came through, along with a slightly unpleasant aftertaste that lasts for a pretty long time. The intestine also left my mouth with what felt like a slimy film. Definitely an acquired taste, and I don't think I've been exposed enough to similar flavors to appreciate it. I'll stick with the fried calamari!

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

Trieu Chau – The Meal

April 13, 2006 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Vietnamese Restaurants

In Part I of this post, we made our way to Trieu Chau, and sat, only to open the menu, and discover that most of it was not in English (there was a handwritten section with stuff like pork fried rice). So as the Missus tried to decipher the Chinese portion of the menu, and little plate of Youtiao(Fried Dough, "Crullers") found it’s way to our table.

These were cold and dense, not crunchy and light; a very inauspicious start. At this point, the Missus had gotten through much of the menu, but still could not figure out what some of the dishes were. This is when our intrepid "guide" Kathy appeared. She patiently explained that the dishes we were having problems with were dishes with specific types of noodles. She started in English, went to Cantonese, and finally was able to explain some of the dishes to the Missus in Mandarin. At one point, she thought that the Missus was Laotian, so she started speaking in what I think was Lao. Talk about a humbling experience, I barely speak one language well (that would be English), and Kathy just jumps from language to language without hesitation. Needless to say, we were impressed. Finally, the Missus decided to go the "small plates" route, instead of ordering noodle soup and ordered a few dishes that She had already picked out, and Kathy helped fill out the menu.

First up was the Missus selected the Beef Stew:

The Missus picked this out, because she knew how much I enjoy a good Beef Stew. This was almost a hybrid Chinese – Vietnamese style Beef Stew. Beef colored by annatto oil, nice hints of anise, cinnamon, and garlic. The meat was pretty tender, and the fat content was pretty low. What I really enjoyed about this dish, was the large amount of buttery, melt in your mouth tendon, cooked to perfection. Also, the usual layer of oil coating the top of the sauce, was minimized. An average dish, brought up to good by the delici-yoso tendon.

The Missus also selected the Soy Sauce Duck:

Nice, meaty and tender, soy sauce flavored duck leg, served with pickled vegetables. What made this dish work was that the salty duck was tempered by the pickled vegetables and pickle "juice."

Kathy had selected the rice noodle with seafood for us:

I could smell the fragrance of this dish as it was cooking; thinking to myself; "that must be for us…." Wide rice noodles, egg, bok choy, and seafood, in a brown sauce. First off the shrimp were over-cooked and tough, and the squid was like rubber. The sauce though a tad on the sweet side had quite a bit of garlic which balanced it out a bit. The interesting thing was that I could taste a hint of a slightly smokey flavor in the noodles; I think there was a bit of Wok-hey going on.

Strangely, Kathy also ordered Lup Cheong(Chinese Sausage) and Shrimp Fried Rice for us. I think she was hedging her bets a little, just in case we didn’t care for anything else we ordered.

This was the weakest dish of the meal. Again the shrimp were over-cooked, and some of the Lup Cheong were charred, and nothing about the dish stood out. As we were eating, the Missus, said "didn’t you make this last night." I had indeed made fried rice with leftovers the night before, and this was no better then what I had thrown together at home. But still, nothing terrible about the dish.

All told the "damage" was $20, for 4 dishes(we had the leftovers for dinner) and tea, not bad at all! The service was very efficient, and Kathy was very patient and helpful. While the Missus went to the Ladies Room, I chatted briefly with Kathy, who recommended the Lemongrass Chicken, and a few other dishes for our next visit. Though I’m sorely tempted to try some of the Beef Stew Noodle Soups……

Trieu Chau Restaurant
4653 University Ave
San Diego, CA 92105

Trieu Chau – The Teaser

April 12, 2006 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Vietnamese Restaurants

While sitting here realizing it’s pretty darn late, and that I’ll never finish this post before I just plain "crash out", something popped into my "head" (that in itself is a fairly unique event). You see Diet Chili Cheese Fries just sent me something he calls a "teaser" for His movie Asian Stories (Book III). Which led me to wonder if you all would buy into a "teaser" post????? So here goes…..

Recently we had heard of a Cambodian-Vietnamese-Chinese Restaurant on University called Trieu Chau, and finally managed to get there.

