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Archive for noodles

Lunch Quest – Dai Ho

Dec07

Restaurant: Dai Ho Restaurant

Location: 9148 Las Tunas Dr, Temple City, CA 91780. (626) 291-2295

Date: May 27, 2022

Cuisine: Taiwanese Chinese

Rating: Notoriously reasonably priced

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Dai Ho has been on my “to try” list forever (maybe close to 10 years). It’s a very small menu Taiwanese lunch place known for noodles and being incredibly cheap (and tasty).
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Typical old school SGV frontage.
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The extremely casual interior space.
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Tubs for sale.
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Bean curd and anchovies. Nice texture and a bit savory.
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Mustard greens with Bean Curd.
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Mixed “spicy”. Peanuts, peppers, bean curd, garlic.
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Tripe and Bean Curd. Pretty good for tripe.
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Ground Pork Dry Noodles.
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Ground Beef Dry Noodles.
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Sesame Dry Noodles. Like a dan dan with less spice. Probably my favorite of the noodles — although not as strong as a good dan dan.
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Beef Noodle Soup.

We pretty much ordered everything. There are some variants of above, but we covered our bases. Everything we had was very tasty and the bill was ridiculously low, but I do like a restaurant more more variety!

For more LA dining reviews click here.

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Lunch Quest – Happy Valley Village
  2. Lunch Quest – Da Long Yi
  3. Lunch Quest — Xiang La Hui
  4. Eating Xi’an – Warrior Lunch
  5. Cocoa Island – Languorous Lunch
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: AFF, Hai ho, lunch, Lunch Quest, noodles, Taiwanese Cuisine

One One Dumplings

Sep08

Restaurant: One One Dumplings

Location: 704 W Las Tunas Dr #4, San Gabriel, CA 91776. (626) 282-8695

Date: December 17, 2021

Cuisine: Northern Chinese

Rating: Solid boiled and fried dumplings

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AFF and another Friday trip to the SGV to check out some Asian goodness. We actually intended to go to Hui Tou Xiang next door but they were only open for takeout — and since daddy don’t do takeout, we hit up one one.
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Small interior.
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Very casual sauce containers.
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The menu is smaller than the interior and doubles as an order form. And a third of it is crossed out.
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Flavors stewed bean curd. Tastes pretty normal actually. Flavors is mostly soy sauce (and maybe some sugar) and a couple of spices like star anise.
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Fried pork dumplings. Great crispy bottom.
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Stewed pork noodle in soup.
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Flavors stewed beef. Presumably this meat is braised in the same liquid as the tofu.
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Cabbage, pork, and shrimp. Straight up delicious boiled dumplings.
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Pork with soup, steamed. What they mean here is soup dumplings, ie. that frozen or solidified broth was included in the filling before steaming. Delicious of course.
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Chive, pork, egg, and shrimp boiled dumplings.
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Fried chive, pork, egg dumplings. These had the most perfect pan fried bottom!
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The mess.

One one is a simple place, but if you crave straight up boiled and fried jiaozi dumplings, it’s certainly got ’em.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

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This is where we intended to go. When they reopen for sit down, I’ll try again.

Related posts:

  1. Shandong Dumplings
  2. Day of the Dumplings
  3. XLB – Soup Dumplings!
  4. Dumplings the size of Grapefruits!
  5. Dirty Dumplings
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: AFF, Chinese cuisine, Chinese Food, dumplings, Friday, lunch, noodles, One One Dumplings, SGV

Quick Eats – Menya Tigre

Dec14

Restaurant: Menya Tigre

Location: 2012 Sawtelle Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90025

Date: July 13 (and others), 2021

Cuisine: Japanese Curry & Ramen

Rating: narrow but pretty good curry ramen

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The not-terribly-great chicken only ramen place on Sawtelle closed a long time ago and was replaced at some point by this curry based ramen joint.
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The small menu.
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The interior — although I’ve never actually eaten inside as they have a nice patio.
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Tasty Japanese salad with the zingy ginger dressing.
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Takoyaki. Fried octopus balls with mayo and okonomiyaki sauce. These were actually the first kind of food I had on my first trip to Japan 30 years ago!

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Curry Tsukemen. Chicken curry broth with noodles and chashu. This is the ramen variant where the noodles are served on the side (cold) and dipped into the broth.
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Zoom of the parts.

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Curry Ramen. Chicken and curry broth ramen with pork and egg. It’s pretty good, but not as thick and unctuous as I might like.

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Keema Bowl. Side bowl of ground meat curry on top of rice.
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Chashu Bowl. A similar bowl of marinated chashu pork on rice.
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Karaage Curry. Karaage fried chicken with curry and rice.

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Surf & Turf. Karaage chicken and fried shrimp with curry and rice. This was solid curry rice, but it isn’t nearly as good as the late (and missed by me) Kimukatsu.

Overall, Menya Tigre is ok. I like curry and I particularly like curry rice. I’m actually very sad that Kimukatsu closed as that was the best Sawtelle curry rice. This is a passable substitute, but just not as good. The ramen is ok too, but not as good as Killer Noodle — which is by far my favorite except for its not-so-subtle GI consequences.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Quick Eats – Mogumogu
  2. Quick Eats — Ippudo
  3. Quick Eats – Venice Ramen
  4. Quick Eats – Red Rock
  5. Quick Eats – Flaming Pot
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: curry, Menya Tigre, noodles, ramen, Sawtelle

Too Tony at Chef Tony

Apr13

Restaurant: Chef Tony

Location: 2 E Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91105. (626) 803-0028

Date: February 26, 2020

Cuisine: Cantonese Dim Sum

Rating: Dumplings good, but portions tiny

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The Lunch Quest gang is always keen to try a new Chinese spot.7U1A8984
So we trekked out to Pasadena once we heard that the original chef from Sea Harbor was opening up a new “fancy” dim sum spot in Pasadena.
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This is in the old 800 degrees space and nicely built out… up stairs at least.
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There is an attractive bar.
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But our six person party was banished to the “dungeon.” The basement was claustrophobic and smelled of “potty.” Ick. It was pretty off-putting.

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The Menu.
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Sauces in the usual microscopic dishes.
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XO sauce.
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Lobster Salad. This is a “whole” order ($28.80). It was tasty, but very small.
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Steamed chicken feet in brown sauce.
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Shrimp dumpling with gold leaf. These are basically har gow (below) but with a black dough and gold leaf. They don’t taste too different. One of the nice things about Chef Tony is that almost all the dumplings can be ordered by the piece as well as by the order. This really helps when you have a person count that isn’t divisible by 3 or 4.
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Har Gow. Very nice classic shrimp dumplings — except they are $2 each and at many places they are $2-3 an order!
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Shrimp and Pork dumpling with Black Truffle. Pretty much your usual shu mai but with truffle. They were good, but I’m not sure the truffle actually improves anything.
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Baked BBQ Pork Bun. Excellent version with the usual sweet interior.
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Shrimp wonton with house spicy sauce. Very nice and delicate with quite a bit of salty flavor.
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Shrimp, crab meat, and matsutake dumplings. Nice delicate dumplings.
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Juicy Pork dumplings (XLB). Very good example of the Cantonese variant of these.
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Pan-fried shrimp & pork pandan bun. Doughy, but with a very nice flavor. Quite tasty.
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Deep fried pork dumpling. Just an ok version of this chewy fried type.
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Deep fried tofu in Thai sauce. Nice tender tofu. Quite good.
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Pan-fried radish cake with XO sauce. I really liked this dish. It had the soft/starchy daikon texture with lots of umami XO flavor.
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Squid ink pasta with crab meat and gold leaf. This was a total disappointment. It was just vaguely fishy with a strong red pepper flavor. Not terribly good at all.
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Stir-fried rice noodle with beef. This was much better. Like Chinese beef Pad Thai.
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Deep fried crispy king prawn. Tasty and super crispy but also super fried.
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BBQ Pork. Delicious and pretty much coated in syrup.
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Braised eggplant with minced pork on rice noodle casserole. Not a ton of eggplant but I enjoyed the chewy “rice noodle” with the sauce.
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Sliced Chinese broccoli with black truffle sauce. Now this was only $6.80, but it was embarrassingly tiny. We are talking 2 inches across!
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Sautéed string beans with minced pork. Decent tasting but also about 1/3 the size of a typical version of this dish. It was hard to split 6 ways.
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Coconut pudding. These were super cute, but very bland. Basically nearly flavorless coconut jelly (vaguely sweet) pressed into bunny moulds.

