hot pot :: All Things Andy Gavin

Archive for hot pot

Lunch Quest – Happy Valley Village

Dec05

Restaurant: Happy Valley Village / Shanlitun

Location: 1655 S Azusa Ave E, Hacienda Heights, CA 91745. (626) 669-8406

Date: May 26, 2022

Cuisine: North East Chinese

Rating: One of a kind

This unusual “hot pot” restaurant in Hacienda Heights specializes in lamb spine and goose hot pot from the region just west of Korea.

It’s located in the usual kind of mini-mall and is as far as we can tell one of a kind in California — in that no one else offers this cuisine.

It has a pretty nice build out.

And a colorful decor. Notice the hoods over each table.

And each table has this built in super hot pot.

The menu.

Five Vegetable Noodles. Mustard and tangy sauce with mung bean noodles.

Cold beef with garlic sauce. Sauce was great. Beef is dense and pastrami-like.

Sweet and Sour Crispy Pork. Very breaded. Not actually sweet enough. A bit mild in flavor.

Lamb spine hot pot with mushrooms and eggplant.
Add in pork belly and pork ribs.
Add in crystal noodles (wide).

And corn cakes cooked on the side.
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Steaming up.

Spine had a ton of flavor. Very boney, but worth it. Ribs were the best and pork belly also great. Sauce/broth had huge depth of flavor.

Inside of the corn bread.

This is a pretty focused restaurant where the stew is more or less the thing, excepting the fairly simple set of “appetizers.” But the stew is pretty darn tasty. There are the 5 variants: fish, goose, cabbage & pork, chicken, and lamb spine. You can’t really try more than one per visit so we’ll have to come back sometime and try at least the goose.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Happy Valley Village, hot pot, lamb spine, Lunch Quest, SGV

Lunch Quest – Da Long Yi

Dec01

Restaurant: DaLongYi Hot Pot 大龙燚火锅

Location: 250 W Valley Blvd L, San Gabriel, CA 91776. (626) 872-6690

Date: May 20, 2022

Cuisine: Chinese Szechuan Hot Pot

Rating: Very solid spicy hot pot place

Da Long Yi Hot Pot is a relatively new spicy hot pot branch of some Chinese chain, in the Chongking style, but from Chengdu specifically.

It’s located located on the second floor of this classic mall right next door to Shanghai #1 Seafood Village.

The interior has a decent but modern industrial build out.

The “snacks” are extremely minimal.

The sauce bar section is decent, totally workable, but not as good as a few other chains.

I made my usual pair of sesame and vinegar based sauces.

Fried Pork. Super nice fry with juicy pork. Great!

Half spicy, half bone broth. The bone is boring, of course.

Smooth beef. Thick slices coated in egg. Very tender and nice.

Pork meat balls. Great, not those dense packaged ones.

Luncheon Meat. Always one of my favorites.

Fish Balls stuffed with Roe. Great.

Angus Beef.

Beef Tongue.

Lamb Shoulder.

Assorted Tofu.

Assorted Mushrooms.

Lotus root. Love that crunchy texture.

Napa cabbage. Because this is always the favorite veggie, we decided to just order it.

This turned out to be a surprisingly nice spicy hot pot. It’s “almost” as good as Shancheng Lameizi or Chun La Hao, but not quite. Build out isn’t as attractive as either of those. Sauce/snack bar is a bit worse. Actual hot pot food quality was quite good, basically equal. Weirdly, they were completely empty. One employee I think and we were the only customers. Food was great though.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Chinese cuisine, Da Long Yi, hot pot, Lunch Quest, SGV, spicy, Szechuan cuisine

Malubianbian Spicy Stick Pot

Apr08

Restaurant: MaLu Bian Bian Hot Pot

Location: 18194 Colima Rd Ste A, Rowland Heights, CA 91748. (626) 820-9206

Date: February 23, 2020

Cuisine: Chengdu Szechuan Chinese Hot Pot

Rating: 12/10 for experience

I’ve been on a bit of a Szechuan style hot pot kick for the last year. For those of you know don’t know, “hot pot” is the classic Chinese homestyle food which is super popular as a restaurant type in recent years. The most “classic” form is “Mongolian” like Hot Pot Hot Pot or Little Sheep. Then there are hybrid more modern joints like Hai Di Lao. And even the cheap student pre-prepped version like Boiling Point or Flaming Pot. But my favorite is the ultra spicy Chengdu or Chongqing style. I’ve had this in Chengdu and last year several opened in the SGV including Chun La Hao and Shancheng Lameizi.

So bringing us to tonight, Malubianbian represents a new style of skewer oriented Chengdu street hot pot. This is one crazy experience so I’ll detail it.

This is in the “Yes Plaza” in Rowland Heights. It’s like teleporting to China because everyone here is Chinese and at the restaurant everyone is about 23.

If you can see, there are about 20-30 people waiting outside.

Inside it’s sort of industrial new Chinese style. Small tables. Uncomfortable chairs. Ineffective hoods. As part of the “experience” a few minutes after we entered I started to cough uncontrollably. Something was just making my throat and eyes itch. I thought something was wrong with me until I noticed everyone else doing it. The server came by to apologize as the chef had just fried up a new batch of chili oil. Lol. I should have known. The place already smelled like chilis, so you couldn’t really smell it, but when you make Szechuan style chili oil (which I do myself) you have to dump 350deg oil over chilies and it releases a ton of pepper compounds into the air which are very “irritating.”

In any case, we didn’t have to wait too long (only 20 minutes) as we had a “reservation” for the “private room” which was this super cute painted closet with a two burner little table. Supposedly it sat up to 12 — but really 8 max. I mean max.

Very cute though.

Wine was a whole saga too. Only Jefferey brought some, but no one, including the restaurant had a corkscrew. He wandered the mall but no restaurant was willing to help him open his bottle (and walk out with it). Eventually we managed.

Like many new hot pot places Malu has a “sauce bar.” This isn’t as extensive as at Chun La Hao or Shancheng Lameizi but was sufficient. It was, however, pretty messy.

This was one of the main sauces I made. They didn’t have the sesame paste or all the fermented stuff I really love at Shancheng Lameizi.

They do have these traditional dry “powdered” sauces. You grab one and then add some broth from your pot to make up a sauce. It congealed very easily and didn’t really work for me, but the sauce bar version was decent.

We got all the broths. On top here is the lame tomato broth and below is the series traditional super-spicy ox fat (those big rectangles that haven’t melted yet) and blend of peppers and 18 spices.

Below is the other lame broth, the “mild” mushroom broth. Above that is the “classic” spicy Szechuan broth that doesn’t use the heavy ox fat.

I exclusively used the fully leaded traditional gut cleansing medicinal purgative spicy ox fat broth — as should anyone who isn’t a wuss.

But what, you say, does one do with these punishing broths? You cook stuff in them. But the format at Malu is interesting. Out in the dining room are about 10 refrigerators filled with skewers and boxes of food. You just wander over and grab the stuff (which seems a touch “unsanitary” but never mind). The staff count your skewers and containers at the end to calculate your bill.

Malu’s particularly unique bit is the whole skewer thing. These cost about $0.35 each and you just shove them in your pot and easily withdraw them. But for some reason I found this a bit awkward and preferred the plates of stuff.

There are a lot of skewer types including nearly all the vegetables, tons of marinated meats, the usual meat/fish etc balls and whatnot. Each bit on a skewer is pretty tiny. Often even half a meatball or the like.

They also have a bunch of plates with more meats and various other “exotic” stuff like duck blood or duck intestine (anyone want a whole bowl of raw duck intestine? we did!). I mostly ate off these because I found it easier.

Fried pork. This is a menu order item. It was just okay.

Spicy beef stomach. This was quite delicious — and chewy.

Special house spicy beef. This was amazing. Tons of flavor (and heat).

Spicy glass noodle. Really mung bean jelly. It was actually warm, which is unusual for this type of typical Szechuan street food.

Crab sticks. Imitation crab. Tasty, but they come apart in the pot.

Luncheon meat. This is always one of my hotpot favorites. Pure pork and fatty goodness. We went through at least 3 orders of this!

Beef. A Staple.

Lamb.

Weird spongy shrimp rolls. I don’t know what to call these, but they actually cooked up as delicious things.

Shrimp balls with actual shrimp and row. These also cooked up great.

Skinned frog. This was just too sad.