Since there was no available parking in the lot, we parked on a a side street and noticed that the restaurant was pretty full. Though the exterior and interior of the restaurant was a bit worse for wear, there were wonderful smells all through the dining area. This was probably due to the configuration of the restaurant, a small "L-shape" with the kitchen separated by a "bar-counter" from the dining area. As we were seated, I noticed the usual condiment tray:

Thing were looking up…..until I opened the menu:

There was nothing in English!!! Talk about cutting this Third – generation (Sansei), only English speaking(I can cuss in several languages), American of Asian ancestry down to size. All items in everything from Sanskrit to Chinese, but not English……wait a minute, there’s the Chinese portion of the menu whew! Until, the Missus(born and raised in China) said; "You know, some of this stuff, I can even read, but it doesn’t make sense to me. I don’t know what it’s saying!" Oh-uh……..

Talk about feeling a bit nervous………

So now for the tease. Would our intrepid eaters fail? Would they get kicked out on their butts onto University Avenue? Would they die of starvation? Would they at least get a spot of tea? Would the Missus have a sudden revelation and decipher the menu? Would my facade of Banana-Asianism be revealed? Would the Missus please call Her Mom for some GUIDANCE!!!!!

Stay tuned tomorrow……..And RONW, this menu’s for you. Can you help us decipher it?

Panda Palace – Another ABCDE in National City

April 4, 2006 mmm-yoso Chicken Wings, Chinese Restaurants

**** Panda Palace has Closed

Can you dig the generic Chinese Restaurant name? If it has Pearl, Royal, Golden, Garden, Phoenix, and Eastern or something similar(dragon, ruby, panda?) in the name, it's likely a circa '70's style Chinese Restaurant, something like "Eastern Pearl Royal Golden Phoenix Garden Restaurant", you'll automatically know it's a Chinese Restaurant. Much like Royal Mandarin across the street Panda Palace Restaurant serves a combination of ABCDE ("American Born Chinese Dining Establishment") and Chinoy Food. However, unlike Royal Mandarin, whose Salt and Pepper Chicken Wings are almost legendary in the Filipino Community, nary a word has been said about it. So the Missus and I decided to see why…..

The bright and generic interior screams last century Chinese.

The menu was filled with San Diego Chinoy favorites, and we proceeded to order a few.

Upside Down Pan Fried Noodles($6.75):

Noodles fried to a crisp, topped with shrimp, chicken, beef, and vegetables. First the good, the noodles were excellent, not over fried to a brittle consistency, the noodles got nicely chewy as the sauce soaked through them. The Beef and Shrimp were well cooked, soft, and moist. The bad? This dish had virtually no flavor, even the beef and chicken had no flavor. Combine these noodles and the cooking technique with the brown sauce from the Upside Down Pan Fried Noodles at Mandarin Canton and you'd have a pretty decent dish.

The Missus has a Shrimp with Lobster Sauce($8.25) fixation:

I have an aversion to gloppy, pale dishes studded with frozen peas and carrots. So I asked the Missus how this tasted. Her verdict? B-L-A-N-D. While waiting for our order we watched in amazement, as a Young Boy poured almost a half bottle of soy sauce on his fried rice. I now understood why. In fact, at this point we were pretty close to needing a refill of our soy sauce.

Finally, we had to try the Salt and Pepper Chicken Wings($6.75):

So how did these measure up to Royal Mandarin or Golden Chopstick? Not even close. First of all, not enough salt, pepper, or green onions and garlic topping. Secondly, not crispy enough. One interesting thing; I could distinctly taste a sweet component, either sugar or honey, that made these wings a bit different.

One thing I will say about Panda Palace, our Waitress was super efficient, there was absolutely no wasted motion, from taking our orders, to bringing take-out containers along with our check. As for the food? If we crave some ABCDE grub, I think we'll stick with one of the "Big Three".

Panda Palace Chinese Restaurant
1105 E Plaza Blvd Ste D
National City, CA 91950

One final item – one day soon I'd like to set-up a "taste-test", purely subjective of course, of several (4-5) versions of Salt and Pepper Chicken Wings. So Calvin, Howie, and Jack; you Guys game?

Dede’s

March 9, 2006 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants

*** Dedes' has closed

Before there was Ba Ren, we used to go to Dede's fairly regularly for Sichuan Food. Though if we really wanted Sichuan Food we'd still do the 100 plus mile drive to Chung King in Monterey Park. But of course Ba Ren changed all of that. But that's not to say the food at Dede's is bad, it's not. Just perhaps not to our taste.