Overall, Chef Tony is not a phenomenal experience. The dumplings were actually pretty good, being a bit fancier and smaller and more delicate like they are in Hong Kong. But many of the other dishes were a bit limp. It’s still in soft opening and a few things on the menu (like Chow Fun) weren’t available. Service was fine. QPR isn’t great. Some dishes are laughably small. Some are way more expensive than at a larger “Cantonese Palace.” Some are both. I’d certainly rather go to a place like World Seafood, Elite, or Grand Harbor. For me, Pasadena is also further away than the SGV and more difficult to park in.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Lunasia Dim Sum
  2. Shandong Dumplings
  3. Chef Yu Bo & LQ Foodings
  4. World Seafood is Elite
  5. Westwood Chinese – Northern Cafe
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Cantonese cuisine, Chef Tony, Chinese cuisine, Dim sum, dumplings, Lunch Quest, noodles, Pasadena, Truffle

OC Viet Crawl – The Sequel

Dec23

Restaurant: Góc Ha Noi Corner

Location: 8516 Garden Grove Blvd, Garden Grove, CA 92844. (714) 867-6665

Date: November 11, 2019

Cuisine: Vietnamese

Rating: Excellent opener

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Our previous OC Viet Crawl — in which we drive down and spend the afternoon “crawling” between Vietnamese restaurants — was such a success, that it spawned a mini crawl and this followup sequel — all new places!
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First up is this place — 11am, almost time for breakfast.
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Clearly some other kind of restaurant before it was Vietnamese.
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Maybe a diner?
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The counter has an altar-like aspect.
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The big menu.
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In case you wonder where the bodies are buried — must be in here.
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Someone needed an iced tea.
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Gio tai (crunchy sausages). The description made me order them. There were slightly crunchy bits inside what seemed to have a texture similar to a fishcake — spongy. Meaty taste of course.
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Herb salad to go with other stuff, and some kind of sauce.

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Bun Rieu Cua Lot Ha Noi. Ha Noi soft-shelled crab tomato tofu vermicelli soup. Tangy sweet and sour soup. Quite delicious.
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Banh cuon thit cha nurong ha noi. Steamed thin rice paper with Ha Noi grilled pork, fresh herbs, and fish sauce. Really nice meat flavor and as ever great contrast with the herbs and soft rice paper.

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Bank breaker!

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We didn’t get these, but they made for a pretty photo.

Overall, nice little place with friendly service and tasty food.

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Restaurant: Mai Phung Restaurant

Location: 8415 Westminster Blvd, Westminster, CA 92683. (714) 890-1155

Date: November 11, 2019

Cuisine: Vietnamese

Rating: Excellent opener

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Stop two is this little parking lot side place.
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We had to wait a bit as there was a crowd already at noon.
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Smaller more focused menu.
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They make and sell their own hot sauce here — it was hot!
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Bun Cha Na Noi. Special Na-Noi style grilled pork served with vermicelli. More grilled meats on noodles.
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Fish sauce as usual. Dumped over the meat and noodles this was supremely tasty.
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Banh Canh Tom Cua Thit Heo. Crab, shrimp, and pork thick noodle soup. This is one of the main specialties here. Both the broth and the noodles (like udon) were thick. Mild, but delicious and great texture.
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Another crushing blow to the wallet.

Overall, small place, small menu, but it was tasty — and popular.

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Restaurant: Quan Hy Restaurant

Location: 9727 Bolsa Ave, Westminster, CA 92683.

Date: November 11, 2019

Cuisine: Vietnamese

Rating: Excellent opener

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Place three is a bit larger and more upscale.

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Their was also a line, both inside and out — and on a random Monday!
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The inside is more upscale.
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With a cool fish pond in the floor.
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Which Yarom somehow didn’t notice until he stepped right into it!

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The menu.
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A bit of wine — it’s afternoon after all.
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Banh beo. Steamed rice cakes with shredded shrimp etc.
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Gratuitous zoom. You put a bit of fish sauce on these and slide them down. Soft gooey texture.
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Mi Quang doc biet co sura. Yellow noodles with shrimp, pork, vegetables, and jellyfish. Jellyfish! Yay.
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Cam suran ram. Grilled ribs and vegetables served with steamed rice. Lots of grilled meats today!
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Oooh, $10 more! What shall we do?
Overall, they had a slightly bigger menu, but not huge — still I’d like to try some other dishes.

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Restaurant: Hien Thanh Restaurant

Location: 9741 Bolsa Ave #108, Westminster, CA 92683

Date: November 11, 2019

Cuisine: Vietnamese

Rating: Excellent opener

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Our penultimate place is just around the corner from the last so we hoofed it.
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This is even more mom & pop.
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Tiny really, without much decor.
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But a huge menu.
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Not much English on the menu, but this was a kind of steamed eggplant. Texture was like fish, or perhaps jackfruit, but it tasted great.
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Carmel Fish. Scrumptious. A bit of an oily thing flavor, but in a good way.
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A kind of stuffed tofu in tomato sauce.
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The usual.

Overall, a surprising place. It was a bit old school so I was wary — but the food was great, particularly the fish.

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Yarom and kirk pose at the mall entrance.

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Restaurant: Tan Cang Newport Seafood Restaurant

Location: 10541 Bolsa Ave, Garden Grove, CA 92843. (714) 554-3996

Date: November 11, 2019

Cuisine: Vietnamese Chinese

Rating: More of a Chinese restaurant, and pricier, but great lobster

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Yarom has been wanting to come here for a while since we go all the time to the SGV location.
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This is the original — and clearly it’s a bit “Vietnamese.”
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But it also looks like a Chinese restaurant — and basically is a Chinese restaurant.
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Lobster tank.
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From my cellar, some sparkling rose.
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Clams in basil sauce. Savory and delicious.
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House Special Lobster on garlic noodles. This was a big 4 or 5 pound lobster with tons of meat and a fabulous sauce — although they billed it as a 6.5lb lobster. ha!
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The noodles were thick and eggy but particularly delicious under the lobster — still I like Garlic and Chive’s version a hair better.
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Pea Tendrils sautéed with garlic. The usual tasty colon sweeper.
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Oranges.
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The price here was considerably higher — particularly because of the lobster. The owner was incredibly nice and hung out with us for awhile. If she was a touch younger Yarom would have proposed (again)!