Noodles, lotus root, and strange veggie cake.

Pig ear on a stick.

Plus tons of things I forgot to photo.

Odd rice jelly. This was like water jelly. It had a jello texture and was totally clear and absolutely zero flavor. The brown stuff was some kind of syrup and very mildly sweet. You could barely taste it. I suppose it was meant to cool the palette after the inferno.

Fried rice cakes. Another typical Szechuan dessert.

Overall, this was a great experience and TONS OF FUN. The broth is awesome. The format is weird, but fun and flexible because you can get your own stuff. The problem is that the ingredient quality isn’t quite as good as at Hai Di Lao, Chun La Hao and Shancheng Lameizi. Also the sauce bar is only adequate.

Service was fabulous though. Usually hot pot service isn’t the greatest, but it was here. They kept checking on us and the owner came over and was super nice, the manager was super nice. Really friendly and helpful.

It’s very inexpensive too. A skewer is only $0.35!

So I highly recommend if you are adventurous and into new things. Mind your bottom.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Chengdu, Chinese cuisine, hedonists, hot pot, Rowland Heights, SGV, Sichuan, spicy, Szechuan cuisine

Chun La Hao – Infernal Pot

Sep20

Restaurant: Chun La Hao Chong Qing Hot Pot

Location: 5701 Rosemead Blvd, Temple City, CA 91780. (626) 766-1230

Date: August 5, 2019 & May 16, 2021

Cuisine: Chong Qing Hot Pot

Rating: Tied for best hot pot I’ve ever had

After Yarom and I met up in March at the awesome Shancheng Lameizi for some fiery hot pot (which blows the boring mild hot pot out of… something) we decided to drag some more people to a different new, higher end Szechuan Hot Pot place.

Chun La Hao is located in the same Temple City mall as Grand Harbor and right across the street from Bistro Na. It hails from Chong Qing, the largest city in Szechuan and well known for its brazen, no holds barred take on spice.

They have bar style munchies and tea in the waiting area.

And a modern Chinese decor much like the aforementioned Bistro Na or Shancheng. It’s more spacious than either of Shancheng’s branches.

Our table for size was still a bit tight — for us big westerners.

The menu is the usual check sheet and with an extensive list of favorites and freakish culinary bits one can boil up. Aka duck intestine, black tripe, pork aorta and the like.

The have the best “snack bar” I’ve yet seen at a hot pot. Extensive munchies.

The usual kind of peanuts and crisps.

A big assortment of pickled things like spicy cucumbers, kimchee like stuff, etc.

And more weird crispy stuff.

Here are some I got. The cucumbers were great. The kimchee was very hot, even by my standards.

And some different “snacks” on 5/16/21.

From my cellar: NV Pierre Péters Champagne Blanc de Blancs Brut Cuvée de Réserve. JG 91+. As is customary with this bottling from Rodolphe Péters, the wine is a blend of fifty percent of its base year of 2014 and fifty percent from last year’s blend, which had gone into the family solera of reserve wines that dates back to 1988. The vins clairs here do not entirely go through malo as fifteen percent are non-malo wines, with the range raised in a variety of vessels, including barrels, stainless steel tanks and cement vats and the wine spend two years aging sur latte. The new release is very good indeed, offering up a youthful blend of apple, pear, hazelnut, chalky minerality, incipient pastry cream and spring flowers. On the palate the wine is crisp, focused and full-bodied, with a good core, still pretty brisk acidity, frothy mousse and very good backend mineral drive on the long and nascently complex finish. This is very good today and will be even better with a couple of years in the cellar.

We ordered the maximum spicy classic Chongqing ox fat broth and a light mushroom broth for the losers.

Here it is all fired up, at the end too when the spice has taken over some of the wuss side.

Chun La Hao also has a big sauce bar. Bigger perhaps than HDL but a bit smaller than SL.

A slightly better view. There are all the classics here and more, plenty to make a great sauce. They lack a few of the weird (and delicious) fermented options at SL, but otherwise it’s pretty complete. All the base components are here. Spices, sesame oil and paste, soy sauces, vinegars, etc.

This is my “mild” (not really) vegetable sauce with a soy vinegar garlic base.

And my fiery sesame flame garlic “meat” sauce.

The presentation is cute. A red army truck brings the Veggie Combo Platter of various greens.

Oddly, no cabbage in the combo, so we ordered some.

Lotus root provides a nice crunch.

Lately I’ve taken to Square Bamboo Shoot as a source of great texture and fiber.

Mushroom Combo Platter serves up even more fiber.

Wood Ear Mushrooms.

The tofu combo platter brings handmade tofu, black tofu (which was kinda gross), fried beancurd and others.

Fish Filet was marinated. It looked pretty, but was filled with bones.

Cuttlefish dumplings look like sticks of wax, but cook up to be delectable chewy sticks with a hint of seafood.

Crab sticks.

Dumplings with roe — actually pretty darn good.

Raw beef with egg (you coat it in the egg and cook it).

Pig butt. Yup.

Luncheon Pork is one of my favorites and I got two orders. Basically spam, this stuff is soft and delicious.

Mini Sausage are fun.

Pork Meatballs were clearly house-made and the best I’ve had. Really tasty.

Fatty Beef. Delicious.

Beef Brisket. Moderately leaner.

Beef belly is also fatty and delicious.

Lamb shoulder was delicious. Too bad under all that spice one can barely tell the meats apart :-).

Probably also lamb shoulder or some other lamb cut.

Beef Tendon isn’t a white boy favorite, and is very gelatinous when cooked up, but tastes amazing (if you can handle the texture).

Pork is good too and needs to be cooked a bit longer.

A leaner beef cut.

It’s a bit crowded at the table and the uncooked food is on shelves at the edge of our alcove, a bit hard to get at.

Sure makes a big mess.

Check out the congealing spicy ox fat after it’s had a chance to cool down!

They have a funny timing game you can play once per table to “earn” a discount too.

Thai Red Curry Sorbetto — I made a version of this in 2017 and it was a dismal failure, but haunted me since and so this one is redemptive. Made a (no salt) red curry paste from scratch (chilies, lemongrass, galangal, cilantro roots, kaffir lime leaves, garlic, Asian shallots etc) and then cooked it into a pure Thai Coconut Milk base. Sweet and Spicy! — made by me for @sweetmilkgelato — #SweetMilkGelato #gelato #dessert #icecream #FrozenDessert #nomnom #dessertlovers #dessertporn #icecreamlovers #gelatoitaliano #foodporn #gelatolover #food #foodgasm #foodblogger #dessertgasm #desserttime #foodphotography #gelatoartigianale #gelatomania #dessertlover #icecream #icecreamlovers #sorbetto#Thai #red #curry #spicy

Buko Pandan Gelato — Infused the milk with fresh Pandan Leaves and then crafted it into a dairy coconut base as my take on the Filipino favorite. Unusual and soothing. — made by me for @sweetmilkgelato — #SweetMilkGelato #gelato #dessert #icecream #FrozenDessert #nomnom #dessertlovers #dessertporn #icecreamlovers #gelatoitaliano #foodporn #gelatolover #food #foodgasm #foodblogger #dessertgasm #desserttime #foodphotography #gelatoartigianale #gelatomania #dessertlover #icecream #icecreamlovers #buko #pandan #coconut

Overall, service was great. Decor is good. Snack bar is best in class. Sauce bar is an A-, but still great. Plating is the best I’ve seen at hot pot and the flavor was spectacular. If you can handle spicy hot pot, this is one of THE places to go. Seriously it’s as good as a similar place in Chengdu or Chongqing!

It should be noted that only 2 of the six of us (Yarom and I) were brave enough to eat from the spicy side. I ate entirely spicy, consequences be damned! It’s well worth it, but part of the experience is the catharsis and adrenaline rush. Expect coughing in reaction to the toxic fumes and insanely great heat. Some intestinal distress is nearly guaranteed.

Afterward, to cool down, we went across the street to Meet Fresh.

Counter order Asian Shave Ice place.

Very nice decor.

Shave ice with various beans and taro pudding and the like.

Super mango shave ice with sweetened milk and ice cream. Yum Yum! Plus some milk teas and the like.