I believe that "Dede's" inherited their English name from the previous business that occupied the space; a Tea and Boba joint. The Chinese name of Dede's indicates that Chongqing style Sichuan food is served here.

We decided to drop by Dede's, to see what had changed in the last 2 years since our last visit. The colorful interior of Dede's belies it's Teahouse past:

On this afternoon Teresa Teng(the late Deng Li-Jun) videos were playing on the big screen television. We also noticed that, many of the "specials" on the placard had taken a larger turn away from Sichuan Cuisine.

Though all the old favorites are still there:

On this visit we ordered the Spicy Fish Slices with Golden Mushrooms($8.50):

This interesting dish was like a combination of two classic Sichuan offerings, the Water Boiled/Boiled in Hot Sauce and Pickled Pepper type dishes. This was a nice hot, but not numbingly hot dish, though the amount of oil was fairly low. Battered and lightly fried fish lay on a bed of Enoki Mushrooms and was covered with "Hot Sauce", Zhacai and other pickled vegetables were also featured in this dish. Good, but not great.

I also ordered one of my favorite Sichuan snack type dishes Spicy Cold Noodles($4.99).

This was pretty horrible, a failure from all angles. The noodles tasted like they were uncooked store bought noodles, very hard and brittle. The sauce lacked sugar, and almost tasted like just Black Vinegar. Usually there would be at least a mild sesame paste flavor as well, but not this time. Not even a bit spicy to me as well. The peanuts were half peanuts, and not coarsely chopped. This was just bad eats!

Luckily, we ordered my favorite dish from Dede's; Cumin Flavored Lamb($8.50):

As far as I know, this isn't a Sichuan dish, but it's still good eats. Fragrant, slightly nutty cumin dry fried with thin slices of lamb and onion, and topped with cilantro. Delici-yoso!!! You can tell that high heat was used very successfully in the creation of this dish by the lack "oil" that would be created if the lamb was stir fried in a conventional manner using inadequate heat.

Dede's offers an alternative to Ba Ren; most of the dishes do not use quite the same amount of oil, and is not as spicy. We do think that the flavors at Dede's are not as complex as Ba Ren's. There is also a lack of the layering of heat that we appreciate, and Ma-La(numbing hot) is lacking in many of the dishes. All the "usual suspects" of Sichuan food are available, and we've tried most of them; Rice Crust dishes, Dishes Boiled in Hot Sauce, ChongQing Red Pepper dishes, as well as Cold Dishes like Fuqi Feipein. We also noticed that in the last few years Dede's has added Sichuan Hotpot(Malaguo) to their menu, with a Buffet available at $20 per person.

Dede's Teajuice City
4647 Convoy St
San Diego, CA 92111

Finally: Lee’s Garden

February 27, 2006 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Vietnamese Restaurants

**** Lee's Garden has closed

As indicated in My previous post, we were searching for Lee's Garden when we got side tracked by Ly's Garden. And after that very inexpensive lunch, we traveled a bit further down the road, and came across Lee's Garden, though the signage really didn't make it easy…..

Nor did the rather battered storefront, Lee's just looked alot more rundown then I remembered, how sad:

We decided to eat at Lee's this past Sunday, and arrived at about 4pm for an early dinner. We were walked to our seats immediately by a very friendly Gentleman. We passed one of the other tables and noticed that the Vietnamese Family there were eating 4 different versions of clams, so I made a mental note while we were seated. As is typical for these Vietnamese/Chinese Restaurants, the menus are huge, and analysis paralysis set in:

After what seemed to be a very long period of indecision, we placed our order. Starting with the Clams with Basil($8.95):

These clams seemed to be cooked a bit too long, the clams somewhat tough, and many of them really "gritty". Also, many of the clams had fallen out of their shells and settled into the bottom of the earthen bowl, making this into a search and destroy mission. This led the Missus to state; "I swear, there are more shells than clam meat in this dish, I think we're being ripped off!" I of course disagreed, but felt strangely aware of what seemed to be an abundance of empty clam shells….. This dish was flavored with a good amount of basil, and some jalapeno peppers, but seemed a bit flat in taste. I think it was the lack of garlic in this dish, in addition to perhaps some sweetness to balance out the anise like flavor of the basil.