Related posts:

  1. Viet Noodle Bar
  2. Little Saigon Mini Crawl
  3. Little Saigon Mega Crawl
  4. Mandarin Plaza Crawl
  5. Chicken Crawl – Dong Nguyen
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: crawl, Góc Ha Noi Corner, hedonists, lunch, noodles, Orange County, Vietnamese cuisine, Wine

Otafuku – Carb Coma

Aug19

Restaurant: Otafuku

Location: 16525 S Western Ave. Gardena, CA 90247. (310) 532-9348

Date: June 21, 2019

Cuisine: Japanese Izakaya / Tempura / Noodles

Rating: Great noodles and tempura

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Asian Food Friday (AFF) is another of my fun food “groups” — composed of a bunch of Santa Monica guys that on certain Friday’s set out in search of great Asian eats.
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This time we headed off to Otafuku, recommended as one of the best soba and tempura places in LA — located in Gardena Little Japan. You enter through the less than glamorous back.
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It’s really an Izakaya, they have a lot of sochu on the wall and a very drinking friendly menu.
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Very casual small interior. Really nice staff.
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Pickled Vegetables. Japanese love pickles. Several radishes, Japanese Mountain Yam, cucumber, carrot, etc. Nice complex vinegar flavor. Good crunch.
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Japanese Omelet (tamago). Really nice savory omelet. Great fluffy texture.
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Small horse mackerel with fresh vegetable bowl. Very fresh mackerel, not at all fishy, with a good bit of ginger and various veggies.
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Delicious Small Tuna Bowl. Just straight up tuna sashimi.
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Fishcake Tempura. A battered chopped shrimp and scallop with assorted vegetable tempuras. This was the best “tempura mixto” I’ve had — and I always get it. Lots of tender shrimp and scallops in here. Perfectly crispy light breading.
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Sea Eel Tempura. Extremely “Big” sea eel tempura which is “absolutely unique” (with a few assorted vegetables). I’ve actually had eel tempura several times, but this was light and fabulous. Hannosuke has a somewhat similar eel. Not sure if it’s exactly the same type.
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Shrimp Tempura. Black tiger shrimps with some assorted vegetable tempura. Excellent. Classic.
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Vegetable Tempura. Shitake mushroom, red pepper, onion, asparagus, perrilla, enoki, sweet potato, Japanese Squash etc. I like the perrilla (shiso?).
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Broiled chicken leg. Really nice dark meat.
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Stir fried Kurobuta pork with ginger soy sauce. Like a pork version of the meat that goes in a beef udon bowl — delicious.

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The pork came with miso soup.
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Special Seiro Soba (cold). Specialty soba which is quite thin white noodle made of a mixture of special white buckwheat flour. The difference from the Zaru is used on heart of soba seeds. It’s that special!  Really nice light noodles. These were served with a bowl of noodle sauce I forgot to photo, plus some chopped green onions and wasabi.
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Kikouchi (cold). Dark brown noodle made of 100% buckwheat flour. Gluten free. Really great buckwheat noodles! These are also dipped into the dipping sauce.
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At the end they bring this broth you can add to the dipping sauce to drink it like a soup. Very nice too.

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Curry Udon. Great curry udon. Chicken, onions and curry. Lighter and more complex than most curry udons.
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I brought some of my gelato too:

Arancia Crema Fiorentina Zabaione — Marsala Orange Vanilla Zabaione base with Orange Variegate — made by me for @sweetmilkgelato — Very close to the oldest gelato flavor!! — #SweetMilkGelato #gelato #dessert #icecream #FrozenDessert #nomnom #dessertlovers #dessertporn #icecreamlovers #gelatoitaliano #foodporn #gelatolover #food #foodgasm #foodblogger #dessertgasm #desserttime #foodphotography #gelatoartigianale #gelatomania #dessertlover #icecream #icecreamlovers #orange #Zabaione #CremaFiorentina

Salted Caramel Chocolate — House-made salted caramel forms the core of this base which then is layered with house-made Valrhona dark chocolate ganache and Valrhona milk chocolate chips — made by me for @sweetmilkgelato — my best salted caramel yet — #SweetMilkGelato #gelato #dessert #icecream #FrozenDessert #nomnom #dessertlovers #dessertporn #icecreamlovers #gelatoitaliano #foodporn #gelatolover #food #foodgasm #foodblogger #dessertgasm #desserttime #foodphotography #gelatoartigianale #gelatomania #dessertlover #icecream #icecreamlovers #caramel #chocolate #Valrhona #ganache
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The owner loved my gelato so much they brought us free this fabulous flan with dark caramel. Really nice custard with a perfect creamy texture and contrasting caramel.

Overall, this was a great place. On the border of sketchy neighborhood wise, and very hole-in-the-wall, but super nice staff and really great food. Everything we had was quite good, particularly the tempura and noodles.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Không Tên – Brunch
  2. I-Driva to I-Naba
  3. Hannosuke Tempura
  4. Szechuan Impression Tustin
  5. Happy Table 2X
By: agavin
Comments (1)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: AFF, BYOG, Gardena, Gelato, Japanese cuisine, noodles, Sashimi, soba, tempura

Quick Eats – Mogumogu

Jul05

Restaurant: Mogumogu

Location: 11555 W Olympic Blvd Suite B, Los Angeles, CA 90064. (424) 371-5085

Date: May 30, 2019

Cuisine: “Soupless” Ramen

Rating: Good

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Mogumogu is a new “soupless” ramen joint near Sawtelle.
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It’s located in the space of the former Ramen-ya, just to the west on Olympic.
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The interior is… simple.

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The menu.
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“Umami” vinegar and sesame seeds.
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Shishito. Flash fried Japanese peppers with salt and lemon. I’ve had better shishito — I’ve had worse.
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Deluxe mazeman. Sliced pork chashu, spicy minced pork, poached egg, chives, minced garlic, fish powder, seaweed, soft boiled egg, seaweed flakes scallion.
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To which I added some wild ear mushroom. The “sauce” is kinda at the bottom.
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You mix it up and eat. It was pretty tasty. More like a ramen pasta. Left one feeling the carb coma, but not the epic salt and fat coma of a regular ramen. Kinda enjoyable. I will have to repeat to get a better feel for this new style of ramen. I love that the noodles are thick and al dente.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Quick Eats — Ippudo
  2. Quick Eats – Venice Ramen
  3. Quick Eats – Tasty Noodle
  4. Quick Eats – AR Cucina
  5. Quick Eats – Seasalt
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Japanese cuisine, Mogu Mogu, noodles, ramen, Sawtelle, Sawtelle Japantown

Quick Eats — Ippudo

Feb13

Restaurant: Ippudo Santa Monica

Location: 1403 2nd St, Santa Monica, CA 90401

Date: January 17, 2019

Cuisine: Japanese Ramen and Buns

Rating: Buns were very good, ramen decent

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Ippudo is a very well hyped Japanese ramen chain moved to New York. Oddly they are owned by Panda Express (which is trying to move upmarket). They announced (and presumably signed a lease) taking over the old Taberna Arros y Vi space over two years ago!
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So finally, after months of being up but not open, they finally do open. Took me a bit to get in too after all that time, but a really rainy day drove me in.
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This is a weird (and overly large) space on 2nd street. And although the street is being taken over (finally) by lunch options this space has a bizarre side entrance and poor visibility. Neat brick building though.
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The interior is enormous and nicely built out for a ramen joint.
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They have a bit of a bar too, but not super big. They are pretty organized.