Flan shave ice with ice cream, two kinds of flan, various jellies and jiggly bits, and all sorts of other cool stuff.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Chinese cuisine, Chongqing Hot Pot, Chun La Hao, hot pot, SGV, Sichuan, spicy, Szechuan Chinese, Szechuan Hot Pot

Molten Lava Goodness

Apr01

Restaurant: Shancheng Lameizi

Location: Mandarin Plaza. 18932 Gale Ave, Rowland Heights, CA 91748. (626) 581-8808

and 1530 S San Gabriel Blvd, San Gabriel, CA 91776. (626) 766-1700

Date: March 7 and March 26 and May 7 and June 22 and December 27, 2019

Cuisine: Szechuan Hot Pot

Rating: Best Hot Pot restaurant I’ve been to

On the middle night of my 3 day class trip to the SGV Yarom made the trek out east to join me for what Erick and Skylar said is the best new Chongqing style hot pot.

They describe themselves on their website thusly:

Our secret recipes of the soup base all come from Chongqing, so that our customers can taste the authentic flavor of hot pot from that mountain city. Apart from that, more than twenty kinds of free special snacks also attract many diners and lead to our good reputation, making the company prosper in the dining industry for more than twenty years. Our tenet of providing quality and comfortable service also makes every one of our customers “come with joy and leave with satisfaction”. Our specialties are delicious, rich-flavored and good for your calcium supplement. Their functions of skin care and regulating Qi and blood are also good for your health. Our soup is daily fresh-made.

This branch (there are a couple) is located in busy Mandarin plaza. There are like 15-20 Asian places out here and we are returning in the summer for a crawl.

There is even a bit of outside decor.

Check it out, they spent some actual money.

There is even an outside hot pot patio! (the tables have the built in hot pots). I’ve never seen this before.

Inside has a cute bit of decor, and tiny Chinese girl sized booths. We were initially offered a 2 person booth like the near one on the right — Yarom and I, being neither a couple nor particularly petite waited for a four person sized table.

Then 2 weeks later I was out in the SGV by myself picking up some gelato equipment and decided to try out the Alhambra branch. Similar elaborate building — I didn’t see the patio, but friends say it’s there. I went back again 5/7/19 too because this place is just that good.

Inside has another of these “fancy” Chinese decors that would cost an American 3 million but probably only cost them $300,000.

They have the best “sauce bar” I have ever seen, although you have to pay $1.50 a person for it. It includes more than just sauce like these snacks (which I didn’t eat).

More snacks.

Dessert. Very Chinese. Bean stuff sesame balls. Kinda dry and not worth the carbs.

More snacks. Peanuts, dried lima beans, etc. These were good. Shrimp chips.

Not sure what all these were. Some red beans. Some weird mysterious sweet things. Like those sperm on the left. Kinda gelatinous and sweet.

This is the main sauce components (there were a few others, not pictured, like garlic, peanuts, etc. This stuff was awesome. So many different super Chinese fermented spice flavors.

Very detailed pan across of all the sauce components!

Various toppings to add into your sauce mixes. The soy sauces, vinegar, oils are separated out.

Never heard of this oils, which makes it cool.

You fill out the menu while waiting.

From my cellar: NV Philipponnat Champagne Royale Réserve Rosé Brut. BH 92. A moderately fruity nose reflects notes of cherry, strawberry, raspberry, yeast and a subtle citrus nuance. There is a really lovely sense of energy to the delicious, round and nicely voluminous flavors that are shaped by a moderately fine effervescence that carries over to a lingering and solidly complex finish that is drier than the 9 g/L of dosage would suggest. One of the aspects that I particularly like here is that unlike many examples of rosé that tend to be prettier than they are deep, there has very good depth. Like the Royale Réserve, this could easily be held for further aging but it is so attractive now that there is no particular reason to do so.

agavin: perfect hot hot pot pairing

I developed 3 sauce blends. This is the “light” blend with a lot of vinegar, soy sauce, sesame oil, and various fermented flavors. Trying to be vinegar heavy.

This is the “meat” blend with a lot of peanut, sesame, and other spicy fermented flavors. Very thick and and heavy but delicious with the meat.

A different day’s sesame based blend.

This was a “fermented” flavor. Tons of peppers and every weird fermented chili thing I could find. Interesting and delicious.

And another take on fermented flavor of death. I added every type of chili oil and everything fermented.

Sauce refills.

Crispy Pork Appetizer. I really wanted to order some pork rind like things I saw on another table, but ended up with these, basically like the fried pork chunks that are in a good version of the sweet and sour pork. Pretty delicious actually. Like pork tenders.

We got the hot pot split with bone broth and super spicy Szechuan hot pot (the slurry of melted ox fat, chilies, and peppercorns). I asked for max heat. They also have a 9 way split but it’s more so people can have their own area. They only have 2 broths.

Starting to heat up.

Furious boil (on the left).

Video of it boiling.

On request, you can even get a branded bib — I highly recommend you do!

Certified Angus Beef Short Rib. Very nice meat.

On top was Lamb Shoulder. Also really good.

Fatty Beef Belly — richer!

Some other meat.

Streaky Pork. Thicker and full of flavor.

Meatball Combo (beef? and a fish ball).

Tofu Combo. Lighter and heavier tofu.

Rice cakes. Carby but great texture.

Vegetable combo. Various cabbage and greens. These are really good sauce vehicles and helped wash things down.

Some root vegetables.

Yarom brought this Cab from the night before — still in awesome shape and strong enough to overcome the heat.

On top, Special Luncheon Pork (spam). So good we had three orders! Below was Mini Sausage which have a lot of flavor and open up when cooked.

Raw Pig brain! Yeah, it’s really scary. I made sure to cook it really really well.

Chicken gizzard. Very very chewy. Can’t say I would recommend.

Spongey mushroom with shrimp. Surprisingly delicious. Interesting spongey texture too.

Fish Filet. Chunks of thick deboned whole fish that you drop in — in my case into the spicy side — to get that Szechuan boiled fish effect.

Mushroom combo to add even more fiber to the mix — plus one of our extra luncheon meats.

Wood ear mushroom. I love these guys.

Special baby bamboo shoot (5/7/19). On one of my return trips they had added LOTS of specials, including all sorts of intestines. I skipped those and got this sheet of delicious fiber — along with the mushrooms and chili oil keeps one fully regular. Notice that I again ordered the baloney.

Lotus root. Always add some nice texture to a hot pot.

You can order fried or white rice if you like.

The girls next door ordered quite differently with quail eggs, bean curd, and PIG BRAIN!

The bill is 100% in Chinese!

Overall, this was probably the best Szechuan style hot pot I’ve had, up there with my friend Wendy’s epic home cooked New Years hot pot (which isn’t spicy, but had really good stuff). I think Shancheng Lameizi was actually better than the place we went in Chengdu and definitely a little better than my local favorite Hai di Lao. The atmosphere was very Chinese, the ingredient quality was excellent, service good, they allowed us to open our wine ($10 corkage, which they might not have even charged), the broth, particularly the spicy broth was insanely good, and the sauce bar was unparalleled for blending weird intense Chinese flavors. Now, do bear in mind, that given the super spicy soup base, and my thick chili laden slurry of sauces that what goes in the pot is largely about texture. lol.

Apparently there is a branch at Valley and San Gabriel, right near the Crack House, Shaanxi Garden, etc. When I went 2 weeks later it was just as good! Very crowded at lunch too (and this is a HEAVY lunch!). I’ve now been at least 5 times and it’s always great.

Oh, and do bear in mind that hot pot like this is a form of high fat “cleanse.” As they say at Killer Noodle, “mind your bottom!”

For my catalog of Chinese restaurant reviews, click here.

This minimall is hilarious. Tons of different places. Don’t know what this kind of BBQ is (appears to be a Chinese take on Yakitori), but the slogan is amusing.

This old school 50s or 60s place has become a Benihana clone — but more Chinese.

By: agavin
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Tagged as: beef, Chinese cuisine, hot pot, pig brains, pork, Sichuan, spicy, Szechuan Hot Pot, Yarom

Eating Chengdu – Fiery Hot Pot

Sep22

Restaurant: ? Hot Pot

Location: ? read the Chinese card below

Date: August 4, 2018

Cuisine: Szechuan Hot Pot

Rating: Stomach of Ox in Chili Oil says it all

A visit to Chengdu wouldn’t be right without some fiery Chengdu Hot Pot to cleanse the GI.

Nearby was another of those restored streets that looks like the China you wish was still around.