Seafood Hotpot with Duck Feet(leg – $11.95):

See that kind of yellow/brown strip of meat to the right of the pot? I think that's duck "meat", but I'm not quite sure. I almost never take a salt shaker to my food, but in this case I came pretty close. The dish was very bland, and insipidly boring. Even the shrimp had no taste, the only item in the pot that had any flavor were the shiitake mushrooms.

The best dish of the evening was the Fish Fillet with Black Peppercorn($7.95):

The slightly sweet, salty, gooey sauce, full of pungent black pepper was oh so good. The fish, on the other hand was not. First off, the fish was dry, now I believe that one of the real benefits of battered and fried fish is to keep it moist. But in this case, the fish was dry as if overcooked, probably due to lack of freshness. Also, the batter did not keep any of it's crispness, it seemed to be either under fried or fried at the wrong temperature. Too bad, this could have been a really great dish.

As we were leaving, Lee's started filling up, and everybody seemed to be getting the clams, so I'm guessing it's one of their more popular dishes. We did enjoy the excellent service, and the prices weren't too bad, but I don't know if we'll be back anytime soon.

Lee's Garden
4055 54th St
San Diego, CA 92105

Lee’s, Um No It’s, Ly’s Garden, Or Is It?

February 26, 2006 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants, Vietnamese Restaurants

**** After a very long run; Ly's has closed

Recently, we've been eating at all of our regular Chinese Restaurants; China Max, Ba Ren, and yes, even at the "ABCDE" special, Mandarin Canton. For a change of pace, and for the sake of "material" for a new post, I needed to find someplace new to eat. Just then it came to me, let's try Lee's Garden, we hadn't eaten there in years. The Missus was game, so off we went for a nice weekday lunch. As we took the turn at 54th street, the Missus grabbed my arm and said "turn around, turn around, you just went past it!" Me: "Are you sure?" The Missus:"Turn around I just saw it on our right!"

So I did two U-turns, and drove into the seedy strip mall parking lot. And there it was:

Or was it? This was Ly's Garden…. I mentioned this to the Missus, who responded; "How many Ly's/Lee's Garden do you think is going to be on this street?" "OK, I just thought they were on the other side of the street."

We entered the Restaurant, and surveying the cavernous, but slightly run down interior, I knew immediately, that this wasn't the "Lee's Garden" I was thinking about. But the display of roast pork and duck hanging in the display was calling to me. We were immediately seated by the most cheerful server, and opened the menu. And oh my, the prices….. Just to keep this interesting, let's play a little game. I won't reveal the prices of each dish, and we ordered alot of food, until near the end of the description of each dish.

We ordered a bowl of Won Ton Soup, which came with a plate of bean sprouts and lemon:

The steaming hot bowl of soup was delivered, with a few slices of fishcake, lots of fried garlic, green onions, cilantro, and even some Gailan. And it was a good thing; the broth was on the mild side and needed a little "help".

The wontons were typical Vietnamese-style wontons, very dense pork meatballs. There were 8 wontons in this decent bowl of soup, that cost us…..guess, 4 bucks, maybe $4.50? Well……..

It was $2.75!!! Yes, less then 3 bucks for won ton soup.

The Missus also ordered Porridge with Pork and Preserved Egg:

The porridge was served steaming hot, but was on the watery side, with hardly any preserved egg. Also, the Missus noted that the pork in the porridge was almost like ground pork, not the strings of pork She is used too. The Missus noted a lack of pork flavor and velvety richness that a good bowl of Jook has.

The price? Yep, $2.75……

I ordered one of the most expensive items on the menu. 3 Meats with Steamed rice. While waiting for my lunch this arrived on the table.

I asked the Server what this was, and was informed that it came with the roast meat dish. So hey, another meat. This rich beef-pork broth, along with the soft meat from the pork shank was delici-yoso!!! I'd be happy with just a bowl of this. The broth had the flavor close to that of Pho', but with a bit more "oil" and richness.

As I was polishing this off, my plate arrived:

I had ordered Roast Pork, BBQ Pork (Char Siu), and Roast Duck, all of which came on a bed of Jasmine rice. The BBQ pork was moist, but really too mildly flavored, lacking any of the sweet-beany-saltiness that good BBQ pork has. The duck was also underwhelming and the meat lacked the rich flavor of good roast duck. The Roast pork was pretty good, the skin portions crunchy, the meat slightly sweet and very moist.