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The menu is basically buns and a variety of ramen. I had to try both.
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Trio of buns.
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Pork Bun. Pork Belly with special BBQ sauce and mayo. This was a good one. The fatty belly meshed perfectly with the soft bready bun (and its light sugar content). The mayo just seamed it all together.
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Yakiniku Bun. Sliced beef cooked in Japanese BBQ sauce and mayo. This was the weakest of the three and didn’t taste like Yakiniku at all, more like that steamed meat that is often found in udon. I’m pretty sure they don’t grill it.
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Ebi Katsu Bun. Deep fried shrimp katsu with spicy chili mayo. This was pretty good though, like a fried shrimp sandwich Japanese bun style. Lot ‘o carb though.
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Karaka Spicy Ramen with egg. The original Tonkotsu pork broth with an added kick, thin noodles topped with our special blend of hot spices, fragrant garlic oil, pork belly chashu, bean sprouts, kikurage mushrooms and scallions. For my first ramen here I didn’t load it up (only adding the egg). The broth had a nice flavor. It was pretty straight tonkotsu, but good. The noodles were a touch thin for my taste, but classic ramen noodles. I got them al dente and they were. The chasu was good but not a ton of it. The spicy meat and oil was actually pretty spicy and did add some nice kick. I debated asking for some vinegar to add acid, but didn’t bother.

Overall, the build out is large and very attractive. Service was great and the place is slick and clean.

I really liked the buns, particularly the pork bun. The ramen too was very good, if a touch “straight up.” After Killer Noodle, I have a hard time with any ramen that isn’t incredibly intense. For me it sets the standard by not even really being ramen, instead closer to dan dan mein.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Quick Eats – Venice Ramen
  2. Quick Eats – Big Boi
  3. Quick Eats – Tasty Noodle
  4. Quick Eats – Mondo Taco
  5. Quick Eats – Orto
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: buns, Ippudo, Japanese cuisine, noodles, Pork bun, ramen, Santa Monica

Chong Qing Special Noodles

Dec10

Restaurant: Chong Qing Special Noodles

Location: 708 E Las Tunas Dr, San Gabriel, CA 91776.  (626) 374-1849

Date: October 20, 2018

Cuisine: Szechuan Chinese

Rating: Good Chong Qing style casual place

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I’ll take any excuse to head out to the SGV — and next to no excuse to head out to the SGV for Szechuan.

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Most of the Szechuan places I go to have their culinary roots in Chengdu, but a few, like this one, in Szechuan’s larger, less iconic city: Chongqing.
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Clearly this used to be a KBBQ or something because it has hoods over all the tables.

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The classic Chinese joint Menu.
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Watermelon juice. Pretty much just blended watermelon.
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Smoked plum juice. Love this stuff!
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They have the cold bar. We ordered pretty much all of it.
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Salty/sweet garlic cucumbers.
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Shredded potato. These I like with some spicy sauce.
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Peanuts.
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Wood ear mushrooms with celery. Aka “black fungus”.  Love ’em.
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Pastrami like cured beef? Or maybe pork. Either way a bit spicy and really good.
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Pork intestine with bean curd. Not my fav.
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Pig ear with chili oil!
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Cold steamed chicken with spicy sauce. Chicken itself was good, but didn’t like this version of the sauce (more BBQ like).
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Spicy wonton with “soup.” Delicious little spicy pockets of yum.
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Spicy fried chicken with aromatic peppers. Love this salty dish.
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Ma Po Tofu. Just a so-so version of this dish. Not much mala and not that spicy.
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Chongqing noodle. Noodles with pork, fried egg, and spicy goodness.
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Dan dan mein. The nuttier other classic Szechuan noodle dish.
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Mixed up this was fairly accurate to what I was getting in Chengdu. Quite good.
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Noodle pull!
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Shredded pork with green chilis. Quite hot and very tasty soft pork.
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Cumin lamb. Good too.
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Repulsive liver soup. This stuff was gross. The broth was that tasteless pork bone broth and the liver… ick.
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Greens. Colon sweeper again. Maybe mustard greens.
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Matcha White Gelato – ceremonial matcha green tea gelato base with white chocolate stracciatella layered in — made by me for @sweetmilkgelato — #SweetMilkGelato #gelato #dessert #icecream #FrozenDessert #Matcha #GreenTea #WhiteChocolate #Stracciatella

Overall, we ordered a LOT for 4 people and enjoyed most of it. This is an older style SGV place, VERY casual, friendly but slightly indifferent service, excellent value, tasty food, average ingredient quality, authentic. They have a lot of dishes. And some are excellent and some are just okay. As someone who has eaten a lot of Szechuan food I tend to prefer places with a slightly tuned up kitchen, better ingredients, etc — but still, no serious complaints.

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

Related posts:

  1. White Guys Can Cook Noodles
  2. Eating Chengdu – Alley Noodles
  3. Eating Beijing – 3.3 Noodles
  4. Hip Hot
  5. Night of the Whirling Noodles
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Chong Qing Special Noodles, noodles, Sichuan, spicy, Szechuan Chinese, Szechuan cuisine

It’s not really Silverlake Ramen

Nov28

Restaurant: Silverlake Ramen

Location: 1319 3rd Street Promenade, Santa Monica, CA 90401. (424) 330-0125

Date: October 4, 2018

Cuisine: Ramen

Rating: Solid

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Silverlake Ramen’s original shop (located in Silverlake) is one of LA’s better small ramen shops.
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Recently they moved onto Santa Monica Promenade (my old hood) as well as some other Ca locations, so I guess it’s not exactly Silverlake Ramen anymore.
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The small menu — smaller I think than at the original.
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Karaage (Japanese fried chicken). Good, but very fried.
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Tsukemen. Dipping noodles. This is the dry part.

A thick creamy pork and fish-based broth in one bowl, and noodles in the other. Tsukemen is dipping ramen, for the seasoned ramen pros who want to make every bite just so! Tsukemen is not for everyone, but there are many hardcore ramen aficionados who swear by it!
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This is the pork/fish broth. Heavy stuff, but good. Needed some vinegar though.
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The classic. Tonkotsu broth. They slow cook pork bones for many hours to make this rich creamy broth. Tonkotsu is the first ramen and is widely renowned across the world.

Silverlake certainly offers solid ramen. The menu so far is pretty straight up and plain vanilla — and I’m a bit over really straight up ramen (for reasons that are perhaps more personal than culinary). Still, I’m sure I’ll be back to get a better picture of how they hold up. Also notice that these bowls start at $13, not that I mind, I know what it takes to actually produce a bowl of ramen, but those that complained about Ramen Roll’s $11 base price need an inside-the-head egg-scrambler.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Far Eastern Ramen
  2. Jinya Ramen Bar
  3. Quick Eats – Venice Ramen
  4. Chicken or Egg? – Tentenyu Ramen
  5. Ramen is all the Rage
By: agavin
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Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Japanese cuisine, noodles, ramen, Santa Monica, Silver Lake Ramen

Driving to Daw Yee

Nov14

Restaurant: Daw Yee Myanmar Corner

Location: 2837 Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90026. (213) 413-0568

Date: September 26, 2018

Cuisine: Myanmar Cuisine

Rating: a touch bland and hence disappointing

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I braved the deadly rush hour traffic to the ass’s end of LA (from a Westsider’s perspective) — Silverlake!
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Mostly because I wasn’t sure if I’d ever had genuine Myanmar food before. This is a relatively new branch of an SGV place. It’s located right next to Silverlake Ramen, Pho Cafe, and down the street from Ma’am Sir.
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The interior is small and cute.
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The menu.
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Fish curry. Rakhine style tilapia fish fillet, tomatoes, lemongrass, shallots, cayenne pepper, and paprika. Served with coconut rice. Odd way to start off!
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Laphet Thoke (Tea Leaf Salad). Myanmar imported fermented tea leaves, tomatoes, roasted peanuts, fried yellow lentils, fried garlic, toasted sesame, diced tomatoes, shredded cabbage, dried shrimps, and fish sauce.
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All mixed up. Interesting.
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Gin Thoke. Pickled ginger, roasted butter beans, roasted lentils, toasted sesame, peanut butter, and shredded cabbage. Nice crunch to it.
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Samosas. Fried pastry filled with poatoes and onions seasoned with masala curry. Can’t go to wrong with fried.
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Kima Platha. Platha sutffed with masala seasoned chicken, beef, or lamb. A bit like a Beijing meat pie.
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Potato pancakes. Pan fried mashed potatoes stuffed with ground lamb, mint, and Thai chili.
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Kachin Style Salmon Belly. With cilantro, lemongrass, and spicy chili steamed in banana leaves.
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Inside view. Not sure they had Salmon in Myanmar back in the day.
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Mohinga. Myanmar’s national dish. Round rice noodles and hard-boiled egg in catfish chowder.
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Shan noodles. Rich stick noodles served with coconut chicken, roasted peanuts, toasted sesame, chili oil, and Shan pickles. This was tasty.