Replete with pole toting vendors.

And giant gates.

This is our hot pot. It was recommended to us because they have individual pots and actual vegetarian broth — something we needed with our diverse party.

Now the actual name remains a mystery to me. Maybe one of my Chinese reading friends will translate and tell me.

Inside.

And our private room equipped with individual inductive pots.

Some actual alcoholic beverage — almost a week into the trip!

Steamed buns with condensed milk — guilty pleasure.

Scallion pancake.

Meanwhile we have the hot pot sauces. I think there might have been a sauce bar downstairs which I would have liked, but I made due with the fixed sauces.

And some condiments to jazz them up like chilies, garlic (my favorite), and green onion.

Then the spicy hot pot. I forgot to photo the kid’s tomato broth, the non-spicy chicken broth, and the vegan mushroom broth.

The spicy one is an ass busting mix of rendered ox fat, chili oil, chilies, and Szechuan peppercorns!

All of the following stuff is intended to go into the pots, cook to your personal taste, then be sauced and eaten.

Homemade meat balls, not frozen like you usually find in the states.

Tomatoes.

Wontons.

Mixed mushrooms.

Sliced potatoes.

Fish (mackerel?).

Glass noodles.

Green colored wheat noodles.

Greens.

Beef slices.

Lamb slices.

Stomach of ox. Yep, ox tripe. Only for those with strong stomachs! This stuff was so chewy — with a texture exactly like a really thick water balloon — that I was chewing it for 3-4 minutes straight before I thought it was safe to swallow.

Fresh bamboo.

Fish balls stuffed with pork. Yummy!

Lotus root. I love this stuff for the nice crunch.

Tofu.

For those of you who dream of making this kind of Szechuan hot pot at home, I saw the above home starter kit in many Chengdu stores. You take this brick of chillies and ox fat and plop it into the chicken or pork broth of your choice and melt, therefore rendering it all into a fiery pit of stomach hell.

This was a fine hot pot place, and we had to do it — and definitely I prefer the spicy Chengdu style to any other. It’s just that hot pot isn’t my favorite Chinese meal as it’s sort of monotone. You only really have one “sauce” / style of prep for the night. Just lots of ingredients. We do have pretty good hot pot in LA — and it’s very popular.

All I can say is that it’s a good thing that the Chengdu Ritz Carlton bathrooms come equipped with state of the art Toto “auto washing” toilets!

For my catalog of Chinese restaurant reviews in China, click here.

Szechuan face changing at the Chengdu Opera

Acres of Lotus at a nearby public park

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: beer, Chengdu, China, Eating Chengdu, Eating China, hot pot, Sichuan, spicy, Szechuan cuisine

Mountain Hot Pot

Mar05

On one of my 2018 trips to Mammoth for skiing some friends hosted us (two nights in a row) at their condo for homemade Chinese Hot Pot. Yay!

And we returned on New Year’s Eve for even more great hot pot.

I was in charge of the libations. From my cellar: 2011 Pierre-Yves Colin-Morey Saint-Aubin 1er Cru En Remilly Cuvée Nicholas et Mathis. 93 points.

Our hosts Wendy and Alex pulled out all the stops, cutting up all the additives like the above tofu and veggies.

Beef — higher quality than at most hot pot places.

Beef, pork, squid, and fish balls. I love these.

Shrimp.

Mushrooms.

Glass noodles.

From my cellar: 2004 Domaine Michel Gros Vosne-Romanée 1er Cru Aux Brulées. BH 89. Deep ruby. Distinctly ripe and perfumed aromas of warm earth, underbrush, spice, dark berry fruit and a subtle smokiness complement perfectly the supple, sweet but robust medium full flavors that finish with impressive complexity and solid power. This is firmly structured but not hard or aggressive and the natural ripeness of Brulées comes through here.

The broth by itself. It was a pork broth.

Some of the ultra-tender pork meat that came out of the broth.

Condiments to use in constructing dipping sauce. This was also my job.

Our hosts, Wendy left and Alex right. Chopping away!

The loaded hot pot!

So on 12/31/18 we returned for another round of even more over the top hot pot.

This is one serious home hot pot spread!

Three types of mushrooms, tofu and bean curd.

On the right 3-4 flavors of “meatballs.”

Fish cakes!

From my cellar: 1997 Maison Roche de Bellene Chambertin Collection Bellenum. 96 points. This wine was drinking superbly tonight.

Four kinds of meat including pork belly, lamb, and two awesome types of beef!

Veggies.

Marinated tofu.

And an array of sauce components.

As New Year approached we, of course, cracked the Krug.

Our host additionally made this amazing Apple Pie.

And homemade mochi / red bean “brownies”.
Wendy takes her Ice Cream seriously. Look at the freezer drawer!!!

Overall, a fabulous and fun meal. Better than at some of the hot pot restaurants I’ve been too and loads of fun.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Chinese cuisine, home cooking, hot pot, Mammoth Lakes

Quick Eats – Flaming Pot

Jan15

Restaurant: Flaming Pot

Location: 2222 Sawtelle Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90064

Date: December 1, 2017

Cuisine: Taiwanese Hot Pot

Rating: Simple

In the SGV both “medium end” and cheap hot pots are plentiful and mobbed. My favorite of the higher end ones in Hai di Lao, and it and similar level are cheap enough that I never have seen fit to go to Boiling Pot or the other super crowded cheap ones.

But a Taiwanese variant has opened on Sawtelle right next to Popcorn Chicken (same owners).

The interior is about $20k above nothing much.

Extremely minimalist space, and I don’t even think they have a hood.

The menu is simple. A few fixed hot pots with some minimal options.

Ice tea. Seems to default sweetened. Ick.

Spicy Flaming Pot. Packaged noodles, beef, fish balls, tofu, pig intestine. Doesn’t look that spicy either. Unlike the more elaborate hot pot where you cook yourself this is just a pot you heat up and heat. It’s actually easier, but takes a bit of the fun out of it.

Curry Pot. Pork, veggies, corn, imitation crab, fish balls, mushrooms. The curry flavor was very mild. Just some curry powder really. It didn’t taste bad.

Boiled lamb slices. They did add some flavor and protein to the pot. But aren’t exactly high quality.

Rice.
Rice noodles. Turn into super thin glass noodles.

Overall, very mediocre. I might come back if desperate. It’s not bad. And it’s fairly cheap (although mysteriously more than ramen). Service was TERRIBLE. They were very confused young Chinese kids. Nice enough. Unless you love hot pot and are really don’t want to drive, not too much reason to frequent.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: China Cuisine, Flaming Pot, hot pot, Sawtelle Blvd, Sawtelle Little Tokyo

Little Sheep Hot Pot

Oct21

Restaurant: Little Sheep Mongolian Hot Pot

Location: 140 W Valley Blvd #213, San Gabriel, CA 91776. (626) 307-1901

Date: October 18, 2015

Cuisine: Mongolian Hot Pot

Rating: Middling quality hot pot

Hot Pot is an ever popular style of Northern Chinese / Mongolian food. Basically a pot of boiling broth is used tableside to cook various foods.

Little Sheep is a small chain, the name refers to the prevalence of lamb in Mongolian cooking. Fortunately it’s not, “Little Marmot,” as the squirrel-like rodent is common on the Mongolian steppes and has been known to end up on the cook fire.

The interior is fairly modern.

The menu, somewhere in the middle of our markup process. You have to understand that you basically order plates of stuff, which you add to your hot pot.

Little Sheep does have a sauce bar. It’s not nearly as extensive as the one at Hai di Lao, particularly as the left and right halves are the same, but it’s still more than sufficient to make a great sauce.

These are my sauces. On the left is a richer sesame paste one, on the right a lighter ponzu style.

There are two broth types here, “plain” and “spicy.” This is spicy, which isn’t actually that spicy unless you eat the chilies — but good luck avoiding them all!

2009 Sea Smoke Pinot Noir Ten. VM 89. One of the Sea Smoke flagships, the 2009 Pinot Noir Ten impresses for its depth and sheer power. Layers of flavor flow through to the huge, dramatic finish in a full-bodied, intense Pinot. Once the intensity of the fruit fades, there is not much development in the glass, which results in an overall impression of one dimensionality. The Ten is one of Sea Smoke’s flagships. It is made from all ten Pinot clones planted on the property. While a solid effort, I expected more from this offering, which also happens to be the wine through which I discovered Sea Smoke years ago.