This set me back……$4.50!

The Missus, not believing how inexpensive the food was, had to get something else, and went to the deli case and ordered the Shrimp and Chive fried dumplings($2.95):

These were fried up, and arrived on our table a few minutes later. Though a bit on the oily side, the chive and shrimp filling was quite good. And no skimping on the chives either!

In the end we spent $14(without tip), for 4 dishes! Bargain city…….

Some notes on Ly's: The service here was very nice and friendly. The parking lot looks a bit dicey, but there were 2 Security Guards walking around. The atmosphere is quite "divey", but the good service made up for any shortcomings. All prices are for lunch, I think that prices are a dollar more during dinner.

Ly's may not be a "Foodie" destination; but if you're in the neighborhood, and short on cash, Ly's is worth a visit. You will get what you pay for.

Ly's Garden Chinese Restaurant
4350 54th St # B
San Diego, CA 92115

After lunch we drove further down 54th St, and to our left, there it was, Lee's Garden. A Ly and Lee on the same street? Talk about confusion! Guess where we'll be headed next? To Be Continued…….

Chinese Garden Restaurant

February 21, 2006 mmm-yoso Chinese Restaurants

Don’t you love the name? After all even if there wasn’t the word "Chinese" in the name, all it would need would need is "Garden", "Dragon", "Imperial", or something similar – I’m sure you all will be able to think of a long list, to tell you it’s a Chinese Restaurant. Actually, Chinese Garden is our neighborhood Chinese Restaurant, located in our local, a bit worn, stuck in the 70’s, strip mall, with the usual fast-food(Carl’s Jr, Mickey D’s, Subway), and similar type establishments (Hometown Buffet, Mountain Mike’s Pizza).

Truth of the matter is, I’d only visited Chinese Garden once, right before we purchased our Home in the area. It was raining, and a bit cold, and I thought, I’d grab a quick bite before doing a walk through. I went in a had the buffet($6.45 – lunch), and have never been back since. Let’s just say the food was appropriate in taste and texture for the majority of the customers I saw. See the building hovering above the "Chinese Garden" marquee? It’s a Senior Living complex. ‘Nuff said.

But during a recent afternoon; I needed to return some DVD’s to Blockbuster(in the strip mall), and decided to walk the three blocks instead of driving. And since it’s been a bit on the chili side, I thought I’d give Chinese Garden another visit. Not to punish myself, but to attempt to become one of the "Millions of Happy Customers!"

I always smile when I see that sign. Though the menu says Mandarin, Szechuan, & Chinese Cuisine, I always ask myself, isn’t Mandarin & Szechuan Chinese? Oh well, as you can probably figure with items like Chop Suey and Hawaiian Delight(???), on the menu, Chinese Garden is an ABCDE (pronounced abb-cee-dee – American Born Chinese Dining Establishment).

The decor of the brightly lit interior is pure time capsule 60-70’s Chinese Restaurant, from the large Koi painting, to the faux hanging lanterns.

I decided not to partake of the buffet (with good reason), and instead went for a bowl of War (Wor) Wonton Soup, which was fairly inexpensive at $5.75. I’m not quite sure what the origins are of this soup, to me it’s plain ABCDE.

After a short wait, the Server brought me a pretty large bowl of soup. The first thing I noticed was the abundance of "canned items". Lot’s of bamboo shoots, water chestnut, and button mushrooms. Also the broth was very under flavored. Even more strange, only the whites parts of Napa Cabbage was used. However, the shrimp still had flavor(5 pieces), and there were seven large wontons in the crowded bowl. Even though the appearance of the wontons kind of reminded me of brain matter, they were very soft, not like the dense pork meatball I was accustomed to. I’m wondering if this was due to a larger amount of filler? The flavor of the wontons were mild but acceptable. Overall, an okay bowl of soup for the price. Hey, I may even stop by again, but won’t stray too far from Wonton Soup, or maybe Fried Rice.

The service was very nice, even though they forgot to bring me chopsticks after I asked for them. And even better, I got nice little walk, and a view of Fiesta Island as I walked home. They’ve started working on moving the phone and electricity lines underground in our neighborhood. I can’t wait for the nice unobstructed views.

Chinese Garden
3057 Clairemont Dr
San Diego, CA 92117