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Vegan bowl. Curried potatoes, seasonal vegetables, Myanmar tofu, several kinds of noodles, and coconut rice. Not bad at all for vegan.
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Garlic noodles. Wheat flour flat noodles tossed in garlic oil, soy sauce, and shredded duck. Chinese in style, but good.
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Goat Curry. Naah! Pretty mild though.
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Platha. Daw Yee special homemade platha served with mashed garbanzo beans. Dips well in curry, otherwise greasy.
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Beef Curry. Beef shank in onion, lemongrass masala curry, served with coconut rice. On of the stronger (and therefore better) curries.
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Lamb Curry. Lamb with potato in onion and garam masala. Served with coconut rice.
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Steak Bowl. Tri tip steak, shallots in spiced rum, seasonal vegetables, brown rice, and topped with a fried egg. Interesting mix.
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Pumpkin curry. Pumpkin, potatoes, mustard seeds, and curry leaves. Served with coconut rice.
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Lemongrass chicken. Ground chicken wrapped in lemongrass stick, seasonal vegetables, and brown rice.
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Spicy Prawns. Prawns, seasonal vegetables, and coconut rice.
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Tapioca Cake. Tapioca, coconut milk, and white rice flour. I loved these actually. Gummy with a mild coconut flavor.
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Shew Kyi Cake. Semolina wheat cake with poppy seeds. Hmmm. Dry.
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Cassava flour and egg. A bit like a dry custard/flan cake.
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Overall, Daw Yew was good, and interesting, but the flavors were kind of muted. The dishes visually look like they would be strong in flavor, but the intensity, fish sauce, spice, etc were all toned down. The owner told us that he “did it because of the neighborhood.” I like strong flavors though so I was a bit disappointed. Fun evening though. And they treated us really well.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Random wines from the evening:

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Related posts:

  1. Hedonists Noodle over Hoy-Ka
  2. Eating Philly – Tiffin
  3. Deep South – Mandovi Goan Cuisine
  4. Akbar – Curry not so Hurry
  5. Chicken Crawl – Red Chicken
By: agavin
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Posted in: Food
Tagged as: beans, curry, Daw Yee, Egg, goat, hedonists, lentils, Myanmar Cuisine, noodles, Rice, Silverlake, Wine

Eating Leshan – Noodle Shack

Sep24

Restaurant: Noodle Shack

Location: ? Leshan China

Date: August 5, 2018

Cuisine: Szechuan Noodles

Rating: Solid

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We drove t the small city (1 million, a Chinese small) from Chengdu to check out the world’s largest premodern statue:
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The Great Buddha of Leshan, carved into the cliffside of the river 1200-1300 years ago!
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And so we caught a quick lunch between tourist stops.
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At this anonymous (unless you read Chinese) noodle shop our guide took us to. He has a penchant (apparently) for hole-in-the-wall noodles.
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We sat outside so as not to broil in the 100deg heat.
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Non spicy pork noodles. Pork “ribs” similar to what you sometimes get at dimsum places.
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Plain noodles for my picky son. Chinese don’t actually like to make plain noodles, and in this case they felt compelled to at least stick some green onion on top.
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I had the spicy pork noodles. Not bad, some kind of pork broth with a ton of chili and the same pork nuggets.

Not the greatest meal ever but it hit the spot.

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

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The fiery line to view the Buddha was 2.5 hours in 100deg heat just to START climbing down the stairs!

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Leshan has it’s modern side too (just across from the Buddha)

Related posts:

  1. Eating Beijing – 3.3 Noodles
  2. Quick Eats – Tasty Noodle
  3. Eating Chengdu – Alley Noodles
  4. Eating Xi’an – Warrior Lunch
  5. Hawaiian Noodle Bar
By: agavin
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Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Chinese cuisine, Eating Chengdu, Eating China, Eating Leshan, Leshan, Leshan Buddha, noodles

Eating Xi’an – Warrior Lunch

Sep07

Restaurant: ? near Terracotta Warriors

Location: ? near Terracotta Warriors

Date: August 2, 2018

Cuisine: Shaanxi Chinese

Rating: hearty and tasty

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After a nice hot (100 deg) morning visiting the vast terracotta army of Qin Shi Huang it was time for lunch.
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The human version of this army most have eaten a lot of noodles!
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We stopped at a local place just outside the grounds. The name wasn’t in English but anyone who reads Chinese can feel free to zoom in and translate for me. Please message me and I’ll update the post.
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The inside is simple.
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They had pomegranate juice which is a speciality of the region. It’s pretty sweet.
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Scallion pancake.
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These are some plain knife cut, hand pulled, noodles. Thick and almost like lasagna sheets they are a staple of Shaanxi cooking.
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Preserved beef noodles. This classic local dish is hearty peasant fare and delicious. Thick noodles are covered in sauce, potatoes, celery, etc and then topped with “preserved beef” which turns out to basically be pastrami. Quite lovely.

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Noodle pull!
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Sprinkle chicken. I don’t know what to call this interesting and presumably non traditional dish. It was deep fried boneless chicken strips in a sweet and sour sauce and covered in rice sprinkles! While the taste was a bit like a more homestyle Panda Express dish it was actually quite addictive. The soft/sweet chicken was nicely offset in a textural since by the mild crunch of the sprinkles.
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Chicken noodle plate. We finished the noodles and pastrami in our first big plate and so ordered another, this time with chicken. We didn’t realize it would be fried (just like the sprinkle chicken). It was still tasty though.

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Greens. So all those noodles don’t cause a blockage.

This place was simple and hearty but a solid example of homestyle Shaanxi cooking. Actually something I wanted because on this trip I’ve been trying to eat regionally and experience the character of each area.

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

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Related posts:

  1. Eating Beijing – Xian Lao Man
  2. Eating Beijing – 3.3 Noodles
  3. Eating Xi’an – Jia San Soup Pau
  4. Eating Beijing – Country Kitchen
  5. Crafty Little Lunch
By: agavin
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Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Chinese Food, Eating China, Eating Xi'an, noodles, pasta, pomegrante juice, Shaanxi, Terracotta Warriors

Eating Beijing – 3.3 Noodles

Aug24

Restaurant: Noodles at 3.3

Location: No.33 Sanlitun Road, Chaoyang District, Beijing, China +86 10 6417 3333

Date: July 30, 2018

Cuisine: Chinese

Rating: Noodle fast casual

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I’m not sure what this place is actually called, but it’s the noodle joint at the top of this building (nearly 90% sure).
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If any of you read Chinese you can tell me the actual name. We stopped in here for a quick late night bite.
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It’s popular. A little like a fast casual noodle bar that might be found on Sawtelle or something, just more Chinese. And actually the waiters take your orders — China has no labor problem — but it’s still sort of fast casual.
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The menu is simple. Basically stuff on the same noodles.
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Plum juice. I love these Chinese plum juices, but this one wasn’t very good. Not very sweet.
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Spicy pork and egg noodles. Red and green chilies, shredded pork, omelet, and a bunch of thick noodles underneath. Not bad. Not complex or anything, but greasy and excellent post drinking food.
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Pork and mushroom noodles. Same, but less spice, more shroom.
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Spicy chicken noodles. Cleaver-ed chicken (with bones, and feet, and beak) with the peppers and the noodles. I’m sure you are sensing a theme.
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Shrimp noodles. Shrimp and well… noodles. There seamed to only be one type.
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Pea tendrils. In case noodles don’t leave you regular.