Supreme lamb shoulder.

Premium Lamb leg.

Supreme angus beef.

USDA Choice rib eye.

Beef of an indeterminate nature.

Pork belly. Look at all that fat.

Free range chicken. Surprisingly good, for chicken.

2009 Aubert Pinot Noir UV Vineyard. VM 93. The 2009 Pinot Noir UV Vineyard once again shows the richness and heft of the clay-rich soils in this site. This is an especially dense Pinot, even by Aubert’s standards, that needs another year or so in bottle to start shedding some of its baby fat. Despite the wine’s richness, there is more than enough underlying minerality to give the wine a sense of proportion and harmony.

Lamb meat balls.

Beef meat balls.

Pork meat balls.

Luncheon meat. A.k.a. spam. Delicious.

Pork sausages. Little wieners.

From my cellar: 2004 Joh. Jos. Prüm Wehlener Sonnenuhr Riesling Spätlese. 92 points. #1; COLOR-nice golden; NOSE-burnt BMX tires meets peaches, apricots & pears; spritzy; TASTE-beautiful bluestone; gorgeous dried Apricots; viscous & oily; gorgeous peach juice; very polished; great, great wine; very delicate; nice floral aspects; subtle cactus juice & on the finish; a concoction of Cantaloupe & dandelion dancing on the back-end; very complex; great balance of acidity & fruit; great structure; absolute elegance at it’s finest; DS-92; GV-92.

Scallops. Total fail here, these were not fresh.

Shrimp. These were fine.

Calamari (squid).

Crab legs. Got a bit mushy in the pot.

Fried fish cakes. Pretty tasty, with an interesting chewy texture.

2010 Domaine / Maison Vincent Girardin Meursault Les Narvaux. Burghound 89-91. An elegant, pure and cool nose of white flower and citrus leads to minerally and well-concentrated middle weight flavors that possess a racy, intense and well-balanced finish. This dry and relatively forward effort should offer 2 to 3 years of upside development if desired.

Miscellaneous vegetable plate.

Miscellaneous mushroom plate.

Soft tofu. I love it, but hard to get out of the pot.

Hot Pot Dumplings. Chewy, tasty. Not sure what if anything was actually inside.

Udon noodles. Again hard to get out of the pot.

Fresh egg noodles. I loved these. Mixed with the sauce they made one of those tangy/spicy Chinese noodle dishes.

Glass noodles. Also great.

Chinese donut. Not actually sweet at all, but with a very nice crunch.

Mongolian bread. Hot from the oven and nice. Who says Chinese don’t make bread?

Mongolian beef pie. This one was delicious. We had a second that was a bit overdone and wasn’t so great.

2010 Copain P2. 89 points. Neither red, white nor rose. Slight tannins from red give body and structure while the pinot gris gives a fragrant juciness that allows it to go with so many modern foods, especially on a warm day with a slight chill.

Lamb dumplings. A little weak.

Pork dumplings. Same. Just kinda soft without too much flavor.

Lamb skewers. With the usual cumin.

Beef skewers.

Chicken skewers.

At the end, the cooling sauce is starting to congeal.

Overall, Little Sheep is a decent hot pot place. The broth was good, the sauces good, and many of the ingredients like the meat and breads quite good. The seafood was fairly lousy, and the dumplings weak. They also don’t have a ton of broth choices and you have to share the pot with about 4-5 people.

Now I’d place it about Hot Pot Hot Pot (with a 8+ person per pot and no sauce bar), but below Hai di Lao. However both of the first two have a bit more variety of non hot pot ingredients than Hai di Lao.

After, we wandered downstairs in this monster Maxi-mall (which also includes Spicy City) and checked out this bakery.

A couple of us got this layered Crepe Cake. It’s just crepes and custard, chilled. Mild, sweet, milky and delicious — like a sort of crepey tres leches cake.

Another mild cakey thing.

And they also have various teas and slushies. On the left a milk tea, on the right a mango slushie.

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here.

or more crazy Hedonist dinners here!

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Bake Code, Bakery, Chinese cuisine, Dessert, hedonists, hot pot, lamb, Little Sheep Mongolian Hot Pot, Mongolian cuisine, Riesling, Wine

Night of the Whirling Noodles

Sep09

Restaurant: Hai Di Lao Hot Pot

Location: 400 S Baldwin Ave, Arcadia, CA 91007. (626) 445-7232

Date: September 7 & 20, 2015

Cuisine: Chinese Hot Pot

Rating: Very solid hot pot with good ingredients

I’ve been eating Shabu Shabu for decades, but it was only about 7 years ago on a trip to China that I realized it was actually a food derived from China. True, the Japanese put their own wonderful spin on nearly any food type they incorporate, but they picked it up while “visiting” in Northern China during the war and toned down the spice.

Hai Di Lao is a hugely popular Chinese hot pot chain that has moved to America.

And it’s located in the middle of the food area of Arcadia’s Westfield mall!

The menu is extensive. Not as huge as Hot Pot Hot Pot, but certainly big enough. They are also so modern that you order from ipads at the table!

The interior is updated and contemporary Chinese.

It was busy too, even at 5pm!

A great feature here, and an area in which the bargain Hot Pot Hot Pot totally fails at is the sauce bar. They have this HUGE bar where you can build your own sauce concoctions. Plus there are various cold appetizer ingredients there too.

Row after row of different sauce components.

More.

More.

And even more, including the giant vat of garlic!

And there were four of these helpful cards providing suggestions for those who aren’t sauce experts.

Amuse. These skewers of indeterminate yellow stuff came with the meal. They had a bit of crunch too them. I think it was some turnips and the like.

2011 Willi Schaefer Graacher Domprobst Riesling Spätlese #10. JG 92. The contributing parcels are Ferbert and Gertzgrub, mid and low slope, and of course Schaefers knew and could show me on the satellite map. We’re sleeker now, but again this tumbling swelling into an absurdity of mineral nuance and lip-licking saltiness; a doctoral thesis in slate.

agavin: great with the heat.

Pickled vegetables.

Above were some of our sauce concoctions.

I also made this spicy mung bean jelly. Yum!

Mushroom broth. With enoki, shiitake, and cloud ear mushrooms. Another huge win at HDL is that everyone has an individual Hot Pot. One of my problems at some other places is sharing a big hot pot with 10 people. This was a nice light mild broth.

Spicy Szechuan Broth. I got this one. Szechuan spicy oil and ginger with garlic. Spicy and also a little numbing. Awesome stuff, basically the same chili oil / numbing heat as a “fish filets boiled in chili oil” Szechuan dish. Really had a lot of flavor even on its own without the sauces.

Shrimp. These large shrimp had to be pulled out of the pot quickly, but they were good.

Nice fresh scallops on ice.

The lobster seafood combo. Salmon, scallops, shrimp, lobster, and orange clam.

A selection of meat balls. Some meat, some fish. I liked them all.

2004 Saxum Syrah Broken Stones. Parker 92-95. Exquisite from the barrel, the opaque ruby/purple-colored 2004 Broken Stones (75% Syrah and 25% Grenache) exhibits crisp underlying acidity, a sweet perfume of raspberries, blackberries, garrigue, pepper, and spice box, full body, and tremendous length, richness, and balance. It should easily age for 12+ years. I highly recommend that wine enthusiasts who love Rhone Ranger wines pay a visit to the James Berry Vineyard, one of the true grand cru sites in the region.

agavin: a monster, and quiet nice once the heat of the food had settled down.

Marinated beef tenderloin. Lean beef marinated with Korean chili. Good stuff, although not like you could taste the chili after it was boiled in my chili oil and drowned in my super strong hot sauce mix 🙂

Angus Rib Eye. I think. Had to remember which meat we ordered. This was one of our favorites.

Beef Short rib. More yummy meat.

Lamb shoulder. Awesome and tender. These aren’t super frozen like the ones at Hot Pot Hot Pot, which is a good thing.

Spam. Delicious. You mock it, but it’s great in the pot.

Crispy pork sausage. These delicious little Frankenfurters open up like squid flowers in the heat.

Mixed vegetable combo. Obvious enough.

Mixed Mushroom combo. Good stuff.

Soft tofu. I love the texture here. With the spicy sauce it was like Ma Po.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GuSLhEsZTmQ]

Dancing Noodle.

Made with wheat, egg, and flour. The noodle dancer comes to your table and stretches the noodle in a pretty amazing display of noodle power.

The hand pulled noodle goes right into the pot. In this sauce, it was fine on it’s own after 2 minutes.

Mango pudding. “Free” dessert. Cool and hit the spot.

And some more, fresh fruit.

We liked HDL. In fact, I thought it was much better than Hot Pot Hot Pot, which while good, was kind of a zoo of cheap prices. The advantages here are solid ingredient quality, great broth choices, the amazing sauce bar (HPHP sauces were lame, and the sauce is very important), and individual pots. The individual pot is key. Sharing all the ingredients is fun, but when you have 8-10 people in one pot you don’t really control what you cook, how long, or that you even get it. Plus it’s a little gross.

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Chinese cuisine, Hai Di Lao, hot pot, noodles, Szechuan

Hot Pot Hot Pot

Apr08

Restaurant: Hot Pot Hot Pot

Location: 120 S Atlantic Blvd, Monterey Park, CA 91754. (626) 282-1089

Date: June 20, 2015

Cuisine: Mongolian Hot Pot

Rating: Shabu Shabu’s evil good cousin!

Hot Pot is one of those Chinese comfort foods that American’s usually know nothing about.

These places are mobbed, and there are a lot of them. Basically, it’s throw lots of things in a pot of boiling broth and cook it table side. Similar to Shabu Shabu — and this is hardly a surprise as the Japanese got the idea from the Chinese during WWII (when they occupied big chunks of China).

The menu is enormous and full of pictures.

Each table has a hot pot burner.

Our half and half with house original broth and house spicy broth. All sorts of stuff is floating and in the broth, but everyone decided they liked the spicy a lot better.

While we wait for this to heat, we sample a few appetizers.

Seasoned jellyfish.

Scallion Crispy Pancake. Good stuff.

Lamb dumplings. Awesome, if a touch mushy and very (temperature) hot.

Pork dumplings. Oink!

Lamb fried rice. We loved this enough to order 3-4 orders.

Shrimp fried rice. Good too.

The hot pot ingredients come on these cute little trays. This is about half of what we ordered! As you can see from the menu there are a lot of choices. All of these items are eaten by cooking them to the desired amount in the boiling broth of your choice.

They have four sauces you can combine to make up your sauce. A sesame one, a darker more punchy one, a hot one, and a tangy plum type one. No one in our group was a skilled sauce maker, which is a kind of black art.

First up are the meats.

Pork belly. Pretty much bacon. You start with the meats to fatten up the broth.

Sliced beef.

USDA Prime Angus beef. A ricer cut.

Sliced lamb. The Mongolian classic.

Pork skin. Really sucked up the juices, but an odd texture.

Beef meatball. Great. The other table also had the lamb meatball which was even better.

Spam. Yeah, sounds kinda crazy but it was awesome.

Shrimp. Sort of a waste all boiled up.

Squid. A giant cuttlefish or squid.

Jumbo Scallop. These were good.

Fish dumpling. Good but a bit fishy.

Two kinds of fish ball.

Soft tofu. I love this stuff. Hard to get out of the pot though.

Fried tofu and a glimpse of the lamb meatball.

Melon?

Water chestnuts or bamboo.

Enoki mushrooms.

Oyster mushrooms.

Maitake Mushroom.

Squash.

Cabbage and corn.

Some kind of green.

Pea tips.

A-Choy.

Udon noodles.

Mongolian Noodle.

The pot in full action. Bear in mind that 8 or so people are sharing this — quite the chaotic endeavor.

Chicken fried noodle. In case the rice wasn’t enough carbs.

The aftermath.

The wine situation was so fluid that I made no attempt to pair it with anything in this report. It’s all just listed here.

2001 Château Monbousquet Blanc. VM 90. Aromas of grapefruit and spicy, vanillin oak. Chewy and bright, with peach, grapefruit, mint and floral flavors enlivened by fresh acidity. Finishes lively and long, with subtle notes of lime and honeysuckle and a tactile, saline quality. Shows no sign of the 13.7% alcohol. Much higher in acidity than the 2000 version, a year when acid levels were compromised by rain two days prior to the harvest. This was bottled in January of this year, eight months later than previous vintages owing to the stronger structure of the wine.

2006 Chateau St. Jean Chardonnay Sonoma County. 86 points. I get bananas and tropical fruit on the nose. Maybe pineapple. A bit of pear on the palate.

2011 Bedrock Wine Co. Chardonnay.

From my cellar: 1994 Ulrich Langguth Piesporter Goldtröpfchen Riesling Auslese. 85 points. This bottle was very bretty and not the best I’ve opened.

2011 Sea Smoke Pinot Noir Southing. 91 points. Nose is all candied red fruit. Ripe cherries and a little bit of cola, with zippy acidity and a bit of new oak across the finish. Good concentration, so will go strong for a while. I expect that this will be doing just fine in 5-6 years, but it’s a fantastic bottle worth drinking right now.

2009 Domaine Denis Mortet Gevrey-Chambertin. BH 89-90. An earthy and very ripe nose of extract of black berry fruit aromas merges into very suave, rich and opulently textured medium-bodied flavors that brim with dry extract that easily buffers the relatively fine tannins, indeed this is much finer than most Gevrey villages wines.

2011 Sine Qua Non Syrah Dark Blossom. VM 96. The 2011 Syrah Dark Blossom is dark, mysterious and wonderfully inviting. Black fruit, savory herbs, leather and spice meld together in a deep, dense wine that is constantly changing in the glass. Savory overtones add intrigue. The firm, muscular 2011 tannins are going to need time to soften. Readers lucky enough to find the 2011 can look forward to years of thrilling drinking.

2002 Bond Matriarch. VM 92. Good full medium ruby. Dark plum, truffle and buttery oak on the nose. Suave and fine-grained, with enticing flavors of plum and black raspberry. A plump, sexy wine with a long, slow-building finish featuring very fine tannins. This shows a firmer structure than the very good 2001. In fact, this seems more refined, as well as more of a real wine rather than simply a blend made up of declassified fruit, than previous vintages of The Matriarch.

2012 Dark Hundred.

2010 Les Vins de Vienne (Cuilleron Gaillard Villard) Cornas Les Barcillants. VM 90. Inky ruby. Sexy aromas of dark fruit compote and vanilla, with complicating notes of smoked meat, olive and floral oil. Creamy, palate-staining black and blue fruit flavors show very good depth and pick up spiciness with air. Dusty tannins come on late and give grip to a spicy, focused finish that repeats the smoky note.

2012 Bedrock Wine Co. Zinfandel Old Vine. VM 90. Vivid ruby. Pungent, high-pitched aromas of cherry skin, raspberry, licorice and lavender, with a bright mineral topnote. Juicy and incisive, with sappy dark berry and bitter cherry flavors. Supple tannins add grip to the spicy, floral finish.

2012 Bodegas Los Toneles Cabernet Sauvignon Export Selection La Pradera.

2010 Tenuta Valdipiatta Vino Nobile di Montepulciano.

2008 Sine Qua Non Roussanne Jinete Bajo Vin de Paille. VM 95. Deep gold. A highly aromatic, pungent bouquet of orange marmalade, apricot nectar and yellow plum, with exotic honey and spice notes. Lush and creamy in texture, with deeply concentrated, sweet pit and tropical fruit flavors and a strong note of candied citrus. There’s surprising energy and lift to the finish, which leaves juicy peach and orange notes behind. I’d serve this as a dessert, by itself. This clocks in at 11.8% alcohol, with 240 g/l of residual sugar.

From my cellar: 1989 Chateau Gilette Creme de Tete. Parker 93+. I actually prefer the aromas of the 1989 Chateau Gilette Creme de Tete to those of the 1990. The nose is initially taciturn but then it unfurls with engaging scents of aniseed, beeswax, smoke and lychee. The palate has a spicy entry, almost Alsace-like in style, with light honeyed notes, curry powder and cumin. The finish feels dry, although in fact there would be around 110 grams per liter of sugar. This has great potential, although personally I would suggest it needs at least another 5 to 6 years in bottle.

2012 Inniskillin Vidal Icewine Niagara Peninsula VQA. 92 points.

Overall, this was cheap, yummy, and fun eats. Like a more flavorful giant group shabu shabu with lots and lots of options. Totally Chinese!