This place was quick and had a sort of greasy yummy factor. Not bad for a quick stop but fairly one note — definitely for the youngish crowd.

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

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Doing it Gavin Style!

Related posts:

  1. Eating Beijing – Xiao Long Pu
  2. Eating Beijing – Dadong
  3. White Guys Can Cook Noodles
  4. K-Town Report – Lee’s Noodles
  5. Night of the Whirling Noodles
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Chinese Food, Eating Beijing, Eating China, noodles

Opening Day at Killer Noodle

Oct16

Restaurant: Killer Noodle

Location: 2030 Sawtelle Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90025

Date: October 16, 23, 26 & 29, 2017 + about 15 other times!

Cuisine: Japanese Dan Dan Noodles

Rating: Tasty but highly specific

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Tsujita is the king of Sawtelle ramen with three existing store fronts on the street, the original, annex, and their high end sushi joint.

Yesterday/today they just opened their newest venture in the old Bachi Burger space. Killer Noodle specializes in Tantanmen which is the sort of milder more approachable Japanese “adaption” of Chinese Dan Dan Mien. I love the original Chinese version and even make it myself.

All the Japanese vendors leave these flower arrangements to celebrate your opening.

They are quite lovely but a few of them are rotting in the former Ramen Roll space as I type — I’m not bitter, no no.

The outside menu. Yesterday Killer Noodle was giving away free bowls but today is the first (normal?) day and it was mostly full at 12:30-1ish but not quite. People probably don’t totally know it’s open yet but no crushing mob.

The interior is spacious and much more upscale from the other two noodle shops.

Attractive for sure and lots of space between tables. Small bar too.

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Tasty looking spices make up the decoration behind the bar.

You can pick your spice level. I tried #3 normal. It wasn’t really spicy at all by my standards.


The simple focused menu. Don’t bring anyone here that doesn’t want spicy pork noodles — nothing else on the menu!

Because of the threat of spice I ordered this Japanese Yogu drink. Went well with the tan tan actually. Very Japanese. They have Asahi draft and that’s about it too. Tsujita is VERY minimalist.
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Long after opening (second half of 2018) they added some buns like this spicy pork bun to the menu as cheap appetizers. I detested the slice of tomato and the slightly sweet, slightly spicy bun just didn’t do it for me. Stick to the noodles.
 Side of Char sui pork. Same as at Tsujita LA, and just as good. They make a nice fatty pork. You stuff this in the noodles (below).

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Shabu Shabu Pork. Boiled pork with green onions and a bit of soy and chili sauce. Nowhere near as good as the char sui — go for that instead.

Poached egg. What the Japanese call an Onsen style egg (boiled at low temp) rather than a proper marinated ramen egg (with gooey center). This is a very soft half cooked egg. Still good though. You crack it in your dish.

Now for the main events:

Tokyo style Tantanmen, wet. Here is the “signature” version, wet. The wet version uses thinner ramen noodles.

With pork and egg added. The Tokyo also has some sesame in it, but as far as I can tell no Szechuan broad beans, five spice, or pickled mustard greens like a real Dan Dan. The broth base is a mix of chicken stock and tonkotsu stock. Presumably the same or similar as a regular Tsujita ramen. It’s mildly spicy with the chili oil, very garlicky, and has a mild sesame taste. It was very tasty, and again much closer to a “spicy ramen” than a real dan dan. But that’s what tan tan is.
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Tokyo style dry. This is a 10/26/17 level 5 with extra egg and pork. Tokyo is a touch nuttier, a touch less mala by default, but certainly not very different. So far, this is my favorite variant (and I’ve tried all the dry versions).
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Mixed up. This is what you actually eat.

Downtown Style Tantamen, dry. The dry variant they claim is closer to the Chinese original, although I’m not sure I agree. This downtown one has cayenne and Szechuan peppercorn. It wasn’t very hot or particularly numbing at level 3. It was very tasty though. Tons of garlic. Ground pork. Definitely a more Japanese blend than a real Chinese one. This version doesn’t have the sesame (or at least not nearly as much). At a level 5 this packs a very potent chili wallop.

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Fully dressed and ready to mix (photo from 10/23/17). This is actually a killer level 4 and you can see the increased Szechuan peppercorn dust on it.

The stirred up (but messy) dry style. Not totally dry obviously as the flavor is in the sauce. They use the same (as far as I can tell) thick Tsukemen noodles for the dry version.

The final flavor is “original style“, here shown “dry” level 3. “Original” here apparently means “novel” not the most “typical” tantanmen.

With the requisite $1.50 egg.

And all mixed up. This is BY FAR the most different of the 3. It’s got a sort of green/black pepper flavor and while it has plenty of heat is much more subtle and much less flavorful. Nice texture with the bean sprouts and tofu too. They give you lemon to add acid. Tasty and interesting, and almost “cooling” between bites of my level 5 “downtown”. But I wouldn’t crave it nearly as much.
 Pork over rice bowl. This is tiny. It’s not a meal but an “extra”. You mix it up, but it has sour cream in there too along with chili sauce and ground pork. Makes for a weird mix.
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Mapo ball. Why it’s called a ball, I have no idea. But the mapo is actually an excellent take on the Chinese classic. Not exactly totally Chinese, but super delicious with some real mala heat.

Overall, I’ll be back (many times) as this was a very tasty spicy ramen. I had the wet version the first time (Tokyo) and the dry version (Downtown) the second and a dry (Tokyo) the third and a dry (Downtown) and dry (Original) the fourth. To break down the styles: Tokyo is my favorite and has far more sesame nut flavor. Downtown is more straight chili, mala, and vinegar. Original has it’s unique bright green/black pepper flavors but is much more subdued flavor-wise and feels far less rich.

The thicker noodles are better and because of that I like the “dry.” But I found out you can order the thick noodles in a wet so I have to try that too.

I think Killer Noodle does an excellent job with Tantanmen — being the derived milder Japanese version of Dan Dan. That’s pretty much all they offer, even if there are a couple versions. It would be a weird place to bring a group because not EVERYONE wants a spicy ramen variant. But when you do, totally worth coming.

The first time I got a 3 heat level and that was relatively mild. The second a 4 and that was a big step up heat wise and had me sweating although it wasn’t tough to eat. I tried a 5 (on two different days) also and that was very hot. Certainly I could eat it, but I was really sweating. I’ve had the 6 twice too and it’s fabulous, but has “consequences.” 4 is probably the sweet spot going forward for most people although occasionally I feel like a 5 or 6. Definitely on my regular rotation for now – I go most weeks!

This isn’t for everyone, but if you like a LOT of flavor and spice, Killer Noodle is fabulous.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Because of the heat we were bad and wet across the street to B-Sweet.

Glazed donut stuffed with taro (Ume) ice cream. Sweet and delicious. Glazed donut bread pudding with cream-cheese sauce and ice cream. Oh yeah, sweet!

Related posts:

  1. Hawaiian Noodle Bar
  2. Noodle Check – Yamadaya Ramen
  3. Hedonists Noodle over Hoy-Ka
  4. Viet Noodle Bar
  5. Lucky Noodle King is the Dan Dan Emperor
By: agavin
Comments (2)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: B-Sweet, Dan Dan Mein, Dessert, Killer Noodle, noodles, spicy, Tantanmen, Tsujita LA

Noodling About – Mian

Sep20

Restaurant: Mian

Location: 301 W Valley Blvd #114, San Gabriel, CA 91776

Date: August 9, 2017 and January 27, 2019 and August 20, 2022

Cuisine: Szechuan Chinese

Rating: Salty but good

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Mian is the Szechuan noodle outpost from the people who run Chengdu Taste, which is one of the SGV’s original Szechuan places and pretty darn good.

It’s located in the minimall with Tasty Dining and Mei Long Village. And this fact led us to eat not one lunch but two, hitting up both Mian and J&J separated by a one hour bargain foot massage — all in the same minimall!

Mian has a superficial level of style — although if the entire build out cost more than $30,000 I’ll eat 5 bowls of noodles. Still, instead of the hideous white drop ceiling there is an ugly black drop ceiling.

Slightly fermented spicy cabbage adorn the table — like Szechuan kimchee.

And they serve sweet mung bean tea.

I’m not sure I’ve had this tea before, and boy is it ugly to look at, but it goes with the food.

The same Mao era canteen mug is home to this delicious egg custard with ground pork (8/17 and 1/27/19 and 8/20/22). One of those delicate fluffy egg custards covered in savory ground pork. Yum! I really enjoy the texture (and taste) of this kind of custard and with the pork was fabulous.
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Zoom in on the custard.
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Beef in chili sauce (1/27/19 and 8/20/22). Quite spicy, dry, and nice.

Sweet and sour pork wontons (earlier and 8/20/22). The sauce was that spicy/tangy Szechuan sauce I like, and the noodles and pork filling excellent, however the whole thing was a touch too salty.

All mixed up for better coverage.

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Szechuan Cold Noodles (1/27/19 and 8/20/22).
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You mix up the above cold noodles and eat. These were superlative. Nice noodle texture, good weight, and this scrumptious tangy chili sauce. Loved them. I adore when the acid balance is right and these really had it down. A bit of nuttiness, but not nearly as nutty or heavy as a dan dan — different, but great.
IMG_5724
Extra side of minced pork to mix into the noodles.

Chengdu Zajiang noodles with fried egg and pork. This is the house specialty, with and without egg, with and without some kind of gut busting Chengdu bean.

Here it is mixed up. The noodles themselves were perfect and the meat was delicious. The overall effect was excellent. I think these are a top version of this particular noodle variety. I’m a little partial to great dan dan mien as that has a more complex nutty flavor, but I certainly wouldn’t kick these out of bed.

Overall, Mian has a very simple menu. There are 4 types of the same wontons, about 6 types fo the Zajiang noodles, and not too much else, so it’s pretty much a great spot for a tasty bowl of Chengdu noodles, not a whole Szechuan meal (you could go to Chengdu Taste or one of the many other great Szechuan places for that). The things they do make, however, are quite good.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Eating Barcelona – Mian
  2. Heavy Noodling at JTYH
  3. White Guys Can Cook Noodles
  4. The Legendary Restaurant
  5. Pockmarked Old Lady Tofu
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Mian, noodles, SGV, Sichuan, Szechuan cuisine

Westwood Chinese – Northern Cafe

Sep02

Restaurant: Northern Cafe

Location: 1064 Gayley Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90024. (310) 208-8830

Date: August 4 & 29, 2016

Cuisine: Northern Chinese

Rating: Small menu (for Chinese), but great to have on the Westside

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My quest for decent Chinese food on the west side of town continues unabated.

Northern Cafe joins Qin as one of Westwood’s two most recent fairly authentic Chinese openings. Here they serve northwestern Chinese type food, sort of quick Beijing favorites.

It’s located right in the heart of Westwood, on Gayley, far from the SGV!

The interior is simple but pretty updated. The clientele was almost all Chinese.

The format is fast casual. You order and pay at the counter and then get a number. They bring the food to the table.

The menu.

Some cold appetizers. Cold beef and cilantro.

Pickled cucumber and chili.

Cold noodles w/ Shredded Chicken. Chicken white meat, sesame peanut sauce, cucumber, chili oil. A bit western-a-fied (chicken?) and pleasant, but pretty mild.

Dan Dan Noodles. Sesame peanut sauce, chili oil, cucumber, peanuts.

The dan dan in a bowl. Lots of sesame flavor, but almost no heat and no meat! This is a far cry from the rich, spicy, umami flavor of the real deal.

Zha Jiang Noodles. Kurubuta pork, black bean sauce, cucumber.

Mixed up. Ok, but not as much flavor as I would have liked.

Vegetable pie. Like a tortilla pie filled with garlic greens!

XLB. Juicy Pork Dumplings. These are good as always. A little thicker dough than Din Tai Fung (which I had the day before!). But the inside was very tasty.

Pork & Celery Dumplings. Classic steamed dumplings. The celery flavor came through loud and clear and I always like this kind of textured dumpling. Pretty good actually.

Lamb dumplings. Not the perfect incarnation of this kind of simple dumplings, but maybe an 8/10, very enjoyable. Strong lamby flavor too.

Pan fried shrimp and egg dumplings. Excellent too, hard to tell what is inside these puppies, but it’s good.

 Spicy wontons. Nice. Again they just tasted pretty good. A medium heat.

Beef rolls. Tasty enough. Not amazing, but certainly a decent version and not too huge.

Kung Pao Chicken. A decent version. Not amazing, and a little fried, and not too hot, but a good amount of flavor.
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Orange Chicken. The American Chinese classic. More like sweet and sour spare ribs, the ultra-fried orange version. That being said, I like this homey dish and this was a very good version of the goopy sweet “type.”

House Special Cumin lamb. Onion, cilantro, cumin, chili oil. Not a bad version of this staple dish. Not super spicy but good lamb flavor.
IMG_5882
Mapo tofu. (10/1/16). This mapo had nice soft silky tofu and a thin looking sauce — but there was a decent amount of mala numbing flavor from the Szechuan peppercorns. No meat however, I much prefer it with some ground pork, but this wasn’t a wussy Americanized version either. Sort of a 6/10.

Shrimp fried rice. A passable version. You can’t really go to wrong with fried rice. This version was actually very lightly fried.

Overall, Northern Cafe has some pretty authentic stuff on the menu, it’s not American Chinese exactly — nor is it as good as so many places in the SGV. But it is close, quick, cheap and pretty tasty, so I will go by again soon enough.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Eating Hoi An – Brothers Cafe
  2. Hip Hot
  3. XLB – Soup Dumplings!
  4. Eating San Francisco – Zuni Cafe
  5. White Guys Can Cook Noodles
By: agavin
Comments (2)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Chinese cuisine, Dan Dan Mein, dumplings, noodles, Northern Cafe, Westwood, XLB

Quick Eats – Qin

Jun17

Restaurant: Qin West Chinese Cuisine

Location: 1767 Westwood Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90024. (310) 478-8829

Date: June 5, 2016

Cuisine: Western Chinese

Rating: Certainly good for Westside

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This regional Western Chinese place has cropped up in Westwood and I figured I’d try it, even though most places west of the SGV aren’t really worth it.

It’s in a little alcove on Westwood Blvd right next door to he old Sunnin and down the street from the early Flektor office I had in 2006.

The small menu of mostly noodle based Western Chinese dishes.

Steamed dumplings. Perfectly yummy steamed pork potstickers.

Guilin Soup. Spicy rice noodle soup with beef pickled Chinese cabbage,vegetable and peanuts. It wasn’t super spicy even though I got max spice, but it was tasty and interesting. Sort of like a spicy Pho with lots of Chinese pickled vegetables.