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here.

or more crazy Hedonist dinners here!

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Chinese cuisine, hedonists, hot pot, lamb, mushrooms, Wine

Szechuan Everywhere

Oct23

Restaurant: Chuan’s

Location: 5807 Rosemead Blvd. Temple City, CA 91780. (626) 677-6667

Date: October 21, 2014 and January 4 & 12, 2016 and March 6, 2016

Cuisine: Szechuan Chinese

Rating: Great flavors, not ultra hot

I love me some Szechuan, and surprisingly, so do a lot of others because Szechuan places have become all the rage lately. This is a composite meal built from 2 Hedonists dinners and several casual lunches.

Chuan’s is the latest Chinese chain to open a Southern California output, like Meizhou Dongpo in the Century City Mall.

The interior is actually styled and casual but cute. They have a private room too which we ate in.

The menu is super glitzy with big clear pictures of every dish (oh so helpful!). This is the 2014 edition, as it has changed slightly since then.

Spicy peanuts. With celery. These do have a mild kick.

Vinegar peanuts. King of like a tangy Kung Pao without the meat!

Cold appetizer plate. Cured beef, beef tripe, and firm tofu.

Coated Lima Beans. Delicious actually. A kind of sweet and salty vibe.

Chuan’s didn’t offer liquor on our first visit, and we couldn’t bring ours in really either. But they did have this (non-alcoholic) Sour Plum Juice that was quite delicious. It had a smokey rich flavor. Really smokey — the most like bacon of any juice I’ve ever had.

Cold eggplant with preserved green chilies. A bit funny looking, but pretty damn good, and that’s even with this being the style of steamed eggplant I usually don’t like. The chilies were excellent.

Spicy avocado. Never had this one. Maybe a Cal/Chinese hybrid, but pretty good.

Chopped Chicken with Fresh Peppercorns. The menu version had a lot more peppercorns. This is always a good dish, and this example was no exception. There was the “boney chicken bits” problem, but, hey, this is authentic Chinese food. It wasn’t that hot.

Bean Jelly with Preserved Soybean and Peppers. A fabulous dish (even if the bean jelly noodles were a bit thick) as it had a delicious tangy, salty, hot flavor that was nicely in balance.

Another Bean jelly. There are two versions of this dish, with slightly different sauces on the menu. Very slippery!

Dan Dan Noodles. The Szechuan classic. Both times we came for dinner the dan dan was a tad bland, although the noodle texture was nice.

Here they are mixed up. On my several lunch visit (pictured) the dan dan was great, with a lovely complex nutty undertone. Small portion though (perfect for 1-2 people).

Chengdu Sour and Spicy Vermicelli. A bit more flavor than the Dan Dan, but still maybe a little bland on the first visit. On the second dinner visit this had been punched up with a lot more sauce (below).

And this version was great, with that sour/numbing vibe.

Chili slathered Pork Dumplings. These were great. Better than Chengdu Taste, not as good as this mall food (lol).

Sweet and Sour Herba Houttuyniae. Never heard of this herbal green. But it was delicious.

Sesame lettuce. A really nice salad, with a very strong sesame dressing.

Crispy Duck Drenched in Oil. The name about sums it up. This had a nice pastrami-like tea-smoked flavor.

Ma Po Tofu. A delicious take on the classic. This version had a nice tang, great texture, and a bit of heat. It didn’t really have enough peppercorn numbness for my taste, but it was still probably the dish of the night in October 2014. In March 2016, it was a little salty and the tofu a little soft.

Combination fried rice. Solid fried rice.

Fish with Pickled Cabbage from Hometown. The “green chili” version of the boiled fish dish typical in Szechuan. This one was moderately mild. Fine, but not exciting.

Cherry Braised Pork. Fatty, but absolutely delicious. Like melt-in-the-mouth bacon cubes.

Fish filets boiled in chili sauce. The classic Chungking dish. Not bad at all. Nice soft/fresh filets of fish.

Boiled Beef with Chilis. This was a hotly debated dish at the table. I thought it was very tasty, although on the mild side. Some others didn’t love it.

The sauce was incredibly delicious over rice. Have a bit of chili oil!

Shredded chicken and glass noodle with chilies. This third boiled chili dish was fabulous with soft strips of boneless chicken and glass noodles buried in all that red.

Dry cooked string beans with potatoes. The classic Szechuan green beans + french fries in spicy sauce!

Corn with pork belly. Insanely good. The lardon-like pork served as the fat in place of the butter and made for one tasty corn dish!

Suicide potatoes. Sliced potatoes with a fabulous spicy Szechuan rub. Fairly spicy for this meal, but not really that hot on an absolute scale.

Eggplant. A version of the garlic eggplant dishes, this one with soy beans. Quite tasty, if mild.

Special Lobster. This wasn’t on the menu, and it cost a bundle, but it was absolutely scrumptious — although the meat was a bit hard to get at.

Chili crab. Great Szechuan dry-pot like vegetables below, and fried crab that was cooked until the shell is soft.

Kung Pao Shrimp Balls. AKA Kung Pao Shrimp. Nice pungent ginger/scallion flavor. Not that hot either but tasty.

Squid with chilies. Nice chew and flavor. Just a touch of fishiness.

Fried scallops. Spice in the batter, and VERY fried, with a nice tempura crunch. A little like the Nobu tempura popcorn shrimp.

Dry spicy fried chicken with chilies. Also a classic Szechuan dish. The chicken had ALL the bone bits. Almost every piece was filled with bone. Despite this, or perhaps owing to this, the taste was amazing. You just crunch through the bone and it tasted great with chili aromatics, fat, and a bit of numbing Szechuan peppercorn.

Crispy Beef. Basically, chicken fried steak nuggets! Probably really should have been a lamb dish traditionally, but was beef here. Tasty though. The meat was soft and flavorful. So soft, and so pare, that we were joking about it not being beef.

And the pepper/peanut mix fun to pick at.

Twice cooked pork with buns. Super tender flavorful meat with soft buns. Awesome combination too. Really tasty together.

Cumin lamb. The classic, but a very good version with tender lamb.

Chicken with green chilis. A bit of heat here, and a different style of chili heat than most of the dishes with their red chilies.

Shredded potatoes. Fine, although I’ve had better versions of this dish.

Special Seafood Dry Hot Pot. Like a Wuhan dish, a mix of dry hot shrimp, potatoes, veggies, fish balls, and the like.

Fried pumpkin and bean cakes. Greasy, but pretty good for fried Chinese desserts. These had that mochi like consistency with the bean paste inside. VERY fried and greasy.

Overall, Chuan’s was extremely tasty. The service was great, and they seemed to use fairly high quality ingredients, on par with Szechuan Impression and better than at Chengdu Taste. The flavors were good too and there is a lot of variety on the menu. But it isn’t that spicy. Really, afterward I was thinking it was about right because the through the night burn was fairly mild, but during, I missed that searing/numbing heat that is found at the hottest examples of Szechuan cuisine. Most dishes were well executed. Almost no bombs. Weakest probably was the fish filets, dan dan (both evening visits — although they have been great at lunch), and maybe the duck (a lot of others liked the duck), but there were a lot of very strong dishes too: Ma Po Tofu, dumplings, the meats, Lobster, dan dan (second visit), shredded chicken with noodles.

On our second dinner the young lady above helped us out and she did a great job. We ordered in flights and she kept everything straight and changed out the plates fast.

Chuan’s is one of my favorite Szechuan places for a combination of atmosphere, service, and dish execution. It’s not as “home style” as one like Cui Hau Lou, but they use very good ingredients and I never get the MSG headache.

The Ladies Room included this amusing public service notice!

During our March 2016 visit it was close to Chinese New Year and there was a show given by this character in costume — actually pretty cool and certainly mysteriously Chinese.
Afterward (on our October 2014 visit) we went around the corner in the minimall to Guppy’s a strange kitchy Taiwanese place for some shave ice.

Taro/Red Been Shave Ice. This, by the way, is the “to go” a size smaller than the small!

Strawberry shave ice with mango ice cream. This is a small! Notice the cup of sweetened condensed milk on the table, in case it isn’t sweet enough!

Taro, Red Bean, Strawberry, Banana, Shave Ice with Mango ice cream. This gives a better sense of the scale of these monsters!

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here,

or more crazy Hedonist dinners here!