For super fast Chinese this was pretty “authentic” and interesting, and certainly very authentic for Westwood. Everyone in there was Chinese — always a good sign. I have to come back and try more, particularly the soup with beef bone and snail broth!

For more LA Chinese dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Quick Eats: Tofu Ya
  2. Quick Eats – Da Jeong
  3. Quick Eats: Chan Dara
  4. Quick Eats: Sunnin
  5. Quick Eats – Pho 2000
By: agavin
Comments (1)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: noodles, Qin, Qin West Chinese Cuisine, West Chinese Cuisine, Westwood

White Guys Can Cook Noodles

Jan13

Since I’m a noodle fiend, and Dan Dan Mein is one of my all time favorites, and a lot of my home cooking focuses on pasta (and pizza and gelato) I got it in my head to try making this amazing noodle dish at home — super authentically of course.

So I hunted around for recipes and came across this hard core one to use as my base.

For those of you that don’t know, Dan Dan Mein is the sort of “OG Sesame noodles.” But it’s so much more than the watered down version we get in the states. Ever wonder why sesame noodles are sometimes spicy? It’s because they derive from this dish, which in its true form is always hot. But it’s more than hot. Good dan dan is very complex incredibly aromatic, nutty, spicy, numbing, meaty, and a hefty bowl of chow.
IMG_4620
Then before meeting my pal Sebastian out in the SGV for some Szechuan I stopped by the 168 Market and spent about an hour hunting down all the ingredients. I went so far as to make sure even normal items like garlic and peanuts were grown in China! Subtle things like the differences in vegetable breed can influence the flavor of a dish.
 We start off making chili oil from scratch. This particular incredibly Szechuan oil is flavored with Szechuan peppercorn, star anise, cinnamon, and “regular” chilis.

Here are the Szechuan Peppercorns, which I learned were also known as Prickly Ash or sometimes Red Ash. They smell amazing (and strong) and have a citrus note and a numbing quality on the tongue.
 Dried star anise, which smells like licorice. Oh, and the cinnamon.

Then the chili flakes, and peanut oil.

First try. Let it get too hot. Don’t do this (notice the brown color).

Next try went much better. You basically cook the peppercorns, anise, and cinnamon in the oil slowly to 325.
 Then strain out that stuff and dump the regular chilis in and let it sit until it becomes super red and potent.

 Next up we brown the meat for the dish. I actually made the noodles twice the first week, once with turkey (above) and another time with lamb (below).
 The sauce for cooking the meat involves a mix of shaoxing wine.

The incredibly yummy (and salty) Szechuan sweet bean paste.

And some dark soy sauce (plus a little five spice powder)..

Then in with the browning meat you add sui mi ya cai. This mystery ingredient, which apparently is some kind of preserved mustard green, took me about 30 minutes to possibly locate in the market. None of the employees knew what it was. This “spicy preserved vegetable” was the closest thing I could find. Perhaps it’s the right stuff. Perhaps it’s a variant. It’s certainly preserved and certainly mustard green.

Here they are cooked together with the sauce, then set aside until the noodles are ready. As my friend Bryan, who tried my second batch, commented, the preserved vegetable makes it much more Chinese.

Next up we work on the noodle sauce which is more soy sauce and sesame paste.

Pretty!

And the five spice powder.

And the aforementioned Chinese garlic.

Mixed together.

Some more Szechuan peppercorns needed to be crushed to go straight into this part, so I used my killer mortar and pestle.

You blend it up.

Then incredibly dump a huge amount of that red chili oil in.

And keep stirring.

Meanwhile, some peanuts (also from China).

Chopped.

Then the noodles. The recipe called for Lanzhou noodles, which are flat and white. These turned out to be about the same as most of the restaurant dan dans.

They cook fast.

Then you put the sauce in the bottle of the bowl, dump in some noodles.

Layer on the meat mix, peanuts, and some chopped scallions.

It looks great above, but you need to mix it up.
 Here is the fully mixed version you eat. It might not be a looker, but the dish is incredible and I was very pleased how it turned out. Just like restaurant dan dan, all the good stuff is at the bottom, the rich sauce, the meat chunks etc. The lamb version really kicked ass too (most dan dan uses pork). I also used more meat then most restaurants do and tried to keep the sauce under control so it didn’t get too soupy.

Related posts:

  1. Night of the Whirling Noodles
  2. Tsujita LA – Artisan Noodles
  3. Hedonists Cook the Goose
  4. Chengdu Taste – Power of the Peppercorn
  5. Yojie – Deep Boiled Noodles!
By: agavin
Comments (4)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: Chinese cuisine, Cooking, Dan Dan Mein, noodles, san Gabriel valley, SGV, Sichuan, Szechuan cuisine

Far Eastern Ramen

Sep18

Restaurant: Silver Lake Ramen

Location: 2927 Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90026. (323) 660-8100

Date: July 31, 2015 & September 13, 2016

Cuisine: Japanese Ramen

Rating: As good a Tonkotsu ramen as I’ve had

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My friend Sebastian really wanted me to try Silver Lake Ramen, which is a well liked member of the new cadre of Tonkotsu (Hakata) places in LA.

The storefront is REALLY not much.

On busy Sunset Blvd, not far from Thai Town.

IMG_5698
The menu consists of a few ramen, the toppings, and some nice greasy appetizers.

What would ramen be without Japanese beer? It is, after all, a drinking food.
IMG_5699
Yuzuaide. A delicious slushy of yuzu juice (lots of) sugar and mint.

Sunomono. Cucumber crab salad. This one was fine, but not nearly marinated enough for my taste. I like the sweet tangy typical Sunomono marinade.

Fried chicken. Hot and delicious.

And they really mean fried.

Spicy tuna toast. I never saw THIS in Japan. Tasty enough, but so California.

Gyoza. Some of the best fried gyoza I’ve had in LA.

Vegetarian ramen. Extra veggies. I would never order this, it’s against my creed, and it looks more like a salad than a ramen. But it floats some people’s boat. The broth was good for vegetarian, very miso.

Tonkotsu ramen. Now this is the real deal. A big slab of pork belly, soft, although not quite as good as Tsujita’s. I added bamboo shoots and left out the bean sprouts. The noodles were nice and the broth was fabulously smooth. I cut the grease with a hefty dose of vinegary gyoza-sauce (I like it that way) and stirred in the chili paste. Really a delectable broth.
IMG_5701
Shoyu ramen. Chicken broth with special soy sauce and green onion, bamboo shoots, spinach, dried seaweed.
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Tsukemen dipping noodle. Thick pork and fish broth with green onion, spinach, bean sprouts, seaweed, egg and pork belly. Now Tsujita is the benchmark Tsukemen. This was good, but a bit different. It was rich, but not quite as rich, with a stronger seafood flavor that was quite nice. The noodles weren’t quite as eggy/good. The pork more pork belly/bacon. Still a very good ramen.
Silver Lake Ramen was as good a Tonkotsu as I’ve had in LA, and all the apps were really tasty. But it’s far far east for me and there are lots of great Westside ramens like Tsujita, Tatsu, Jinya. So if you live or travel out east, by all means get your noodles on.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

Related posts:

  1. Jinya Ramen Bar
  2. Tatsu – Ramen with a Soul
  3. Ramen is all the Rage
  4. Shin Sen Gumi – Ramen Revolution
  5. Tsujita LA – Artisan Noodles
By: agavin
Comments (3)
Posted in: Food
Tagged as: fried chicken, Japanese cuisine, noodles, ramen, Silver Lake Ramen, Tonkotsu
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