For our March 6, 2016 dinner at Chuan’s we brought wine (they had no liquor license when we first came). They did charge $15 corkage. Here is the lineup of mostly sweet stuff.

NV Paul Bara Coteaux Champenois Grand Cru Bouzy Rouge. 92 points. Nice rose.

NV Jean Josselin Champagne Brut Cordon Royal. 92 points.

From my cellar: 2008 Pierre Morey Meursault Les Terres Blanches. 92 points. Bright yellow. A musky quality blew off to reveal strong nutty notes of macadamia and almond, plus a whiff of iodiney oyster shell. Densely packed, tactile and serious but with a light touch. More rocks and flowers than primary fruit here. A precise, persistent, rather grown-up style of Meursault, and serious for village wine.

2013 Desparada Sauvignon Blanc Borealis.1.E4 McGinley Vineyard. VM 88. The 2013 Sauvignon Blanc Borealis.1.E.4 is an intriguing wine made in amphora. Lemon, grapefruit and white flowers meld together in a bright, nicely balanced wine. The 2013 was made from McGinley Vineyard. As so often happens wines made in amphora, the vessel and elevage dominate the wine’s personality. It will be interesting to see where future vintages go.

2012 Herman Story Tomboy. VM 89. Lemon oil, white flowers, mint and jasmine meld together in the 2012 Viognier Tomboy. Floral notes add lift in an oily, textured Viognier built on raciness and persistence. The 100% new French oak is evident, but nicely balanced at the same time. The 2011 spent 12 months in 100% new French oak.

agavin: too heavy for my taste.

F.X. Pichler Riesling Smaragd Dürnsteiner Hollerin (don’t remember vintage). VM 93. Medium green-yellow. Dark wet slate dominates the nose initially, with mandarin orange, vineyard peach and anise coming up with aeration. The fruit is sweeter and more opulent in the mouth than the nose suggests, but limey acidity gives shape and lift. Salty minerals linger on the very long finish. This already offers outstanding drinking pleasure, but will continue to improve and should hold well until 2014.

2002 Dönnhoff Oberhäuser Brücke Riesling Spätlese. VM 92. A bouquet of lily and narcissus is both sweet and musky. A coulis of red raspberry and molten minerals flows over the palate, but the sheer intensity here is matched by an elegance and lightness of touch. You might say this has the concentration of other recent vintages of Brucke Spatlese but not the weight, a perfect illustration of Donnhoff’s characterization of 2002 as “playful and light even though dense. ” The balance of acid and sugar is perfect, so that the sweetness drops away completely in the back. Red fruit, citrus and devilishly diverse expressions of salt and stones hang around for a lot longer than you can wait before taking the next sip. 2 stars.

agavin: I thought this might have been 5% corked, very light.

2005 Weingut Keller Westhofener Morstein Riesling Auslese. 91 points. A light, almost Spatlese style, but very nice.

2005 Dönnhoff Schloßböckelheimer Felsenberg Riesling Auslese Goldkapsel. VM 92. Pale golden yellow. Musky peach, a floral nuance and a hint of licorice on the nose.Smoke and honey give way to a spicy acidity on the palate. Well-balanced, vivid auslese, showing an almost salty minerality on the finish.

agavin: 94 points. We thought this was awesome.

From my cellar: 2000 Trimbach Pinot Gris Sélection de Grains Nobles. VM 93. Bright medium gold. Superripe aromas of apricot jam, exotic spices, honey and tobacco; just misses the clarity of the best SGN bottlings from this producer. Very dense but not hugely unctuous thanks to firm, perfectly integrated acidity. Sappy, vibrant and very long on the aftertaste.

1999 Domaine Philippe Delesvaux Coteaux du Layon Sélection de Grains Nobles. 94 points. Served lightly chilled as a mid afternoon refresher. Medium amber color, delicate botrytis aromas and flavor notes of apricot, honey, pineapple, brown sugar, and a hint of oranges. This seemed a little less intense than I remember the prior bottles being but it had a delicate, crisp feel that I found delightful on this occasion. Perfectly balanced with a lingering finish, really a delicious drink.. Served lightly chilled as a mid afternoon refresher. Medium amber color, delicate botrytis aromas and flavor notes of apricot, honey, pineapple, brown sugar, and a hint of oranges. This seemed a little less intense than I remember the prior bottles being but it had a delicate, crisp feel that I found delightful on this occasion. Perfectly balanced with a lingering finish, really a delicious drink.

1988 Château Lafaurie-Peyraguey. VM 91. Good pale color. Fresh, flinty aromas of apple, fresh herbs and dried fruits. Very rich and pliant in the mouth, with a strong resiny/spicy flavor. Strong for the vintage, and very well balanced. Quite powerful and long on the finish, with complex flavors of honey, earth and tobacco.

2011 Herman Story Syrah Nuts and Bolts. VM 93. A vivid, multi-dimensional wine the 2011 Syrah Nuts & Bolts bursts from the glass with the essence of blackberry jam, melted road tar, graphite, incense and licorice, all in a rich, broad-shouldered style that is immensely appealing. Vibrant mineral notes underpin an exciting, full-throttle Syrah loaded with personality. This may be one of the very finest Herman Story wines I have ever tasted. Readers will want to give the 2011 at least a few hours of air, as the wine really needs time to open up.

2007 Alban Vineyards Syrah Reva Alban Estate Vineyard. VM 94. Inky purple. Black and blue fruits on the nose and in the mouth, with smoke and Indian spice nuances adding complexity. Densely packed and forceful, with building notes of candied licorice and mocha. This very rich, seamless wine shows very good energy in the mid-palate. A candied violet quality comes up on the finish, which clings with impressive tenacity.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Chengdu, Chinese cuisine, hedonists, hot pot, Pork Dumplings, shave ice, Sichuan, Szechuan

Swish Swish – Mizu 212

Dec18

Restaurant: Mizu 212

Location: 2000 Sawtelle Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90025 (310)478-8979

Date: December 17, 2010

Cuisine: Japanese Shabu Shabu

Rating: Best Shabu Shabu in town

Shabu Shabu is a form of Japanese cuisine where various meats and vegetables are cooked table side in boiling broth. Literally the name means “swish swish” for the sound the food makes as it is swished in the boiling water. In Japan one might get the impression that Shabu Shabu, like all Japanese culinary specialties, has been an inherited tradition since neolithic times, but in fact it entered the vocabulary only during World War II. Japanese soldiers in China encountered the ubiquitous Mongolian Hot Pot. But the Japanese are nothing if not masters at the art of culinary assimilation. They have a special ability to take the dishes of others and make them uniquely their own.

Mizu 212 is one of many excellent Japanese restaurants on Sawtelle. They do only Shabu Shabu and it’s all organic.

Each seat has a little hot plate.

On which is installed the pot of broth.

Hot green tea.

Part of the allure of shabu shabu are the sauces. The sesame sauce on the left and the ponzu on the right. The sesame sauce — like the cuisine itself — is borrowed from China. Loosely the sesame is for meat, and the ponzu is for veggies. But the unmodified sauces are just the beginning.

These are the basic condiments. From left to right: Chili oil, scallions, daikon radish, chili powder, and in front garlic!

The sesame gets a huge dose of garlic, as does the ponzu. But the ponzu also gets scallions and radish — and garlic.

There are also the advanced condiments, available on request. Both really help the ponzu shine. The yuzu on the left (juice from a Japanese lime) adds zest, and the chili is HOT! In a perfect kind of green hot. I find that red chili hot doesn’t go so well with shabu shabu — but green does.

The finished sauces.

And the actual food arrives. The vegetable plate. All sorts of organic goodness, plus some tofu and udon noodles.

The beef. This is a large plate of vintage aged beef. Mizu actually has about half a dozen meat options, including two different types of Kobe beef, plus chicken, lamb, and numerous types of fish. But beef is traditional.

The pot after a few rounds of veggies are added. Part of the key here is to cook each thing for just the appropriate length of time..

The beef cooks very quickly.

Swish, swish and voila!

Finished. Slather in the garlicky mizu and enjoy.

After all the cooking the meat fats are about all that’s left. Not so appealing.

The remains. There is a endless rice too. After you remove meat or vegetables from the broth, and dip it in one or the other sauces you can rest it to cool on the rice. That way, by the end the rice has become nicely saturated with sauce and fat.